dspitwodMilitary Base Play Set for Army Command Center Battle Accessories Toy, Defence Guard Tower, Drone, Guns Weapons Building Block Toys for Kids 8 10 12 14 Years (Military Base 1)

The boys enjoyed having this for the base they made in there lego town

Two aspects of this set initially attracted my attention - the drone build and the dozen 1x6x5 girders. The drone ended up not being too special, but it does cleverly use a roller-skate to simulate a camera and its propellers are excellent. As for the girders, those are very good and their scarcity in light gray easily justifies the purchase price of this set, which is just under $30 at the moment. They are all, of course, no-brand LEGO-compatible size pieces. I tallied up the pieces as best I could and came to 456 pieces not including the weapons - 40 for the drone, 414 in the fort, and two extras.The set came in a plain corrugated box with a couple mostly forgettable stickers, one indicating the seller and one on the back for the manufacturer - Shantou Chenghai Jile Toy Company. This got me a little bit excited. Many of my favorite no brand bricks come from the factories in Shantou, and these, too, have the excellent fit I've come to expect. The colors in this set have a little more variation than usual, however. The 1x1x2/3 wedges look like they've miraculously been produced in retro light gray and the large roof slopes, too, look closer to pre-2003 brown than any of the standard modern colors. I did notice some of the ordinary 1x2 bricks have sides with slight irregularities, waviness, etc. that didn't impact fit at all.The instructions for the drone are one sheet and just right. The instructions for the fort are adequate, but printed much too small. It almost feels as though the people producing those went at it with much the same attitude that I did, which is to say, "This is a fort you could build with these bricks, but you probably are going to want them to do your own thing." I built the fort per the instructions anyway, because I'm a completionist, but I have to admit it is probably going to be short-lived. I want those girders for sci-fi themes and all those masonry profile bricks for castles. I'm afraid the WWII and contemporary military figures may just have to keep waiting their turn for a build to call home. On its own, this is a fine set to toss the instructions and build whatever kind of forts you please.Speaking of those figures, this set does have a couple sprues of light artillery and some firearms with a print combining camouflage and wood grain stocks. They have a very nice appearance, and although I'm not normally one to go ahead and paint pieces, I am seriously considering making an exception to make their barrels metallic. I think they would look outstanding like that. There are no minifigures included in this set, but it does give them lots of places to be.As a total package, I think this set is just shy of a 4.5 out of 5, simply because of the tiny instructions and a few irregular colors. Throwing all design considerations out the window, as a reasonably-priced set of very good bricks to build your own forts with, it's easily a 5.

THE TL;DRSimple, but solid little set. Build itself is nothing to write home about, but the quality of the pieces is - they've cracked the code on whatever recipe is used to create Legos. These bricks feel and handle almost identically (with one exception noted below), they make that same nostalgic clinking when you rummage through them, and they are beautifully uniform.THE GOOD:- Minus the little Lego emblem and one piece (the flat rotary pieces that serve as the base for the rocket platforms), these bricks are practically indistinguishable from Legos. Same clinkiness, same weight, same reliable performance, same high quality construction.- There are several similar sets like this one, but I haven't seen any others with the additional minigun turrets and drone. It's not earthshattering, but it is a nice bonus.- One particular thing of note - the larger flat plates that serve as the base for the build are notably flat. This might sound like it should go without saying, but one of the most common departures from Lego quality I've seen in not-Lego sets is that the base plates are warped or bowed. This set has avoided said pitfall with exquisitely flat, Lego-quality base plates.THE BAD:- While still serviceable, the instruction booklet leaves a bit to be desired. Small print, small images, not especially clear on placement, and it is missing a number of the little quality of life items that Lego includes (rotation indicator, arrows highlighting precise placement, substeps, etcetera). They do a good job making each step a simple change, though, so it is still fairly easy to follow along.- Those bonus minigun turrets don't have the most secure assembly, which is a bummer. Once I got them together, I didn't want to touch or adjust them as it was frustratingly easy to undo my careful alignment of the barrel rings and the shied.- Regarding the indistinguishability from Lego pieces, that one exception is the rotary pieces. Not the ones on the drone, but the ones used for the rocket platforms; they don't free spin like their Lego counterparts, but they do rotate properly without issue. Not a huge deal, but you wouldn't want to use them for, say, the blades of a helicopter.THE END:Overall, this is solid set that I am comfortable recommending for those interested in military-themed bricks. While it lacks some quality of life elements in the instruction booklet, it more than makes up for it with high quality bricks and gloriously flat base plates.

This set is compatible with the leading building brick manufacturer. The pieces have a good feel and clutch.That said, some of the accessories, such as the chain guns, tend to be fiddly and don't stay together the way they should. And as a set that should be played with, that's rather a bummer. The set itself is fairly easy to assemble, but the instructions are of lower quality, which makes following them a bit difficult.While this isn't a "glamorous" set, it's a good set for parts and getting set up for some army action.

Instructions are clear and the packing is good. Can't wait to assemble it and start having some awesome war recreations with this fort!