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Review: 10228 Haunted House

  

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Lego 10228 Haunted House

I knew I wanted the Haunted House as soon as I saw the first images appear... so I was at the Lego store on Sept 1 to buy it on the release day with my kids. Then of course, I had to build the thing in one night... took another day to get it all edited and commented and uploaded, but here it is.

Name: Haunted House

Set Number: 10228

Pieces: 2064

Price: $180 US

Ages: 14+

Minifigs: 6

Theme: Monster Fighters

Year of Release: 2012

Links: Bricklink Peeron Brickset

The Box Front

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The front of the box matches the rest of the Monster Fighters line. It's got the usual Lego info and a nice large photo of the house. Interestingly, there ARE two missing normal details. There's no set name, and there's no names for the minifigs.

The Box Back

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The back of the box shows the inside of the house. Unlike the modular line of buildings, this one does not separate into floors. Instead, it hinges open like a dollhouse. There's tons of nice detail to explore, shown here in small inset pictures, but we'll get to that as we build...

The 1:1

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Like most sets, there's a 1:! scale figure on the top of the box so strange people who have never played with Lego can understand the size of the contents.

The Stickers

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Yes, there is a small sticker sheet. Looks like some windows will get decorated, and some tiles will become newspapers, portraits, and records.

The Manuals

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Thankfully, the manuals and sticker sheets came in a bag with cardboard, so they're in great shape. All three books have the same front image as the front of the box.

The Back of the Manuals

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Book one ends with a normal building page. Book two has a Lego Club ad (and is much thinner than the other two books), and sadly, book three has the Win! kid. Seriously Lego, that kid's gotta be what, like 25 by now? Get a new photo!

The Manual Beginning

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The first page of the manual has the usual info about sorting the bags and making the minifigs. Note that there's both glow in the dark ghosts AND glow in the dark zombie heads here.

The Manual Pages

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The pages of the manuals are nice and clear. There's a subtle background of clouds with a moon in the corner, but it's very subtle. The colors are well-defined and the black has white outlines, critical since there's lots of grey and black in this build.

The Bags

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There are 5 loose grey plates and lots of numbered bags. Interestingly, there's only two small bags numbered 1 (minifigs and interior details), lots of 2, 3, and 4, and a single bag 5.

The Minifigs

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The Haunted House has six residents. According to Lego, these are : Vampyre's Bride, Vampyre, Zombie chef, butler, and 2 glow-in-the-dark ghosts. The butler looks more like Frankenstein to me, although in grey rather than green. His head extension piece looks to be the same mold as the monster in Series 4 Collectible Minifigures, but in light bluish grey and a different print. Both Vampyres have glow-in-the-dark heads. I did notice a flaw in the manuals though - it only shows the gold dot on the leg print of the Vampyre, not the white bottom edge of his jacket. In fact, I assembled and photographed the figures wrong the first time since I didn't notice the dot in the manual and assumed both had plain black legs.

The Minifig Backs

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The four main figs all have printing on the back of their torsos, even though it's covered on the Vamprye and nearly covered by the Bride's hair.

The Minifig Alternate Looks

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Here are the back prints on the Vampryes, as well as their alternate faces. Neither servant gets an alternate head print, since the back of their heads aren't covered, but I the Butler does get a full face print (with eyebrows) even though the top is covered by his extra head piece. Also, the ghosts don't get legs, just a white brick and plate. (yes, I got the black legs swapped in this photo. Too bad)

The Accessories

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The rest of bags 1 make an assortment of awesome accessories for the house. Some of them shown here - a heart (from the Pirates of the Caribbean Mill set) in a bottle, a bedframe, a helmet in a tub (I have no idea what that's about), a stove, wardrobe, some jars and light fixtures, and my personal favorite, the incredibly clever phonograph.

Building the House, 1

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The house begins with a foundation - 3 of the large plates with an assortment of bricks and tiles added. Doesn't look like much yet, but just wait....

