Review: 8197 Highway Chaos

[Ricecracker]

With the beginning of the new year, Lego is giving us reason to celebrate. Today I'm going to be reviewing for you set 8197 Highway Chaos from the Tiny Turbos subtheme of the Racers theme. I'll start off with some set info:

Set Name: Highway Chaos

Set Number: 8197

Theme: Racers

Subtheme: Tiny Turbos

Pieces: 142

Year: 2010 (November 24th 2009 release in some parts of the world)

Price: CAD $19.99/USD $14.99/AUD $24.99/EUR 14.99/GBP 9.99

Resources:

Bricklink

Brickset

Peeron

Lego S@H

flickr

Now for the review!

The Box:

Front:

A very action-oriented scene is presented to us. While there is what appears to be a bridge tress in the background, the set doesn't actually feel well suited for a bridge scene, but rather a highway scene. To each their own, I guess.

Back:

The back shows another slightly different view of the set, as well as the unfolding function of the ramp.

Sides:

Not really anything unusual here.

Opening the Set

Once you cut the plastic handcuffs () off the box, you pull out the fold-out-ramp, which holds the contents of the set.

Car taken off the box

You can see that if you take the yellow "car" off the other end, the F.O.R. (Fold-out ramp) doesn't actually come down the whole length of the box. And so continues the age-old debate surrounding packaging size.

Contents:

Inside the box you get this: One (1) F.O.R., one (1) instruction booklet, two (2) numbered parts bags with parts, and two (2[!]) sticker sheets.

And since I know you all want to see the contents separately, here we go:

Instruction Booklet:

It has the same picture as on the front of the box, just with more blank space around it. Nice contrast between the darker set and the lighter sky.

Bags:

Bags one and two build the cars and toll booth, respectively.

Sticker Sheets:

I have to admit that I while I don't like putting stickers on official sets, these do seem like they'll be useful for MOCs.

The Build:

Bag One:

Here we have bag one open and emptied. I spy with my little eye some nice parts.

1x2 Cheese

The only relatively new piece; a 1x2 cheese in black. Seems like a rather useful piece if I do say so myself.

Car One: The Muscle:

Car one is starting to take shape. It is a pretty solid car, unlike many in the CITY line-up.

Car One Complete

Car one finished! But wait!? Where are the wheels? Could they be in bag two?

That's right, Lego decided to put the wheels and tires in bag two for us, even though the cars are in bag one. , to say the least.

Car Two: The Copper:

Car two uses more single-use pieces than car one, but I think it has a nicer shape overall.

Car Two Complete

Complete! I think the black looks very nice against the white, though I really wish the light bar were tiled.

Bag Two:

Some interesting parts can be spotted.

Interesting Parts:

And here they are. A 6x6 Light Bluish Gray tile, and three White 2x4 tiles.

The building:

Bag two builds us the bulk of the set, the tollbooth on the base.

The One Dissapointment

The tollbooth isn't bad, but as you can see, the gate can't go fully up, meaning it'd be hard to use immediately with larger, minifig scaled vehicles.

The Set

The set in all of it's glory. It is actually pretty fun to have the police car chase the robbers (?), and smash through the

tollbooth...

WHEWWWwww....

Watch out, here come the cops!

The Verdict

Scoring:

Minifigs: N/A

Parts: 8/10 A nice selection of common and uncommon pieces, including some new ones (2x4 tiles), and some quite old, revived ones (6x6 tiles).

Price: 8.5/10 At 10.6 cents a piece (U.S.), it's almost perfect.

Playability: 7/10 I found this set to be extremely fun to play with, and I think children will too. The downside is, as a standalone set, it seems to have a very set storyline.

Design: 6/10 The racers are your average tiny turbos, and the toll booth is sparsely built. The inclusion of the extra signpost was a plus.

Overall: 29.5/40 Overall, I'd recommend this to a friend. Definitely more of a parts pack, with some new (and old!) parts.

Edited January 5, 2010 by SmurfFangy
Indexed

[prateek]

Cool review. Lego has the right idea, but these could be a bit cheaper and instead of a F.O.R., they could have proper accesories.

[Raphy]

Nothin' like a good 'ol Tiny Turbo to take one's mind off those mechas, starfighters, apoc trucks, steampunk floaters, castles, towns, star wars vehicles, nature vignettes, painted cl0nez, mosaics, pirate ships, World War II vignettes, modern warfare helis, gunships and minifigure-scale locomotives for a while, eh? ^__^

[The Cobra]

I already liked this set, your review makes me like it even more.

I hope this year a local shopping mall will sell these fold-outs for 10 Euros instead of 15, then I will surely buy it.

[Holodoc]

Nice review ricecracker!

I call some of the TT sets my own. They are fairly cheap - especially when they are on sale , and these sets tend to go on sale if you are patient enough.

Last years TT sets went to my little sons (6 years) collection. I believe this set is one he would like: It's got a "bad guy car" and and a police one to chase it! Woohoo! That's what younger children love.

Parts: 8/10 A nice selection of common and uncommon pieces, including some new ones (2x4 tiles), and some quite old, revived ones (6x6 tiles).

I wouldn't give it an 8 out of ten. The parts used in this set are common parts, nothing really special and not many for that price (like all of the TT sets).

And the 6x6 tiles are old?

I didn't knew that. In which set were they released before?

[lightningtiger]

Interesting set - normally I don't have much time for racers, but I see their place in the Lego world, hey it's not everyday you build your own Hot Wheels style car now is it ?

Great review 'Ricecracker' - lots of information especially on the DSS (oh why ?!).

I might copy the toll booth idea and bring it to minifig scale - hello LDD !

[Ricecracker]

And the 6x6 tiles are old?

I didn't knew that. In which set were they released before?

Yep, they came in older Scala sets. Here is the Bricklink catalog entry for them.

[Big Cam]

Deja Vu, great looking review, i look forward to the next.

These racer sets although they look cool, I do not think will be in my 2010 budget.

[paul_delahaye]

This reminds me of the old micro machines travel playsets from yester year!

http://media.photobucket.com/image/micro%2..._FishNChips.png

All folding away within the case

[CommanderFox]

Great Review Ricecracker!

This looks like a nice set.

Great choice of parts...especially that 6X6 tile!

The cars are quite nice aswell.

Thanks for the Review!

CommanderFox

[saturncoupe1999]

Car One Complete

Car one finished! But wait!? Where are the wheels? Could they be in bag two?

Actually, putting the tires and wheels in a different bag from the cars is a good idea. I've noticed that some of the tires can leave an oily, icky coating on any parts they come in contact with. So this would prevent the need to clean the parts for the cars before building. I doubt that TLG is listening to only me, but I did offer the suggestion to bag the tires seperately. Let's see if this practice continues.

[Ricecracker]

Actually, putting the tires and wheels in a different bag from the cars is a good idea. I've noticed that some of the tires can leave an oily, icky coating on any parts they come in contact with. So this would prevent the need to clean the parts for the cars before building. I doubt that TLG is listening to only me, but I did offer the suggestion to bag the tires seperately. Let's see if this practice continues.

They aren't bagged separately, they were in the bag with the parts for the building. Also, these tires tend not to be as oily as other ones.