TLG decision making

[StoutFiles]

I've always been curious as to how TLG makes decisions on their sets. Similar to, say, Wonka's Chocolate Factory, we're given a product that's secretly designed, and for a customer that has no say in what they're getting. It's all shrouded in mystery.

Take for example the new Hoth set:

While I did my best to defend it in another thread, if you remove the figures from this set there is NO WAY anyone would be able to tell this is a Star Wars set. How does that happen? More specifically:

-How many people design a set?

-How many people have to give a set approval?

-Does LucasArts ever turn down a set?

-Why aren't the customers polled for set ideas, and not for box sizes?

-When designing a set, is the builder told to work with a certain piece count? Does this make him/her essentially dumb down a set if they've designing something better over a set piece count?

I could go on and on...but I don't know why TLG doesn't work with their customers, especially the AFOL's when it comes to designing sets. TLG has great customer support when I contact them, I don't understand why that support doesn't seem to branch out to communication with their customers about what they do.

Am I wrong for being annoyed at the closed off nature of TLG? Do they talk to us and I'm not aware of it?

Edited June 5, 2011 by StoutFiles

[The Legonater]

-How many people design a set?

-How many people have to give a set approval?

-Does LucasArts ever turn down a set?

-Why aren't the customers polled for set ideas, and not for box sizes?

-When designing a set, is the builder told to work with a certain piece count? Does this make him/her essentially dumb down a set if they've designing something better over a set piece count?

I could go on and on...but I don't know why TLG doesn't work with their customers, especially the AFOL's when it comes to designing sets. TLG has great customer support when I contact them, I don't understand why that support doesn't seem to branch out to communication with their customers about what they do.

Am I wrong for being annoyed at the closed off nature of TLG? Do they talk to us and I'm not aware of it?

Well, only a small handfull of people work in the SW section of LEGO. About 5, I think. I don't know how many people aprove it, but many make sure it's accurate to their official referance. I'm not saying they do a good job, but they do. And seeing as LucasArts is a gaming company, I doubt they have any say in the matter. We use to be polled a lot about set ideas, and we still are on occasion. They don't have a build limit, but do often simplify it because of how expensive they turn out.

[BrickArtist]

7 designers work for the LSW team. Each has an area of expertise, I'm pretty sure one does shuttles exclusively. they decide what they want to make, and a prototype. Lucasarts has to be satisfied with the model, when the separatist shuttle was in the making it was originally going to be made to look like the one that appeared in RotS, but lucas then wanted to appeal to their TCW fan-base and altered the reference. The designers are more independent than one might think, they decide on minifigs and sets, but Lucas must approve the set before it is released. They always have the final word.

Think about all the qualities that would to be implemented to please all their audiences, if you cna design a MOC that meets all those standards, then I'll listen to these complaints and see them as valid. It's harder than you might think...

Edited June 6, 2011 by DobbyClone

[Aanchir]

-When designing a set, is the builder told to work with a certain piece count? Does this make him/her essentially dumb down a set if they've designing something better over a set piece count?

Well, they're designed to work with a certain budget, if not a certain piece count. They can't just design a year of only $150 sets, so some sets will naturally have less detail than others.

However, it's a bit unfair to call this process "dumbing down". Simplifying something and removing extraneous details can be a positive change as well as a negative change. And while some people want a photorealistic starship replica, that doesn't mean that "more detail" is a sign of higher-quality. Streamlining design can lead to a sturdier and more economical set. By "economical" I'm not just talking about price-- I mean that the set is as efficient as possible, making sure that the vast majority of the space is used to house interesting features and there's less "waste" in general.

I could go on and on...but I don't know why TLG doesn't work with their customers, especially the AFOL's when it comes to designing sets. TLG has great customer support when I contact them, I don't understand why that support doesn't seem to branch out to communication with their customers about what they do.

Am I wrong for being annoyed at the closed off nature of TLG? Do they talk to us and I'm not aware of it?

TLG has their reasons for not accepting AFOL input. One of these is obviously that AFOLs can't be counted on to know all of what makes a good set. Kids and AFOLs are attracted to vastly different attributes in sets, which isn't to say kids are experts, either-- there are a lot of kids and AFOLs alike who'd happily sacrifice certain aspects of quality by using illegal connections that can cause part damage, designing a set with hard-to-follow instructions, or designing a set that's all "looks" with very little play value. These are all things that LEGO designers learn from experience, and things which more "hardcore" LEGO fans don't necessarily sympathize with, but which genuinely help move product.

