Review: Brik Buster Tower Toppling Game, worth £26.99

Review written by Toddle About VIP Club member, Lena Chen. The aim of this game is to built up a tower and then take turns knocking out support columns without making the whole structure collapse. Essentially, it’s like Jenga with Duplo style bricks. Packaging: The game comes neatly and compactly packed in a much smaller box than I expected, which is great for saving space when your toy storage is already overflowing. However, the disadvantage is that you have to painstakingly construct all the columns and stack all the base plates in order to put them away again in the original box; try sweeping them all in higgledy piggledy and there’s no way all the pieces will fit.

Quality: We really loved the brightly coloured and durable bricks, which feel as high quality as any other leading brand. They feel like they should withstand substantial rough-and-tumble play, which is just as well given they are designed to be hit repeatedly with a hammer! Game play: Unfortunately, there’s no way around the fact that building the tower is very tedious. The base plates and columns must be orientated a certain way in order to hold together properly, which wasn’t entirely clear from the instructions. Older children might manage this, but my toddler certainly didn’t have the skills or the patience to construct the tower. She did enormously enjoy bashing it down again with the hammer, although this was short-lived in comparison to the amount of time we had to keep her away whilst trying to rebuild the tower. The concept of taking one column down at a time does work well, as long as you have children old enough to understand it. The pieces do scatter when you knock them down, and retrieving them from under couches is a pain - especially as there are no spares, so losing even one block would affect game play the way it is intended. On the plus side, the pieces are compatible with Duplo and can be used as standard building blocks, which really enhances the scope of creative and imaginative play you can get out of them. Overall: A good quality toy but perhaps more suited to older children, age 5+, who have bags of patience! Purchase from: Amazon