What's in the Box
I bought this under the false impression that it came with a stripped-down player's handbook and DM's guide. It does not. The Player's book is essentially a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure style story that talks you through building up a character by taking you on a short quest and translating your decisions along the way into parts of your character sheet. The Dungeon Master's book contains some basic rules of play, such as tips on roleplaying and combat, a short group adventure, some instructions for creating your own scenarios, and a small selection of monsters to use.
The set also contains a large double-sided fold-out set of maps, player and monster tokens, power cards, and a set of polyhedral dice.
The Good
Rather than letting my kids build their characters themselves through the solo adventure, I chose to DM it for them (the youngest is 5 after all). They enjoyed this, although it gets repetitive to have to use the same adventure to create lots of player characters. Sadly there are no reference instructions on character creation in this set, you really have to use the solo adventure or nothing else.
Once they'd got their characters build, I DM'd the group adventure for them, and we all had great fun. 4th edition D&D (and this box set in particular) get a lot of flak, but as a joint Christmas present it was definitely worth it. I ended up using it as a tool to teach my kids what Roleplaying Games are and how you play them. I'm not sure how well any of us would have fared if I hadn't done in all before (albeit years ago).
The kids found the power cards handy to quickly check what their abilities were and how they worked. The dice included are functional (luckily I'm not a dice connoisseur, and there was no way I was going to dig through my loft to find the dozens I had as a kid). The map poster is usable and so are the character and monster tokens, although I recommend getting some zip-lock bags for those to keep them sorted.
The Not so Good
I can't avoid mentioning that half the box is cardboard filler - literally a cardboard wedge. There's also a lot of hate for this box set on the internet for various reasons. This set is based on the 'Essentials' rules, which differ slightly from the full 4th edition rules, which themselves have their own naysayers. Having taken a huge break from D&D since Advanced D&D 2nd Edition, I don't think I'm qualified to judge why any edition is better than any other, but a lot of comments certainly smack of the usual Internet trope of "I like my thing and your thing sucks!".
So far, I've no complaints with 4th edition. It's an odd time to start playing it, as 5th edition (or D&D Next) is being play-tested, and a lot of people still fight for the 3.5 rules. But there's a lot of 4th edition material out there, it is based on the d20 system (along with a lot of other RPGs) and unless you're really hardcore about your RPGs, I don't think you're going to have a problem.
The most frustrating thing for me was not having a proper reference for character creation. You just have to go through that same solo adventure over and over again to get it done. You're going to be aching for the full core rule books very soon into playing this.
Verdict
I think a lot of the critics are maybe missing the point of this set. If you have any experience of RPGs at all, you're going to find lots of holes to pick. But consider the challenge for Wizards of the Coast: to create a Starter set in the proper meaning of the word, that introduces a game and allows you to play it if you're new to even the concept of pen and paper roleplaying. Most of us were lucky enough to be drawn into it via friends and relatives, but if you're completely new to RPGs it is a tricky concept. Maybe the only way to baby step people into it is through a set like this.
Overall, even with its faults, we had a blast with this set over Christmas. It reminded me how much I love roleplaying, and now I'm fully back into it.
It goes in and out of stock at Amazon, but they usually list other sellers that may have it. If you've played D&D before, you should maybe just see it as a box of maps, dice and counters.
If you've played before, Wizards of the Coast actually put the quick-start rules online for free:
Quick Start Rules - Wizards of the Coast
And the first published D&D 4th edition supplement is online for free:
Keep on the Shadowfell - Wizards of the Coast
But personally I think you'd struggle to play that without the full core rulebooks.
Also of note, the d20 system that D&D 4th edition is based on, available for free under the Open Gaming License:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=d20/article/srdarchive
And finally, if you're married to the 3.5 rules (not judging - never played 'em) I'm sure you won't let me get away without mentioning Pathfinder. As its also based on 3.5's open d20 system, there's a free resource for Pathfinder online here:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com
Adventure!
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