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Is Playmobile Worth It?


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We are getting our Dd some pretty significant gifts this year and I'm coming up with blanks for our 4 year old son. I've starting thinking about Playmobile. Do you think they are worth the price? We're thinking about a medium sized Pirate or Knight set, $75-100 total. If you have these, what kind of storage do you use?

 

Thanks!

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Absolutely worth it!!!!!

My kids got hundreds of wonderful play hours out of their Playmobil. We started with pirates and pony barn , added castle and knights, animals, Egyptians, Romans....

These are the only toys my kids ever played with, complicated creative role play - from age 4 to 12.

DS got the pirate ship when he was four.

 

We store the parts in plastic bins, sorted by theme. Sewing/craft boxes with small compartments are perfect for storing small items like swords and accessories.

 

ETA: Playmobil is very well made and extremely durable. Over all these years and with hundreds of parts, we had two pieces break.

It is also great for getting add-ons; the whole family can give playmobil in any price range, starting from a few $.

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Yes, it’s worth it for the most part. We have way too much Playmobil thanks to generous grandparents. My guys mostly play with the people and the weapons. We have been given several very large sets and our experience with those is somewhat mixed. We got the Roman coliseum one and it was crazy big, we had nowhere to leave it out and it’s too difficult to take apart and put back together. They love all the guys and weapons and chariot from it but we got rid of the actual building soon after getting it. They also both have castles. One of those is also way too big and it comes apart too easily so is kind of a waste in my mind. They will still take out the various walls and set up “scenes†but it’s not kept all together. One of the castles is more compact and has stayed together for 5+ years through several moves and played with often. They also have several boats which they love. One has a big pirate boat and one has a Roman boat and those get played with a lot.

 

We keep it all in their room now. The castles and boats stay set up, the guys and other accessories are in Rubbermaid bins. I would really like to get it out of their room as they also have too many Legos in there also and I think their 3 year old sister is ready to play with it. But they both (ages 6 and 9) are very reluctant to let me move it.

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My kids love them. We got into Playmobil accidently. Tigger found the fold up castle, some knights, and a bunch of accessories at a yard sale for $3. He used his own money to buy it. Tigger and Little Guy spent 5 hours straight playing (quietly, no less!) with it when we got home. They spent another 10-15 hours playing in the next week and I decided I had to buy more.

 

I bought a pirate ship and a bunch of people and accessories off eBay. The ship was missing a few pieces and everything else were mixed lots from more than on person. I think it all came to $75-80, when they would've been hundreds new. So if you are unsure if Playmobil will be a hit, try buying used mixed lots off eBay.

 

Used sets that are complete sell for a lot more. I found much better deals buying lots with knights, pirates, and Victorian people mixed together. The kids have fun dressing up the knights with Roman shields and rifles.

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Our sets have received use on and off over the years. It's stored all together in one large see-through plastic storage bin. We don't attempt to store by theme. As a previous poster mentioned, they're extremely durable and long-lasting—the foundation of our collection is the Playmobil my brother and I played with as kids. My mother passed it along to us, and we've added on to it gradually.

 

There are some fun smaller pirate sets as well. My son really likes the cannon that you can shoot.

 

Erica in OR

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Yes, it’s worth it for the most part. We have way too much Playmobil thanks to generous grandparents. My guys mostly play with the people and the weapons. We have been given several very large sets and our experience with those is somewhat mixed. We got the Roman coliseum one and it was crazy big, we had nowhere to leave it out and it’s too difficult to take apart and put back together. They love all the guys and weapons and chariot from it but we got rid of the actual building soon after getting it. They also both have castles. One of those is also way too big and it comes apart too easily so is kind of a waste in my mind.

 

 

Playmobil has been very well worth it here. Years and years of play. That said, I'll agree with the above - I have never bothered to get a big building for any set. We have tons of people, animals, accessories, furniture, and vehicles for a whole bunch of sets (Hosptial, Rescue, City, Farm, Vet, Magical Kingdom and Egypt among them), but the buildings are expensive, take up a lot of space we don't have, and imho limit creativity. My kids made buildings and sets for them out of blocks and shelves and all sorts of things. They could imagine all kinds of roles and scenarios and mixed the sets to make, say, the Hospital ward at Hogwarts.

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Playmobil was well worth it at our home. They were played with for years and years. As someone mentioned, the people and weapons were more played with than the elaborate sets. However, the castles sets got lots of use, but never got put together exactly like they were supposed to be after the first time--but that's okay.

