Exetrius Posted April 2, 2020 I am delighted to share my first 2020 MOC! Let's first take a look at some of the images and the how's and the why's of this build will follow along the way. The build The so-called money shot. A lot of post-production involved here, more on that later. The actual thing. In short, this is the result of trying to answer the question "how do I fit an entire game/theme into a somewhat feasible set?". There are the four most iconic lore/NPC characters: the Faction Leaders, who, as the name implies, represent the four factions that players could join in the game, as well as two bad guys. Also, there are four worlds/areas more or less related to each faction, plus one for bad guys to hang out. Total part count: 1382 pieces. And it including the following items; from left to right: Brick-built Spiderling & Stromling (Maelstrom), Faction Leader Vanda Darkflame (Paradox), Duke Exeter (Sentinels), Dr. Overbuild (Assembly), Hael Storm (Venture League), Brick-built mini Venture Koi. The other named items: Inventor Goggles, mini Hidden Dojo and mini Assembly turrets ("Assembly Personal Fortresses" to be exact). The rest should be easy enough to identify yourself. Now a bit more into detail for each world, with a bit of build process background: Forbidden Valley, the first world I started designing, March 2017 (there were a number of steps that came before, though). However I it was way too big, so in April 2018 I found myself redesigning it from scratch. Most important change was that I made the Great Tree (with Hidden Dojo) mini/micro scale, instead a heavily downsized minifig scale. The floating rocks parkour was inspired by the in-game area "Perilous Path". Two things that stood out to me from this world (other than the tree) were the candles, and a high abundance of places infected with Maelstrom energy, hence I included candles and dark energy crystals. I would have liked to carry over the shrine and the refinary installation from my initial attempt, but couldn't due to space and parts constraints. Gnarled Forest was the second location I tackled. First I redesigned the mini Black Seas Barracuda (I made a full prototype prior to starting Forbidden Valley), end of April 2018, still. I worked on the floating island, sporadically but intensely (my workflow in a nutshell ) in May and August of that year, by that time it was about 70% complete and moved on to the other worlds. The final submodel features the pirate ship stuck in the the tree, which can be rotated and removed, with a small beach, seen in the "Pirate Camp" area. The broad waterfall is open for interpretation, but in my mind it is the sea with an 'infinity' edge: water is continuously falling off and indefinitely replenished, a common theme with floating islands. However, with the smaller waterfall, it is also similar to pond at "Tortoise Terrace", so really it is what you make of it. The skull can be seen in "The Ravine" and on promotional artwork. The back side is even more abstract, but with a bit of imagination it could pass as The Ravine too, imo. Crux Prime was rather easy to make, just a collection of rocky platforms with glowing lava underneath, as seen in "Caldera Mar". Built it in September 2018. I did have an idea for them to sit on 'arms', attached via ball joints, so you could adjust and position them in the air however you wanted, but in the end that would add a lot of extra parts, and perhaps those would be too unstable or unsightly, so went with three loose islands. Btw, I do have a physical build of the Dark Spiderling, it's a fun little thing. I might sometimes play with it, sometimes... But then I took some time to charge up for the largest submodel of the build: the 2-in-1 Nexus Tower & Assembly Lab. With "some time" I actually mean that things started to progress at the beginning of January 2020... What took the most time was figuring out how to set up the interior (the Assembly Lab) of the island, especially with the gate and landing platform as well. What didn't help was that I couldn't find much about Assembly-specific in-game areas, so I improvised. I made an Inventor Goggles charging station and a big monitor. And added danger stripes. The Nexus Tower is in-universe actually located on Crux Prime, but in-game you can only play in the tower itself, not on the terrain around it. I based my design mostly of promotional artwork, where the tower is often in the distance, sitting atop an especially spiky chunk of rock. In this submodel, the terrain can be lifted up on either side of the tower to peek into the lab, but can also be removed entirely with the tower. I splashed some green onto it for the sake having colour instead of only grey, sprinkled some micro Assembly turrets here and there, and added the mini Venture Koi on the back. The silhouette of the Nexus Tower at this scale was challenging to achieve, but I'm very satisfied, and I even managed to recreate the energy beams found at the observation deck/landing bay. I also found a great part for the beam of Imagination Nexus: the spiraling fire station pole! All in all, the build, without the custom decorations, was finished in February 2020.Decorations and rendering My largest uncertainty and greatest concern while building were the decorations: I had no idea how to apply them, and I would have to make some of the myself. I saw a tutorial in the LDD forum, but I didn't understand how to get into the LDD files (and still don't). I found comfort in the thought that I got support form @Umbra-Manis, who showed me he could make some excellent renderings of custom minifigs, though. In the end, I didn't have to rely on his help for it, because of the newly released program Part Designer, an extension for Stud.io, which allowed me to quickly and easily decorate any part with any decoration. Only thing left to do was obtain the textures for the figures from the LU fandom wiki, and create the rest myself, in Inkscape. After I finished the custom parts I and incorporated them in the Stud.io models, I did some rendering tests and then made a lot of renders.Post-production First I did colour- and light adjustments to the renders, same as I do with actual photos, that's where it usually stops. But now, I also wanted a more 'cinematic' shot, as the main promotional image (the first image in this post). Thus, I went to Inkscape again, made the background from scratch (taking inspiration from the amazing promotional wallpapers for LU), and applied various effects to the render. My ambitions didn't stop there, either...Promotional video Yes, that's right: I became a Youtuber just for this build. Sort of. The perceptive reader must have taken note already of the fact that this whole MOC smells a bit like... an Ideas project. In order to convince even more people of how cool LU really was, I figured I had to do a video to stir