LEGO Sci-Fi Ongoing - Rumors, Speculation, and Discussion

[jodawill]

Yeah, I agree with danth. This is an extremely boring set. It doesn't seem to be a very compelling pinball experience. The minifigure has mostly been released already and now I'm extremely annoyed that I bought the ones with yellow hands, not that it was one of my top color choices anyway.

I didn't have high expectations for this set, but it's underwhelming no matter how you look at it. I was really hoping we would at least get a couple good classic space parts out of it, but there's absolutely nothing here I'm interested in buying. I don't know who this set is for.

[danth]

Honestly, I'm almost angry at how bad at is, even ignoring the lack of tie-in to Lego Space.

For an idea of what this could have been, with about the same number of pieces...LOOK HOW GOOD THIS IS:

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DZaus6zO6ff/

Edited June 17 by danth

[Lyichir]

I dunno if I agree. That one seems almost too busy and cluttered, and relies on a lot of electronics for its looks (yet does not do actually useful things with those electronics, like keep score in any way despite the multiple non-functional score and multiplier labels). I kind of prefer the simpler brick-built arrows and lights on this one along with the fun mechanical feature of the astronaut elevating based on your performance (a novel way of creating a performance-based objective without electronic scorekeeping). That's not even getting into the tacky pseudo-Star Wars designs of its themed models.

It's not exactly a Classic Space homage beyond the figure choice, but I see plenty of reasons I'd prefer this new set over this clone set that comes across to me as more style over substance.

[danth]

I would argue that "busy and cluttered" are good things in pinball. Seriously, go look at actual pinball games. They have so much going on!

Basically, this pinball set has two spinners, one bash target, and one ramp. Where are the bumpers though? And the standard slingshots above the flippers? I realize this is Lego, but you can't leave out the basics!

The fake Star Wars spaceships in the Guly set are better than nothing. The Lego set should have at least a couple small spaceship builds, or what is even the point? Stuff like that is standard in pinball games. See this Terminator pinball machine with Terminator head and vehicle. You gotta have things to look at!

Also the Guly set has brick built arrows too. And they light up! I don't know about this style over substance talk when the Lego set has almost no style or substance. 

The ramp and the "score" count gimmick are cool but not enough. 

I think bumpers, some space ship "clutter", and large prints (not stickers) of something from the past 40 years of Lego Space lore (even some theme I don't like as much like Alien Conquest) would have saved this set.

Edited June 18 by danth

[danth]

Reading the comments on the Brickset article is cathartic and vindicating.

https://brickset.com/article/132548/lego-11374-arcade-pinball-machine-revealed-with-new-classic-space-minifigures!

Basically a lot of people saying what I'm saying. It's boring, not enough pinball features, not actually Space themed (Classic or otherwise), and the stickers suck.

[RichardGoring]

I like it as a thing made of LEGO and at first glance it looks good. My initial reaction is that it's very clever to have made a pinball machine out of LEGO.

But at $230, you're paying so much more than you would for a similar sized, but still more detailed and complex pinball machine. There are some for just $30 on Amazon. And some for $30 where you construct it out of wooden pieces, so you can even get a build experience from it.

That is true of many things though. What I'm not convinced about is whether the build experience will be any good. I got to build the table football set and it was so dense with parts to make it structurally sound, that it didn't have the joy of clever techniques or delightful NPU that you get from many other sets. It was just a very heavy, dense, robust, and therefore expensive, block of LEGO. And it couldn't have been anything else, given what it was required to do. It was probably just a poor choice of subject matter. That's what worries me about this. Maybe reviews will tell me that the build is actually incredible and I will be wrong.

But then, you come back to whether it's better to have a thing made of LEGO vs a more detailed and more functional non-LEGO version of the same thing.

Edited to add: I do like the brick built arrows in the floor of the ball area, which is really neat.

[RichardGoring]

Video review from Cheesey Studios. And the statement "I genuinely did not enjoy the build process at all on this one, until the last couple of bags..." which is really worrying. The review is mostly focused on the play, which is cool for LEGO, but not great for pinball. It's as I feared based on the table football set. Such a shame. Still like the overall look of it though. The new blue violet colour goes well with black.

 

[Space78]

Yeah, saw his video review yesterday.  Glad he was pretty thorough.  This is just too basic for the price.  I mean, there are only two things to aim for - the gray boulder to move the scoring, and the ramp (which gets you nothing on the scoring).  That's it.  I think ages 3 - 99 will get bored with this pretty quickly, so not much value as a functional model, and the price is just too steep for what it is.  It's an easy pass for me.

