Bionicle 2015 Discussion

[VBBN]

Personally, I would be content if HF stayed minifigure scale with constraction elements, while Bionicle was full constraction.

That's an interesting idea. It would help to keep the themes more unique from eachother

While I don't mind if Hero Factory were to end, having both running at the same time could really boost the amount of new/recolored elements.

Though I think it's safe to say if they kept both, we wouldn't see many more one-off lines on the side like the Super heroes line or the now 2-year Chima ultrabuilds.

[Jetrax99]

That's an interesting idea. It would help to keep the themes more unique from eachother

While I don't mind if Hero Factory were to end, having both running at the same time could really boost the amount of new/recolored elements.

Though I think it's safe to say if they kept both, we wouldn't see many more one-off lines on the side like the Super heroes line or the now 2-year Chima ultrabuilds.

Apparently youtube member William Furno got a reply from Lego about a question he sent them regarding HF ending anytime soon. In short the answer was "no".

Edited July 5, 2014 by Jetrax99

[Zenerius]

Apparently youtube member William Furno got a reply from Lego about a question he sent them regarding HF ending anytime soon. In short the answer was "no".

Lego might be trying to cover up Bionicle's return, or they might be telling the truth. We'll just have to wait and see.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Zenerius

[Aanchir]

Apparently youtube member William Furno got a reply from Lego about a question he sent them regarding HF ending anytime soon. In short the answer was "no".

That's pretty good news, though at the same time it's worth keeping in mind that sometimes certain branches of the LEGO Group treat the "end" of a theme as when they stop providing it to stores and not just after the last wave. If Hero Factory does continue to do battle machines with mini-heroes (and maybe even mini-villains) I will be thrilled! It's a format that has brought so many great opportunities to the theme. And now that the foundations are laid, with the mini-hero parts and cockpits introduced, there is so much further they could take the concept.

If Hero Factory does continue at this scale, I wonder if they'll "update" the mini-heroes in any way to freshen them up, the way they do with regular minifigures in most themes. It could be as simple as armor in a new color, or it could be something more elaborate like a totally new armor design. Though personally I'm more than happy with the current design. The biggest improvement I could think of, which wouldn't really affect the figures' appearance much, would be glow-in-the-dark Hero Cores. The Fairground Mixer this year introduced 1x1 tiles in White Glow, so it's totally possible! I'm honestly kind of surprised that the LEGO Group didn't do this sooner, since White Glow was introduced in 2012 and the hero cores switched to being a single white color for all heroes that same year. It seems like a natural way to take advantage of that and make it even cooler.

[Jetrax99]

Or, they may be planning on having both run side by side.

[just2good]

I think if both run side by side, HF will continue in the minifigure scale and Bionicle will be in the "normal" constraction scale. Aanchir, I'd love to see the HF minifigures get updated!

[Timeline15]

Seeing as these Bionicle rumours seem very reliable atm, and HF doesn't seem to be ending either, I'd say that's very likely. The only alternative is to have the themes alternating years, which seems very unlikely.

While I would probably prioritise buying the Bionicle sets over the HF ones, if this continuation means we might actually see Stringer and Nex again, I'm happy. They need their own minifigures godammit!

[Cirkit]

Well, this is surprising.

Having had a read-through the threads.. I can't really say that I'm not excited about the possible return of the epic tale of BIONICLE, its characters, locations, and everything else affiliated with it, but I am taking all with a grain of salt. It could all be a hoax, or a mis-interpretation of an edited photo. You never know.

If it were to return, and use the current CCBS system, I'd hope they'd use those heads featured in the 'Brain-Attack' (Hero-Factory) wave, as opposed to creating totally new heads.

In the black-and-white display photo, one can easily identify armor elements from the current system, and that spider-thing appears to use the big black spike parts recently introduced. Neato.

I wonder, if BIONICLE is to return, what new elements it might bring along with the old? It probably won't ever be the BIONICLE we once knew, not exactly.

[Aanchir]

Well, this is surprising.

Having had a read-through the threads.. I can't really say that I'm not excited about the possible return of the epic tale of BIONICLE, its characters, locations, and everything else affiliated with it, but I am taking all with a grain of salt. It could all be a hoax, or a mis-interpretation of an edited photo. You never know.

