LEGO Castle 2013

[Hive]

You have to realize that most kids could care less about LotR. They would much prefer castle over LotR. Kids don't even look at LotR sets at my Lego store. It's only adults.

Still, I don't get why they don't try to differentiate the two themes some more.

LotR and The Hobbit are replacing the Harry Potter theme and it's target audience.

Wait, Harry Potter was not for kids? I'm not sure I buy that one.

[just2good]

Wait, Harry Potter was not for kids? I'm not sure I buy that one.

The orginal stuff was more towards younger kids, but later on in the line, it was aimed more towards older kids (judging by the age ranges).

[Aanchir]

Still, I don't get why they don't try to differentiate the two themes some more.

They do differentiate them. Thematically, they're both European medieval fantasy, and the IPs share some traits like dragons (though the LotR and Hobbit sets have yet to include any), but that's about as far as the similarities go. The Lord of the Rings has primarily non-human baddies as well as several other fantasy races, whereas the new Castle line has exclusively human soldiers in both factions (even if other fantasy elements are maintained). The Lord of the Rings has very distinctive fantasy architecture in earthy colors, whereas the new Castle theme has more archetypical castles with brightly-colored accents. The Lord of the Rings has a focus on distinctive, named characters, whereas the new Castle theme's characters are all nameless archetypes.

A new Vikings theme or other historical theme might have stood out more from the Lord of the Rings, but from what we've seen Vikings lack the timeless appeal of more traditional Castle themes. And frankly, the Lord of the Rings and Castle themes already have plenty of features differentiating them.

[8BrickMario]

LotR is quite a bit darker. Castle is friendlier. They are intended for different age groups, yet designed for all to enjoy.

[Ki-Adi-Mundi]

Does anybody have a clue when the new wave of castle sets is supposed to hit Europe (Germany)? The Castle line has disappeared from the tags of the usual official Lego retailers quite a few years ago.

Basically, i am only interested in the Dragon (the the same named mountain set).

[Lordofdragonss]

Does anybody have a clue when the new wave of castle sets is supposed to hit Europe (Germany)? The Castle line has disappeared from the tags of the usual official Lego retailers quite a few years ago.

Basically, i am only interested in the Dragon (the the same named mountain set).

Are you me? :D Indeed in the new Polish retailer catalogue there was no Castle... But I'm sure we will get in in august.

[Hive]

Does anybody have a clue when the new wave of castle sets is supposed to hit Europe (Germany)? The Castle line has disappeared from the tags of the usual official Lego retailers quite a few years ago.

Basically, i am only interested in the Dragon (the the same named mountain set).

They haven't arrived in Denmark yet, either. You'll probably have to wait untill August.

[Fives]

A few months ago I was at my local LEGO store and there was a kid, about age 8 or 9, trying to decide between a Monster Fighters set or the Orc Forge. While Castleis targeted towards younger kids, LOTR still has an appeal to some kids.

[Rogue Angel]

A few months ago I was at my local LEGO store and there was a kid, about age 8 or 9, trying to decide between a Monster Fighters set or the Orc Forge. While Castleis targeted towards younger kids, LOTR still has an appeal to some kids.

There are always exceptions, but it's rare to see a kid over by the LotR sets.

[Aanchir]

A few months ago I was at my local LEGO store and there was a kid, about age 8 or 9, trying to decide between a Monster Fighters set or the Orc Forge. While Castleis targeted towards younger kids, LOTR still has an appeal to some kids.

Yes, definitely. And that's by design. LEGO is by nature a toy, and kids are consistently the most reliable market for toys. So there would be very little money in designing a line as big as the Lord of the Rings theme that didn't appeal to kids at all.

At the same time, when you design something to cater to diverse audiences, its design won't be as focused towards any of them nearly as much as if you're targeting one audience in particular. So it's not that no kids are buying the Lord of the Rings sets — it's just that there are enough who aren't that the market can support another medieval fantasy theme geared towards that particular demographic.

[Kliq]

Was LEGO not expecting the success they've already gotten with the new Castle line? How short of time has the new Castle line been out in the USA and already they've sold out of 70404 King's Castle online, with a restock not arriving until July. I wanted at least three of those. I didn't know that I had to make my purchase on day one to guarantee I get some. lol

Also, is it common for a new line to already have a set limit put on it? There are a few of the new sets that I want more than five of.

[Rogue Angel]

So now that I have been paying attention, there has been a pretty even split on kids buying small LotR sets vs castle sets. The little kids are usually only buying Riddles or Wizard Battle, but they will get the whole range of Castle sets.

Also, the 5 set limit is pretty standard in Lego stores. I don't know how common it is online, but it wouldn't surprise me to see in on any new sets for the first few months.

[Ridge Montante]

Just a quick question. For whomever has King's Castle. How many single wall pieces are there in the set? Thanks.

[AlphaQuad]

Just a quick question. For whomever has King's Castle. How many single wall pieces are there in the set? Thanks.

21

[Aanchir]

There are also 18 corner panels, bringing the total number of big wall panels to 39. Nothing to sneeze at.