[SpacePolice89]

Yesterday I built the upscaled blue Classic Space astronaut and I have to say that I really like how it looks.

 

[SpacePolice89]

A picture from the instructions

Of those sets I have 6820 and 6702.

[danth]

According to the LegoLeaks subreddit, there will be a City Interstellar Space Shuttle set in Jan 2027. I wonder if it'll be sci-fi? 

$25, so won't be too big.

[Black Falcon]

Quite surprised about it, as it seems to be a standalone set for now. Well, will be while before we see pictures.

[GreenhouseBricker]

Apparently we are getting an "Interstellar Space Shuttle" set 60539 in January. It will be under the city banner. I wonder is this will continue the style we got in 2025 or if it will be something new?

[Lyichir]

7 hours ago, GreenhouseBricker said:

Apparently we are getting an "Interstellar Space Shuttle" set 60539 in January. It will be under the city banner. I wonder is this will continue the style we got in 2025 or if it will be something new?

If it's standalone (i.e. not establishing a whole new subtheme), I kind of hope it stays the same style (or at least something somewhat compatible).

[Brickthus]

On 1/7/2025 at 1:51 AM, PlanetLEGO said:

If we're going by LEGO dropping a hint to a Futuron set, I wonder if the fact the reference is to "bases" could play a role...

What Futuron set would be sizable and iconic enough for an Icons remake than the Monorail anyways? :P

A Futuron Monorail Icons set would have to be up to date, using available pieces rather than the large bespoke pieces of the 1990s.

I have been developing a new system for 14 years and it is finally ready to recreate set 6990.  Viola!

The track, train and canopies are all made from small, available pieces, 3000 for the set.  The largest are the available stanchions and a standard train motor.

PF/PU compatible, PU in the set, using the same electrical pieces as a train set.  I use a PF LiPo battery for exhibitions.  An earlier train ran 3km on one charge of the battery.

The small pieces mean it can be supported from Pick-a-Brick online, far beyond the shelf life of a set.  Track records may tumble!

Please log into LEGO Ideas and support the project https://ideas.lego.com/product-ideas/3b2e5ca7-13c5-4dbe-8c4d-cb9d22b40f93 ❤️

Thanks,

Mark

[icm]

Thanks for posting on Eurobricks. I already supported this on Ideas. It's a very good System monorail from small parts, but my hunch is it'll probably take a lot of work to satisfy production requirements. Still, the approach of building it out of many small parts that can be easily obtained from PaB or Bricklink is a good one, because it future-proofs the monorail.

[Lyichir]

1 hour ago, Brickthus said:

A Futuron Monorail Icons set would have to be up to date, using available pieces rather than the large bespoke pieces of the 1990s.

I have been developing a new system for 14 years and it is finally ready to recreate set 6990.  Viola!

 

The track, train and canopies are all made from small, available pieces, 3000 for the set.  The largest are the available stanchions and a standard train motor.

PF/PU compatible, PU in the set, using the same electrical pieces as a train set.  I use a PF LiPo battery for exhibitions.  An earlier train ran 3km on one charge of the battery.

The small pieces mean it can be supported from Pick-a-Brick online, far beyond the shelf life of a set.  Track records may tumble!

Please log into LEGO Ideas and support the project https://ideas.lego.com/product-ideas/3b2e5ca7-13c5-4dbe-8c4d-cb9d22b40f93 ❤️

Thanks,

Mark

This is a really cool MOC, but to be honest I think an issue with brick-built monorails as far as set potential is concerned is that they could end up being a very tedious building experience. I don't think it's a coincidence that most Lego train and road systems of any type use big prefabricated parts—while hobbyist AFOLs can often have the dedication and patience to put lots of work into a large layout, I think for most builders the vehicles and buildings are the "exciting" part of the build, so having so much of the build consist of assembling brick-built track sections could majorly drag down the experience of putting it together.

[Brickthus]

19 hours ago, icm said:

Thanks for posting on Eurobricks. I already supported this on Ideas. It's a very good System monorail from small parts, but my hunch is it'll probably take a lot of work to satisfy production requirements. Still, the approach of building it out of many small parts that can be easily obtained from PaB or Bricklink is a good one, because it future-proofs the monorail.

Thanks, you have understood the idea of it.  After doing some obsolescence studies at work 25 years ago, ringing up suppliers and asking "can I still get these parts?", and then seeing how the selection of pieces on Pick-a-Brick online varies, with many parts specific to sets being discontinued after that set ends its shelf life, I sought to use pieces that were most common.  This was already a feature of the track curves, with the taller Hidaka design and my own plate sandwich design being based on 2x2 sections.