If it were to return, and use the current CCBS system, I'd hope they'd use those heads featured in the 'Brain-Attack' (Hero-Factory) wave, as opposed to creating totally new heads.

In the black-and-white display photo, one can easily identify armor elements from the current system, and that spider-thing appears to use the big black spike parts recently introduced. Neato.

I wonder, if BIONICLE is to return, what new elements it might bring along with the old? It probably won't ever be the BIONICLE we once knew, not exactly.

Well, obviously it would have new heads or masks, like every constraction theme since BIONICLE has had. Beyond that, I expect new weapon pieces. Beyond that, I think it's fair to expect some new shells or detail pieces to help distinguish the sets from Hero Factory.

Generally, I don't expect to see many classic BIONICLE pieces whatsoever. Those have almost entirely disappeared from sets, with a few exceptions like the Bohrok eye, Barraki eye, Toa Mahri hose, and Piraka foot, which are still appearing in sets today. And for the most part, the Hero Factory building system has supplanted the basic building elements like arm, leg, and torso beams.

Thankfully, this should mean we can expect better proportions than many BIONICLE sets offered, especially in the later years. The current building system allows for a $10 figure to have roughly the same proportions as a Toa Mata or Toa Nuva, possibly even better in some cases since the Toa Mata and Toa Nuva frequently used the same parts for their arms and legs, and were a bit bony.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Aanchir

[Transparency for Effect]

Anyway, looking at that leaked picture, we (might) have a Skakdi, Visorak, and Tahu (?), and I was thinking - Bionicle could do a 'throwback' line, sort of like Transformers' Generations line. It'd consist of remakes of old sets in the new CCBS system. I don't know how popular Bionicle is (was?) compared to Star Wars, but if SW can rehash vehicles every vehicles and still be confident that people will buy them, I don't see why this can't be the same for Bionicle!Agreed. With HF going minifig-style this year, it could distinguish itself from Bionicle in this manner, which would be strictly constraction figures.

Ooh, like Stars, but less sparingly crafted (still likeable, but simply comprised of similar, very small and limited piece builds).

That is correct, actually. The chances of getting a faithful BIONICLE movie in theaters might be stronger today, though, since the LEGO Group has more money, more storytelling experience, and more bargaining power in general.

Sort of. The BIONICLE collectibles were blind-packaged like the CMFs, but instead of figures they had accessories like masks. Also, generally each set would include two or three randomly-packed collectibles, so it'd be rare for any two packs to have the exact same contents. The mask packs from BIONICLE's first year had 72 masks to collect (12 shapes in 6 colors each).

Someone already mentioned transparency, but was there any feeling, at the very least for the right type of mask?

[Zenerius]

I haven't seen this many viewing the Action Figure forum in years- This topic jumped from about 5,000 views to 41,000 in about 2 days. I sort of mentioned this on Flickr, but it goes to show what an impact Bionicle had on people. Regardless of if this is real or fake, this news has pulled in far more traffic than any news about Hero Factory has done

Not quite true. Compared to the HF 2014 topic, this one is drastically smaller. Take into account other posts like the Mixels discussion; it has even more than this, clocking in at 50 thousand views. Now, put the HF discussion into perspective: a whopping 240,471 views! That's nearly five times as much views as the 2015 rumors topic. While I do agree, this is somewhat uniting the fanbase again, and a 35 thousand view jump is pretty good, it's just not as major as we expected.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Zenerius

[Aanchir]

Ooh, like Stars, but less sparingly crafted (still likeable, but simply comprised of similar, very small and limited piece builds).

Someone already mentioned transparency, but was there any feeling, at the very least for the right type of mask?

Not here in the United States, since they came in small cardboard boxes over here. In Europe they sometimes came in cardboard boxes and sometimes in polybags.

Generally, getting a complete collection was not very feasible except for the most dedicated collectors. It was even more ridiculous with some later collectibles. The Kraata packs could include Kraata slugs in six shapes and thirty-six colors each. That's 216 variants. Add the six color combinations that came in the original six Rahkshi sets and the Bright Violet "Shadow Kraata" that came in later production runs of those same Rahkshi sets (all of which were available in any of the six shapes) and there were 252 Kraata variants available in BIONICLE sets. This is a handy chart).