On a note somewhat related to that question, a recent comment about 41005 Heartlake High's eight 1x6x5 wall panels led me to look up some of the history of LEGO wall panels, and I was surprised at what I found. I never realized wall panels were a staple of LEGO Castle sets since near the beginning. Apparently, according to Brickset, the only big castle sets before the introduction of wall panels were the two versions of the Yellow Castle. Wall panels started appearing in 1984 when there were two big castle sets: 6073 and 6080. 6073 had 17 wall/window panels total, and 6080 had 30. Two years later, 6074 Black Falcon's Fortress introduced corner panels. It had 10 wall/window panels and 12 corner panels.

Now, what really gets interesting is when you look at the number of wall panels as a percentage of the sets' total piece count. 6073 was 4.15% wall panels. 6080 was 4.45% wall panels. 6074 was 5.12% wall panels. And today's King's Castle? Surprisingly, just 3.92% wall panels. Certainly not as low as 7946, of course, which has 22 wall panels in a 933-piece set, making it a mere 2.36% wall panels. And not quite as low as the well-regarded 6085 Black Monarch's Castle, which clocked in at 3.56% wall panels.

A lot of the reasons this might be are similar to the reasons price-per-piece tends to be better for newer sets when adjusted for inflation. Today's sets use a lot more small detail elements than "classic" sets, on which many of the pieces were purely structural, so there are a lot of pieces that cost very little to include. Older sets also often had more minifigures than today's sets relative to their size, and the heavily-decorated and pre-assembled nature of minifigure parts means those run at a premium in any era of set design. Fewer minifigures in todays sets means that there's room in the budget for the inclusion of details made up of cheaper parts.

Still, it's a bit shocking to see how big wall panels, often perceived as one of the key components of "juniorization", were a key part of LEGO Castle design even in its early years. This was not the mid– to late 90s, often regarded as a "dark age" of LEGO design (6097 Night Lord's Castle surprisingly only had around 13 big wall panels, though there were plenty of other large pieces in its design that could be considered large or overspecialized like prefab columns and battlements), but rather the mid-80s, which many people consider the start of a golden age of LEGO design. I'm not saying that those older sets aren't as good as people think them to be, but it really makes me question why the number of prefab wall panels are still being used as a measure of a set's complexity in this day and age. Looking at all the things the LEGO Castle theme has moved past in recent years (the prefab battlements and giant raised baseplates of the 90s and naughts, for example), if anything the LEGO Castle theme has moved closer to its roots with many of the set designs of the past four years.

Edited June 13, 2013 by Aanchir

[1974]

I love panels. Just bought another couple of hundred. I'm sure I've read somewhere that a TLG designer said something along the lines of; "panels are actually not cheaper than the same amount of bricks, but makes it easier to build" .. can't seem to find the quote right now though ..

TLG's use of panels started in 1978 with the Homemaker houses

I really like the two classic castle panels (with or without printing) but highly dislike the rest (too many to list)

The yellow castle does not use panels and thus have a very high part count compared to sets of that era

This is getting OT and should maybe be split oof so we can talk more about it?

[Ridge Montante]

AlphaQuad and Aanchir thanks for that info. I was expecting more of the pieces. But thats perfect.

Edited June 13, 2013 by Ridge Montante

[TheLegoDr]

I agree. I like the panels. I don't have nor want want the yellow castle, but I love the rest of the early castles including my favorite Black Knight's castle...The kingdom's castle use of panels wasn't that bad. I don't understand the hate. I just don't love the new castle for some reason. The blue seems off to me and maybe too similar in shape to the kingdom's castle, so I'm not as compelled to pick it up. Plus not liking the heraldry doesn't help.

[Hive]

I like wall panels. They make it possible to build larger structures with fewer pieces. And I actually think they look quite good, too.

If I end up getting this new castle, it will be purely for the pieces. I don't think any part of it looks good.

[Aanchir]

Hmm, a lot of posts coming out in defense of panels! That's interesting and certainly not the response I'm used to. Perhaps wall panels' acceptance in the Castle community is just a result of them being so central to LEGO Castle designs from so very early in the theme's existence, or perhaps it's for more practical reasons (after all, the more sections of your castle are pre-assembled, the less advance planning has to go into building a castle of impressive size).

I'm a fan of wall panels myself, having grown up in that era (Dragon Masters/Dragon Knights was one of the main castle themes of my childhood, though I recognize the castles of that theme were far from the most impressive of the early 90s). Back in the day I would try to assemble grand castles of my own, sometimes turning to David Macaulay's Castle for guidance and inspiration.

As such one of my consistent disappointments with LEGO Castles was the lack of realistic details to make them "livable", such as a dining hall, bedrooms, and kitchens. Ironically, I did have one castle toy that incorporated several of these features: A Mega Bloks set from their "Legend" series which, needless to say, was of absolutely wretched quality (stickers galore, a giant shell/carrying case forming the entirety of the castle structure, rudimentary figures, and mediocre brick quality), but which somehow did surpass many LEGO castles of that time with regard to interior furnishings. Yesterday I finally found some pictures of this set: 1, 2.

