Nerf Rival Atlas XV- 1200 Blaster Toy, Red

This toy was one of the favorites at Christmas this year. The first shot sounds extremely intimidating and I almost regretted buying it for the kids, but the bark is worse than the bite and it doesn't hurt to be shot by the little balls. A spontaneous Nerf war broke out and the whole family enjoyed battling with this and the Nerf Zombie Strike Doominator Blaster. Definitely recommend this one for kids and adults of all ages. You may need to assist the kids with loading the balls at first, but they'll get the hang out of it pretty quick.

Great shotgun blaster

My sons love all Nerf guns and this one is no exception. I feel like sometimes our house is over-flowing with Nerf guns, it seems that is all they ask for during Christmas or birthdays. Still fairly safe to play with indoors but really fun when you get to play outdoors. (Too cold right now) We like to set up shooting galleries for the boys with cardboard boxes and Solo cups.

The Nerf Rival series marches on with the Atlas XVI, which represents the first "gimmick" style blaster in the series. In this case, the gimmick is the ability to fire two Rival HIRs (High Impact Rounds) simultaneously. While firing two or more rounds at once is nothing new for Nerf blasters (going all the way back to the early 90s), it's a first for the Rival series.In most respects, the Atlas is a solid blaster. Like most Rival blasters, it's a very large blaster overall, with a huge chassis, large grip and oversized foregrip. This makes the Atlas somewhat heavy and it will definitely require two hands to use, though neither of this points are really a detraction. The Atlas is primed via sliding the foregrip back and forth once, which places two HIRs in the chamber. The trigger has an integrated safety (a welcome feature new to the Rival line) and fires both HIRs when pulled. As expected, the Atlas boasts impressive power and range and is reasonably accurate, placing it in roughly equal footing to the Apollo. The Atlas is somewhat limited on ammunition as it can only carry 10 round magazines (and no larger) and, given the dual shot nature, this is really only good for effectively 5 shots. The magazine well itself is somewhat awkwardly placed on the blaster, a problem that is common to the other large Rival blasters (such as the Zeus). This can make reloading somewhat troublesome but not especially so.Overall, the Atlas is a cool shotgun-style blaster that boasts Rival performance with the typical wonky reloading and easy-to-lose HIRs (seriously, these things bounce like crazy when fired and are small enough to go EVERYWHERE). It doesn't do anything exceptionally new or interesting, but it works well and its gimmick is all-around pretty fun. I for one just hope that Hasbro keeps the gimmicks to a minimum for this line and concentrates on performance, simplicity, and ruggedness in the future.

I love giving nerf guns to my kids for presents— they have ‘nerf gun wars’ with each other and it keeps them away from the tv. It’s worth buying a gun that’s a little better than the low end ones, the kids get more excited to pull them out and use them

This thing is big. Fires 2 balls at a time. Not as accurate as the single shot guns, but just as powerful. The longer magazine of the xvi-1200 works in the smaller 700, but not the other way. These rival guns shoot harder and farther than the dart based Nerf guns. Take that into consideration if buying for a younger child. Pictured with the Apollo-700 for size comparison.

My 12 year old son saved up his money to purchase this. He is happy with it and it has held up well

Using my ProChrono Digital chronograph, I was able to measure the speed of the Rival Rounds (balls; obviously not darts) fired by this stock Rival Atlas blaster at an average of 86 FPS feet per second (FPS). This is notably weaker than the other Rival blasters, which have an average velocity of 100 FPS. In fact, the Atlas shotgun type blaster is the weakest in the entire the Rival line. The main reason for this is that the blaster is forced to shoot 2 balls at a time with both balls flying out of the same hole, thereby sharing the force of the spring-weighted prime. Still, at 86 FPS, that is still faster than the average Nerf Elite dart blaster which is at 70 FPS. Using this shot-blaster is supposed to feel really cool, but for me it feels kind of odd for some reason. I think it is because it makes an unnecessarily loud ratcheting sound every time I prime it. It could also be because of the extensive length of the priming tract, and the ergonomics of the handle do not feel as comfortable as I expected either. It is like my middle finger is being forced to accommodate the bump on the handle grip. It has a big forward pump-grip priming handle. The blaster comes with a 12-round magazine and can only be reloaded with a 12-round mag. Loading the mag takes some getting used to because you have to fit it right and slam it in place to go in right. To remove the mag, you need to press the awkward magazine release levers down (on both sides) in tandem while sliding the magazine out with your other hand (you can use your third hand to hold the blaster while you do this. Just kidding, but seriously you have to figure that part out by yourself, lol). There is a lever on the left side of the Atlas that supposedly releases an internal mechanical lock if it ever accidentally freezes up. The safety-lock button behind the trigger rubs against my finger as I hold the blaster, and perhaps the Nerf design team could have relocated it to a better location if not at least made it more comfortable to press (it looks like the half-moon male end of a dial knob). There is a jam door on the left side which functions normally, but I have not had to use it for a jam yet, and don’t get me wrong, it does jam. It is just not the place where the jams typically happen. If you are using knockoff ammo that are less firm than the official Rival Rounds, expect a lot more jams. Apparently the balls try to fit in together at the same time, and I’ll let you imagine what that looks like in the barrel. The Picatinny type rail on the top is not supposed to fit Picatinny type products, but it can fit Nerf Rival accessories and Standard Nerf Tactical Rail attachments. It has a tiny flip-up iron sight on it that does not line-up with anything in the rear. There is a single sling-mount attachment point on the rear of the blaster for what I suppose is to sling it behind you to use as a secondary if you are okay with lugging this hefty blaster around on your back. Like the other Rival blasters, it is really long and comes in the colors red or blue. Obviously, the Atlas would be a close-quarters combat (a shotgun) blaster for those who like to get "up close and personal" to their opponents. There are two balls fired at a time, which could either hurt or help you: as a pro, it has a decent spread damage from further distances despite both balls following the same path (they usually fly close to each other while airborne but they sometimes don’t have the same inertia so one of them may fall shorter), and as a con, you chew through your 12 round mag twice as fast. There is no way to select a single round firing option, so really, you can only fire off 6 shots before you need to reload. In conclusion, I personally think this would have been better if it were smaller in size (the Rival blasters are in desperate need of a Rival secondary that you can switch to when your primary is out of ammo in the middle of a firefight), or at least if it held two magazines at a time. While it does provide adequate firepower at close range, the rest of the Rival line shoots harder, farther, typically carry more ammo at-the-ready and/or have an easier time reloading. The Atlas user should always be at a disadvantage. I prefer to utilize the Atlas’ sling mount and sling it over my shoulder to pull out in a pinch. Come on Hasbro, bring out the Kronos already (5-round Rival pistol).