LEGO Nexo Knights 2018

[x105Black]

10 hours ago, Penkid11 said:

Sad to hear the theme is ending. Hope it gets some sort of story send off. Also, since LEGO is currently on the market as to what to do next, we're obviously going to have the "Bring back castle, LEGO!" people popping back in again, I thought I'd remind people that NEXO Knights was a Castle theme (not a space theme, or a sci-fi theme), and, therefore, it’s failure would actually worsen the chances of another Castle theme (traditional, fantasy, or otherwise) showing up anytime in the next two years at minimum.

Also, I hate to break it to people, but in the current market, generic Castle just isn't something kids are interested in (LEGO's target market). However, medieval fantasy is probably at an all time high. I believe that, if LEGO were to go for a Castle theme in the near future, their safest course of action should be the elven, dwarven, and orc filled subtheme we've been dying for a revival for since 2008. Though an issue would be theme conflicts with Elves, and some of the concepts of Harry Potter.

Or, you know, how 'bout a catchy space theme, or maybe even some Pirates, I dunno.

It may have technically been a Castle theme, but it was so far from it, and really did fit better as a Space theme.  And I wouldn't be so sure that this will make the case for a real Castle theme any less likely.  It would be something completely different.  And hopefully they've spent these couple of years observing and understanding the mistakes they made with Castle 2013 and Nexo Knights, and can improve upon them to make something that the fans will actually appreciate.

That said, I wouldn't mind Space or Pirates either.  But Space would likely be much like Nexo Knights.

5 hours ago, DraikNova said:

There are two things I'm hoping for in a potential successor to Nexo Knights:

1. The popularity of dragons (seriously, if I remember correctly there have been at least two sets featuring dragons, usually more, for the past five or so years) results in LEGO making the theme dragon-focused. There's a reason even Megabloks managed to make a dragon-based line last for over half a decade.
2. LEGO doesn't act stingy with giving female characters sets.

I'd love some dragons.  The dragon from the 2013 line was great, as were the previous iterations in dark red, black, and green with armor (from Vikings).  I also love Smaug.  More of those would be welcome.  They could definitely do something using their dinosaur molds from Jurassic Park / World as well.  I just hope they avoid brick-built dragons.

And yes, more females would be great.  Especially females that aren't royalty or peasants.  A female warrior, we don't get those often enough, but there are some good examples in the CMF line.

3 hours ago, MAB said:

Let's face it, if they do a traditional castle theme with two factions, people will complain about always making sets based on conflict and how they actually want peasants and civilians rather than soldiers. If they do peasants, then people will complain they want more army builders. If they do a battle pack, there will be too many soldiers based on the same torso. If they don't, there won't be enough soldiers based on the same torso. If they do two factions, others will want 3 factions, or 4, or 5. If one faction appears evil and one good, then people will complain that the story line is too pre-determined. They should bring back old factions, but update the ensigns. But the new designs don't perfectly match the old, so there will be complaints and people will say this is why the theme has been a complete flop. And we need different factions. More factions. But not too many. And they should be: wolf, falcon, lion (heads), lion (full body), crown, dragon (green), dragon (black), boars, bats. But not too many of them. But all of them. Why no red dragons? Stupid decision. We should have had more. And a battle pack for each. And mixed battle packs. With different torsos in for variation and also the same torsos as I want my army to look uniform. Actually, they should be based on real historic emblems, such as cross keys, fleur de lys and the red cross of the crusaders. Sales would have been much better if they kept it realistic concerning the history and I can prove it with facts. If they do a grey traditional castle, people will want a yellow Classic Castle. If they do a classic yellow one, people will complain about juniorization of sets these days, and the bright colours, comparing it to the detail of Orthanc. If they do a large detailed castle, it will be too expensive but also not big enough at the same time. If they do a medieval market set with pigs in it, it'll be the worst decision ever made by LEGO as someone wanted goats not pigs. There won't be enough horses, or there will be too many pushing up the price of sets. And they should have gone back to the classic horse with no articulation. Or not, if they did. Or introduced a new horse with more articulation. Wait a minute, they gave us all those factions but still no forestmen? Stags. We need stags.

