Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

My seven-year-old son has been obsessed with contraptions ever since he saw them on "Blue's Clues" years ago, so when we set up the Wacky Contraption Lab on Christmas morning, he was very interested in how everything worked and was engaged in the set up. This from a child now mostly interested in video games. I was so pleased! We followed the directions, got everything together, and set the ball rolling. Though the ball dropped squarely on the plate that is supposed to, as the grand finale, launch the pig, nothing happened. We modified. No launch. We called Dad over. Dad has a degree in bio-medical engineering. Dad couldn't make the thing work. Eventually three PhDs and an MD and two former grade-school teachers flailed and failed, and our previously engaged little boy wandered off to play a video game. A less subjective response to this toy: the felt boards lose their shape after several rounds of pressing the velcro-mounted chutes to them, thus hindering the success of the contraption, and the strike plate for the pig launch is so narrowly calibrated that it almost never works when the ball falls on it. Also, the chutes tend to pull away from the backboard after one or two runs. I usually pay close attention to the product reviews on Amazon, but I didn't this time. Christmas was a week away and I needed a gift. This one had such promise! But now the box and shipping information are gone and I am stuck with over-priced, poorly engineered wacky junk. This purchase was worse than merely disappointing, it was a failure.