Story-Driven Castle Themes?

[SerenityInFire]

I just want lego to go back to the fantasy era where we have the heroic but often misunderstood Orcs and Skeletons fighting off the forces of the evil humans and dwarves.

[Lego David]

12 hours ago, Alexandrina said:

I could not agree more on this point. It's true that in real-life medieval history, strong women weren't abundant - but they definitely existed. Eleanor of Aquitaine, Matilda of Flanders, Joan of Arc, Queen Matilda of England... these were the heroes of their stories. And so what if they were the exceptions? Stories are always about the exceptions. Not all Hobbits had boundless courage and crossed the known world to destroy the powers of evil and their artefacts - but Frodo did, and so we get the Lord of the Rings.

We're also living in the modern world, with the modern state of the fantasy genre. Much as Lego aren't ever likely to make Game of Thrones sets, it's still a fact that A Song of Ice and Fire is one of the modern-day titans of medieval-inspired fantasy - and it features many women in positions of power. There's no reason a revived Castle theme, especially one with multiple factions, would need to avoid having powerful female characters.

But the worry would be that Lego would fall into the trap of thinking strong = badass fighters. There's room for women skilled at sword and bow, shieldmaidens and huntresses, but I think it's equally important to see representation for women who have and exert power while also being feminine - in all that entails in the medieval context. So many of the real-life female icons of the Middle Ages played the roles expected of them by society, but played them well. Ideally a Lego theme would have at least two major female characters - the warrior and the lady. Over time, they can develop into more rounded characters less defined by their archetypes, but having those two starting points is a good jumping-off point.

I would like to point out though, that realistically speaking, LEGO won't include more than one major female character in the cast of their original themes, due to the perceived idea that everything except for Mini-Doll themes is aimed at boys. On the flipside, Mini-Doll themes aimed specifically at girls never include more than one major male character, so you can clearly start to see a pattern there. Depending on who the target audience is, they won't include a whole lot of characters of mixed genders. I know theoretically a LEGO theme could be aimed at both boys and girls, but LEGO doesn't seem to believe that. 

[Alexandrina]

46 minutes ago, Lego David said:

I would like to point out though, that realistically speaking, LEGO won't include more than one major female character in the cast of their original themes, due to the perceived idea that everything except for Mini-Doll themes is aimed at boys.

Aren't there two major female characters in Hidden Side? In any case, what Lego has done in the past should not bind them to what they can do in the future. 

[Aanchir]

6 hours ago, Alexandrina said:

Aren't there two major female characters in Hidden Side? In any case, what Lego has done in the past should not bind them to what they can do in the future. 

Indeed! Going back further, the Alpha Team theme's main cast included two female protagonists (Cam and Radia).

Moreover, even if there were just one female character among the main protagonists, that still leaves plenty of room for interesting female characters in other roles, like as supporting characters or villains. After all, as you pointed out above, girls and women can play lots of important/influential roles in a story besides the role of an action hero!

For example, even though the Nexo Knights theme only had one girl (Macy Halbert) among its five main knights, it also had several female villains like Lavaria, Whiperella, Ruina Stoneheart, Pola, and the Harpies, as well as female supporting characters like Ava Prentiss and Queen Halbert (Macy's mother). The Legends of Chima theme went even further, with eleven different female minifig characters in its three-year run. Even if they only made up a small fraction of the Legends of Chima characters who appeared as minifigures (around 1/7th), that's still way more than we've seen in any incarnation of the Castle theme!

The important thing, in my opinion, isn't whether a theme achieves some perfect balance between male and female characters, but rather whether it manages to include both male and female characters across a wide range of different roles. And that's an area in which story-driven themes have made great strides over the past decade.

[Alexandrina]

11 minutes ago, Aanchir said:

The important thing, in my opinion, isn't whether a theme achieves some perfect balance between male and female characters, but rather whether it manages to include both male and female characters across a wide range of different roles. And that's an area in which story-driven themes have made great strides over the past decade.

Exactly this. There's nothing wrong with having, say, a character who is a Lady in Waiting and nothing more - it's variety, it's a role some women actually played in life, and combined with a well-written leading lady can give an interesting dynamic.