In the case of Echo Base, I don't necessarily understand your complaints. No, it doesn't immediately stand out as a Star Wars set without the minifigures, but then again, this would apply to pretty much any location-based set. Echo Base was hardly the most distinctive location in the Star Wars franchise, but at the same time I've been waiting for years for TLG to design a set showing the bacta tank scene, and this one does it as well as I could ever have imagined (well, with the exception of Han not being there). It even has the recovery bed/chair! I'd rather that TLG design a somewhat boring Echo Base set that depends on flick-fire missiles to have any interesting pieces than stick only to more familiar locations and never make any Echo Base set at all.

[vexorian]

I'd rather have a good set than something that is iconic SW but not a well-designed set.

There is no reason to think TLG would always concern about making things that resemble iconic things from SW. For starters, for non-SW fans there are really so much things that are immediately recognizable without the minifigs. I am more on the geeky side of the non-SW fandom and even I have trouble really recognizing ships other than the Millennium Falcom, the X-wing, the imperial ships and the Death Star. The rest I am not sure if I remember or if they are just a ship with a SW minifig on them.

Edited June 6, 2011 by vexorian

[StoutFiles]

However, it's a bit unfair to call this process "dumbing down". Simplifying something and removing extraneous details can be a positive change as well as a negative change. And while some people want a photorealistic starship replica, that doesn't mean that "more detail" is a sign of higher-quality. Streamlining design can lead to a sturdier and more economical set. By "economical" I'm not just talking about price-- I mean that the set is as efficient as possible, making sure that the vast majority of the space is used to house interesting features and there's less "waste" in general.

Let's not sugarcoat it, it's dumbing down. I understand it's a business though, having just one less piece removes X cost, multiplied by tens of thousands. All I want to know is when there's a clear ship error that could have been fixed, I wonder if it was already fixed...and became a casualty of fitting the set into a certain price range.

TLG has their reasons for not accepting AFOL input. One of these is obviously that AFOLs can't be counted on to know all of what makes a good set. Kids and AFOLs are attracted to vastly different attributes in sets, which isn't to say kids are experts, either-- there are a lot of kids and AFOLs alike who'd happily sacrifice certain aspects of quality by using illegal connections that can cause part damage, designing a set with hard-to-follow instructions, or designing a set that's all "looks" with very little play value. These are all things that LEGO designers learn from experience, and things which more "hardcore" LEGO fans don't necessarily sympathize with, but which genuinely help move product.

Who said anything about us building the set in any way? All I'd like is to be polled for ideas about sets...which ships are important, which characters are important, which areas are important.

In the case of Echo Base, I don't necessarily understand your complaints. No, it doesn't immediately stand out as a Star Wars set without the minifigures, but then again, this would apply to pretty much any location-based set. Echo Base was hardly the most distinctive location in the Star Wars franchise, but at the same time I've been waiting for years for TLG to design a set showing the bacta tank scene, and this one does it as well as I could ever have imagined (well, with the exception of Han not being there). It even has the recovery bed/chair! I'd rather that TLG design a somewhat boring Echo Base set that depends on flick-fire missiles to have any interesting pieces than stick only to more familiar locations and never make any Echo Base set at all.

Once again, I'm not complaining about kid-friendly elements. Flick-fire missiles, icicle traps...whatever. That doesn't bother me at all...what does bother me is that a good designer could make a set that is both kid-friendly AND remotely accurate to the source material. It reeks of laziness to blob everything into one room, and the apparent lack of checks and balances (5-7 people decide basically everything? If that?) is discomforting. You can look at every forum there is; the vast majority of AFOL's are incredibly displeased with this effort.

But it'll sell. It'll sell because the collect 'em all mentality, the unique minifigs, the unique parts. What's worse is that I can't tell TLG that they blew it this time. They can look at the profits and say "Hey, we made money, no need to try harder". Let's make a cantina set now that has literally no resemblance to the actual cantina. Do they know if people are unsatisfied with their sets? Do they even care?

I'll save this set with a MOD, but this will be the largest MOD I've ever had to do on a System set. I'm just worried that along with ever rising prices, future accuracy will plummet now that they know we'll buy whatever as long as new minifigs are included.

