Review : 6256 Islander Catamaran

[Guss]

Hello everyone! a short time ago I received my prize for second place in the Captain's Cabin Contest, it's an old and cool pirate set, the 6256 Islander Catamaran, so here I am to make a little review of it!

Details:

Reference: 6256

Theme: Pirate

Name: Islander Catamaran

Year : 1994

Pieces : 56

Minifig : 2

Price : it was sold 12$

Links : Gallery, Brickset, Peeron

Box:

I received it in this box :

Well, it doesn't really looks like a box, that's the package I received, so here is the box ( found it on Peeron.com ) :

Content:

A plastic bag, an old sail and a manual, that's of course not the "official content".

Here is a close-up of the sail which have a really cool "islander painting" on it, in the black box, it's the back of it :

Here are the 2 "canoes" , with stickers on it, the stickers are quite old so they're a little "unglued" , but that's ok, it's an old set!

Here are the rest of the parts, except the minifigs and the crocodile, you can see that it contains some nice arches and 4 "horns" .

Manual:

The front of the manual is of course the same as the box art, the back of it is just empty, which is quite rare now, they're always commercials for new sets:

At the end of it, there is no commercial for the pirate theme or for other lego sets like in new manuals too, there is just another picture of the set, of course there is no part list as well :

Here is a random page of it, as you see it's well explained :

Build:

It's easy and quick to build, but they did put a scheme with an upper view of the set :

Complete Model:

The minifigs are really cool , and the crocodile is nice, I love Lego crocodiles!

As you can see the back of the minifigs are unprinted, this seems to be the norm from my pre 1995 Lego memories

And here is the complete Set, the catamaran is really nice, the two parrots, which I supposed they're statues, are really a nice touch.

A view from the other side, you can see the rudder, that can't move to the left or to the right, but that's a minor point. You can also see that the crocodile can't reach the islanders when they're on the catamaran, he must wait that one of them does a mistake and fall on the water!

That's a really little set, but finally the model is quite "big" for the number of pieces, so the minifigs really have some space to move, and it features some cool accessories, I loved the Staff and the drum, they're simple but awesome:

Notes:

Design: 9/10 __ It really looks like what it's supposed to be, a nice Islander Catamaran, plus the sails printing is really cool!

Build: 8/10 __ A simple build but well thought, I learnt that arches can nicely be put on a canoe

Parts: For a pirate fan : 9/10 For the others : 6/10 __ Apart from the arches, the others are not very useful for non-pirates fan, for Pirates fan, there is a lot of great parts!

Playability: 9/10 __ With all the accessories, the crocodile and a couple of islanders, you can make a lot of little stories, with only 56 pieces!

Minifigures: 9/10 __ 2 minifigs + a crocodile is quite nice for a small set.

Price: N/A __ Not sold any more, but it was not expensive if you consider the cool islander parts.

Overall: 8/10

Conclusion:

This little old set is very nice for it size, the playability is awesome for a so little set, you have a crocodile, 2 canoes, an exclusive sail, 2 parrots and 2 minifigs with some accessories, like a spear, a staff and a drum ! For a set with less than 60 parts, that's very nice! Plus the design of the catamaran is really cool, it really fits the islander and it's their biggest boat! there was only one other islander boat released so this is the biggest boat from this line, ( this one) , so for a pirate fan, I think this set is a must have.

For an Afol who's not really into pirate, it's surely a not very interesting set, apart from building islanders moc, the parts are not very useful, the sail can't be used for another theme as well than the canoe(once the stickers put), but it's still cool, because it's the only Lego set that come with 2 canoes, and it haves some nice black parts ! so that's still cool!

Edited June 19, 2009 by Guss

[alex12]

Love the review.

I'll have to buy one to attack my pirates.

Loving the fact the lady islander has some lip gloss on in the middle of nowhere.

Reminds me of some peeps i know.

Edited June 9, 2009 by alex12

[Rijkvv]

Nice review.

This is one of the sets I always dreamed of as a kid.

[Lorentzen]

Wow - what an amazing review. It sort of made me want to own this set :)

there are a lot of nice features in this set for sure. Excellent pictures btw

[Ratshot]

Good Review Guss. I really like this set even though I haven't seen it intirely built (My cousins gave me there old one. It came in shambels so I wasn't able to build it.)

[Captain Blackmoor]

Awesome review Guss! I see your Reviewers Acedemy badge turned into silver, perhaps that was already earlier, but I just notice it.

I never knew this small set could be such a nice one, I wish I had one since I can use the pieces! I have no islanders at all so...

Thanks for letting me know this set is quite awesome!

[I Scream Clone]

An awesome review of a great little set. I may have to find some of these around.

The photos are really clear and the text is well written. Thanks for putting the time in to review this set and congrats on achieving your Silver medal too.

[Teddy]

Thanks for the reviwe Guss.

It's always nice to see reviews of these old classics.

[Tom Bricks]

This set looks great compared to the other classic pirates sets and the islander figures are well done. I am a proud owner of this set and I still love how well the sail and mast work with the boat. Red is probably not the most historically accurate color for the canoes but it brings some less common colors to the pirate line.

[Dr. Steve]

That was a great review, very detailed and very good pics

A+

[Guss]

thanks for all the "great review" everyone^^

the text is well written.

thanks to your corrections I Scream Clone ^^

congrats on achieving your Silver medal too.

I see your Reviewers Acedemy badge turned into silver, perhaps that was already earlier, but I just notice it.

No it wasn't already there earlier, this is my 6th review ^^ thanks for your kind words!

Edited June 10, 2009 by Guss

[General Armendariz]

for the tenth time...Great review. and I see you got a fantastic condition set for your prize

Edited June 11, 2009 by General Armendariz

[Fluyt]

This is a very nice set, I also aquired this in the Captain's Cabin Contest .

With relatively few parts, it still mounts up to a substantial and solid looking set. It includes some nice special parts, like the "zebra-hide" round tile and a good source of canoes.

The only improvement would be that Kahuka could be replaced with a normal islander, that would make it way better to buy multiples of it. He is in just about every islander set (or otherwise you could make one, like with the forbidden cove set, the only set he wasn't in was crocodile cage I think). +maybe the canoes would be better if printed, I have 4 now, and all of them have peeling stickers to some degree (any well working fixes?).