It would be an issue if every female character was either a stereotypical princess or a demure lady in waiting, but as part of an assortment of characters it's healthy. And on the other side of the coin, having all the male characters rigidly stick to the same archetype of sword-toting would be at best samey, where a variety of characters could help a series prosper. 

[cosmic]

On 3/9/2021 at 2:38 AM, Lego David said:

So, if hypotetically the only way Castle could ever come back would be through a story, what kind of story do you personally think it should have? 

I’ve been dying to find a discussion thread like this. I honestly love Castle and want a lot of its elements represented in Lego at any given time. The Castle and Space themes are some of my favorite in house properties and I myself have been wanting Lego to bring them back. I personally have an idea and I have hope it may actually come to fruition one day. A general fantasy theme. I’m not so much a fan of story driven themes because of Lego’s track record of how they handled them. Lets look at a few examples

• Chima - the fire and ice plot of the show killed the theme in my opinion. We stopped seeing regular lairs and castles for the heroes and their regular tribal vehicles and in turn everything became red or white. Creative decisions like that, where they don’t know how to move on and spend 2 waves beating a dead horse make me lose interest in an otherwise compelling theme

• Monster Fighters - gone too soon

• Nexo Knights - the theme was way too stylized and as someone who wanted castle elements seeing them represented in a high tech and color specific way made the theme not feel very versatile and stuck in its own image

• Hidden Side - perfect theme but I must admit the main cast was not that exciting to me and a big let down of having a story driven theme for me is the constant recurrence of protagonists and their repeating designs I barely cared for in the first place. 
 

There are some advantages to a story driven theme. For on they typically receive cartoons (Ninjago, Chima, Nexo Knights) or an app (Hidden Side) so they tend to have a broader reach with audiences because they can reach people across platforms not exclusive to Lego (TV and video games). And the advantage of a generic theme would be how easy it is to army build when instead of say, a named character you get a generic soldier.

 

My dream of how Lego would revive Castle is under a general fantasy label. I’d like to see the theme of the waves rotating. One year it could be castle. Red kingdom is fleshed out, with a castle, a series of small shops and markets that make up the kingdom, maybe some village farm and home builds, some vehicles for the king and his men, and dragon lairs and evil towers for the evil wizards. We usually see small tower prisons and carriages in Lego castle so notice how some of my suggestions haven’t been made yet. But we can see the different kingdoms rotating each time they get back to a castle wave, and different kingdoms, maybe with the knights teams being fleshed out versions of some of the logos that have appeared in the cmf series. We can get buildings that represent the Far Far Away model of a kingdom, surrounding the castle, and also poor villages with peasant far removed from the kings land. I’d love to see Lego represent that medieval dichotomy of poor village and capitol living people. Evil wizards, goblins, orcs, dwarves, and elves could all be represented.

but here’s where my idea changes.

The theme is described as rotating. One year its castle, but the next year its pirates. Pirates vs soldiers. Mermaids, underwater kingdoms, giant sea monsters, viking ships, treasure hunters, treasure islands, spirits and sea creatures are all represented.

Then another year its a general fantasy wave. Cyclops’s, orcs, trolls, dragons, fairies. Think of all you can do with fairies. Winter fairies, grass fairies, fire fairies, dark fairies, pink skinned fairies, fairies with butterfly wings and pink skin, fairies with bug wings and blue hair, high tech fairies. Steampunk sets. Trolls village sets, ogre wooden campout sets, giants capturing and eating protagonist who needs to escape set, fairytale worlds. 
 

Basically I want a Lego theme that switches between generic castle (with different protagonists and antagonists, villages, kingdom sets etc), pirates (vs sea monsters, soldiers, and mermaids of various designs) and fairytale (ogres, giants roasting humans, troll mountain fortress’s that need to be escaped from, and forest witches). What the reasoning Lego gives for the continuous switch is up to them but I don’t think I want specialized characters for the theme, and would prefer the cast rotate and focus on the specific fantasy element being represented in said set as opposed to the same characters appearing throughout each wave in the middle of a different landscape. This helps avoid repetition and gives each set room to make new designs that fit perfectly into each concept.

 

I apologize if this was worded poorly I was struggling with how to phrase my desires for a general fantasy theme that would cover both castle, pirates, and general fairytale and there’s a lot of overlap between the 3 but long story short I don’t want it done with a central cast because I fear it would detract from the creativity of the figures produced. Feel free to nitpick or inquire more about these ideas. Do you hate them? I really like them lets talk it out.

