Wild Planet Animal Scramble

by Wild Planet

Product Features

• Designed for preschool kids
• Develops turn-taking and sharing
• Friendly, encouraging voice calls out the clues, easy or challenging, as you learn
• For 1 to 6 players
• Features an electronic hand-held tagger shaped like a giraffe and four friends

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 4.5 x 12 x 10 inches ; 1.4 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0016A5788
• Item model number: 46004
• Our recommended age: 36 months - 5 years
• Manufacturer recommended age: 36 months - 6 years
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #37,392 in Toys & Games (See Top 100 in Toys & Games)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (65 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

From Wild Planet: “Animal Scramble is a really fun game and we thank each customer for their honest feedback; it was through your reviews that we learned how to improve the design of this toy. Our engineers and have made alterations including re-designing the pegs to be more durable and keep the animals on their bases. If you experience any problems at all with this game, we ask that you please contact us via email at [e-mail]." Wild Planet Animal Scramble is an active learning game for growing bodies and minds. The game is designed for preschool kids. It gets the kids moving, thinking, listening and learning, all while having fun. It features an electronic hand-held tagger shaped like a giraffe and four friends like the monkey, parrot, tiger and elephant. The giraffe calls out which animals the children should run to and tag. It tracks the amount of time taken to complete each course. In team mode, kids pass the giraffe to other players as they work cooperatively to achieve the fastest time. The sharing, listening and turn-taking aspects of this game reinforce positive social behaviors. Played indoors or outdoors, solo or in teams, Animal Scramble keeps kids up on their feet, expending energy and having fun. Animal Scramble won a Gold Award from the National Parenting Publications Awards. (Hyper Dash earned “honors” status last year in this same competition.

Product Description

From Wild Planet: "Animal Scramble is a really fun game and we thank each customer for their honest feedback; it was through your reviews that we learned how to improve the design of this toy. Our engineers and have made alterations including re-designing the pegs to be more durable and keep the animals on their bases. If you experience any problems at all with this game, we ask that you please contact us via email at [e-mail]." From the makers of the popular Hyper Dash games, Animal Scramble is the listen-and-learn game of animal tag. Set out the animals, and listen to the giraffe call out friendly, encouraging clues. Which animal is green? Who says "rooooar?" Kids must scramble to the correct animal and tag it with the giraffe. This active learning game lets kids move, have fun and build coordination as they learn colors, numbers and animal sounds. Five levels of run-around fun, from easy to hard, allow this game to grow with your child. Requires three "AAA" batteries, not included.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

64 of 66 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Definately worth the money!, August 28, 2008

By 

Jenna M. Hoosier "Grapes415" (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Durability:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Wild Planet Animal Scramble (Toy)

{Be forewarned! I am going into great detail because this is the first review and I may have spent less time in Target debating over this purchase if I had known this beforehand. Sorry for being so longwinded!}

I bought this game a few hours ago so I can't say how long it will last, but it sure is fun! I was going to get the regular Hyper Dash for my daughter even though it is for older kids, but I saw this one and (after much debate) I decided to get it instead. Not only is it adorable, but it burns energy. Although the regular Hyper Dash would probably have been more fun as a family game (adults enjoy it too, from what I hear) this game is very fun for her to play by herself or with a friend. Her and her cousin have been playing it in the "treasure hunt" mode, which is like hide-and-seek, for awhile and love it.

Here is how it works. There are 4 different modes of play (play alone, play with group, treasure hunt and memory) and 5 different levels. When you play alone, you spread out the four animals and the base (giraffe) calls out animals, colors, sounds, attributes or letters (depending on the level) and the child "tags" the corresponding piece with the base. You can keep all of the pieces in front of your child so that they can sit and play or you can spread them out around the room so that your child has to run around to get to them. We even put one up a couple steps so that the kids had to climb to get to it. At the end the giraffe tells you how long it took you to finish so that you can try to beat your record. Group play is the same except that the base tells you when to pass to another player. Treasure hunt is just like hide-and-seek. One player takes the giraffe and counts. The other player hides the animals and then the giraffe calls out the names of the animals one by one for the player to find and "tag." This mode is definately the favorite so far. My only complaint is that the giraffe only counts to ten and the kids don't have enough time to collect and hide the other pieces. There is no way to pause the giraffe either, so as soon as one person finds all the pieces he goes right into counting for the next person. I guess kids have short attention spans anyway, so they aren't complaining! In memory mode the giraffe calls out 1 animal name, then 2, then 3, etc. and the player has to find them in the order they were called.

Other than the issue in treasure hunt mode that I mentioned, there is one other thing that I was a little dissappointed about. The box that this game comes in cannot be used to store the pieces because it has a hole in the front that is big enough for the pieces to fall out. Even though I would prefer to have a place to keep the pieces, it's not dissappointing enough to take off a star. This game is still great!

Put simply:
The pros: Pieces seem durable, cute, many modes of play, daughter loves it, active game, unique and fun!
The cons: Not enough time to hide the pieces in treasure hunt mode, no box for storage.

I'm definately glad we bought this!

*UPDATE* - I took this into my Autistic Support class and the kids love it! It's hard to find games that all of the children will play, but they all participate when we play this one!!!

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great toy for energetic kids!, November 25, 2008

By 

Caleb's Mom (Columbia, SC) - See all my reviews

= Durability:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Wild Planet Animal Scramble (Toy)

My 3 year old son loves this game! It is a great way for kids to expend energy! My husband and I really get a kick out of watching our son run around like crazy! We can play it with him or he can play alone, which we like. We have not experienced ANY problems with its durability. I think the two reviewers may have gotten untypical games. The animals in our game fit very snugly into their bases (to the point that our son has trouble pulling them apart at times). Our son and his friends are NOT gentle when slamming the giraffe on the animals, but it has held up fine. I agree with Jenna Hoosier's review regarding the "treasure hunt" mode not giving the kids much time to hide the animals, but honestly, the kids don't seem to mind. We have played this both indoors and outdoors and I would definitely recommend playing it outside. I think it's much more fun. The kids can spread the animals out much further and get to run more, which they seem to enjoy.

We also have Hyper Dash (which we like equally well), but I think my son enjoys this one more because he can do ALL of the levels instead of just a few like with Hyper Dash. We'll probably stick with this one for another year or so. Overall, I'd definitely recommend this game for anyone with kids 5 and under!

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars SO, So, so dissapponited, April 23, 2009

By 

Disappointed Dad - See all my reviews

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:3.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Wild Planet Animal Scramble (Toy)

This game was at the top of our Christmas list for our 3 year old son. We were so excited about it- loved the concept and just knew our son would get into it. Well, come Christmas morning he did! He was super excited about receiving it, so we openend it and played. In the 1st game, yay FIRST use, two of the four animals broke off their stands. The little green peg made a clean break inside the tiger and the monkey. They can't stand, even though I've tried and tried super gluing, and the game just isn't the same. We could NOT believe the poor, poor quality and to say we were disappointed was an understatement. What a great game concept, but what nousey construction.