Building the House, 2

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The other large plates form the other side of the base. There's a hinge connecting the halves and flooring for the front porch has been added.

Building the House, 3

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Ah, the first of the sand green has appeared. There's TONS of it to come. I love the fireplace too - it's got the printed "ship in a bottle" from the small Pirates of the Caribbean set and it's on a hinge which will come in handy later.

Building the House, 4

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This is pretty much how the build is going to go - add brick after brick around the house.

Building the House, the Windows

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The house uses lots of these window modules. They're all similar to this - a couple small windows (with or without glass, and with our without stickers), some nice black detailing at the top and bottom, and a board or shutter across it.

Building the House, 5

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The first floor is basically done. Again, there's tons of sand green bricks in assorted 1x something sizes (1x1, 1x2, 1x4, 1x6 are in abundance). It's a little plain still though since the porch hasn't been finished yet.

Building the House, 6

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At the end of the bags 2, the porch is done and there's a floor for the second floor. A nice detail is the zombie heads at the top of the pillars.

Building the House, 7

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The second floor builds similar to the first - walls with window openings. There's some nice texture from the dark tan brick bricks, and studs on the walls for later decorating. You also use a bunch of the tall 1x1x5 bricks in sand green, which are new to this set.

Building the House, 8

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And in no time, the second floor is complete. Some of these windows get falling shutters instead of boards, but they're still basically the same module. One future play feature is showing though - there's a trapdoor frame and an axle through the wall next to the chimney.

Building the House, 9

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The attic level starts off rather tedious. Any time the part callout in the manual has numbers in the 20s and 30s, you know it's not going to be fun There's 1x2 tiles with handles around the edge, and then alternating 1x1 cylinders and 1x2 inverted slopes on top of that. You can also see the purpose of the trap door - there's a folding ladder made of railing pieces. Cool!

Building the House, 10

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The attic gets a lot of the detail accessories from the first bag.

Building the House, 11

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The attic is nearly done.

Building the House, 12

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Just one bag to go, and the roof is on. It has the same spiky edge of black arms as the porch roof. It's nice that this is supposed to be a run-down building, so you don't have to precisely get all those arms matching and evenly spaced :)

Building the House, 13

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Bag 5 makes this top peak of the building. Nice assortment of slopes for MOCing too. (and fittingly, I documented the build in 13 photos. Bwah hah hah!)

The Finished Outside

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When the house is opened up, you can see most of the outside. Like the modulars, it's heavily detailed on the front and much less on the back, but it's still nice all around. It's a bit disappointing that the shutters aren't the right size for these windows, but it's still a great effect.

The Finished Inside

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The interior shows the attention to detail that's equal to any of the modular buildings. Let's take a closer look...

The Attic

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The attic, naturally, is full of random old stuff. The tub with helmet is here, and the chest has a top hat inside.

A Flaw!

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Here's one issue I have with the design. I like the folding latter on the trap door, but you have to only fold it up almost all the way. If you collapse it completely, the hinges hit the brown plate and it won't go up all the way.

The Music

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The other half of the attic has the Vampyre's music. The photograph and box of records are here, along with a skull and bone for ambiance.

The Second Floor

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This area of the second floor is mostly for transitions, with the stairs from below and the attic ladder being here. Behind the ladder is a writing desk.

The Bedroom

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The right hand side of the second floor is a bedroom. There's a cool antler rack made of white arms, and I like the stickered artwork as well. The green plant in the corner though seems out of place. The tan bamboo leaves would have been better here.

The Kitchen

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The zombie chef has a kitchen to cook for the Vampyres. Not sure I'd like the snake stew that he's working on though.

The Entryway

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The left side of the lower level is a bit boring. The only thing here is the stairway and front door. You can see the fireplace though - when closed, it's over in the kitchen, but when you open the house, it hinges into the center area.

The Side Entrance

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On this side of the house is the kitchen door and a lot of windows.

