We originally bought this for our son at a year old, but I think that's a bit too early really for a device like this. Now he is just over 2 years old, he will sit and play with it. I really can't understand the comments about poor graphics. They are perfectly fine for the purpose it is intended for and they certainly do not resemble those of an Atari 2600. That's just plain insulting to this product. What were people expecting? Playstation or Xbox quality graphics at this price point? My wife and I also kept wondering if we even had the same product as we haven't heard any mispronunciation of words either. Kids at this age treat them roughly and attention spans are limited anyway so I would rather spend $40 on this than some much more expensive device that would offer little more benefit for this age group. When he's old enough we'll get him a real computer with 'better graphics' but certainly not when he's 2 years old!
I decided to try this over the Little Leap system. Originally, I thought the Little Leap would be better. However, I looked at the demos that they show on the website and the baby discs did not look interesting, only the toddler discs which can only be used in their toddler mode. The baby one that they showed was filled with annoying baby talk. Plus, there seems to be trouble with setting it up for some people and since we use an xbox 360 instead of a regular dvd player I did not think it would work for me either. I also think that the v-smile is a better value bc the Little Leap does not come with a real disc to use, just a demo....
Okay, on to the point! I bought this today for my 13 month old son. I agree that the graphics/ audio are not spectacular, but let's keep in mind that this is for babies and toddlers, NOT adults. The graphics are perfectly fine for a baby. I do think though that they could have done something to grab attention a little better, some parts do seem pretty bland. However, what gets the attention of one baby may not get the attention of another. I think a big part of the issue with some of these negative reviews is that some parents expected to just set it up and walk away with their baby sitting and smiling up at the tv. This requires a lot of interaction from the parent to help keep their child's attention and fascilitate the learning process. (think: "wow! look at the yellow stars!" "can you press the red heart? good job!") But on the other hand, if your child does give attention over to the tv easily, it is nothing to brag about that they'll sit there for hours. Too many children spend all day in front of video games/tv/computer. Even educational video games should be limited and should not take the place of active play.
This system is for 9 months and up, but I think that's a little young. The keyboard can be played with seperate from the full system, which would be appropriate for the age, but you could not want to pay that much just to do that. I don't know why they even bothered with the purple wrist rest (or whatever they call it). It comes right off and there is really no point in it. The keyboard can be set to play alone mode and it identifies the shape and makes other sounds (ex: the red heart says heart when pushed and makes a kissing sound) when the buttons are pushed.
The cartridge that comes with the game is heavy on colors, shapes, and counting to five. He liked the peek-a-boo animals and the counting song. The songs were annoying to me; but again, this is not for me it is for my son and he liked it and even "danced" a little bit to it. Overall, I had a hard time keeping his attention to it for very long. But again, all babies are different as far as this goes. The tv does not keep his attention much yet anyway. The only thing he likes to watch is Baby Shakespeare-he loves Bard the Dragon. But he could care less about any other Baby Einstein video although I know there are a lot of babies that love them. At any rate, I am just trying to make the point that you should not decide whether to get something based on what someone else's baby prefers.
I agree with others that it is surprising that they did not choose to include ABCs with it. Maybe one of the new cartridges will have that. I can highly recommend the Meet the Letters video though to anyone who is looking for a good way to teach the ABCs to their child.... it is very effective.
The bottom line is this: Yes, it could be better but this is the cost of a couple of dvds, so it is completely worth the money to have a system that can grow with your baby/ toddler that they can learn something from..... Just don't think it is something that they can do on their own. It requires parental involvement. Also don't put your child on the path of zombiehood. Remember the importance of play that does not involve the tv!
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We bought this for our two year old daughter. The resolution is terrible, and the words are mispronounced. MY daughter loses interest very quickly in it, and much rather look at her books than the screen. I think it has a lot to do with the quality of the picture. I wouldn't buy this as a gift, even on sale at a great price. I'm hoping the new leapfrog baby/toddler product is better than this one. This was a very disappointing purchase.
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Okay, my husband and i were torn between the v.baby smile and the leap frog little leaps for our daughter's first birthday. I spent DAYS online reading and comparing reviews. After hearing so many conflicting opinions we finally decided to buy them both and figure it out for ourselves. Here is what we came up with. Yes, the graphics are WAY better on the little leaps. But thats about the only thing we liked about the little leaps in comparison. The V.smile baby has graphics that will definately get the job done and was easier to set up. But the thing that REALLY sold us on the v.smile was that when you pressed a button something IMMEDIATELY changed on the screen. Even when the cartoons are talking and you are not instructed to push a button something little will pop up after a button is pushed. The cartoon continues explaining so you dont loose any information but the child can also see the effect of pushing that button. With the little leaps if you pushed a button out of turn nothing happend. And they talked alot and asked for little response. When they did want you to press a button the screen would just pause until you did. So to me it felt like watching an educational video and the child just has the pause and play buttons. Since we are buying it for our daughter's first birthday that would put her in the lower end of the recommended age for these toys so we wanted to go with the one that would hold her attention longer and would enforce things like cause and effect because she is going to care more about something popping up when she hits a button than what the cartoon is saying to her, atleast for now. Another plus to the v.smile baby is that the activity panel is a toy on its own and it offers sign language. Hope this helps anyone else that was in the same situation as us. Keep in mind that we did not buy any games for the systems since we were just testing them out so this review is based on the sample games that come with the systems. Also this review is based on what my huband and i noticed when we played with it, its a gift for our daughter so she has not yet played with it so i cant tell you how she responded to either of these toys. End result, the little leaps is getting returned and the V.smile is getting wrapped for her birthday.
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The setup was only about 2 minutes once I got it out of the box. This includes inserting the batteries that it came with. There is actually only one plug that is pretty straight forward, it's labeled video and audio. Plug it right into the T.V. If your T.V. has a video and audio outlet in front or back, then you will be able to plug it in.
I found the graphics on this game to be cheap for the price I paid for it. I only used the demo it came with, other games may be better. The operation of the game was simple and fun to play with. My son loved to hit the big buttons and had fun watching the game do things.
The console has a huge 'ON' button that lights up right in reach of little hands, so my son kept hitting it over and over and over...the cord it way too short too so I couldn't even move the console out of reach.
Pros:
Came with batteries
Big buttons are great to press
Every time a button is pressed something on the screen changes
Fun colors and cute songs
Cons:
Graphics aren't good for $40 paid
Each additional game is $15-$20 so it's expensive
Huge ON button that lights up on console that my son kept hitting
Very very short cord so not many options on where to put the console
This toy should either come with a full version game or be $25 tops with demo game.
I have trusted, knowledgable people who highly recommend baltic amber for teething babies. I shopped for many days before deciding on this product. I loved the mixed colors. The necklace arrived on time and in good condition.
