Hot Wheels Dragon Fire Track Set

Despite the negative reviews and warning we caved in - this was our 4 year old's only wish from Santa this year and all he talked about! So we hoped that the positive reviews were right and got it for him...
Putting it together is a snap and really easy - a pleasant surprise. The real problem is that it does not work... the car (that came with it) will not complete the circuit even once in a lifetime! The boosters just don't have enough oomph to accelerate the car enough to make it through loopings reliably. The whole dragon head thing seems totally pointless since the car never completes the loopings anyway - it doesn't matter whether the dragon head hits it or not!
This is running on brand new Duracell D's so I do not believe the battery power is to blame but I will try another set just in case.
I am also surprised about some comments here about pinched fingers etc - the booster wheels have clutches and stop at the slightest touch of a finger, so I can't see much danger coming from them. Maybe that's the whole difference between some people's (working?) tracks and ours?
Another very annoying thing is that it is mentioned everywhere that the real fun is having multiple cars running through it - well, the one car that comes with it is just about the only one that will work with it! Mattel lists about 8 other car models that will work but good luck finding those! We bought a whole package of cars that even had the dragon head printed on the package and only one of those is listed. But, worst of all, since the boosters are so weak they would never "recharge" in time once a car went through them - so they would never be able to accelerate another car at the same time (well, they don' even accelerate one car right).
So please heed my warning - this is absolute JUNK, a $[...] game that does not even once work out of the box. And Mattel doesn't even offer any web site help or anything - this is the height of arrogance by a company that obviously doesn't have to care because parents like us get suckered into buying the junk. How do you explain to a four-year old that Santa got him some junk that does not even work?

Christmas day is a terrible time to be disappointed with the ONE toy you wanted so bad that it's all you asked Santa for...

My six-year old lives & breathes dragons & race cars. So despite the price & negative experiences with other Hot Wheels track sets, we caved to elf-pressure & got it. It falls apart when bumped. The stick that makes the dragon work is too short & falls out. It took forever to put together (which is what you expect on Christmas day, but geez louise!). The cars almost never make a full circuit...they fall out of the track, get jammed in the accelerators, or run into one of the joints where the track doesn't exactly fit together right.

And a word to mom's with long hair: DON'T BEND OVER THE TRACK--IT'S MEAN & PULLS HAIR! It wasn't a terrible yank, but I had to turn it off to extricate myself. If you have a little girl w/long hair who likes race cars (hey, it could happen...), it could scare her pretty bad even if it doesn't hurt that much.

All in all, a HUGE disappointment. Sure think a company this old could figure out how to make race tracks that don't fall apart...

This toy is fun and cool but it is very loud. My son has auditory sensory issues and this wasn't a good choice for him. He loves it, but won't turn it on.

From the moment my 5 1/2 year old and his two Uncles saw this, they loved it. Santa brought the best gift. They spent probably close to an hour playing with this dragon track as soon as my son opened it and I can't tell you how many pictures they thought they needed of it. It's a great track. Went together easy and hours of fun for the WHOLE family!

This toy is all flash and no substance. It works. The cars shoot around the track a few times befire they finally wipe out. But the boosters don't seem to have anough torque to recover from one car to the next so if you try to run more than one car at a time, it's likely the second car through the booster will not make it around the loop.

But all that aside, the toy is a bore. My kids (ages 3 and 5) were on FIRE to get this toy up and running and were so excited once it was assembled to play that they could hardly contain themselves. About 15 minutes after they started playing, they lost interest and went back to manually sending their hotwheel cars down the simple track going down the stairs to the basement. The toy just has no substance. You put a car in, it shoots around for a while, then it eventually flips over or something and stops. The end. It was more fun to build having my kids searching for and handing me the right lettered track piece than it was to play with. But I must admit, they were certainly sold on it's packaging hype and flashy layout.

Final word: Fun to watch for a few minutes, but not worth the $40. There are much more engaging ways to entertain a child for that much money.