Sounds about right.  It's hard to please everyone, and if they try they may end up pleasing no one.  Still, any mix of those things would be cool.  I'd love an old faction, Forestmen, and goats.  Just those 3 would make my day.  1 set a year that did any 3 of the things you mention would be a huge boon to Castle fans, even if it was a $20 set.

2 hours ago, Cyclone_37 said:

I think this is the last time we will get a castle theme for a while, this is now multiple failures for castle sets even with a reinvention of the idea with Nexo Knights. I think Lego might go in a completely new direction this time around given the recent failures of old successes (Bionicle, galaxy squad, Knights, pirates, to my knowledge) Just not another Chima-esque theme please

I wouldn't be surprised to see them avoid Castle.  That said, I don't think the failure of Nexo Knights means a failure of Castle.  I think it means a failure on the concept of making a futuristic sci-fi infused Castle theme.  Hopefully the good people at LEGO understand this.

[Lyichir]

2 minutes ago, x105Black said:

I wouldn't be surprised to see them avoid Castle.  That said, I don't think the failure of Nexo Knights means a failure of Castle.  I think it means a failure on the concept of making a futuristic sci-fi infused Castle theme.  Hopefully the good people at LEGO understand this.

You mean the success of Nexo Knights, right? I'd love it if we take the idea that a theme that lasts two and a half years constitutes a failure and nip it in the bud. Sure, perhaps Nexo Knights didn't meet all of its initial expectations. It still lasted about as long as every individual Castle theme from the past two decades (in some cases, longer). And I doubt Lego had any serious expectation that Nexo Knights would have staying power on par with Ninjago, not after Ninjago had become "evergreen" (let alone after its revival had proven to pose a barrier to their similar expectations for Chima). Even at the theme's outset, designers were quite honest about Nexo Knights representing a new, different take on the Castle formula, but not some permanent shift in direction for Lego Castle as a whole. Unfortunately, from my experience, Castle fans seem to lack any sort of patience or perspective, so a three-year period without castle themes that suit their particular, nostalgia-framed tastes (never mind the Elves theme arguably representing a SECOND castle theme during that time period) got interpreted as The End of Castle Forever and Ever.

[Cobb]

I wonder what other theme would do well next? Don't forget they would want to make another tv-series out of it.  Nexo Knights was basically He-Man 2.0 a hugely popular toy in the 80's with a cartoon. A classic sort of castle line is defintely not appealing to that audience.

 

I feel Lego is in a tight spot, Ninjago isn't going on forever and it might be on it's last legs aswell. They drastically need another hit to attrackt the curent market.

Edited February 1, 2018 by Cobb

[x105Black]

4 hours ago, Lyichir said:

You mean the success of Nexo Knights, right? I'd love it if we take the idea that a theme that lasts two and a half years constitutes a failure and nip it in the bud. Sure, perhaps Nexo Knights didn't meet all of its initial expectations. It still lasted about as long as every individual Castle theme from the past two decades (in some cases, longer). And I doubt Lego had any serious expectation that Nexo Knights would have staying power on par with Ninjago, not after Ninjago had become "evergreen" (let alone after its revival had proven to pose a barrier to their similar expectations for Chima). Even at the theme's outset, designers were quite honest about Nexo Knights representing a new, different take on the Castle formula, but not some permanent shift in direction for Lego Castle as a whole. Unfortunately, from my experience, Castle fans seem to lack any sort of patience or perspective, so a three-year period without castle themes that suit their particular, nostalgia-framed tastes (never mind the Elves theme arguably representing a SECOND castle theme during that time period) got interpreted as The End of Castle Forever and Ever.

No, I meant what I said when I called Nexo Knights a failure.  And it was to many people.  And it was truncated from 3 full years to 2.5 years.  So yes, failure is an appropriate word to describe it.

