Iron Man Stark Industries N.R.F. 425 Blaster product reviews

In true boy-style I had to have a play with this myself before I handed it over to the younger generation. At first I wasn't too sure about the idea of stick-to-glass targets and the more I thought about it the less happy I was with the idea. In the end I settled for digging an old piece of formica board out of the garage and sticking the targets to that and leaning it against the back fence. This turned out to be a great choice from the yountg lad's perspective because he could then play 'sneak up and shoot the badguy' scenarios without risking a blow-up from Uncle for breaking anything expensive. With ten darts to fire he was able to blow off a lot of steam and energy, most of it hunting down rogue darts that had flown out of sight and into hedges. We managed to lose one dart to the neighbours pet rabbit who seems to have developed a taste for foam projectiles. Strange bunny. The good thing is I am sure that we could buy suitable replacement darts since this is a Nerf product and they would be silly not to standardise things. The gun is really easy to use, but I admit to being another of those adults who can clearly see extra mounting points on the weapon, but has no idea what could clip on there. Some words from 'Nerf' about this would go a long way to improving the buying experience for me. At least then I would know what other Nerf products I could buy later. All in all this has to be a great 'Summer passtime' toy because it would give the kids a reason to get outside and enjoy a bit of sunshine while its still safe to do so.

Ever since I was a kid I have always had a typical boy's love of projectile weapons. I think this is something hard-coded into the male genome, like that thing with remote controls... we simply LOVE the feeling of power we get when we can do something -here- that causes something to happen -over there-. So I was really keen to see how my young son liked this 'weapon of mass distraction'...

Sure enough, first off his eyes went wide when he saw it was an Iron Man-branded toy, and then his jaw dropped when he noticed it was another foam dart launcher. He was soon out in the back yard with a couple of his mates, running around like a mad thing shooting darts all over the place. And all over the neighbours place. And all over the roof of the house... and shed... and... well, you get the idea. Typical boy.

After the madness was over, I sat him down and picked his brains about what he thought of it. First comment out of his mouth: "The darts didn't really fly THAT far, Dad." And he was bang on. I am not sure how '30 feet' can be reached, but I do know our back yard is only 26 feet across and the darts never made it the full distance. Maybe if there had been a tail-wind... but actually, in my books, this is a POSITIVE thing, since it drastically shrinks the search area when you find you have only located 9 darts so far...

The simple slide-action to cock the gun will be familiar to anyone who has played with a Nerf dart gun, and it takes very little strength to do so. This means, of course, that kids can ready-aim-fire in VERY rapid succession... so don't look up when the first dart hits you... there's probably a couple more coming right behind it.

The reusable stickers are a nice addition, though they curl something chronic and we found they didn't want to stick too well. No problem really, as toys like this are best played with outdoors, so a stack of old Lift+ cans makes for an excellent target anyway.

Overall, this is another great addition to the Nerf line of foam projectile launchers, and a cool 'Iron Man' toy. Any boy who loves those run-around-and-shoot-his-mates type games is going to love this!