Edited June 6, 2011 by StoutFiles

[Uncle]

StoutFiles hit the nail on the head on just about everything.

This Hoth set is a very lazy effort. My question though is not about the number of builders who contribute to the set design, but the inconsistency of their work.

the apparent lack of checks and balances (5-7 people decide basically everything? If that?) is discomforting

Except that this isn't like a government, which can implement immoral legislation if too few leaders are granted too much power. It's just LEGO, and given that even in governments it can be desirable to have fewer people for increased efficient, I'd say the overall process of set design is expedited by having fewer hands on each model. The goal is simply to hire an incredible set designer. But how can the guy (maybe certain builders are consistently worse among the seven SW designers) who built Anakin and Sebulba's Podracers have also created the Sith Nightspeeder and this terrible Hoth set? That's what confuses me. There are plenty of MOC artists who could create better sets, even when accounting for brick and aesthetic efficiency, so how could this Hoth set ever have been created?

Edited June 6, 2011 by Uncle

[Daedalus]

It reeks of laziness to blob everything into one room, and the apparent lack of checks and balances (5-7 people decide basically everything? If that?) is discomforting. You can look at every forum there is; the vast majority of AFOL's are incredibly displeased with this effort.

But it'll sell. It'll sell because the collect 'em all mentality, the unique minifigs, the unique parts. What's worse is that I can't tell TLG that they blew it this time. They can look at the profits and say "Hey, we made money, no need to try harder". Let's make a cantina set now that has literally no resemblance to the actual cantina. Do they know if people are unsatisfied with their sets? Do they even care?

I'll save this set with a MOD, but this will be the largest MOD I've ever had to do on a System set. I'm just worried that along with ever rising prices, future accuracy will plummet now that they know we'll buy whatever as long as new minifigs are included.

Everyone knows this set has its drawbacks, but I'd like to point out two things. First, we're judging an awful lot from one picture; I know sometimes I'm turned off to a set from the box art, but once I see it together it grows on me. This set might end up disappointing a lot of people, but I'll wait until I see a review to make my mind up about it.

Second, not every set is going to knock it out of the park, but I'll cut some slack to a new set idea. I'd much rather have a so-so Echo Base set than the fifth or sixth take on an AT-ST. I agree that this set might need some heavy modding when all is said and done, but that's half the fun, right?

Finally, (I guess I'm making three points, not two) there have always been some lackluster sets across all themes. I think it's an over-reaction to suggest that they're getting lazy in the design department. There have been some nice designs recently to balance out the mediocre ones.

Also wanted to say, Uncle: that's a sweet Avatar you've got there.

[Arigomi]

After all these years, I'm surprised that any designer actually wants to work on the Star Wars theme. I would certainly get sick of sifting through the same source material for the hundredth time trying to come up with a new idea that hasn't already been done to death. Fortunately, the Clone Wars cartoon offers some new material to work with. While the license is incredibly lucrative for TLG, there is a lot of pressure to package George Luca's world in a cardboard box.

Sooner or later, the designers are going to go crazy and create sets like a UCS Jabba the Hutt that slithers and uses a sound brick with his voice.

Edited June 6, 2011 by Arigomi

[Darth CJ]

I thing TLG shouls listen that statment is fair!

[Kaitan]

At the end of the day, TLG is a business, one that has run successfully for many years. In spite of how we feel about it, the majority of LEGO customers are children. A while back TLG realised that the playability value of LEGO as a building medium was no longer enough, and that once customers (i.e. kids) had built their models they wanted to be able to 'play' with them as well. Competing with the likes of Hasbro (Why bother building an AT-AT when you can buy one and play with it straight from the box?) - I believe that's the reason they have made the Hoth base that we've got now. Playability comes at cost to accuracy - Not in all cases, but mostly. The endor battle set was just pure 'win' maintaining accuracy whilst incorporating playability. But the Endor bunker was a relatively small movie set that had a large battle raging around it. The base on hoth was essentially a hollowed out mountain that apart from a briefly seen invasion by Imperial troops had very little actually 'happen' in it. (That might change if the re-releases add in the wampa attack )

My point is, not every scene and location can possibly make a good, accurate, playable and profitable, set.

Just my thoughts...