The Chimney

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The other side of the house is the chimney, which has the hinges built into it. Why oh why though did they use dark grey for half of the hinges though They stick out rather than blending in.

The Gate

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To add to the scene, you also get this front gate in bag 5. It's simple but a nice touch.

With Some Modulars

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As you can see, it can't fit flush with them. The right side has the side door. The left side has the hinge bricks in the chimney - if you removed those it'd fit side by side.

Also, I think it feels a little too big for the others. Sure, the floors are the same size, but it's a single house as big as a fire station. Just doesn't feel right. I think it'd work better in a large layout to have it close and the other modulars farther away to give some perspective.

The Conclusion

Ok, this house is great. It's got all the size and detail of the modular buildings, but in a stand-alone home. It'd be trivial to clean it up and have a nice sand green house, or you can have a run-down dump. It's a lengthy build that can easily occupy several evenings, but nothing's particularly difficult. There's only a few tedious bits during the build. The hinged design makes it much more playable than the modulars as well.

The Ratings

Value: 9/10 - The figs are great, there's lots of sand green, and there's lot of roof slopes. It's a bit more pricey than most of the modulars, but the figs make up for it I'd say.

Design: 9/10 - All the details and furniture make a great house design. I had to deduct though for the dark hinges and the attic ladder though.

Playability: 10/10 - The only way to improve would be to add a garage and car :)

Parts: 8/10 - Points for the color scheme and details, but there's not anything too special.

Overall: 9.6/10 - Go buy one. Or two - have a haunted one and a nice one.

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Nice review. :thumbup: But I've noticed that you've given Lord Vampyre's legs to Butler. He and Cook are awsome :sweet:

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Great review!

I'm really thinking of buying it now (it's at a tempting 139€ in France, for once we've got a good price). As I've read somewhere, I think it would make a fantastic doll house by "fixing" it replacing sand green parts with pink parts. I might buy another one for my daughter if this is doable (pink parts are really hard to find sadly).

One question : do you have other modular buildings? If yes, could you shoot it alongside to see how it compares? Thank you.

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Thanks, it's a beautiful monstrosity IMO. You answered my main question (you like the hinged part as opposed to the stacked floors of the modulars).

It's a little pricey but there are a lot of parts. Wish they'd included a couple monster fighters, anyone collecting the CMFs has most of the figs already.

Funny how they put all the minifigs in one bag, thought they were spreading them out into seperate bags?

Cheers

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Great review and pics. Thanks. But 9/10 for value? By what measure?

MMV, 1602 pieces @ 4.5p/p

Fire Brigade, 2231 pieces @ 4.5p/p

Haunted House, 2064 pieces @ 7.3p/p

It's 60% more expensive than comparable sets. I appreciate we're all fans of Lego here, but if you're going to give every set 8/10 or 9/10 for value regardless of the price, then the scores become meaningless.

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Great review and pics. Thanks. But 9/10 for value? By what measure?

MMV, 1602 pieces @ 4.5p/p

Fire Brigade, 2231 pieces @ 4.5p/p

Haunted House, 2064 pieces @ 7.3p/p

It's 60% more expensive than comparable sets. I appreciate we're all fans of Lego here, but if you're going to give every set 8/10 or 9/10 for value regardless of the price, then the scores become meaningless.

I gave it the value score largely based on the figs, as I noted in that section. The other modulars have fairly basic figs, where this one has the Vampyre couple (otherwise only available in the large MF castle set), the great zombie chef (unique to this set), the butler (another great and unique fig), and a couple (fairly common now) ghosts. Based on the better figs I allowed for the $30 higher price than Fire Brigade or Pet Shop. And compared to the smaller MF sets it's a great value in price/part. And you get tons of sand green, so it's a good value for MOCers too. Keep in mind there's about $30 worth of just 1x6 bricks in sand green (50 some of them). And $10 worth of 1x4 bricks. etc.

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Great review!