The next trick was to recreate the tighter curves like the original 6990 track.  In my previous "Space Monorail" project I had jus the wider curved and there was the complaint of "brick stress" using the "wall of 2s" technique.  The solution for me was to use the 1x2 plates with rounded ends but it's not as simple as that because if you use only those the track will lose form completely; it would have to be formed around something and would then change shape as trains ran around it, applying forces as they did so.  So the knack was to alternate the oblong and rounded-end 1x2 plates in the right pattern to achieve various curvatures without stress.

As it happens, the 1x2 plates with rounded ends are relatively new but we see them in so many sets that they have quickly become a core piece, available in many colours and hence most likely to be continuously available on PaB online.  That was key to choosing them.  Along with some round plates and tiles with similar good availability, this means the curves as well as straights are made form always-available parts.  That meant track extension is almost sorted, with no need for a "track pack" set because LEGO Ideas sets have to be just one set.

So production requirements for the track should be OK; it's just a matter of how long it takes to build each curve, but adult sets have more smaller pieces and the reward of a completed pair of curves can arrive in 20 minutes.

I could say the same for the canopies; the Technic joints and smaller pieces are common and the trans-blue pieces are those that have been continuously available in trans-blue despite that colour being less-common than other trans colours.  There's a bit of trickery owing to the relative sizes and clutch power of a 1x1 plate with or without hole in the various Technic joint holes; I was careful to stick to "legal moves" but it means using some 2M rod pieces where I have 1x1s with holes either side of a joint with 2 axles.

The train using the electric pieces from a train set makes sense as those can support each other, even if the system develops.  It's a good train motor and should continue for a while yet, even if the plug changes again!

The other train parts are mostly common.  Small Technic pieces and the available canopy, which I hope might be varied in colour; it was in trans-yellow for Blacktron Renegade 10355 but I had to get trans-clear ones for others as a trans-blue one does not exist.  I understand that there is a nominal quota of 4 recolours of pieces for a LEGO Ideas set.  Another one I'd like is a trans-blue 1x1 round plate with hole.

And I know TLG would vary the design anyway; I just wanted to make it as easy for them as possible with the principle of small, available pieces.

18 hours ago, Lyichir said:

This is a really cool MOC, but to be honest I think an issue with brick-built monorails as far as set potential is concerned is that they could end up being a very tedious building experience. I don't think it's a coincidence that most Lego train and road systems of any type use big prefabricated parts—while hobbyist AFOLs can often have the dedication and patience to put lots of work into a large layout, I think for most builders the vehicles and buildings are the "exciting" part of the build, so having so much of the build consist of assembling brick-built track sections could majorly drag down the experience of putting it together.

20 minutes for a pair of curves (2x 115 pieces for the smallest) is probably a good enough reward for adult builders, compared to some other kits that I have found very tedious!  Then the modularity and varying which bit is built next can help.  Even 6990 builds two almost-identical containers at different points in the instructions, just with different tools inside.  The track for the set is 4 curves 28M, 2 hills 64M, 1 straight 48M, 1 straight 32M, 1 straight 16M and the lower track for the station, for which I used a 24M curve and a special-length straight of 36M as that is now in the first test of my next exhibition layout; the special length helps align the Train-over-Train of the station with the double-track formation of 24M and 34M curves for the show.  I had to stick to the original 6990 amount of track except for the extension suggestion but it is a very customisable system as well as fitting a grid easily.

I certainly don't expect a kit of 20000 1x2 plates, 10000 2x2 plates and 5000 2x2 tiles, which is what I bought originally! 😂  That would make 45 metres of curved track.  So in the obsolescence strategy I was already hedging by making a "lifetime buy"!  I have since added 1x2 plates with rounded ends 1000 at a time for a reasonable number of curved pieces.  It may be a little while before I exhibit a larger layout but 6ft x 2'6" is enough work for now, including some public interaction.  We're hoping to show at the Great Western Brick Show at the STEAM Museum in Swindon, UK on 10th-11th October.

I know there is also a tedium risk with the canopies, building 4 lots of 2x sections of trans-blue pieces to fit the frame.  But it's less tedious and quicker to the reward than some sets I've built!

The fiddly bit might be the trains.  4 loops of chain.  I have experimented with belt drives but those are not as good.  The bogies use quite a few small pieces but the design is necessary to get round the tight curves.

Someone remarked that the video showed the train going a bit too fast!  That has to be a good thing.  A bit spare for a longer train, or for when the batteries weaken.

But the sustainability of the small pieces is the key to longevity and viability as a system.  One can only hope for no more obsolescence but planning helps.

Mark