Kaitan

[Lego Otaku]

Sooner or later, the designers are going to go crazy and create sets like a UCS Jabba the Hutt that slithers and uses a sound brick with his voice.

I'd buy that one!

[DarthSion]

They have a big chicken farm, they make lots of squares with vehicles . lots of squares with mini figures, then they chop the head of a chook then use what ever is in the square the chook lands in to make a set, which is how you get a IG droid and Aurra in the bounty hunter gunship when neither were even in either of the 2 episodes featuring the ship, and how they have like 12 MF.

Edited June 6, 2011 by DarthSion

[Aanchir]

Let's not sugarcoat it, it's dumbing down. I understand it's a business though, having just one less piece removes X cost, multiplied by tens of thousands. All I want to know is when there's a clear ship error that could have been fixed, I wonder if it was already fixed...and became a casualty of fitting the set into a certain price range.

So "less expensive" = "dumber"? That's new to me. Also, I don't understand why any difference between a vehicle or scene in the source material and the same vehicle or scene in a LEGO set can be considered an "error". After all, the most recent D2C Death Star set was a work of art, despite not being to scale, including only a select few scenes, and compressing every scene into a tiny space. LEGO City builders don't expect every vehicle to be a perfect likeness of its real-world counterpart, non-LEGO Star Wars toy fans don't expect all playsets to be exact movie replicas, and it seems awfully pretentious for Star Wars fans to assume they deserve better than either group.

Who said anything about us building the set in any way? All I'd like is to be polled for ideas about sets...which ships are important, which characters are important, which areas are important.

I'm sure a lot of AFOLs and Star Wars fans consider Echo Base important, but at the same time, telling TLG that wouldn't ensure a better set than the one that resulted. It's the design details that people seem to dislike about the set, and that's the place where official LEGO set designers have a lot more experience and know a lot more of the factors that make a set attractive and practical.

Once again, I'm not complaining about kid-friendly elements. Flick-fire missiles, icicle traps...whatever. That doesn't bother me at all...what does bother me is that a good designer could make a set that is both kid-friendly AND remotely accurate to the source material. It reeks of laziness to blob everything into one room, and the apparent lack of checks and balances (5-7 people decide basically everything? If that?) is discomforting. You can look at every forum there is; the vast majority of AFOL's are incredibly displeased with this effort.

Blobbing everything in one room isn't lazy, it's practical. Throw up a bunch of walls everywhere and you make playing with the set more difficult (even more so for us adults with our non-kid-sized hands), you drive up the cost of the set, and you make the set a lot harder to display in an attractive way whether in real life or on box art. And anyway, if there were walls separating the rooms, would it really be that much more accurate if the walls weren't in the right place? The Cloud City set and the aforementioned Death Star set are both amazing designs, but they have various scenes smooshed together next to each other, not spacing them out with hallways like they were in the actual movie.

Accuracy is often overrated. Back when I did collect LEGO Star Wars sets, I had a lot of Star Wars cross-section books, and I tried to design models of the vehicles that hadn't been released as sets. In general, I aimed for the highest possible accuracy. And in general, the final models were ugly, brittle, and boring. TLG has since released sets of a lot of those same vehicles (for instance, the AT-TE) that far surpass my attempts despite being considerably less accurate to the source material.

I believe Lucasfilms does have to approve every set, but if you think that the merchandise guys at Lucasfilms care about total accuracy you're sorely mistaken. I think if you look most Star Wars playsets meant to depict movie scenes, they will not be significantly more movie-accurate than this one (especially if all the major Echo Base scenes are meant to be consolidated into one toy).

But it'll sell. It'll sell because the collect 'em all mentality, the unique minifigs, the unique parts. What's worse is that I can't tell TLG that they blew it this time. They can look at the profits and say "Hey, we made money, no need to try harder". Let's make a cantina set now that has literally no resemblance to the actual cantina. Do they know if people are unsatisfied with their sets? Do they even care?

I'll save this set with a MOD, but this will be the largest MOD I've ever had to do on a System set. I'm just worried that along with ever rising prices, future accuracy will plummet now that they know we'll buy whatever as long as new minifigs are included.

The idea that because AFOLs don't like a set, the designers "didn't try hard enough" is laughable. They tried very hard to accomplish what they felt was most important. And they have enough experience to know that what's important in a set isn't necessarily its accuracy to the source material. An AFOL wouldn't try nearly as hard; they might just settle for an unnecessarily accurate replica that could, for all they know, totally fail to sell to kids.