I don't think anyone thought it would be the end of Castle forever.  But there was definitely a sense of urgency on the part of myself and others to get Nexo Knights over with so that we can return to Castle-like Castle themes rather than experimental sci-fi-like Castle themes.

[Aanchir]

3 hours ago, Cobb said:

I wonder what other theme would do well next? Don't forget they would want to make another tv-series out of it.  Nexo Knights was basically He-Man 2.0 a hugely popular toy in the 80's with a cartoon. A classic sort of castle line is defintely not appealing to that audience.

I feel Lego is in a tight spot, Ninjago isn't going on forever and it might be on it's last legs aswell. They drastically need another hit to attrackt the curent market.

There's no rule that each theme gets exactly one "replacement". Usually, it's more a case of LEGO introducing themes when they think the time is right and retiring themes when they think the time is right. So, 2019 could potentially be the right time for a new "big bang" theme AND a new Castle theme, not just one or the other. Or LEGO might hold off on one or the other so they can focus on The LEGO Movie Sequel, who knows?

I definitely don't get the sense that Ninjago is on its last legs. It was one of the top-selling themes as recently as two years ago, and while the movie didn't do well, I don't feel like it made the brand as a whole LESS popular with kids (though the reduced TV presence over the past two years has probably been holding it back somewhat, something that can hopefully be corrected this year).

[Dr.Cogg]

Ninjago is so popular it became an evergreen theme, so I wouldn't say its on its last leg at all.

[deneweth]

I think people are putting too much blame on the theme and sets themselves without understanding that it wasn't a failure in terms of losing money.  It was a failure in that it didn't live up to expectations, and ending it early might allow them to focus on something that makes more money.  That being said a large part of the failing goes to the app and power scan gimmick.  It was a cool concept that just never took off.  It was poorly executed at times and too ambitious at others.  The TV show never really caught on either.  Jang made some excellent points about two other themes hogging the spotlight with movies.  I would take it a step further and ask if two big bang themes (both targeted at about the same age range, primarily boys) is sustainable.

I know AFOLs see the sets as "not castle" because we remember the grey ramparts, and rounded swords of yore.  For kids this is the only castle theme they've ever known.  It has "knights" in the title and the TV show fleshes out the castle lore.  Yes the knights wear power armor, and fly around in spaceship sets, but to kids it's castle.  To lego it was castle re-imagined to appeal to kids (boys specifically).  Most of the actual castles these days are marketed towards girls.  I don't know if that means they won't try a castle theme, but I'm afraid it will be mostly wagons and catapults if they do.

If I could give lego advice I would point to the success of the brick built monsters in year 1 and the more fantastical villain figs in year 2.  I think a good compromise theme would a non-historically accurate mash up of Greek/Roman mythology.  It captures the essence of castle with the fantasy element while not specifically going down the orcs, dwarves, and elves route.  I think vikings tried to do that but it was a little ahead of its time.  If you compare some of the modern dragons, and the wolf from the Thorr set, lego has come a long way with brick build creatures.

[x105Black]

4 minutes ago, deneweth said:

I think people are putting too much blame on the theme and sets themselves without understanding that it wasn't a failure in terms of losing money.  It was a failure in that it didn't live up to expectations, and ending it early might allow them to focus on something that makes more money.  That being said a large part of the failing goes to the app and power scan gimmick.  It was a cool concept that just never took off.  It was poorly executed at times and too ambitious at others.  The TV show never really caught on either.  Jang made some excellent points about two other themes hogging the spotlight with movies.  I would take it a step further and ask if two big bang themes (both targeted at about the same age range, primarily boys) is sustainable.

Those are great points.  It may not have lost money, but it was a failure in other ways.

4 minutes ago, deneweth said:

I don't know if that means they won't try a castle theme, but I'm afraid it will be mostly wagons and catapults if they do.

I'm afraid of this as well, as that is what many sets have been.