 

[Alexandrina]

45 minutes ago, cosmic said:

One year its castle, but the next year its pirates.

This is the only part of your idea which makes me dubious - Castle and Pirates are two lost classics of Lego, and I'm sure there's a load of AFOL's who want to see both on the shelves at the same time. Combining them permanently into one theme would be an unpopular move, when there's nothing stopping Lego from putting one theme on hold if they don't want to produce a sets for both at the same time. 

[cosmic]

37 minutes ago, Alexandrina said:

This is the only part of your idea which makes me dubious - Castle and Pirates are two lost classics of Lego, and I'm sure there's a load of AFOL's who want to see both on the shelves at the same time. Combining them permanently into one theme would be an unpopular move, when there's nothing stopping Lego from putting one theme on hold if they don't want to produce a sets for both at the same time. 

I mean consider at the moment neither are receiving sets. And again, I am advocating for a general fantasy theme that rotates its focus. On the one hand castle and pirate themes of recent years have only pasted about 1-2 years anyways. Given a rotating schedule it would take 4 years to give each sub theme its second wave and 6 assuming it has a 3 subtheme focus. That can be promising assuming fans support it enough for each to get its second wave. My ideas are vague and the thought honestly came to my mind i wanted to write it down before losing it. But I’m thinking now how would I clearly define a third fantastical subtheme. I’m going to reconsider my idea, as it was written in haste. I’m going to write out all the fantastical elements I want seen in general; elves, orcs, ogres, centaurs, castle king, queen, royal court, soldiers, inhabitants of an upper class “Far Far Away” inspired medieval kingdom where the king’s castle stays. Medieval farms and peasant houses similar to the Village Raid of 2011(?). Dragons, wizards, mermaids, pirates, sea monsters, krakens, Dwarves, honestly Vikings could even be implemented in this considering their use of dragons and gods in their mythology. Even greek mythology sets could be made with this. I’m thinking a theme that could cover every fantasy element without really taking away from the source material. No odd creative decisions like red elves or purple island warrior men (the new Ninjago series). The elves should look like the elven maiden from Series 16. The ogre’s should look like something Lego has never done before. Their trolls and orcs can also stick to a green and brown color scheme while providing new details and uniform choices. Oh and fairies! I was inspired by the Disney fairies where they have fairies of different tribes. I’d like to see something like that here too. I like the butterfly wings included in the Series 17 girl, the traditional fairy wing piece and even some of the plastic wing pieces used over the years could work well for different fairy tribes. I wouldn’t want a storyline that has an original cast set to be present in each set, but rather the figures be appropriate for the build. The reason I want the theme to rotate its focus is to maintain these themes on shelves without the stress of each one needed to perform well enough to carry on for years, when the strength of each sub theme and the thirst for that third year where an idea can be brought back can, I think help sales because when say we get a pirates wave year after year each one needs to perform at a certain standard that audiences and even Lego designers may not always be enthusiastic about maintaining. It can prevent the theme from being discontinued early because audiences won’t bore out from an idea but rather yearn for it if executed correctly.

 

[zoth33]

9 hours ago, cosmic said:

