Transformers KRE-O: A Review

I was pleased to have received a sampling of Hasbro’s latest addition to the building-brick genre: KRE-O Transformers.  We received a Bumblebee 75-piece set and Kreon minifigure in mid-October, both of which my youngest son immediately helped himself.

This set doesn’t pretend to be any better or different than that other plastic brick company’s product.  In fact, there’s even an emblem on the front of the box declaring these bricks fully compatible with other brands’ building bricks.

My youngest son (age six and a half) wasted no time assembling the robot variation of this set.  The directions and my son’s fine motor skills for assembling the robot were what I expected, very similar to Lego.  He’s able to do about 90% of the tasks, mostly asking for help in separating particularly stubborn bricks.  He didn’t fail to point out that the set is “just like Lego”, and wondered “Why isn’t this Lego?”

This is the point where we all expected that you can flip, twist and rotate the robot and voila!  You’d have a car!  But this is not the case.  To go from the robot to the vehicle, you have to disassemble everything and start from scratch with a separate set of directions.  Definitely not what we expected for Transformers!  Both the kids and the parents were disappointed in this, but our son took it in stride.

It didn’t take long for my youngest son to convert Bumblebee into the vehicle.

The 75-piece KRE-O Transformers Bumblebee kit retails for about $7.99 and can be found at major toy retailers.  There is also a 325-piece kit that retails for $19.99.  KRE-O kits are also available as Optimus Prime, Starscream, Megatron, and Sentinal Prime.

We also received a free “Kreon” minifigure sample.  The larger kits include these Kreon figures:

GeekMom is pleased to pass along two promotional events that Hasbro is sponsoring if you are interested in purchasing KRE-O products for your loved ones this holiday season.

First, you can visit this link at Coupons.com, view a short promotional video and download a coupon worth $5 off any $20 KRE-O purchase (through 27 November).

Secondly, Hasbro’s KRE-O website is sponsoring a Great Brick Giveaway, where they’re giving away one KRE-O brick set per hour, 7 days per week, from now through December 9th.  That’s over 1000 KRE-O sets, and all you have to do is visit their website and play the game!  (Login is required).

Note: The KRE-O Bumblebee and Kreon minifigure were provided free of charge for review purposes.