 

I wish the Egyptian and Roman stuff had been out when my kids were young.

 

I miss the Playmobil days! <sniff, sniff>

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I think they are on and off depending on the set. My son mostly just likes the animals. He has a Trex from playmobile he has played with quite a lot, he got it probably two years ago. I got him a pack of two alligators with babies and he loves those. I bought him a rather expensive set that came with snakes and lizards and he really just plays with the snakes and lizards. So if I had to do it over I would do one set and then supplement it with "cool" stuff but not get multiple sets so much.

 

For instance, a T-Rex is on the playmobile website for 7.99, a pack of baby dinosaurs is 10.99 and then maybe I would get some of the zoo stuff.

 

So I would do that with the sets you are interested in. Like maybe a ship...and that seamonster :lol: or that dragon knight castle set looks pretty cool and then I would also get the dragon on the website.

 

I wouldn't get multiple sets, multiple big pieces, or a really huge set, that becomes too unwieldy, particularly for a younger child. I would get one, reasonably sized item and a couple little things.

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Yes, yes, yes!

 

Signed,

A pirate and Victorian house Mom

 

We have told our kids we will never get rid of their Playmobil----the sets will live here for the grandchildren to play with.

 

 

Told my kids the same thing. My soon to be 127 yr old wants more playmobile for Christmas this year! He loves it still. I find him setting it up and planning battles to this day.

 

Have you seen the playmobile advent claendars? They are only about 20 and are wonderful. My kids have enjoyed getting them each year for the past 12 years. They especially love the animals. I agree the people and animals get the most play at our house. I went though the bin of people and animals last week sorting them into bags to store....my DD came in behind me and started setting up a scene. Still going strong in our house!

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I bought DS5 a zoo set for Easter and it has been played with once. It took two hours to set it up. He can't set it up by himself, and I'm not about to do it again. The big kids get frustrated and bored trying to get it set up too. Plus I think we've probably lost too many of the connectors to get it put back together anyway. So, it sits unused.

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My son loved most of his playmobil toys, though the big castle wasn't a hit so much as all of the little pieces and accessories were. Mostly, my son preferred to use plain wood blocks and Kapla/Keva/Citibloc blocks to create "scenes" and then use the people, vehicles (he loved the construction/heavy equipment vehicles!), and accessories among those; I am sure the castle was never properly assembled and, if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't have bought it - the smaller sets, but plenty of them, are enough.

 

We have our playmobil stored in a large clear plastic container - these, along with Legos and Thomas the Train, are probably among the few toys I'll save for grandchildren.

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well - is lego worth it? (I have adult children who will occassionally still play with lego. I have about 10 gallons of lego.)

 

my son loves his noah's ark. I bought a bunch of stuff off e-bay just to get more animals for his ark - he wanted the other pieces too. He's currently in the bathtub with his ark. he's seven.

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People.... Buy lots of people. And maybe a ship or two. And some fencing and horses.

 

I love the Noah's ark set too.

 

My kids got into them after playing with mine from childhood. I get overwhelmed with toys so we only have 2 kinds in our house: Legos and playmobile.

 

My entire Christmas plan for my 4 kids ages 4-10 (boys and girls) is $50-$75 worth of people and horses.

 

Their website will probably run a sale on Black Friday. Often their website has better prices than the stores. Stores tend to mark them up and then run a sale that is still more expensive than the website. I always compare with the website.

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Definitely worth it for us. I just placed another Playmobil order today. Like PPs suggested, I would stay away from the big sets - houses, castles, zoos, etc. We have a few bigger pieces, and they don't get played with, but the smaller sets, people, and accessories see daily action. My 6yo & 4yo spend hours every day playing with the African wild animals. My 10yo likes the dollhouse accessories, and my 8yo likes the knights stuff. My 2yo likes the motorcycles and other vehicles.

 

Our playmobil is all stored together in a big bin. The kids mix and match everything, so the sets wouldn't stay separate anyway. I'm sitting next to a scene right out of Africa except the animals are using dollhouse furniture. :D

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I just brought home a suitcase (literally a suitcase) full of old Playmobil and Legos... mostly, though, it was Playmobil. These sets are 25-30 years old, and will be given to our boys at Christmas and over the next two birthdays. Very durable, and classic. I'm STILL trying to persuade my friend whose boys are middle-school aged to sell me her pirate ship to go with my old pirates.

 

My plan is to stick to basic "city" sets for Lego, and Playmobil for knights, pirates, farm, etc. That way at least there's not a huge overlap.