up some nostalgia with former players of the game, and give people who are unfamiliar with LU a quick taste of what the lore was like and what the game was about. So I downloaded an open source video editor program, OpenShot, as well as the old trailers and music, and spent another one and a half week tinkering. I also found a great site to distort static images: photomosh.com. This is the result: A final word I like to ramble about my builds, and I am glad I can do so here on EB. If feels good to write this in objective speech, not having to keep everything short and filter out anything that is not relevant for promotion. I'm still planning to add a collage of my build progress to this topic (as I did with my Eva 02 build), but for now this is it. I hope you enjoyed, thanks for viewing and reading, and I'll leave the all-important link below. Links Ideas page: https://ideas.lego.com/projects/b6e5c78a-f3e3-481c-bf83-a47f0c3d0cb5 Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/legouniverse/comments/ft6gfz/comrades_the_time_has_come_accepting_your_votes/ The comment with which it all began: https://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/112657-custom-lego-collectable-minifigures-series-universe/&do=findComment&comment=2285650Tags Just going to tag a few people here that will probably enjoy this: @Peppermint_M @Dorayaki @Bricknave @Umbra-Manis @Murdoch17 @Robert8 @PenPlays , sorry if you didn't want to be tagged! Also sorry if you wanted to be tagged, and were not! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Robert8 Posted April 2, 2020 Thank you so much for tagging me. These looks amazing. I never played LEGO Universe, so I'm unfamiliar with the lore but these look spectacular My favorite are the Gnarled Forest and Crux Prime, love the aesthetic of that one And everything looks so professional and well made. It's looks like a real TLG product. And even a video I'll vote for it as soon as I can. Good luck Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Peppermint_M Posted April 2, 2020 Super Neat! I had a lot of fun playing the Game and really did wish there were sets. Thanks for tagging me, thanks for sharing this here and best of lucl! (Not appreciating the 10 year thing though. I am old) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Exetrius Posted April 3, 2020 13 hours ago, Robert8 said: Thank you so much for tagging me. These looks amazing. I never played LEGO Universe, so I'm unfamiliar with the lore but these look spectacular My favorite are the Gnarled Forest and Crux Prime, love the aesthetic of that one And everything looks so professional and well made. It's looks like a real TLG product. And even a video I'll vote for it as soon as I can. Good luck Thank you!! I'm far from a professional, but I did my best and sure picked up some skills along the way. Good to hear they appeal to you, as a non-LU player! 12 hours ago, Peppermint_M said: Super Neat! I had a lot of fun playing the Game and really did wish there were sets. Thanks for tagging me, thanks for sharing this here and best of lucl! (Not appreciating the 10 year thing though. I am old) Thanks, Pepper! Let's hope it picks up some steam. For me, the most confronting thing is that this project has been in the background for almost as long as I am on EB... My MOC projects keep swallowing up time, taking ages to complete. Time flies! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Lego David Posted April 3, 2020 This is really nice! Though I am not very familiar with the LEGO Universe game, I still am aware of the massive cult following it got and that it definitely deserves a tribute like this. Unfortunately though, the game was a failure at the time of it's release and (correct me if I'm wrong) it got shut down very early in 2012. So considering that, I am not exactly sure if LEGO would approve this set, but it's still worth a try. You have my support, good look with gathering the other supporters! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Exetrius Posted April 3, 2020 5 hours ago, Lego David said: This is really nice! Though I am not very familiar with the LEGO Universe game, I still am aware of the massive cult following it got and that it definitely deserves a tribute like this. Unfortunately though, the game was a failure at the time of it's release and (correct me if I'm wrong) it got shut down very early in 2012. So considering that, I am not exactly sure if LEGO would approve this set, but it's still worth a try. You have my support, good look with gathering the other supporters! Thanks, David! Yes indeed, the closing was premature, and the shock that that sent through the fanbase was monumental. I've tried to steer away form the drama that followed the shut-down as much as possible in my project description, as I want earn the support of the fanbase trough their love for LU. There's still a lot of frustration, but there's no way that the hardcore fans will refuse to buy an official LEGO Universe set. The question is if the LEGO company is willing to expose a little scar of the past in exchange for good karma from the fans that now feel neglected. General remark: I have stopped considering what the chances of a project are of getting approved. No one except LEGO (and licencors) decides what passes, all we can do is vote. It never hurts to help some extra projects to 10K, better supported one project too many than one too little. Glad you supported, despite your doubts! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
PenPlays Posted April 3, 2020 Saw and supported this thing the moment I saw it on Twitter. Thank you for thinking of me, too. Hopefully when one of the reproductions of the game goes live, we can all enjoy this world once again. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Murdoch17 Posted April 4, 2020 Thanks for tagging me! I love what you've done with the locations, it really brings backs a lot of fun memories. Thanks for keeping the spirit of LEGO Universe alive! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fenghuang0296 Posted April 4, 2020 This is wonderful. I really hope this makes it as a set, I would buy it day one. I’m very much part of the LU ‘cult following’. Ah, fond memories. So much nostalgia! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Exetrius Posted May 5, 2021 Unseen prototype footage!! Get it here, while it's hot! If you were hesitation, planning, contemplating, or procrastinating to support my project, I urge you to make up your mind quickly: just over 20 days left until the milestone deadline! While you're here though, I hope you enjoy this little insight into the development of the Forbidden Valley submodel. C&C appreciated! If you want to know more about the background and current status of the project, visit the update page. Cheers! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