4 minutes ago, deneweth said:

If I could give lego advice I would point to the success of the brick built monsters in year 1 and the more fantastical villain figs in year 2.

I would say no to the brick-built monsters and instead point them towards Smaug from The Hobbit and the Jurassic World dinosaurs for creature inspiration.

[Digger of Bricks]

7 hours ago, x105Black said:

That said, I wouldn't mind Space or Pirates either.  But Space would likely be much like Nexo Knights.

I do hope that we see a Space theme (or any sort of Action theme) that ends up using the class of parts that Nexo Knights introduced to us in such a widespread and prevalent fashion. Those parts were one of the best things to come out of the theme. 

[Lucarex]

52 minutes ago, deneweth said:

I think a good compromise theme would a non-historically accurate mash up of Greek/Roman mythology.  It captures the essence of castle with the fantasy element while not specifically going down the orcs, dwarves, and elves route.  I think vikings tried to do that but it was a little ahead of its time.

Yes yes and yes! I won't hold my breath though as seemingly popular historical themes such as Egypt, sold poorly as Pharaoh's Quest proved (the Pyramid remains a favourite set in my house). Even licensing with Indiana Jones and more recently, the awful Prince of Persia, didn't fare much better. As for a Mount Olympus type theme, I'd buy in a heartbeat.

Very interesting discussion in general though. NK has been one of my son's favourite themes primarily due to the "castle and knights" elements and the really cool villains/monsters of waves 1 and 2 (even if the BoM teased some fantastic sea/forest concepts that never came).

That said, other than a few great large sets, there was a lot of repetitive vehicles and it's a shame the line has ended on such an underwhelming note (tech infection, really?).

 

Edited February 2, 2018 by Lucarex

[MasterBuilder477]

On 1/30/2018 at 10:07 PM, Robert8 said:

That's because this wasn't designed as the final wave. Remember we already saw the updated Ruina minifigure

Human Monstrox was probably planned to appear in the very final wave

Where are images of Ruina and Human Monstrox?

[icm]

Sorry if someone else has mentioned this earlier in the thread, but it seems like Nexo Knights really had the deck stacked against it in terms of timing.  During its brief two and a half years on shelves (counting the 1H18 wave), there will have been two (!) in-house Lego movies about different themes, three (!) Star Wars movies, six or seven (!) Marvel movies, and four (!) DC movies in theaters, each with at least one Lego set and in several cases with large waves.  Ninjago didn't slow down to make room for it, instead releasing several large waves besides the movie line, and at my local TRU there was still a lot of leftover Chima on the shelves.  How could Nexo Knights possibly compete will all that product in the same sci-fi/action category?  Perhaps if the same concept was executed essentially the same way two years earlier or two years later it would have exceeded expectations, but there just wasn't room for it in 2016-18.

Edited February 2, 2018 by icm
Fixed typos.

[Nexogeek]

1 minute ago, icm said:

Sorry if someone else has mentioned this earlier in the thread, but it seems like Next Knights really had the deck stacked against it in terms of timing.  During its brief two and a half years on shelves (counting the 1H18 wave), there will have been two (!) in-house Lego movies about different themes, three (!) Star Wars movies, six or seven (!) Marvel movies, and four (!) DC movies in theaters, each with at least one Lego set and in several cases with large waves.  Ninjago didn't slow down to make room for it, instead releasing several large waves besides the movie line, and at my local TRU there was still a lot of leftover Chima on the shelves.  How could Nexo Knights possible compete will all that product in the same sci-fi/action category?  Perhaps if the same concept was executed essentially the same way two years earlier or two years later it would have exceeded expectations, but there just wasn't room for it in 2016-18.

Seriously though cause the theme was overall a great theme with a good show, timing on the other hand was awful. If it came when Chima did i could see it doing a lot better

[x105Black]

2 hours ago, Lucarex said:

Very interesting discussion in general though. NK has been one of my son's favourite themes primarily due to the "castle and knights" elements and the really cool villains/monsters of waves 1 and 2 (even if the BoM teased some fantastic sea/forest concepts that never came).

