Pallino - Educational Game Introduces Coding Basics - Award-Winning Toy to Develop Steam Skills - for Kids Ages 4 & Up

I have been looking for this item for 25 years, and I am so happy I finally found it on Amazon! I looked last year, with no luck, and no one else seems to sell it either. Anyways, I had this as a kid and had to leave it behind when we moved home from Italy, and it has haunted me since. Now I have an almost 4 year old, and she will be getting this for Christmas. I took it out of the box yesterday and was immediately hooked. It's fun for adults too! I'm thinking 4+ might be a little young, but I guess it depends on the child. I have a feeling I might be giving my daughter this a little too early, that it will be too hard and she will get frustrated by it, but only time can tell. You get 12 different patterns. The goal is to put the beads in the right slot. You tilt your board upside down so all the beads end up at the top. They trickle down one at the time. You look at the bead and decide if it should go down into your pattern or not. If it should, you push the button corresponding the column you want it in, then shoot the bead off. If you don't push any buttons it will exit at the bottom. There is an exit button as well, but I find it very hard to only get one bead to exit, so I would rather suggest shooting the bead out without pushing a column-button. Same effect but easier. If you misplace a bead you do not have to restart, you can just empty that column and start it over. This is a great brain-toy, suitable for trips or just at home. I can't say enough great things about this item, and I am so eager to give it to my daughter for Christmas and get to play it with her.

I bought for my Son and he would play with it for hours at a time. If your child is too young to coordinate the balls themselves I would sit with my Son and one would be the so called "shooter" and the other for the placement of the balls. 2 people can easily play with this. Adults like it too. The object is to match the colored balls to the design. There are 12 different designs that you can insert into the machine. It's great for car travel, as it's self-contained for the most part (just the pattern cards can be loose), fairly quiet (not church quiet, though I think this is great for fostering creativity, eye-hand coordination, artistic skills (you can make up your own patterns) and I think it helps kids learn patience too. If you make a mistake, you might have to release a column of balls & thus have to do that column all over again, but they soon learn it's not the end of the world. We love this!

I randomly bought this for myself out of pure nostalgia. It works exactly as I remember and it is still a lot of fun! I just showed it to my kids (almost 6) and they love it too. Here's me with my original one, around 1989!

I bought this for my 4 year old. She tends to get frustrated easily, so I am going to wait a little longer before trying again with her. I love it, though! After I put her to bed, I play with it myself. It is very soothing. The only issue I had was that one of the blue balls inside was malformed in a manufacturing defect. It still moves around ok, but it is much smaller than the others. Also, there is a blue shaving of plastic inside (probably from the defective ball) and it is annoying seeing it float around. The game still functions fine. I wish there was better quality control. I was going to return it, but I can live with the problem. I'd look over your toy before gifting.

Played with this toy as a child and eventually the buttons started sticking. 25 years later the company still sells them and it looks almost identical to the one we had. The card patterns are new and fun to follow and the toy is very well made. Definately worth the price and years of durability.

I had bought this once years ago for my neices who enjoyed it. Now it's time to buy for my daughter and as fun as I think it is, I'm underwhelmed. Filling in the pattern works and the mechanism for shooting the balls into their columns is great. But the reset column is not. The reset lever sticks, and when I push a button to empty a row, the balls stick. It's possible to get them down, but it takes extra moves and is not as simple as it should be.

My grandson was very happy to receive this as a gift he loved playing with an old one of his dad's that barely worked. This is great for hand eye coordination and problem solving.

Sometimes the columns get stuck, but it is an easy fix usually and a CLASSIC! Love this game

Article ne comportait pas les frais de douanes, donc payé l’article super chère pour ce produit,☹️ En plus reçu défectueux....très déçu .

Entretenido y fácil de usar, les encanta

Livraison et emballage impeccables. Ça correspond à mes attentes, un kdo surprise à NOEL pour un garçon de 8 ans, ça va lui plaire à coup sûr !

How it works: The Pallino is low-tech and works via mechanics to allow you to make mosaic designs out of coloured balls. The balls are enclosed under the see-through plastic cover. To begin, you tilt the Pallino to tip the balls from the reservoir, up to the top where balls can be channeled, one by one, through the mechanism. Using two hands, you hold down a button that corresponds to the collum you want to drop the ball into, as you give the 'enter' button a good tap, which shoots a ball along the channel and into that collum. Balls of colours that aren't wanted can be exited back into the reservoir. The Pallino has fold out props so that it can make use of gravity. The collums can be emptied one at a time, using a 'reset' switch, so when you make a mistake, you don't have to start completely from scratch. There are double-sided picture cards to follow or you can make up your own pictures or designs. Who would enjoy it: This toy takes some patience to make a picture but it is tactile and engaging in its simplicity. When you begin a picture, it's almost impulsive to continue until it's finished. The Pallino is not a flashy 'cool' toy, but it has real child appeal and is likely to be returned to again and again because new creative ideas can be made. It also makes an excellent travel toy. The Pallino would suit any child and some adults, especially those with autistic spectrum disorders who may enjoy the sorting, systems and repetition involved, as well as the colourful visual aspect. What to be aware of: The Pallino toy relies on physics so don't expect perfection in smooth useage as though it was software. For example, sometimes a few balls escape through the 'exit' channel, back into the reservoir when you only wanted one ball to pass through. Or a couple of balls might escape from a collum when you tilt the toy to re-stock the balls at the top. These are quirks of its physics and aren't faults as such. But some might be unimpressed by this. The Pallino is not a quiet toy, because balls clatter around inside. Quality and educational value: It takes some planning and spatial awareness to design your own pattern, because the design must be built from the bottom up. So, there is plenty of intelligent play value. The quality is good. The only downside is that the cards, which are stored in the Pallino, can fall out, so watch out for that. The see-through plastic could become scratched or get cracked with rough treatment, but the Pallino seems well-designed and of good quality over all.

Very nice toy, my son 5 years old liked it so much.