Crazy Forts

We have a great time with this with our 5 and 2 year olds. The balls have to have the words "crazy forts" on top when ever being used - as the instructions state, and then you are good to go - all angles should work. It is a great hands on, family activity. Our girls help direct how to build the forts, castles, igloos, etc. They get to use their imagination too, which is always worth encouraging.

Falls apart as it's being put together and then continues to fall apart. I had to help my eight year old and even then I couldn't get it to stay together.

This toy is a great idea conceptually, kids love building stuff. And like to play in forts!

However once you erect a crazy fort and your kids actually try to play in it, the fort will fall down with little provocation. Then come the tears when after putting the thing up for the tenth time in a row you have to finally say, sorry kids let's do something else.

I agree with a previous review that said your kids needed to be at least 8 have a go at Crazy Forts on there own. But even then the thing will still not stay up!

Should be called "Crazy Pile of Sticks and Balls"

We got a set of these for our 2 and 3 year old for Christmas and it was an instant hit. Yes, you should read & follow the instructions for best results. Our kids love being able to help with the construction & then having their own little hideout to read or play in.

I initially purchased this for a family get together where there would be kids in a bunch of age brackets

The Good:
Clever idea - it's keeping the kids and the men entertained & promoted great interaction between adults and the kids.
It kept all of the kids busy - each age found something of interest - the older (7-9 year olds) had fun designing and building while the younger folk enjoyed the end product
Doesn't take up too much space when deconstructed.

The Bad:
While you can make some good forts with one kit, I've been advised that we need another to reach the category of "awesome"
Young children (I would say under 4) are going to have challenges with constructing the forts as the balls need to be placed in a particular position and the fine motor skills required frustrated the toddlers who were trying to help
I was surprised at how easily the fort came apart and we had a couple broken sticks after day one.

All in all this is a fun toy - I think the price point is a little high seeing what you get and it would be helpful for the kids if it was easier to tell which way was down for the connector balls. Since my children are toddlers we've put this one on the shelf for a little while - the age recommendation on this one is worth heeding

Wow - I almost gave up on this one. This is big on concept but poor on execution. I spent the first hour helping put a structure together - guess what?, the balls have a right way up and have to be in the right direction for the 45' angles to work. After we had built a great house, I spent the next hour fixing it because it the rods fall out of the balls at the slightest movement. Aaaagghhhh!
Don't recommend it to anyone for the hefty price.

The idea behind this toy is great, but that doesn't change the fact that it's not safe. FYI, I was playing WITH my kids when it happened, that's how I know WHAT happened. I actually let her try to play with HER toy. Nice name-calling, BTW. Was that for my benefit or my kids'? Very mature! Why don't you read the rest of the comment next time, before commenting? My point was that this accident could easily have happened to a kid of any age or even to an adult. So, if ever your Crazy Forts comes tumbling down on your head (as many others have stated), make sure not to look UP! And next time your child has an accident right before your eyes, be sure there is no one around to call you out for bad parenting. My comment was to HELP people. It's called humility.

Bought it for my kids last year and they asked for more this year.
Check out the facebook page they have on their website. Awesome structures using multiple kits. The imagination coming to life is wonderful to see and experience. That is if you like to be with your kids when they play. Without supervision, a 2yr old can get into all kinds of trouble, and that fact has nothing to do with this great toy.

I am totally disgusted with this toy. I bought this for my 5-year-old. She could not construct the fort on her own because the sticks are so difficult to place securely inside the purple balls. To take it apart is even more straining. One of the sticks split in 2 in my daughter's hand as she was trying to remove it from a ball. That same day, my 2-year-old son poked his eye with the end of one the sticks. We spent New Year's Day in the ER. He was diagnosed with a ripped cornea. He could have lost his eye with less luck. The same accident could easily happen with a five or eight year old kid. This toy is UNSAFE!

Sure wish I had read these reviews before getting sucked into all the hype about this product on the Chapter's.Indigo email newsletter! Adding insult to injury, I was charged $8.99 for shipment of a 4 lb package advertised as "Free Shipping"! I hesitated but decided it sounded like a good product.
I gave it to my granddaughters for Christmas. The 7 year old worked on trying to construct a fort for hours, and even with the help of her parents, her initial excitement and enthusiasm turned to frustration and tears as nothing would stay together. Unfortunately my daughter tossed the box otherwise I would gladly pay to ship the product back just to get the junk out of her house. Shame on Crazy Forts for doing such a poor job and shame on Chapters.Indigo for putting the product forward in their newsletter.

Bought it for the holidays and my girl just loves it. You have to be careful how you put it together -- the instructions say the ball pieces all have to face the same way or you're snookered, and they're right! Once we figured that out, we've been able to follow the blueprints for the castle and the igloo on their website to build forts for my daughter. I would recommend this toy to anyone!

We gave ours away to a local charity because it was a dust collector. There aren't enough pieces to make anything sizeable and it kept collapsing. We build better forts using our furniture and a sheet.

My 2.5 and 5.5 year olds love this toy, and have been playing in it since Christmas. As others have noted, it is not as sturdy as I would have thought--however, I'm wondering if the connectors are meant to fall apart rather than break if they are leaned on. It also would be nice if there were more pieces, but my guys have been happy with what we build so far.

