Magic Tricks

First of all, I'm going to come right out and say that I don't like or do the whole "psychic" bit. That's not compatible with who I am or my beliefs. For me, though, this is a great trick for mentalists.

TL;DR (Too Long; Didn't Read)
I really enjoyed this product. It's simple, straightforward, and sure to stupify your spectators. It can be done in most settings when your performance is adjusted as necessary. Before I go on, I'll just say - Yes. Get it.

Ok, now, let's review this properly...

Pros:
- It was an enjoyable and very sufficient download. The explanation runs about 30 minutes long. It could have been perhaps a few minutes shorter, but it didn't seem to go on and on. I felt like he taught this very sufficiently.
- Easy to pay attention. He's got a great personality.
- No arts & crafts. Well, you do have to do a tiny amount of prep... but if you consider this too much work or complain it's arts & crafts, you are really, really, really lazy. LOL!
- Household items - plastic bags... ziplock type are great but not absolutely necessary. Blindfold... you'll need one. If you have one, chances are that you either sleep with one or... well, I really don't want to go that direction. TMI. If you don't have a blindfold (no trick blindfold necessary), he does show how you can simply use your hands (or spectator's hands) to cover your eyes. You can even go crazy and wrap your head with bandages, put coins and pads on your eyes, etc. Go crazy. Personally, I love Patrick Kuff's Blindfoil method.
- It's a fooler to laymen. To beginning mentalists, it might be. To more experienced mentalists, chances are that, if you THINK you know how this works, you are probably correct. Skip it if that's you.
- It's performance worthy. In fact, I could see this stretching out for a few minutes if you enjoy ad-libbing. If you like this kind of thing, you're very likely to use this.
- Get several spectators involved.
- No stooges.
- I enjoyed the background music. Though it was on a continuous loop, it seemed to fit his personality. If anyone is wondering, I Shazamed it. haha! The song is "Kingdom of Baghk" by Vusal Zeinalov.

Cons:
- Nighttime/low light street work or closeup might be difficult. It's doable, but you should know what you're getting into (i.e. have experience with this trick) before doing it in low-visibility settings.
- Price - I'd like to see this at $4.95. At $9.95, I'm still happy with what you get. However, to be honest, the method is very simple. So, as I always say, base the price not on the method, but on the effect... then you're more likely to be happy.
- I do wish he went into just a little more detail about various blindfolds. He said that "that's not in the scope of this trick", which he is correct in saying... I just wish he did. Of course, I'm not docking anything for that.
- Personally, I didn't like the whole Marco Polo thing. It seemed to go for a while, which was fine in itself. But then, he didn't do that the rest of the time for the other spectators. I totally understand why he did this... he's trying to keep it interesting. However, personally, I feel like when you do that, you basically discount the approach you just took by discarding it. For example, the next time, finding the correct spectator via a Marco Polo game wasn't necessary. So, my thought would be: "Then why the heck did we just do all that goofy Marco Polo stuff?" Just my opinion. I think taking this from a deductive mentalist approach where you figure out which belonged to each spectator all at once might have worked out better.

Overall impression: Great! This really will make your talents (I prefer a deductive reasoning approach (i.e. Sherlock Holmes)) appear supernatural. This is an easy trick to do that can basically be a mini-act in itself. I really enjoyed this. I give it 4 stars out of 5... 5 I reserve for mind-melting "magical" visual tricks and things that just go nuclear on spectators. This trick is not that. It's more of a credibility builder (Dang, this guy knows what he's doing!), which is a compliment and a necessary element to have when trying to be a mentalist. Is it worth the money? Yes (unless you have experience with this already). Is it easy? Yes. Is it something that will go into your repretoire? LIkely, Yes.

By the way, I always try to be honest and straightforward in my reviews, while being respectful to the magician. If you appreciate my reviews, can you please click the "Yes" button below beside the question, "Did this review help you?" It's not like I actually benefit in any way by your clicking it... but it would be nice to see if my reviews are helpful or not. I hope they are. If you ever have suggestions or comments or questions about my reviews, please feel free to leave me a constructive comment. I'm just trying to be helpful. I love the Penguin community and hope that I can someday contribute my own product. :-) Thanks for reading and for any (hopefully positive, but either way, at least kind) feedback.