I imagine he would really enjoy a return or Castle, then!

1 hour ago, icm said:

Sorry if someone else has mentioned this earlier in the thread, but it seems like Next Knights really had the deck stacked against it in terms of timing.  During its brief two and a half years on shelves (counting the 1H18 wave), there will have been two (!) in-house Lego movies about different themes, three (!) Star Wars movies, six or seven (!) Marvel movies, and four (!) DC movies in theaters, each with at least one Lego set and in several cases with large waves.  Ninjago didn't slow down to make room for it, instead releasing several large waves besides the movie line, and at my local TRU there was still a lot of leftover Chima on the shelves.  How could Nexo Knights possible compete will all that product in the same sci-fi/action category?  Perhaps if the same concept was executed essentially the same way two years earlier or two years later it would have exceeded expectations, but there just wasn't room for it in 2016-18.

Nexo Knights would have competed better by being a better product than others available.  To many, it was not.  And it seems that you agree that it did not compare favorably to the other themes you mentioned.

[BrickJagger]

21 minutes ago, x105Black said:

I imagine he would really enjoy a return or Castle, then!

Nexo Knights would have competed better by being a better product than others available.  To many, it was not.  And it seems that you agree that it did not compare favorably to the other themes you mentioned.

This is not a good argument. You have no sales figures to back that up, and the fact that the theme was extended for another year because of how well the winter 2017 sets sold indicates the exact opposite. Nexo was not a rousing success, but it was far from a failure commercially. I think we all know what your opinions of the theme itself are, so we don't need to have that discussion. 

@icm Just made a great case for how Nexo had an uphill battle to gain footing from the start, and expecting it to instantly become more successful than all of Lego's top themes makes no sense. Nexo had a normal lifespan, a decent sized fanbase, and filled its roll in Lego's plans for almost three years. For a non-licensed theme in this day and age, that's more than respectable.

[Lord Insanity]

My six year old is going to be heartbroken.  He loves Nexo Knights.  I must admit I think the Lightning Monsters are one of the coolest bad guy factions Lego has ever made for any theme.  I am actually surprised that so many people didn't like the concept and color scheme.  The Lightning Monsters are my favorite thing to come of the whole theme.

[Dr.Cogg]

I think what killed this theme was the second batch of monsters, while I liked the Rock Monsters myself, the builds were not very good and the color scheme was kind of bland, where as the Lava Monsters and Virus Vampire both have good color scheme and good builds.

[zoth33]

34 minutes ago, Lord Insanity said:

My six year old is going to be heartbroken.  He loves Nexo Knights.  I must admit I think the Lightning Monsters are one of the coolest bad guy factions Lego has ever made for any theme.  I am actually surprised that so many people didn't like the concept and color scheme.  The Lightning Monsters are my favorite thing to come of the whole theme.

Yeah my 7 year old can't wait for the show to come back on here.  He really likes the show and loves all of the villains.  In todays world there are so many things for kids to be interested in.  Its not like when I was a kid and I would play with lego for hours.  Now kids have all these video games and toys to choose from.  Lego really needs to keep their ideas inventive in this ever changing market to keep kids interested.  Right now Ninjago is their biggest original success.  It will be interesting to see if they can come up with something that matches Ninjagos success.  

[Fenghuang0296]

14 hours ago, Willworkfortoys said:

 I'm sure everyone here is in the same boat in terms of having "plans" for a huge MOC that may never come to fruition but half the fun is planning and buying and parting out.  

Well, huge might be a stretch, but I'm certainly planning a homegrown Virus Castle. And I know I'm not the only one.

[Forresto]

I think my fundamental problem with Nexo Knights is how little compatibility it had with other themes.

Having distinct features and design is great but when you're as weird as Nexo Knights you better have solid waves of sets to carry you.

What made Power Miners so great is the first few waves were really strong, especially that first wave. 