All this for little rubber slugs that, unlike Kanohi masks, had little to no impact on a typical model's appearance. At least they came three to a package, so you'd only need to pay $252 US dollars (plus tax) for 72 $2 Kraata packs and twelve $9 Rahkshi sets to get a full collection — assuming that by some miracle you either didn't get any duplicates or were able to trade your duplicates with friends to get Kraata you were missing! And to think collectible minifigure fans complain about them getting too expensive! I'd rather pay $64 for 16 unique minifigures than $252 for 252 near-identical rubber slugs any day!

Though incidentally, the BIONICLE collectibles are part of the reason I don't agree with people who think the collectible minifigures are a scam, because if they taught me anything, it's that nobody in their right mind strives for a complete collection just because a certain number of different collectible items happen to exist. That's why the CMF packages say "16 to collect", not "Collect all 16".

Edited July 5, 2014 by Aanchir

[Shakar]

I obviously don't remember much, but I remember it was very hard to tell which mask you were getting. Minifigs have unique accessories and pieces that make it easier to tell what you're finding. Masks were roughly the same size and shape and had very subtle details.

Now that HF is confirmed to continue, I'll repeat what I and others said: it's totally possible for the two lines to coexist. Isn't it kinda what's happening now? A sci-fi, technologically advanced theme (HF) running alongside a more fantasy, mythical, elemental theme (Chima).

Now that we have a rough idea of what's going to happen next year, IfB's transition to minifig scale makes so much more sense. While elemental robot cops and humanoid animal warriors don't overlap, elemental robot cops and ancient elemental biomechanical demigod heroes... do.

I was, and still am, conflicted about Invasion from Below: while I love the Hero minifigs, I always secretly hoped it would be a one-year thing because I love my hero bots. But since we're getting Toa next year (can't believe I'm actually typing this), I'm suddenly ok with more Hero mechas. The minifigs can be easily kept, while introducing new accessories/armour and characters (like Aanchir suggested). As for the mechs, we just need some more exciting weapons (I guess they had used up the new parts budget) and a better humanoid/non humanoid mechs balance (and not SUDDENLY WALKERS ARE THE NEW BLACK like this summer).

We just need another excuse for going minifig scale. "Let's fight sea monsters" and "Heroes and Villains duke it out inside giant mechas" are the coolest ideas I read so far.

Edited July 6, 2014 by Shakar

[Timeline15]

We just need another excuse for going minifig scale. "Let's fight sea monsters" and "Heroes and Villains duke it out inside giant mechas" are the coolest ideas I read so far.

What if Von nebula just yells "make my monster grow!" and throws that staff of his into the ground, so the heroes have to fight giant versions of escaped criminals? XD

In all seriousness though, I do hope that they return to Von nebula at some point. I mean, they had him escape for a reason, and breakout ended on a cliff-hanger.

[Aanchir]

I obviously don't remember much, but I remember it was very hard to tell which mask you were getting. Minifigs have unique accessories and pieces that make it easier to tell what you're finding. Masks were roughly the same size and shape and had very subtle details.

Now that HF is confirmed to continue, I'll repeat what I and others said: it's totally possible for the two lines to coexist. Isn't it kinda what's happening now? A sci-fi, technologically advanced theme (HF) running alongside a more fantasy, mythical, elemental theme (Chima).

Now that we have a rough idea of what's going to happen next year, IfB's transition to minifig scale makes so much more sense. While elemental robot cops and humanoid animal warriors don't overlap, elemental robot cops and ancient elemental biomechanical demigod heroes... do.

I was, and still am, conflicted about Invasion from Below: while I love the Hero minifigs, I always secretly hoped it would be a one-year thing because I love my hero bots. But since we're getting Toa next year (can't believe I'm actually typing this), I'm suddenly ok with more Hero mechas. The minifigs can be easily kept, while introducing new accessories/armour and characters (like Aanchir suggested). As for the mechs, we just need some more exciting weapons (I guess they had used up the new parts budget) and a better humanoid/non humanoid mechs balance (and not SUDDENLY WALKERS ARE THE NEW BLACK like this summer).

We just need another excuse for going minifig scale. "Let's fight sea monsters" and "Heroes and Villains duke it out inside giant mechas" are the coolest ideas I read so far.

It looks like your italics tags got away from you there! But anyway, I agree with you entirely. If Hero Factory and BIONICLE do both continue next year, I'll be thrilled, because it would represent a big change for the constraction category in general. The last time we had two in-house constraction themes at a time and neither was supplementary to a System theme was Galidor, and we all know how that went.

