Hi everyone,
My daughter and I went to the toy store today and came home with 4231 - Circus Band. This is the first circus-themed Playmobil that we have purchased and I had not expected to like it because it makes noise (a quality that I normally detest in toys) and because it doesn't "fit" with the other themes that we have.
That said, this set is great! It cost $19.99 and along with the noise-making base it came with two clowns, a monkey, a drum set with cymbal, an accordion, a tambourine, a saxiphone, a trumpet, and a chair.
The base is big enough to easily set the drum set and a clown on and has four buttons that make noise. Now here is the really surprising part - the sounds aren't completely annoying as I had expected. The first button plays the "Entrance of the Gladiators," the second plays several seconds of what I think is "Barnum and Bailey's Favorite," the third is a full 10 seconds of drumroll and the last is canned applause worthy of any respectable gameshow. The sound quality is better than what I would expect from a plastic toy and the music sounds like the music accompanying a carousel ride and not the expected synthetic I-got-my-Atari2600-to play-music noise that usually accompanies these sorts of toys. (I had also expected this component to be made in China, but the box says Germany.)
I feel like this set is the perfect marketing tool for the rest of the circus theme because the drumroll sound effect alone makes me want to rush back to the toystore to buy the circus elephants act and the tightrope walkers so that I'll have someone to play a drumroll for.
The instruments are great and can be used with other things - especially the drumb set. I can see it eventually ending up in a teenaged boy's bedroom in my Playmomansion.
I have never owned a monkey before and so this may be normal, but this one's head is connected with a ball-joint so that he can look up and down as well as side to side. I have never seen this sort of head-movement capibility before and think it would be great on klickys too.
That's it,
Kelly