 

[x105Black]

2 hours ago, BrickJagger said:

This is not a good argument. You have no sales figures to back that up, and the fact that the theme was extended for another year because of how well the winter 2017 sets sold indicates the exact opposite. Nexo was not a rousing success, but it was far from a failure commercially. I think we all know what your opinions of the theme itself are, so we don't need to have that discussion. 

@icm Just made a great case for how Nexo had an uphill battle to gain footing from the start, and expecting it to instantly become more successful than all of Lego's top themes makes no sense. Nexo had a normal lifespan, a decent sized fanbase, and filled its roll in Lego's plans for almost three years. For a non-licensed theme in this day and age, that's more than respectable.

I agree it was an uphill battle, but I posit that the theme itself would have done better if it was designed in such a way that it was preferable to those themes.  Some things come out of nowhere in a world filled with media and become instantly successful because they are great.  Think of Stranger Things among all of the other competition as far as televised media.  Had Nexo Knights been a better theme, it would have taken off instantly.  That's my argument.

1 hour ago, Forresto said:

I think my fundamental problem with Nexo Knights is how little compatibility it had with other themes.

Having distinct features and design is great but when you're as weird as Nexo Knights you better have solid waves of sets to carry you.

What made Power Miners so great is the first few waves were really strong, especially that first wave. 

Nexo Knights is highly compatible with Space.

[Orange Leader]

*LEGO theme carries on for two and a half years.*

"It's a failure."

You know what a failure by that definition is?

"Castle 2013"

 

[MAB]

7 hours ago, x105Black said:

Nexo Knights would have competed better by being a better product than others available. 

 

Nexo Knights could have had brilliant sets (and in fact some were good), but if it is going up against big movie franchises then sets based on those franchises will naturally sell better. This isn't down to the product itself, it is down to the media associated with the theme.

I'm also not sure it would have done better if it was done when Chima was. Chima suffered in part because it wasn't Ninjago. Again there were good sets, but Ninjago was peaking (both in product and in media) when it was stopped. Anything that replaced it was going to have a hard time following.

Of course, they could have thrown loads of money at NK like they have done with Ninjago, bringing out a NK movie to compete with other themes on a more equal footing. But they have done that with an established popular theme (Ninjago) and the movie was comparitively a bit of a flop.

5 hours ago, Forresto said:

I think my fundamental problem with Nexo Knights is how little compatibility it had with other themes.

Having distinct features and design is great but when you're as weird as Nexo Knights you better have solid waves of sets to carry you.

What made Power Miners so great is the first few waves were really strong, especially that first wave. 

 

NK was reasonably strong for the first couple of years. Not with AFOLs but with kids.

I know people will say it wasn't, but if it wasn't why did LEGO continue with it for two and a half years?

[Aanchir]

3 hours ago, Orange Leader said:

*LEGO theme carries on for two and a half years.*

"It's a failure."

You know what a failure by that definition is?

"Castle 2013"

In fairness, I don't think there are a lot of Castle fans who believe Castle 2013 was a rousing success…

That said, in the grand scheme of things, it's very rare for ANY Castle, Space, or Pirates series to last more than five consecutive waves.

[firefox]

4 hours ago, Orange Leader said:

*LEGO theme carries on for two and a half years.*

"It's a failure."

You know what a failure by that definition is?

"Castle 2013"

 

 Castle 2013 was not a failure, it had the bad luck of comming after kingdoms, one of the best castle themes ever. Fans had very high expectations and

Lego just made basicly  the same sets in blue instead of red, just as they did with pirates 2015. It was a filler set, never intended to grow. 

As an aftermarket theme it's a success, you should look at the prices for 2013's , they are quite high.

 

As for nexo knights, the problems were always too much techo too little castle and the best designers were on ninjago.

Nexo knights was always marketed towards a younger audiance then ninjago i had the feeling and the sets were to lego technic and rushed. Season 2 did kill it with bad sets.