Now that reviews have popped up of the summer sets, I think it makes a lot more sense that the first wave was mainly bipedal machines and the second wave was the reverse, since the gimmick of switching around the upper modules on the machines wouldn't work nearly so well if some of the machines were bipedal and others were not. This also explains why Evo Walker and Rocka Crawler are the exceptions in their respective waves: since the small machines would not work with that gimmick anyway, the bipedal one can be put in the multi-legged wave without any negative consequences and vice-versa. It provides a small bit of variety in a wave that otherwise couldn't really have any due to the upper module gimmick.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Aanchir

[ColdGoldLazarus]

If this is indeed happening, I'm personally hoping for a reboot; retelling the story from the ground up so that it's accessible to new viewers, while hopefully fixing some of the issues from the original run and giving it a bit more coherence and (in my opinion, one of the most important things) character development. While it's very likely they'll use the new HF system, I would personally prefer a return to a more axle-oriented system with maybe some HF stuff to supplement it; I loved the old mechanical functions and would love to see them return.

I have a whole list of nitpicky things I would do, but I'll write that up when I have more time later. Short of it is that story-wise, I'd make it more mature, but without making it too 'dark and edgy'; just more... self-aware and presented with the proper gravitas. Set wise, I'd do what I mentioned already, but also with more challenging builds than either Bionicle G1 (let this be a thing) or HF gave us. Also, make Lime Green pieces not suck, and make Hahli's color scheme match her Mahri form as a Matoran. (No seriously, that color scheme was amazing!) If there are movies or (even better) a TV show, I'd prefer the more organic and less toy-like look of the first movie trilogy, but maybe with a bit more mechanical stuff thrown in as needed.

Edited July 5, 2014 by ColdGoldLazarus

[Jetrax99]

Personally, I'd rather it be a continuation. And after looking at the artwork of "Tahu", he definitely has a normal Hau, but his shoulder pad looks very similar to his adaptive armor/Stars shoulder pad, which leads me to thinking it is a continuation.

Also, "Takanuva" there on the bottom looks to have 2 staffs, again, like his Stars set.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Jetrax99

[Zenerius]

I am about to blow your minds, guys.

This could be a prequel. About the Toa Mata on Daxia, training to collect their kanohi.

Think of it! The black/red spider could be guarding a kanohi, as well as the other rahi to provide challenges for the Mata until they collect them. Also, maybe we could get a new Hydraxon set, a shallows cat, and the Daxia piranhas! And after the Toa get their masks, they can get to Karda Nui to enter the Codrex and be put in stasis, and the story begins back up at 2001.

Just a theory. To be honest, I'd prefer a reboot, but this is a pretty awesome theory in my opinion.

[Zenerius]

Lots of good stuff from Greg today! On the Ask Greg forum at the Lego Message Boards here.

"No idea. If it were up to me, BIONICLE would not come back by picking up the old story, but as something new (a reboot or something else like that). As someone else pointed out in one of the threads, the original BIONICLE audience is mostly in high school and college now, and to succeed, the line is going to have to appeal to today's 8 and 9 and 10 and 11 year olds, who know nothing about it. So picking up old story and forcing them to have to go back and do all that research to know what is going on probably wouldn't be a good strategy."

Looks like we might be going for a reboot, guys!

"4) If it were my decision to make, no. The old story is great, and it's vast, and it's complex, and very few kids in the 8-11 age group the sets would have to sell to knows much of anything about it. Expecting them to study up on 9 years of story to be able to play with the sets is asking a lot."

Most likely we are going for a reboot here. Thank goodness. Having a prequel/sequel would be confusing for future audiences.

[Transparency for Effect]

If this is indeed happening, I'm personally hoping for a reboot; retelling the story from the ground up so that it's accessible to new viewers, while hopefully fixing some of the issues from the original run and giving it a bit more coherence and (in my opinion, one of the most important things) character development. While it's very likely they'll use the new HF system, I would personally prefer a return to a more axle-oriented system with maybe some HF stuff to supplement it; I loved the old mechanical functions and would love to see them return.