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Playmobil is a HUGE hit in this house. We began buying it when our eldest was 4, and now the two of them play with it nearly daily. We have the castle, police station, and some pirate items. They mix and match all the pieces constantly and it's not uncommon to see the knights battling the modern day police force. It is worth every penny we have spent.

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My kids hav. Atloved Playmobil. We started with smaller sets, animals and people sets. Toys R Us has sales. Also if you have a Tuesday Morning store they sometimes have them. Online you can find lots of places with clearance sets like here ...http://www.happyhentoys.com/playmobil.html

 

It helps to match the sets and pieces to what your children like e.g. pioneers, animals, dinosaurs, knights, etc.

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My youngest had fun with Playmobil. We didn't have a lot of sets because I couldn't stand them! Seriously, loathe isn't strong enough. He took them all apart in itty bitty pieces. He lost pieces and cried and cried over them. And he isn't the type of kid to A) lose things and B) cry. We are selling them on ebay now. Apparently, they are very popular because they already have bids and I just put 'em up a couple hours ago. That never happens! I always have watchers who wait until the last minute.

 

My youngest, starting about 4, loved Imaginext. He still loves them and plays with them all. the. time. We have a couple castles, the pirate line, some samurai stuff, and the safari stuff. We did sell the most of the dinosaur stuff last year. He is almost 10 and is still into them. For us, it was a far better investment. And I'll probably keep most of them for my grandma box. (Hoping I get to be a grandma someday....a long time from now.....)

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Absolutely 100% worth it.

 

Yesterday I saw an awesome set at Costco, farm/forest type theme, $94.99. My kids are teen and almost teen now and I sure wished I had a younger kid to buy it for! But we already have enough Playmobil to open a toy store and I have to admit it doesn't get played with very often now. When my kids were younger, they'd spend hours with it most days.

 

Storage:

A three drawer rolling cart, several shoeboxes, a large shelf in a cupboard (maybe 15"x15"x15"), and some sets are disassembled and stored in their boxes. I can't get my kids to part with even one bit of it. It will belong to my grandkids someday.

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I think it is worth it because my dd spends so much time playing very imaginatively with it. They also drive me crazy because the hair and other pieces pops off easily and is difficult to put back on. Apparently my kids are pretty rough on stuff because I have definitely have playmobil stuff break. My son who plays with things very roughly.

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My two really like it and play with it off and on. They have the pyramid and the stone age set. They love the pyramid and that is currently out. My 4 yr old has grown into it a lot more recently and happily spends hours playing with it. I bought the egyptian set second hand it was about three different sets, the pyramid, sphinx and a house thing with lots of people and camels. The stone age gets playe with a bit less but they do like it.

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Good golly yes! Indy played with his from abut 6-9 and we're saving them all for Han Solo and then they will be kept with us for grandchildren. Those things are durable! We have:

 

Egyptian Pyramid,

Egyptian Ship

Egyptian Temple

Egyptian Sphinx

Egyptain Hideout

Camels and Chariots and Egyptians galore

Roman Colliseum (that sucker is HUGE)

Roman Ship

Chariots and Romas galore

Viking Fort

Viking Longboat

Vikings galore

Pirate Ship

Pirate Island

Pirates and horses galore!

More weapons that you can possibly imagine!

 

Indy used to set up very elaborate battles between the Romans and Egyptians and Gladiator battles in the colliseum. It was so awesome. He would play for hours and hours. I think the key is to get sets that match up with their interests.

I love them, not only for their durability, but for the attention to detail. The pyramid came with canopic jars and the temple came with a set of scales and a feather for the weighing of the heart. That is cool!

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I think it depends of the child(ren). I agree that buying a smaller set this year to find out is a smart way to go.

 

My guys mostly played with the people. Long after castes, ships, etc had vanished, the figures will still in use. They had one (or a series of one) guys called "Swordy" that I heard stories about for years.

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My advice is to always play with these things on a sheet. Then,when it is time for cleanup, you just gather the corners of the sheet and hey-presto, you're tidied up.

 

All of these toys were money well spent, especially Thomas and Playmobil. LEGO has too many interations.

 

Thank you PJ for the advice about the sheet. My dc just began playing with the playmobile sets that we have and all the tiny little pieces have been driving me bonkers!

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Ds will get a few sets for Christmas, and I am so excited to introduce them to my kids. Have read nothing but good things about them, mostly on this board.

