"Astro Venture Mars Mission" Mars Base review:

This playset comes with a nice sized habitat, a botanical pod with "growing" plants (gimmick works EXTREMELY poorly), 2 figures and a bunch of accessories.

The habitat is scaled to the included 3" figures but works quite well for standard 3.75" figures like "Star Wars", but is less compatible with 4" figures like "Fortnite". 3.75" figures fit well at the chair and can stand inside the habitat with the lid closed, although the chair has a protusion in the front that works better with ball jointed hips than with swivel hips. 4" figures fit at the chair but cannot stand in the habitat with the lid closed without stooping a bit. There are electronic lights in the interior that are EXTREMELY bright and a small turning wheel on the underside that raises and lowers the comm antennae on the top of the habitat.

The interior has a control panel with an adjustable chair, removeable toolbox, storage spots for the included tools and places for the specimin containers to plug into the console, a food preparation station with removeable foodstuffs and an adjustable rack for the sleep chamber (which I will not be using as it is too small).

The botanical pod is kind of a waste as the gimmick is pretty badly done, but I can take it apart and use it for a custom project so it is not a total loss.

The accessories include handheld metal detector, drill, grinder and a gas analyzer. The set also has some terrain pieces including a rockpile, a crater and 2 rocks that pop apart to reveal trilobite-like fossils inside. The grinder's handle is too thick for most figures, but can be customized to work. The metal detector is really short for 3.75" figures but can be modified to work.

The robot figure is kind of cool, but the waist joint on mine snapped when I tried to turn it so it will need to be repaired. I want to use it as a labor droid but will be swapping the lower arms for something less cartoonish.

The astronaut figure is way too kidish for my needs but the backpack is great and I am going to try and modify the head/helmet for a custom figure.

This set is worth the $29.99 I paid for it and I will be grabbing more if/when they hit clearance.

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fun stuff

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It reminds me of the Baroness' bathysphere from The MASS Device!

Thanks for the review!

Makes me want to turn it into a TIE Fighter prototype or something...

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