Become a palaeontologist and dino geneticist with Dinosaur DNA.
We were sent the Triceratops Dinosaur DNA to review. In the box was a plaster block incorporating a container of dinosaur DNA fragments and a set of glow dinosaur skeleton parts. Also in the box was a set of specially designed digging tools, a brush and 2 Augmented Reality play mats (each size: 42 x 42 cm), 1 piece of soft wax, and the instructions.
The first thing we had to do was dig up a glow-in-the-dark dino skeleton. Please note that this is extremely messy and takes lots of patience as you chip away at the plaster block.
Finding the first piece of plastic skeleton is exciting and as you get further down, you find more and more. Be careful not to damage the plastic skeleton inside as you chip the plaster away.
Once you have excavated the bones you can then build your dinosaur. I have to admit that this is where we struggled with this set as it was very tricky to put together. I recommend that you wash the plastic bones before you start and use a needle to get the plaster out of the holes. We did find that some of the connectors bent too easily and wouldn’t go in the holes so the dinosaur would not hold together properly.
Inside your box there are 2 square mats, each with a small segment of DNA missing. Once you’ve removed it from the capsule, which was also in the plaster, you need to stick it onto the square. You will have one mat with your chosen dinosaur on and another with a question mark on. The question mark is a surprise, it could either be a fiery volcano, a town hit by a huge tornado or a town overshadowed by a huge storm.
As a word of warning, don’t let younger siblings get hold of this capsule as they may lose the vital bit of DNA you need to bring your dinosaur to life, but it does look like great fun – I am off to search all the toy boxes to see if I can find it!
The Dinosaur DNA kit is aimed at children over 8 years old, currently retails for around £13.99 and can be found in all good toy stores and online stores too.
We discovered the problem with the plaster in the holes as well but found the soft wax really helped hold it together. We loved the AR set so I hope that you find the DNA stickers!
Love it! We bought something very similar for my dinosaur mad nephew a year or so ago. He loved it 🙂
We really enjoyed our Dinosaur DNA kit! Hoping to purchase further kits as Christmas presents this year. Hope you find the DNA stickers soon!
This is such a cool idea, hope you found the missing piece x
Hope you found it!! That’s where your new found archeologist skills will be useful lolx
That dinosaur DNA kit looks such a great gift for kids into history and science. Love it!
That looks proper messy but great fun. I’d love to discover a dinosaur! My daddy wild go mad at the mess though 😉
What a fab idea, my son loves everything to do with dinosaurs, so this will be a great idea come Birthday/Christmas.
The mess kind of puts me off, as we have had something similar and my children all fought over hammering to open up and it went everywhere, but then again, childhood is about discovering and creating mess along the way.
I hope you found your missing link to complete your dinosaur DNA.
Great review, thanks for sharing
What a great gift for any dinosaur fan! My eldest would have loved it when he was younger x
My kids would love this, they have seen similar ones before and asked about them but I was never too sure. Will have to give it a whirl 🙂
This looks so good – Pickle is a little young yet but he loves dinosaurs. He will love this when he is older. Kaz x