 

I spent many hours researching/picking out which sets the other day on TRU website. Finally went to order and they were out of the free promotional item, and also would not take off the advertised 20% off all toys either. Called the customer service number and received terrible customer service (was hung up on once, disconnected several times). Anyway, just a little heads up.

 

I had a Kohl's 30% off coupon and free shipping sale, so I ended up ordering from there. Not as big of a selection, but much better customer service. As of a few days ago, TRU was still advertising the free set, despite being out of them.

 

ETA: I took the suggestion from here that kids particularly love the people, so ordered a few sets of extra people on ebay....they were very cheap!

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Absolutely worth it!

 

We used to store it in bins, sorted by set, but now it all lives in DS's trundle drawer, under his bed. We've also used Ikea Trofast for storage, but for now the underbed trundle is working.

 

The only piece that hasn't seen a lot of play is the Roman Coliseum. Egyptians are the hands down favorite here.

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I think it really depends on the child. Some kids love it, and some kids just don't seem drawn to it.

 

Having said that, Playmobil has been the most loved, enduring toy in our home.

Our large play room is actually built around the Playmobil, lol. We have way too much to list, and they've loved it all.

 

My teens do a lot of their stop-motion films with it now, and their younger siblings are walking around with the Playmobil catalog quite a bit. They want their own. :)

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I'd see how he likes them before investing much money. I collected tons of Playmobil for my kids starting before they were even born. As soon as they were old enough to talk about it, they let me know they didn't like them. :confused1: I sold off all of our Playmobil and invested the money in Calico Critters, which is what they preferred. Seven or so years later, Calico Critters are still played with daily. Most kids love Playmobil, but there are those who don't.

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We are getting our Dd some pretty significant gifts this year and I'm coming up with blanks for our 4 year old son. I've starting thinking about Playmobile. Do you think they are worth the price? We're thinking about a medium sized Pirate or Knight set, $75-100 total. If you have these, what kind of storage do you use?

 

Thanks!

 

 

It is by far the most played with toy in our home. My boys don't care for Lego, but they love Playmobil. When we put all other toys away, we keep out the Playmobil. It also holds up well (and that is saying something with my three boys!). I'll be saving our collection for the grandkids. :)

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Between Thomas the Tank, Playmobil and LEGO, my kid never needed anything else, ages 1-17. Oh, and baseball cards.

 

As for storing, we don't sort. We have a Playmobil bin and that's that. Now that my son is 17, I want to hire a couple of girls age 10 to come over and put the hair and mustaches and swords back onto the bodies so it is a reasonable thing to play with.

 

My advice is to always play with these things on a sheet. Then,when it is time for cleanup, you just gather the corners of the sheet and hey-presto, you're tidied up.

 

All of these toys were money well spent, especially Thomas and Playmobil. LEGO has too many interations.

 

 

My boys didn't go for Legos for some reason, but our wooden train collection and Playmobil are our best investments. I'd add in a costume bin to our top 3. :) We don't sort our Playmobil, either. It is all in one huge bin.

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Absolutely worth it!

 

My dd got her Fantasy Castle with all the extras when she was 18 months old and played with it for years. I think it has only been the last year or so that she hasn't played with it as much. I enjoyed playing it with her when she was little.

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I would really let him go look at the Playmobil aisle at a Toys R Us. Not because I don't think he will like them, but because there is so much to choose from and he will probably like some things better than others. My 13 year old was hugely into dinosaurs and dragons - we have a ton of Imaginext (similar to Playmobil, but the figures are different) castle items and a treehouse, dinosaurs. I saved them for my younger son and..yeah, he's not into them. HE wants police people, construction workers, vehicles. LOL The beautiful castle and treehouse are largely unused. I even got rid of the dinosaurs because they were so big and it was a waste of space to store everything :(

 

So, I'm just of the mind that they should pick their own because you may be suprised at what he does or doesn't like from the line.

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Totally worth it!

 

My dss are now 12 and 13. They have many, many sets and played lots with them over the years. When they were younger we just left whatever they wanted on the train table and stored the rest right under the table.

 

Here is the funny thing. I did not want to get rid of the Playmobil. Somehow I thought I'll keep it for the grandkids (I know it'll be a while). Turns out that now the boys ise the large parts of the set to play Warhammer. Who knew? Playmobil just keeps on living.

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I think kids either love it or couldn't be bothered. I have six kids and none of them were ever interested. I have firends whose kids live for the stuff. I would buy a mid-size box in a favorite theme and see if your kiddos are excited. I went all out one year only to find my kids ignored it. Kids....Go figure.....

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