We got it on sale (which helped), so I'm not as annoyed as other posters. I will buy another kit to augment what we have when the boys want more.

There were lots of presents under the tree for our 5 & 7 year old, but this is the one they have played with every day since Christmas. They love it, and they need to think creatively and work together to play with it. It does have limitations, and sometimes what they build falls down, but then they build something new! Excellent. (They've even decided to buy the lights with some of their Christmas money!)

I have given this item to five different children in two families, ranging in age from 7 to 14, and have had enormously positive feedback from all. In the case of each family (one with two kids; the other with three), the Crazy Forts kits were the first gifts to be out of the box and in use on Christmas morning.

This gift is endlessly creative and can be used over and over. Clearly, the more kits available, the greater the building scope there is, so this may become a repeat "add-on" gift if the enthusiasm remains high - as I expect it will. While the packaging suggests an age range of 4 - 8 years, I think it would be more accurate to indicate "4 and up", as even adults enjoy joining in with the kids in creating the forts, making this an accessible and fun activity for all members of a family. I see the creativity, flexibility, physical activity, educational potential and family nature of this toy as a positively winning combination!

Crazy Forts offers lights designed for use in the forts. These come two to a package and are a cool accessory that the kids love. One of the families uses clothes pins to hold blankets in place. Depending on the age of the child using the clothes pins, I think perhaps "Twisty Pegs" from Lee Valley might be an ideal safe and easy alternative (i.e. no finger pinching).

I didn't find it that bad to put together!!! Sure I had to change a few pieces to get it right, but I didn't think it was going to be a 5 minute put together either. And it is still standing with my 5 and 2 year old playing inside of it. I put it together and my son and daughter passed me the pieces, they were still involved in the process, they tried to do a few pieces on their own and when they couldn't get them to stay they were quite happy to assist!!! SO WHAT I AM SAYING IS I DID NOT FIND IT AS BAD AS EVERYONE IS SAYING!!! My kids love it, which is the point as far as I am concerned!!!

We've had crazy fort for a year. It's been a hit, even tho all the complaints on this board ARE true. This is how we managed it.
#1: We didn't have the kids open it and try to assemble it on Xmas morn. We assembled it the night b4 when they were in bed. We did it nice and TIGHT (a must) with the balls' FLAT SPOTS DOWN. It was all set up with a sheet for when they came in Xmas morning. Since we'd done it ourselves, it was pretty sturdy, and great fun on Xmas morn.. Don't use a blanket: use sheets. Snap together pieces would indeed help things, but are not necessary.

Balls' flat spots have to be DOWN. And sticks must be pushed in HARD. Yes this is stupid, but if you have the Fort already, it WILL work if you do this. In fact, here's a plus that no one I have seen has mentioned:

I MUST BUILD THIS *WITH* MY 4 YEAR OLD. IT IS A BONDING THING FOR US. I CAN'T JUST SEND HER OFF TO DO IT ON HER OWN, WHICH MEANS IT GIVES US SOME QUALITY TIME. SHE ALSO MUST BE VERY PATIENT SITTING WITH ME AND ASSISTING ME TO CHECK THE BALLS' POSTIION. SOME KIDS CAN'T HANDLE THIS TYPE OF QUIET PLAY, BUT IN TODAY'S CRAZY I-POD WORLD IT IS NICE TO HAVE THEM DO AN ACTIVITY THAT TAKES A MOMENT AND IS INTERACTIVE WITH MOM AND DAD.

For these reasons I do recommend this toy. However, it is something from an earlier era....something that takes technique and patience. This isn't what some people are looking for in kids' Xmas presents, and Crazy Fort was probably silly to make it look too easy in their commercials.

RECOMMENDATION FOR THOSE WHO OWN ONE:

PUT KIDS TO BED. SET UP AWESOME STRONG CRAZY FORT WITH YOUR AWESOME STRONG ADULT ARMS. HAVE THEM WAKE UP IN THE A.M. TO A TOY THAT WILL KEEP THEM FIGHTING AND PLAYING ALL MORNING. :LOL:

I saw this product advertised everywhere, with generally positive reviews and "user tests". It is awful. As a 38 year old, I can barely get the sticks into the balls. There's no way my 5 year old can. As soon as you start assembling, the earlier pieces detach. Someone in a review below wrote that you need to be a structural engineer to get it to make a skeleton. They're not kidding; the holes in the ball are set up so that if each ball isn't used in the exact same way (flat spot on the bottom), the angles won't line up properly. The sheets cause it to collapse and there aren't enough pieces in the kit to make anything but the most basic of shapes.

I plan to blog about this and see if Crazy Forts has any kind of response.

Wish I could return this poorly designed toy, unfortunately "Santa" brought it for my 4 yr. old. My son likes the idea of this toy and was excited to use it...after putting it together a few of the designs from the website we found it held a sheet but if you moved inside of the structure it came apart. I guess its just for show. The sticks should definately "click" into the balls. The people giving positive reviews I would assume are the manufacturers trying to defend their wretched product. This toy sucks! I wont even donate it due to the fact I dont wont any other kids to be disappointed. Its sad when your child says the toy from "santa" isnt very much fun :( SAD,SAD,SAD.

nope, don't do it...like others have said, too expensive for what you get. You'd need at least 3 boxes to make anything substantial. And they FALL apart...they need to snap in place, that's for sure...