Star Wars Science - Force Trainer Review
I purchased this for my son for Christmas. When I first saw it, I was disappointed. It was made of cheap plastic and was very lightweight. The headset, though, is better quality than the rest of it. The ball inside the trainer tube is a ping pong ball with designs on it. The base is very lightweight cheap plastic. The sound quality of the small speaker isn't so great either.
But we were still anxious to see if it worked. It took a bit to figure out how to get it to connect from the wireless headset to the base, but once we figured it out, it's easy enough to get it to do it again and again.
Once we got it working, we were hooked. Literally, we spent hours playing with it and going through all the paces. After awhile, I ended up with a headache and had to stop, but my daughter and my son both played with it for hours more. My best friend spent several hours playing with it too.
The biggest complaint is that there is no way to save your levels. After while, so much 'concentration' to get the ball to rise to the top makes my eyes and head ache, and I want to walk away, but if you stop playing and turn it off, the machine resets with no way to save progress and you have to go through all the paces again to get up to the Jedi Knight level. Also, there is a 'humming' sound the speakers purposely makes, and it is very annoying. You can't control the volume, for two reasons 1) the game needs to tell you through Yoda's voice what level to move the ball up to and 2) there is no volume control. The humming part that sounds like a machine humming needs to be removed. Very annoying.
All in all, not bad for a bit of fun, but as cheap as it was constructed, 70 bucks was very expensive for what it is. My son wants one that is somehow tied into one of his gaming systems.
Star Wars Science - Force Trainer Feature
- 15 Levels of training: Advance from Padawan to Jedi Knight
- Wireless Headset
- Training remote
- Features STAR WARS character voices and sound effects
- Fun and informative learning guide
Star Wars Science - Force Trainer Overview
Star Wars The Force Trainer
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Customer Reviews
Star wars for kids - Kelly T. Cook - Los Angeles, CA
It is never too early to start Jedi training, all tots need to know the power of the force. I have no idea how this works but I have been told it does. There are 15 levels going from Padawan to Jedi Knight. The wireless headset somehow tracks the brain wave to move the ball up and down in the tube. Comes with voices from Star Wars characters to make it realistic! I am so happy the younger generations are getting into Star Wars. We are definitely keeping the legacy going at our house, I am so proud my daughter said she wants a Princess Leia birthday party!
Reviewed by [...].
May the Force Be with You - Jarik25 - TN
I enjoy collecting Star Wars and Star Trek stuff. By far, this is the coolest thing I own...even though, my mom thinks I look like a two year old in it. I do feel younger, that is for sure. I doubt this really works like they say it does, but I enjoy the item tremensly. And for me, it is entertainment. Does it really run off beta waves? The debate is definitely out there. I do know that when I take the headset off; it quits working completely. If it were on a timer, then the ball should still float while the headset is off. So, something is doing it. Hopefully, some one will get up the nerve to dismantle one,and show us how its done. Cause I'd like to know.
Should Have Been Designed Better - W. Black - Bay Area, CA USA
I got this as a biofeedback machine, thinking it would be nice to learn how to control brainwaves. You can do that with this technology. I couldn't figure out how the thing was supposed to operate. It took the tech support lady about 15 minutes of frustration to get it right. The thing is not straight forward. There are basically two modes: free operation, and doing the things Yoda tells you to do in sequence. You can't just push a button or switch to select modes. You have to push buttons and hold for somewhat random lengths of time. You can't tell when you've selected a particular mode, you just have to wait and see. It's really annoying. The tech support lady eventually deduced that 7 seconds was the proper length of time I need to hold down the button to make one selection, rather than the 5 seconds described vaguely in the manual.
Did I mention Yoda? His voice narrates the thing for you. He's always talking at you, encouraging you, and repeating cliches from the movie. Once again, it's really annoying. If only the thing had a Shut Yoda Up button.
I learned how to control the height of the ball in the tube by varying my state of mental concentration. That was nice. I could learn to be a lot better at it, and would like to do that. However the thing has sat unused now for months, because I just never feel like listening to Yoda's annoying blabbering. Don't get me wrong, I like Yoda in the movies. He's a great character, but who wants to listen to the same dozen recordings of his voice repeated ad nauseam while they're trying to learn mental control?
I really can't imagine why the engineers didn't put simple switches on this thing to control modes and levels, instead of the difficult and imprecise system they ended up with. I do know why they thought Yoda would be a good idea. Personally I think they got that one wrong too. But even if Yoda might make the thing more attractive to some kids, I think a simple Yoda-Off switch would have made the thing a whole lot more usable for most people.
I would have given the thing a 5, if they'd put simple control switches on it, and included some way to turn Yoda off.
dont waste your money - J. Gilford - Florida, USA
I got this for my kid. and when he was setting it up he left the room for a minute.
Well the thing worked on it's own.
I would recomend this for a party. I bet it's fun to use around drunk people who have no clue about it.
*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Jul 26, 2010 05:09:10
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