I'm really thinking of buying it now (it's at a tempting 139€ in France, for once we've got a good price). As I've read somewhere, I think it would make a fantastic doll house by "fixing" it replacing sand green parts with pink parts. I might buy another one for my daughter if this is doable (pink parts are really hard to find sadly).

One question : do you have other modular buildings? If yes, could you shoot it alongside to see how it compares? Thank you.

I do have several modulars, so I'll get a comparison pic added soon...

Great review! How do you think this stands up next to the Town Hall?? I think I'm gonna get one or the other...

Sorry, don't have the town hall. Want it though :)

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The other modulars have fairly basic figs, where this one has the Vampyre couple (otherwise only available in the large MF castle set), the great zombie chef (unique to this set), the butler (another great and unique fig), and a couple (fairly common now) ghosts.

I guess I should've said that anyone collecting the CMFs has variations of many of the minifigs already.

Anyway, I think I thought of the reason that the hinges are in dark grey (and don't match with the rest of the chimney); it's to somewhat indicate to the uninitiated how to open it. Look at it from the perspective of someone who isn't familiar with the set like we are.

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Great review and awesome looking set. I can see peoples gripe about the price, but I guess it (currently) has some rare/sought after pieces and colours so maybe it can be justified.

Slight typo by TLG on the newspaper stickers, as I'm sure it should be 'Prize' rather than price, but it wouldn't be the first time stickers made little or no sense (I'm thinking of the Kingdoms Dragon wizard "Powerfull" sticker).

I would have liked to have seen a few more play features (trapdoors, secret doors, maybe a pipe organ) as the interior is a bit sparse of large items, which makes me think it isn't really aimed at children or part of the monster fighters theme (other than thematically).

That said, even though I'm not collecting Monster Fighters, or the modulars, there's something about a haunted house that just stirs up nostalgia...

Edited by andhe

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Great review, thank you so much for taking the time to do it. In looking at your attic ladder and comparing it to the one in the designer video, something seems off. His seems to extend fully towards the ground, and yours doesn't without 'kinking'. I'm not sure why this is, perhaps an instruction error? In any event, I'll be able to take a closer look at it once I'm building my copy.

I really appreciate the clarity of your photos as well. Thanks again! :classic:

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Fantastic review of this instant classic! It's got such charm, I don't know how I'll be able to resist nabbing this set. :hmpf: How have you gotten your hands on it already? Has it been released?

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Thanks for the review. I have been anticipating this set. I was already planning on getting the Vampire Castle, but I decided to scrap that and get this instead. I'll just bricklink the brown man-bat.

This is a great looking house and I'm glad they used sand green in brick form instead of one of the grays. I'm not entirely sure if I will build this to display it, or just collect the figures and use the pieces to make another MOC Modular. Maybe even the Green Grocer.

It was nice seeing the build closer up. Thanks.

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Fantastic! Nice seeing some new pictures of the set aswell, altho the official images covered most of it.

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I don't know - there doesn't seem to be too much "texture" to some of the building other than a few brick bricks inserted here and there (although the interiors look great) and the build does look a bit on the tedious side in places. I'm still on the fence between this and the vampire castle - I like the figure selection here better but the vampire castle seems to be a more interesting build with a greater number of unique elements than this.

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The attic level starts off rather tedious.

That's an understatement LOL! This is my first modular set and I about shat myself when I started the third book LOL! I really enjoyed building it tho. Took me about 5 1/2 to 6 hours to do in a day(at nap time and after kids went to bed LOL!) All in all I love the set and am glad I got it.

Edited by prozac

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Hi, do you have the dimension of the box size?? Was thinking of purchasing it on the US website and send over. Thanks in advance !

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Hi, do you have the dimension of the box size?? Was thinking of purchasing it on the US website and send over. Thanks in advance !

You could probably get the box dimensions from Brickset

Edited by bjtpro

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I belive this one will always stay a quiet desire for me. it's waaay too expensive and seeing this review I see it's nothing special :sceptic:

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