Use The Force (and the Force of Nature) With GraviTrax This Year!

GraviTrax keeps coming out with new sets that are both fun and engaging for a wide audience. Two recent sets pull in Star Wars (original trilogy) fans and nature- and animal-loving kids. Check them out below.

GraviTrax Junior: My Planet Starter Set

The GraviTrax Junior set is so cute, so adorable, and so fun. It’s more approachable than the sets designed for adults, with fewer options, less complicated builds, open-ended decoration options, and a kid-friendly style. And, almost everything—other than the base pieces and stack pieces—come in handy fabric bags, making clean-up of the 200 set pieces easy, and you don’t worry about anything falling out of the storage box.

In addition to tracks that are easy for kids to set up and run marbles down, there are a ton of spots on the pieces for kids to place the included decorations of animals and nature items, some of which serve as tunnels, turnstiles, starting and ending zones, and other track features. Other pieces are decorations to add interest or context or ambience to the layout, or just to hold marbles while they aren’t being used. There are also cardboard cutouts of colorful characters that kids can place around the set, creating a story to go along with their play, if they like.

The base of the Junior set is plastic, unlike the cardboard bases of the regular sets (including the Star Wars set below). This makes them more durable and (slightly) easier to avoid bending or breaking. The included 10 marbles are made of soft plastics, rather than the usual metal, making them safer, and they come in a variety of soft colors, which hopefully will make them easier to locate when they inevitably roll off the table or roll away across the floor.

Like with all GraviTrax sets, you’ll need a large, very flat and firm surface to build on, somewhere that no one will walk through or trip over anything. A table is often a good surface, but an out-of-the-way piece of hard floor can also work.

The GraviTrax Junior: My Planet Starter Set comes with instructions for how all the pieces fit together, as well as instructions for three starting track configurations. If you open up the instructions all the way, a poster is on the other side, which is pretty cool (but if you hang it up, you won’t be able to access the instructions!).

Note, though, that, while the set is easy enough for older kids to put together, very young kids may need some guidance to get started, since the base pieces need to go together just so, and the instructions are quite minimal. Older kids and those mechanically inclined, though, should be just fine. The set is labeled to be for ages 3-7, and I think those in the 3-5 year old range may really struggle if they don’t already know how it works.

The GraviTrax Junior: My Planet Starter Set is definitely easier and more approachable for kids than the standard GraviTrax sets. Its color scheme is beautiful, and is clearly aimed at its target audience. It contains the possibility of endless play and endless combinations of the pieces. And you can store it all right in the box.

If you want to get your kids started on something even smaller and less expensive than this set, there are other Junior sets that focus more on a single biome, while this one has features from several of them. Check out Ice, Ocean, Desert, Jungle, and even a Lion King expansion. There are also additional individual components you can buy to add on to existing sets.

GraviTrax Star Wars Death Star: Action Set

Great as a stand-alone GraviTrax set for fans of the original Star Wars trilogy—or it can be combined with other GraviTrax sets—this GraviTrax Star Wars Death Star: Action Set includes the Death Star itself as the base, with a Millennium Falcon and Imperial Star Destroyer as platforms to help you build upward.

Based on the epic Death Star battle from Episode IV, you can fly your X-Wing Fighters, fight your way past the TIE Fighters and surface cannons, and infiltrate the Death Star, saving the day. Different colored metal marbles symbolize different characters, such as Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Darth Vader, and a Fighter Pilot. The set includes tons of fun tunnels, scoops, gates, collisions, spirals, drops, and other functions I don’t even know the name for.

As many things as possible in the set are Star Wars-themed, so this one will be a lot of fun for devotees to the franchise. The frenetic energy of the Death Star scene at the end of Episode IV is replicated in this set, because you can set up TIE Fighters and X-Wing Fighters in strategic spots, as well as having marbles of different colors going along different routes, chasing each other or trying to cut each other off. Some of the elements need to be reset in between runs, so learn which ones they are and make sure they’re easy to reach, if you’re running two marbles on the same route, or just between runs.

Here’s a video of one of the elements that I found had to be reset each time:

The practically-wordless instruction booklet starts out by demonstrating how all the pieces work and how to assemble the ones that need assembling. (I highly recommend not skipping this step, as there is quite a lot of pre-assembly that is required, and it pulls you out of the build if you have to do it on the fly. This includes fitting some clear plastic pieces into the hexes in the Millennium Falcon and Imperial Star Destroyer to protect their openings from heavy use.)

The instruction booklet then illustrates how to build six different configurations of varying difficulty. Because all the pieces are white or grey or black, it’s a little hard to follow the build instructions, because greying out earlier steps isn’t all that effective. But if you take your time and have good lighting and good eyesight, you can do it. It also helps that the instruction steps list which pieces you’ll need for each step. Here is an example build step:

As with the normal GraviTrax sets, the Death Star base is cardboard, so assemble it carefully. The pieces also must go together a certain way to look like the Death Star. The base is about 35 inches in diameter once assembled, so make sure to have a large enough space to build.

I recommend starting with the simpler builds to acquaint yourself with the pieces, but you can definitely dive into the more expert setups if you’re already familiar with GraviTrax builds.

The box itself doesn’t have compartments, and most pieces come in non-resealable bags, so consider how you’ll want to organize it all once you put it away for storing. Perhaps a handful of gallon zip-top bags along with a few smaller ones would be helpful. Consider already having these on hand when you or your kids jump into this build.

The GraviTrax Star Wars Death Star: Action Set takes a while to set up, but a lot of that is one-time setup stuff, and then you can dive in and create as many Death Star scenarios as you like. This set is great for families to work together on, whether you’re fighting for the Dark Side, the Light Side, or a little of both. I recommend it for older kids to adults, and can be a lot of fun for anyone who loves Star Wars.

(The above links are to Amazon. If you struggle to find the Star Wars set there, it can also be found at Target, currently on a very good sale!)

Both of these GraviTrax sets are fabulous, carrying the GraviTrax series of toys in new directions, but in ways that are still compatible with the older sets. These both have incredible replayability, and will be fun toys that grow with your kids, or just be fun toys you can all play with together.

Also check out some of my reviews for other GraviTrax sets, including GraviTrax PRO/Vertical and GraviTrax Power!

Note: I received samples for review purposes.