Review: Gormiti 3D Puzzle

I don't know a lot about Gormiti. I know that the shops used to be full of the stuff and now they're not, but that's about it. Wikipedia, the source of all knowledge, tells me that it's a toy property based primarily around non-articulated 2 inch tall figures with a trading card game aspect (doesn't everything these days?).

My children know even less than I do about the line, it really having died before they became aware of such things. That didn't stop my 4yo from wanting these things while we were in Poundland the other week.

Quite what the attraction was, I'm not sure. He didn't know what was inside the heads before I told him, so it must have been simply the 'head' box design.

It being Poundland, I allowed him to add a couple of these to the basket - not realising until I was at the checkout that I'd also allowed him to add some Hot Wheels cars, several packets of sweets, books, and numerous other things. Things quickly add up in Poundland.

We got them home, he handed one to his 6yo brother and we opened them up. The box contains a number of man parts. No, not those kind of man parts, but a man-monster thing broken up into ten or so pieces. The idea being that you then get to put your action figure together 3D jigsaw-like.

6yo, bless him, tried to follow the instructions to put his figure together. This is not recommended. The instructions consist of a series of small, grainy, black and white photographs and are no help whatsoever. It's far easier to look and the final (high quality, colour) image on the packaging and then fiddle about with the bits, trial and error style, until your man is complete. It's slightly tricky, and the arms and legs required help from Dad to force them onto the ball joints, but the boys were kept quiet for a good while building them.

At the end you have what could easily be taken as a standard action figure, with joints at the arms, legs and head. If you like, you can take it apart again and store it back inside the head-box.

A few days later, I found these again in Home Bargains, at a penny less than they had been in Poundland. Since the first two had been a success I bought the remaining pair and soon the boys were quietly building once more.

My favourite part is the box. The four heads look like statues, something the figures would pray to or just decorate their headquarters with. The grey one is even mottled to look like stone.

The label in Home Bargains says these used to cost £9.99 each. If true then I can understand why there're a load of them now in discount shops. At their new sub-pound price level, however, these are great. Fun to put together, and then you can have even more fun 'blowing off' limbs. Recommended.

Really, these were the best names they could come up with?