Minifigures may be a great asset to sets that makes them sell a lot better. What you're ignoring, though, is that they'd help an attractive, movie-accurate set sell just as much as they'd help a sloppy, effortless set. Are you suggesting that TLG's designers just aim to meet a certain level of profitability and decide to call it quits? That's not only insulting the talent and experience of TLG's set designers, it's insulting TLG's business strategies in general. As a business, you aim for maximum profitability, not just "good enough". And that applies for any company that intends to have a competitive edge.

Designers sometimes do make sacrifices in their designs in order to make the sets better in one way or another-- whether "better" in this case means more affordable, more streamlined, more sturdy, more kid-friendly, or safer. Quality is extremely subjective, and different people value different types of quality-- for instance, the amount of fun a kid will have building and playing with a set versus the visual impact of the set once it's completed. Sometimes TLG's designers do have regrets about the things they cut back on and the choices they make. So the idea that they don't value quality themselves and can only interpret it through a set's profits is belittling to designers who are in fact real human beings, and who perform their jobs as designers to the best of their abilities.

I tried to have a civil conversation about this, but if you're too cynical to acknowledge that TLG designers actually put hard work and thought into their designs, I don't even know if I'll bother. But keep this in mind-- I think that this is a very attractive and high-quality set, and I won't be buying it at all-- not even for the minifigures. So you see, it's not just a matter of TLG designing sets for the stupid masses and ignoring the demands of the wiser and more deserving AFOLs. People don't buy sets for the same reasons, and TLG has to design sets in a way that will be most advantageous. Throwing a couple extremely obscure characters in as minifigures isn't a sure-fire way to ensure profitability, and if you feel that it is then it's no wonder you can't grasp the design process for this set.

[StoutFiles]

So "less expensive" = "dumber"? That's new to me.

If you used a design model that functioned at a certain cost, and then removed pieces until it got to a certain price range, then of course.

Also, I don't understand why any difference between a vehicle or scene in the source material and the same vehicle or scene in a LEGO set can be considered an "error". After all, the most recent D2C Death Star set was a work of art, despite not being to scale, including only a select few scenes, and compressing every scene into a tiny space. LEGO City builders don't expect every vehicle to be a perfect likeness of its real-world counterpart, non-LEGO Star Wars toy fans don't expect all playsets to be exact movie replicas, and it seems awfully pretentious for Star Wars fans to assume they deserve better than either group.

The Death Star is a great set. Why? Because it adds playability with scenes from the movie. The cell block, the trash compactor, the conference room, etc. Every room is a winner...even rooms that weren't shown like the cargo bay are fine, because they got so many other rooms right. I own it, it's wonderful.

Echo Base? Well, this set is something...it resembles a base of some sort...but not Echo Base! There is a problem if you remove all the figurines and you can't tell what it's supposed to be. They could change the color scheme and sell this as a Space Police Base. It looks like the old Spyrius space line I had as a kid. IT IS NOT ECHO BASE.

I'm sure a lot of AFOLs and Star Wars fans consider Echo Base important, but at the same time, telling TLG that wouldn't ensure a better set than the one that resulted. It's the design details that people seem to dislike about the set, and that's the place where official LEGO set designers have a lot more experience and know a lot more of the factors that make a set attractive and practical.

I said it would sell. I said it would be fun for kids. I said it was good business. It just looks nothing like Echo Base. Now I worry about the next Jabba's Palace, because it will likely be the same thing. I want sets that when people see them, without the minifigs giving it away, they would say "Hey, that's _____ from Star Wars." It's not that hard.

Blobbing everything in one room isn't lazy, it's practical. Throw up a bunch of walls everywhere and you make playing with the set more difficult (even more so for us adults with our non-kid-sized hands), you drive up the cost of the set, and you make the set a lot harder to display in an attractive way whether in real life or on box art. And anyway, if there were walls separating the rooms, would it really be that much more accurate if the walls weren't in the right place? The Cloud City set and the aforementioned Death Star set are both amazing designs, but they have various scenes smooshed together next to each other, not spacing them out with hallways like they were in the actual movie.

Ignoring the fact the DS had walls, let's look at Battle of Endor where the set opened up so you could get your hands in there. You don't need full walls, just a doorway arch would be fine. This set has two of them, that lead to...nothing.

