42215 Volvo EC500 Hybrid Excavator

[kbalage]

41 minutes ago, Oh_Hi_Mao said:

Hard to agree, I built reobrix set with all black pins, mistake was hard to make because pins were packet separately and you simply don't add them in the same pot. No mistakes were made for 4000+ parts set and I was not very careful

I have built several non-LEGO sets myself and also tested them with inexperienced family members. When pins and axles are the same color, the building process becomes much more difficult and frustrating. I like building complex models, but I hate spending time trying to figure out exactly which pin to pick from the pile. I haven't tried Reobrix yet, but unfortunately other manufacturers don't separate the different parts.

[thekoRngear]

1 hour ago, Oh_Hi_Mao said:

Hard to agree, I built reobrix set with all black pins, mistake was hard to make because pins were packet separately and you simply don't add them in the same pot. No mistakes were made for 4000+ parts set and I was not very careful

Same. I built Cada Ferrari Supercar (2020) with black 3l pins. Had faced no problems. With Lego cars becoming more closer to the shape of the real ones blue pins just keep maddening us 

[allanp]

On 8/15/2025 at 8:39 PM, kbalage said:

I was being a bit sarcastic, of course, but it really is the sad reality of Technic at the moment,

Ah, my apologies, sometimes it's hard to read when people are being just a little sarcastic.

On 8/15/2025 at 8:39 PM, kbalage said:

These days, anything bigger will be expensive, and automatically gets slapped with an 18+ label, which seems to mean it should look decent on display

Looking good on display is fine....

On 8/15/2025 at 8:39 PM, kbalage said:

require minimal building effort

....which isn't necessarily a bad thing as very complex things can be simplified down to a few pieces per step in clear instructions, and be made more accessible with numbered bags to reduce piece pile sizes and some tasteful (not bright red/green/lime/blue etc) colour coding.

On 8/15/2025 at 8:39 PM, kbalage said:

and offer less and less interesting or playable functionality

Yup. And it makes no sense to me why TLG seem to have made a choice to do this. Adults like to play as well ya know! A big Technic set can absolutely look good on display, have a build that's accessible to casuals and still be playable and not filled with colour vomit. 

On 8/15/2025 at 8:39 PM, kbalage said:

but the overall direction is hard to miss

And hard not to complain about!

22 hours ago, Toastie said:

This is no excuse - as far as I am concerned, it is an - upfront voiced - and well-thought-out plan

In the words of Mr Fury, considering it's a stoopidass decision I've elected to ignore it!

11 hours ago, Anio said:

Not to mention that even experienced builders would make mistakes if ALL the parts inside were black.

Didn't @kbalage or one of the other experienced Technic reviewers miss a BRIGHTLY COLOURED gear out of 42215 when building it? Clearly being brightly coloured didn't help! Don't get me wrong, I built a Technic knockoff set (it was a "gift") that was all black inside and I hated it. I didn't make any mistakes but all black looks boring. TLG however are much too far the other way making everything look like a clown vomited sprinkles everywhere and mistakes are still being made. It's as if a single very important brightly coloured piece of vomit doesn't stand out enough amongst a sea of a thousand other pieces of colour vomit! Using colour more tastefully (ie make the chassis/surrounding structure all dark grey, all axles and pins black and all gears light grey or gun metal grey for more special gears) would not only look much better but would make the gears and mechanisms stand out better from the rest.

 

11 hours ago, kbalage said:

with fairly strict color coding to make identifying and differentiating parts easier

As I said above, colour coding can be a great thing, but colour vomit not so much. 

12 hours ago, kbalage said:

but in a nutshell: the 18+ category is clearly aimed at adults looking to spend money on “quality me time,” many of whom probably never built a LEGO set before. Since the pandemic, the 18+ category has exploded

This is a very good point. I think this sentence sums up the 18+ line better than anything. There really doesn't have to be anything wrong with that from a long time fans perspective. 18+ sets can absolutely be accessible to casual builders looking for some quality me time, and I think they should be. I just don't get why TLG thinks that's ALL they can be, forsaking all else. Tasteful colour coding can make a build more accessible than colour vomit. In the case of 42215, pneumatics would have looked much cleaner for a display piece than a bunch of brightly coloured gears and axles in the boom, and would function far better with a good compressor. But now we have all kinds of Lego reviewers (not just Technic specialists) saying it's waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too slow and the colour vomit is awful. It's not just us people here saying these things, we've just been saying them for years!