I have a whole list of nitpicky things I would do, but I'll write that up when I have more time later. Short of it is that story-wise, I'd make it more mature, but without making it too 'dark and edgy'; just more... self-aware and presented with the proper gravitas. Set wise, I'd do what I mentioned already, but also with more challenging builds than either Bionicle G1 (let this be a thing) or HF gave us. Also, make Lime Green pieces not suck, and make Hahli's color scheme match her Mahri form as a Matoran. (No seriously, that color scheme was amazing!) If there are movies or (even better) a TV show, I'd prefer the more organic and less toy-like look of the first movie trilogy, but maybe with a bit more mechanical stuff thrown in as needed.

I'm pretty sure they've probably sorted out the lime green issues by now but, prove me wrong.

Wow, I've just checked the Kraata; imagine the Rahkshi variations they could have spawned from all those wild colours.

[VBBN]

Not quite true. Compared to the HF 2014 topic, this one is drastically smaller. Take into account other posts like the Mixels discussion; it has even more than this, clocking in at 50 thousand views. Now, put the HF discussion into perspective: a whopping 240,471 views! That's nearly five times as much views as the 2015 rumors topic. While I do agree, this is somewhat uniting the fanbase again, and a 35 thousand view jump is pretty good, it's just not as major as we expected.

That topic has been live since halfway through last year almost, and has spanned an entire years worth of sets.

Besides we don't have as large of a construction fanbase as other forums more catered towards it. Our activity in this sub forum has also doubled what it usually is when news is announced; there's no telling where this topic will end up once the year goes on (I'll change it to ____images and discussion as soon as something is officially confirmed) but based on this week, it is getting far better reception in terms of volume of people when compared to the announcements of rumors in the last few years.

Anyway it's not important to discuss really, just an observation.

A prequel to the original Bionicle story is an interesting theory, but where to go after that? A reboot is ideal in terms of rewriting the story to give it a simpler edge, if that is Legos intention, but I feel like they'd want to start with something that they can build off of for years to come. Though depending how they handled it, they could do that, like span off of the Toa and focus on a backstory of someone new introduced in that story. Either way, more anything new with a Bionicle story is a welcome change from more HF story (just personal preference to me) if the two run next to eachother, hopefully they keep HF simpler and leave Bionicle closer to what it used to be. Sort of like how you guys suggested Bionicle be kept as a more adult oriented theme whilst HF is aimed more for younger ones

[Jetrax99]

Lots of good stuff from Greg today! On the Ask Greg forum at the Lego Message Boards here.

"No idea. If it were up to me, BIONICLE would not come back by picking up the old story, but as something new (a reboot or something else like that). As someone else pointed out in one of the threads, the original BIONICLE audience is mostly in high school and college now, and to succeed, the line is going to have to appeal to today's 8 and 9 and 10 and 11 year olds, who know nothing about it. So picking up old story and forcing them to have to go back and do all that research to know what is going on probably wouldn't be a good strategy."

Looks like we might be going for a reboot, guys!

"4) If it were my decision to make, no. The old story is great, and it's vast, and it's complex, and very few kids in the 8-11 age group the sets would have to sell to knows much of anything about it. Expecting them to study up on 9 years of story to be able to play with the sets is asking a lot."

Most likely we are going for a reboot here. Thank goodness. Having a prequel/sequel would be confusing for future audiences.

You do know just because Greg says he would do a reboot doesn't mean it's gonna be that, right? Judging by his responses, I don't think it's his decision.

[Chro]

Not quite true. Compared to the HF 2014 topic, this one is drastically smaller. Take into account other posts like the Mixels discussion; it has even more than this, clocking in at 50 thousand views. Now, put the HF discussion into perspective: a whopping 240,471 views! That's nearly five times as much views as the 2015 rumors topic. While I do agree, this is somewhat uniting the fanbase again, and a 35 thousand view jump is pretty good, it's just not as major as we expected.

Those topics have existed for a long time, while this one has only existed for a few days

[Zenerius]

You do know just because Greg says he would do a reboot doesn't mean it's gonna be that, right? Judging by his responses, I don't think it's his decision.

He might have some influence. Considering the information we have now, it's likely the new Bionicle will be a reboot.

[Jetrax99]

He might have some influence. Considering the information we have now, it's likely the new Bionicle will be a reboot.

It's also likely it's a continuation. Only time will tell.

Edited July 6, 2014 by Jetrax99