Accuracy is often overrated. Back when I did collect LEGO Star Wars sets, I had a lot of Star Wars cross-section books, and I tried to design models of the vehicles that hadn't been released as sets. In general, I aimed for the highest possible accuracy. And in general, the final models were ugly, brittle, and boring. TLG has since released sets of a lot of those same vehicles (for instance, the AT-TE) that far surpass my attempts despite being considerably less accurate to the source material.

Did I say I expected perfection? I don't even expect that in the UCS line. I expect a set to resemble the movie.

I believe Lucasfilms does have to approve every set, but if you think that the merchandise guys at Lucasfilms care about total accuracy you're sorely mistaken. I think if you look most Star Wars playsets meant to depict movie scenes, they will not be significantly more movie-accurate than this one (especially if all the major Echo Base scenes are meant to be consolidated into one toy).

I don't think they do care, hence why I brought it up.

The idea that because AFOLs don't like a set, the designers "didn't try hard enough" is laughable. They tried very hard to accomplish what they felt was most important. And they have enough experience to know that what's important in a set isn't necessarily its accuracy to the source material. An AFOL wouldn't try nearly as hard; they might just settle for an unnecessarily accurate replica that could, for all they know, totally fail to sell to kids.

Which is why I brought that up. I'd love for designers to actually speak with AFOL's on which sets they built, and why they chose to do what they did. Some sets are so great while others are dirt poor. Do they work together at all? Are their good designers (those Pod-racers, another great "Larry" set) and bad designers (we let "Fred" design all the exclusive sets)? I don't know, that's why I'm asking. I want to hear why they did what they did for sets.

Minifigures may be a great asset to sets that makes them sell a lot better. What you're ignoring, though, is that they'd help an attractive, movie-accurate set sell just as much as they'd help a sloppy, effortless set. Are you suggesting that TLG's designers just aim to meet a certain level of profitability and decide to call it quits? That's not only insulting the talent and experience of TLG's set designers, it's insulting TLG's business strategies in general. As a business, you aim for maximum profitability, not just "good enough". And that applies for any company that intends to have a competitive edge.

You conveniently ignore that I said TLG runs a great business. It still doesn't mean I can't complain as prices rise and accuracy gets less important.

Designers sometimes do make sacrifices in their designs in order to make the sets better in one way or another-- whether "better" in this case means more affordable, more streamlined, more sturdy, more kid-friendly, or safer. Quality is extremely subjective, and different people value different types of quality-- for instance, the amount of fun a kid will have building and playing with a set versus the visual impact of the set once it's completed. Sometimes TLG's designers do have regrets about the things they cut back on and the choices they make. So the idea that they don't value quality themselves and can only interpret it through a set's profits is belittling to designers who are in fact real human beings, and who perform their jobs as designers to the best of their abilities.

Maybe if they talked to us about these choices I wouldn't have to guess why there was no film accuracy in this set.

I tried to have a civil conversation about this, but if you're too cynical to acknowledge that TLG designers actually put hard work and thought into their designs, I don't even know if I'll bother. But keep this in mind-- I think that this is a very attractive and high-quality set, and I won't be buying it at all-- not even for the minifigures. So you see, it's not just a matter of TLG designing sets for the stupid masses and ignoring the demands of the wiser and more deserving AFOLs. People don't buy sets for the same reasons, and TLG has to design sets in a way that will be most advantageous. Throwing a couple extremely obscure characters in as minifigures isn't a sure-fire way to ensure profitability, and if you feel that it is then it's no wonder you can't grasp the design process for this set.

Whatever the reason, when a set labeled Echo Base looks nothing like Echo Base, I'm going to be annoyed. I'm not the only one..check out what others say here, or Brickset, or FBTB. The majority is displeased. The people that are happy seem to be the kids, the "OOOMMMGGG tht is so awesome i need it!!!" responses. So TLG, yes, on the business end you nailed it as always. However, maybe next time try to please both parties?

This conversation is civil. You just aren't going to convince me that this set is film accurate and to accept that as a positive.

