Customer Reviews

Melissa & Doug Deluxe Wooden 48-Piece Jigsaw Puzzle - Pirates

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

My 4 year old son got this puzzle and another M&D puzzle last week for his birthday. The graphics are wonderful, but that's all the good things I can say about them. The pictures are already starting to come off of the pieces, the pieces are really hard to get apart, and there are wood fragments coming off this puzzle like crazy. The ends of the pieces are sharp and it gives me the willies to touch them because of the wood shards that are sticking out of the pieces and board. I would have a cardboard puzzle over these any day.

I purchased this puzzle for my 4 year old daughter 1 year ago. She has put it together many times first with assistance then on her own. My 9 year old also has enjoyed putting it together as fast as she can. My 2 year old likes to help Mommy & sister, and I enjoy working on this puzzle with them. It's a very fun puzzle to put together.
The puzzle is very durable, keeping in mind that dogs may like to chew them (not durable for this use). Each piece has an identifying characteristic to it, which is helpful finding the right place for it. It's a great puzzle! We love Melissa & Doug products!

My son got this puzzle two weeks ago, and he still asks to put it together every day. It's enough of a challenge for him (age 3) but still exciting, especially with the pirates! The colors are very nice and vibrant, and I like that it comes with a wooden "frame" in which to assemble the puzzle.
My only complaint is the quality of construction. When we first opened it, the pieces had to be taken apart. They were so tight-fitting that it was difficult even for me to separate the pieces. I got a splinter or two due to the way the many THIN layers of wood were glued together. After putting together the puzzle twice, we noticed that the tabs were flaking off the back of each piece, again due to the extremely thin nature of the bottom few pieces of wood. I'm just not used to this from M&D products, and frankly I'm disappointed. It was not a very costly puzzle for sure, but it would be nice to get something for my son that would last for more than a month.
So, fun - absolutely!! Durable - nope. Enjoy it while it lasts!

i have the jungle version and this pirate puzzle for my twin 5yos boys. they can do the puzzle just fine (it's a challenge but not impossible), however the problem here is that the reference picture is on the back side of the puzzle board. unless my kids assemble the puzzle on the table without using the board, they become very frustrated because there is no picture to look at. other reviewers said there were splinters and the pictures were coming off the pieces, i did not experience any of those problems - the pieces fit together snugly but not too tightly where they break. the puzzle itself is well-made, but i think the puzzle books (by anne sharp or others) work better for our family.

There's nothing to dislike about this puzzle. As with many Melissa and Doug puzzles, thought has been given to everything, even the placement of lines within the image and how they bridge the edges of the puzzle pieces. Gorgeous colours, good construction, a cute design, and enough repetition of thematic elements to give young minds small problems to ponder. My 4-year-old has gone on to tougher puzzles, but still likes to put this one together on occasion.

We've had some luck with M&D products in the past, so we tried some M&D puzzles. The pirate pattern is neat, and a hit with both my four and two year old. The problem is that the pieces stick together, and are hard for little fingers to manipulate. One can literally pick up on end of the puzzle and hold the entire puzzle airborn. It takes work to get the pieces apart, and then it takes more work to actually piece them together again.

I suspect that M&D felt a need to differentiate themselves from the Ravensburger puzzles, and did so by using plywood instead of hardy cardboard. I understand the thought, but it just didn't work. Stick with the other.

This review is about the Melissa & Doug Deluxe Wooden 48-Piece Jigsaw Puzzle - Pirates and the Melissa & Doug Space Voyage Jigsaw 48 Piece puzzles. However, this review may apply to all other Melissa & Doug 48 piece puzzles if they are constructed in the same way. I purchased both puzzles for my son based on the many positive reviews about them and on my satisfaction with other Melissa & Doug toys. I have found the puzzles to very well made but with serious and potentially dangerous flaws.

The puzzles are made of soft laminated wood. The puzzle backer board is almost 3/8" thick with about a 3/16" recess for the puzzle pieces of the same thickness. At first inspection, the pieces and the board seem very durable and likely to last a long time. The drawing on the puzzles have vibrant colors, and the paint appears to be sealed, so the painted surface is smooth and should provide good resistance to fingerprints or smudges - easy to wipe clean.

The puzzle pieces form an 8x6 grid, meaning that each piece is square or rectangular with a single tongue or groove on each side, except of course the edge pieces where one side is smooth. In contrast, there are other puzzles where the pieces have various, free-form shapes. Depending on the how the child tries to match the puzzle pieces (primarily by the drawing, primarily by the shape, or usually some combination of both), the M&D puzzles may or may not be more challenging than other ~50 piece puzzles. Note that the backer board has neither outline grooves nor a facsimile of the complete drawing to help the child place the pieces.

The primary flaw with these puzzles is that the edges of the cuts both around the backer board and around each puzzle piece do not appear to be sanded or sealed. (If they were, then the sanding and/or sealing are unacceptably poor.) Simply separating the puzzle pieces from each other for the first time can generate dozens or even hundreds of tiny splinters and wood fragments ranging from small, 1/32" sharp specs to 1/4" needles. This danger could be minimized by having an adult sand the edges and clean up the puzzles first, but the risk for further splintering would remain due to a secondary flaw.

The secondary flaw is that the puzzle pieces are cut with almost no tolerance or "wiggle room" for the pieces to slide in and out of each other. Therefore, the puzzles tend to "stick" to each other when being placed or removed. This would normally not be a problem as the "wiggle room" would be created through repeated play with the puzzles by the child. However, with the M&D wood puzzles, even applying a slight angle to the pieces while removing them can cause one of the layers of the laminated wood to get caught and be split. How likely is this? I, an adult, splintered two puzzle pieces while removing them for the very first time after purchase.

These issues may not have been a concern to the positive reviewers and may not be a concern for many others in the future. But for me, the problems were sufficiently alarming to immediately remove the puzzles from my child and check his fingers. My cautiousness was reaffirmed when I ended up with a splinter from the puzzles in my own finger while I was handling them for return.

I do not recommend these puzzles at all unless you have the time and energy to sand and seal all the edges of each puzzle and the backer board properly. This is a shame, as the puzzles are otherwise of very nice quality.

My daughter loves this puzzle and the colors and picture are visually very appealing, but we've only put it together maybe 4 times and the wood is splintering and the picture is peeling off. It's very disappointing and nothing like our experience with other Melissa and Doug products.

The kids had a fun time putting this puzzle together and part of it was the art work. However the pieces were falling apart and splintering. Cardboard would have been better, if the quality of wood can't be improved drastically. Also, I think the kids preferred the wood puzzle over the cardboard puzzles except for the splintering and the painted portions coming off.
I hope this review was helpful.

We have three Melissa and Doug Puzzles. My son was only a few months more than three when we purchased this one. Smaller puzzles with less pieces were no longer challenging. Of course, this didn't challenge him for very long but he loves pirates and thus loves doing this one over and over.
This puzzle is very durable and I expect to hand it down to my next son.