To be honest, I'm not sure if we're ever likely to see a castle with this sort of livable interior in a set. Perhaps with the success of LEGO Friends, the LEGO Group may at some point try to create a medieval fantasy set aimed either at girls or at a gender-neutral audience, which I think would help the chances of such a theme emerging. After all, LEGO Friends has gone a long way in providing a level of interior details which were previously almost unheard of in sets not aimed at AFOLs. Ideally, it'd be great to see castle sets that are well-rounded, so they have livable details but also a lot of the more action-packed details boys tend to prefer like catapults, a dungeon, and an armory.

[CloneDoc]

• As my first post, I probably should not admit that I bought "an inferior building block system," but I did get the Megablock castle Aanchir linked to above. At the time it was awesome as an inspiration for my other castles. Additionally I'm a big fan of Gryphons, so there was that.
  
• I appreciate both types of builds I've seen lately on the castle MOC sites, The more realistic brick and plate castles are awesome to behold, but I'm always disturbed by their seeming lack of interiors. I personally always build functionality into my buildings, and as such the large panels are a great help for those interior walls and sub support structures, as well as the back walls where the sun doesn't always shine.
  
• Keep up the great work everyone, and I'm glad to be out in the open here!
  

[Kliq]

I hope the fast LEGO.com sell-out of sets 70403 and 70404 lets LEGO know that Castle has a lot of fans, and we're here with wallets open!

Unfortunately that means for slow-pokes like me, we can't get these sets until nearly July. :[

Hopefully they don't sell out so fast again when they restock!

[Blondie-Wan]

• As my first post, I probably should not admit that I bought "an inferior building block system," but I did get the Megablock castle Aanchir linked to above. At the time it was awesome as an inspiration for my other castles. Additionally I'm a big fan of Gryphons, so there was that.
  
• I appreciate both types of builds I've seen lately on the castle MOC sites, The more realistic brick and plate castles are awesome to behold, but I'm always disturbed by their seeming lack of interiors. I personally always build functionality into my buildings, and as such the large panels are a great help for those interior walls and sub support structures, as well as the back walls where the sun doesn't always shine.
  
• Keep up the great work everyone, and I'm glad to be out in the open here!
  

Hey, welcome aboard!

________________________________

For most of the time this thread's been running I've been focusing my attention elsewhere (just too many LEGO themes I'm interested in to be able to follow most of them as closely as I'd like!), and I've just spent the past few days reading it from the beginning up to now. For some reason, this new Castle theme has really grabbed my attention. Oh, like many here I liked the previous Castle castle (i.e., "Fantasy Era") and Kingdoms even more (especially that absolutely wonderful second year of Kingdoms), but I've never been able to really get nearly as many sets as I'd like from any castle-type theme (or most other themes, alas), but now I'm finding myself contemplating getting this one in its entirety. I may actually just meld it with the earlier "Fantasy" Castle stuff I do own, since it actually strikes me as a spiritual successor to that in many ways, and my initial impression is that the heraldry for the good guys is actually fairly compatible, though I haven't seen them together yet. We'll see...

At any rate, while I do lament the premature passing of Kingdoms, I think the future of LEGO Castle is pretty well assured.

[Ki-Adi-Mundi]

Are you me? :D Indeed in the new Polish retailer catalogue there was no Castle... But I'm sure we will get in in august.

They haven't arrived in Denmark yet, either. You'll probably have to wait untill August.

Umm, I'd like to pick that up again. Recently, i received the VIP catalogue for summer 2013. Usually it contains everything that is supposed to be released until the winter. But there is nothing about the castle line in it. All other major and new lines have been treated thoroughly but castle is not even mentioned. Without being advertised for, i get the feeling that the sets won't hit the shelves anytime soon (i.e. not before winter).

[Hive]

As such one of my consistent disappointments with LEGO Castles was the lack of realistic details to make them "livable", such as a dining hall, bedrooms, and kitchens. Ironically, I did have one castle toy that incorporated several of these features: A Mega Bloks set from their "Legend" series which, needless to say, was of absolutely wretched quality (stickers galore, a giant shell/carrying case forming the entirety of the castle structure, rudimentary figures, and mediocre brick quality), but which somehow did surpass many LEGO castles of that time with regard to interior furnishings. Yesterday I finally found some pictures of this set: 1, 2.

Fascinating pictures with some great furniture ideas indeed, thanks for sharing.

Umm, I'd like to pick that up again. Recently, i received the VIP catalogue for summer 2013. Usually it contains everything that is supposed to be released until the winter. But there is nothing about the castle line in it. All other major and new lines have been treated thoroughly but castle is not even mentioned. Without being advertised for, i get the feeling that the sets won't hit the shelves anytime soon (i.e. not before winter).

I'm beginning to fear that you are right... I see 'Castle' mentioned at no local shops at all, nor on our branch of LEGO's own site. Would they really delay a release in North America by 6 months in Europe...?