Edited June 7, 2011 by StoutFiles

[vexorian]

It reeks of laziness to blob everything into one room,

There is nothing lazy about the design process. More so, since designers have to comply with a lot more requirements than ... MoCers (Price, playability, stability, etc), it is probably a lot harder to design sets and the opposite of being lazy.

and the apparent lack of checks and balances

This is most likely a completely made up fact. I would doubt the designers don't have a sizable amount of people to put them in line if they make a bad decision. There are probably very hard conditions they need before a set idea is approved and before the set idea goes to production.

(5-7 people decide basically everything? If that?)

It is a creative process. Few people should work in a set design. When you add more people to a creative task, it doesn't improve things that much and in fact, too many of them would be detrimental to the object. Design by committee is discredited for a good reason. Ever heard of what a camel is?

is discomforting. You can look at every forum there is; the vast majority of AFOL's are incredibly displeased with this effort.

Quite honestly, AFOL's opinions are basically worth nothing. I am an AFOL, I disagree with many of the sets and things TLG have done in the past, but think about it.

a) AFOLs don't have a relevant portion of the market.

b) AFOLs as a whole are impossible to please. I tell you, if TLG decided to make an AT-ST instead of this eccho base thing, there would be as many AFOLs complaining about TLG not trying new set ideas. There is also how most AFOLs are horribly affected by Nostalgia Goggles, some of us really want TLG to make sets like back in the time they were 10, which is something that is actually unreasonable to expect.

c) AFOLs buy sets anyway. Seriously, what is up with that? We spend all our days and nights complaining in forums about sets. And then... We buy them anyway. TLG don't have any reason to listen to anyone but their wallets, and if our wallets don't send theirs the message, they will never get it.

But it'll sell. It'll sell because the collect 'em all mentality, the unique minifigs, the unique parts. What's worse is that I can't tell TLG that they blew it this time. They can look at the profits and say "Hey, we made money, no need to try harder". Let's make a cantina set now that has literally no resemblance to the actual cantina. Do they know if people are unsatisfied with their sets? Do they even care?

If they get profit from the set and even you will get it then they didn't blow it. That's the reason you can't tell them that they blew it. If it succeeds in profits, it will mean that TLG have figured out that pandering to SW fans that really want accurate sets but would buy non-accurate sets anyway does not really pay as much as giving the rest of their costumers what they want. The collect-it-all mentality of course annoys you and me, but it is irrational to expect LEGO not to go with a profitable strategy just because we would like a different strategy, because we are an incredibly reduced section of their market.

[Churchill]

c) AFOLs buy sets anyway.

This is true. I agree that it would be great to have TLG more responsive to AFOL's, but I believe it's just not going to happen. They know what they're doing, to make money. They know how to do it better than I do.

I just posted on the 2011 rumors about how much I dislike the new MF. And... guess what I'll buy when it's released? Yep.

It's just human nature.

So, I think it's ok to talk about what we like and don't like about the sets, that's partially what these forums are for. But I think we have to be realistic in questioning TLG's practices.

[fred67]

Wasn't the Home One a fan "chosen" set?

I don't think it went over that well. The "fans" liked it, but I don't know how well it sold overall.

Except for the completely iconic ships, I don't think you'd recognize any Star Wars sets as being Star Wars without the figures. Granted, most of the sets are iconic ships.

[Anio]

And what do you think of being a little bit harsher and demanding when writing a review ?

It's pretty boring to read "Oh ! it's a must have, the minifigs are great !" everywhere.

[Churchill]

I love a critical review. It's perfectly appropriate for an AFOL to reflect on what a set means to AFOLs. Just because a set is not good for AFOLs doesn't mean that TLG's target audience (kids) doesn't love it, and it doesn't mean TLG doesn't know how to run a good business.

I really enjoy the reviews on the brickshow.com They aren't as in depth as ours, but they give a rating for different age groups. I realize that this is an AFOL site, but perhaps we could incorporate that into our reviews, if for no other reason than for those of us with kids who love Lego.

[Darth CJ]

I love a critical review. It's perfectly appropriate for an AFOL to reflect on what a set means to AFOLs. Just because a set is not good for AFOLs doesn't mean that TLG's target audience (kids) doesn't love it, and it doesn't mean TLG doesn't know how to run a good business.

I really enjoy the reviews on the brickshow.com They aren't as in depth as ours, but they give a rating for different age groups. I realize that this is an AFOL site, but perhaps we could incorporate that into our reviews, if for no other reason than for those of us with kids who love Lego.

Agreed.