I mean consider at the moment neither are receiving sets. And again, I am advocating for a general fantasy theme that rotates its focus. On the one hand castle and pirate themes of recent years have only pasted about 1-2 years anyways. Given a rotating schedule it would take 4 years to give each sub theme its second wave and 6 assuming it has a 3 subtheme focus. That can be promising assuming fans support it enough for each to get its second wave. My ideas are vague and the thought honestly came to my mind i wanted to write it down before losing it. But I’m thinking now how would I clearly define a third fantastical subtheme. I’m going to reconsider my idea, as it was written in haste. I’m going to write out all the fantastical elements I want seen in general; elves, orcs, ogres, centaurs, castle king, queen, royal court, soldiers, inhabitants of an upper class “Far Far Away” inspired medieval kingdom where the king’s castle stays. Medieval farms and peasant houses similar to the Village Raid of 2011(?). Dragons, wizards, mermaids, pirates, sea monsters, krakens, Dwarves, honestly Vikings could even be implemented in this considering their use of dragons and gods in their mythology. Even greek mythology sets could be made with this. I’m thinking a theme that could cover every fantasy element without really taking away from the source material. No odd creative decisions like red elves or purple island warrior men (the new Ninjago series). The elves should look like the elven maiden from Series 16. The ogre’s should look like something Lego has never done before. Their trolls and orcs can also stick to a green and brown color scheme while providing new details and uniform choices. Oh and fairies! I was inspired by the Disney fairies where they have fairies of different tribes. I’d like to see something like that here too. I like the butterfly wings included in the Series 17 girl, the traditional fairy wing piece and even some of the plastic wing pieces used over the years could work well for different fairy tribes. I wouldn’t want a storyline that has an original cast set to be present in each set, but rather the figures be appropriate for the build. The reason I want the theme to rotate its focus is to maintain these themes on shelves without the stress of each one needed to perform well enough to carry on for years, when the strength of each sub theme and the thirst for that third year where an idea can be brought back can, I think help sales because when say we get a pirates wave year after year each one needs to perform at a certain standard that audiences and even Lego designers may not always be enthusiastic about maintaining. It can prevent the theme from being discontinued early because audiences won’t bore out from an idea but rather yearn for it if executed correctly.

 

Even having pirate ships within a castle theme would work for me.  You could take away the canons and still have pirates.  I would actually prefer it that way.  I'm actually kicking myself for not getting the LOTR ship.  I really liked the design of that ship.  We definitely need more fantasy type figs created.  The CMF's do a good job of giving us those but it's taken forever to get were we are now.  Adding the fact that HP has given us centaurs.  I would just like to see lego really try something different with the castle theme if it does return.  But if they don't i will still buy a ton of sets.  I hope this Mythica thing they are doing works out and translates into sets at some point.  I'm currently using my teenage groots as dryad's right now.  Just hoping for some new interesting fig designs.  

After seeing concept designs for Nexo Knights a while back, I actually wish they would have made those mushroom people, the orcs, the demons and some of the other designs they had.  Also after watching a video about Ninjago there was story about the Lego Ninjago Movie that had a totally different plot and would have had the ninja going back in time and the concept art for that was amazing.  It had knights and demonic samurai that looked fantastic and would have really looked incredible on screen but they scraped the idea for what the movie is now which is just sad.  Hopefully they will revisit that idea in the Ninjago tv show and that would be great.  

[valon]

this is very random, but on world builder, there are two very cool castle theme, they take place in the same area, one is a normal theme, factions fighting and castle but no story, the other has a story

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/41752046-34f4-4bf8-9c26-90228dfa1c62?page=1

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/b552179f-590d-4e8a-a7c8-6673f40e489d?page=1&type=INCORPORATED

[valon]

lego probably will not build a castle theme except on worldbuilder https://www.brickfanatics.com/lego-designer-says-creator-3-in-1-is-the-new-home-of-retro-themes/ 

 

[DaleDVM]

On 3/11/2021 at 6:23 AM, Alexandrina said:

 

 

On 3/11/2021 at 9:17 AM, valon said:

 

Sorry about the empty quotes.  I literally couldn't figure out how to delete them completely.

I don't think Worldbuilder is going to save any of our classic themes.  Worldbuilder is for giving TLG new creative content.  A castle theme no matter what the backstory is nothing new to TLG.  It sounds like they have made a decision about historic themes and these classic themes are only going to get a nod now and then going forward.  I personally think anyone pushing them on worldbuilder is wasting their time.  
 

Perhaps the Blacksmith and 3in1 will sell in such numbers that TLG will realize their mistake.  I recommend everyone who cares to write to TLG today.  I have already sent a pair of emails to express my concerns.  

[valon]

9 minutes ago, DaleDVM said:

 

Sorry about the empty quotes.  I literally couldn't figure out how to delete them completely.

I don't think Worldbuilder is going to save any of our classic themes.  Worldbuilder is for giving TLG new creative content.  A castle theme no matter what the backstory is nothing new to TLG.  It sounds like they have made a decision about historic themes and these classic themes are only going to get a nod now and then going forward.  I personally think anyone pushing them on worldbuilder is wasting their time.  
 

Perhaps the Blacksmith and 3in1 will sell in such numbers that TLG will realize their mistake.  I recommend everyone who cares to write to TLG today.  I have already sent a pair of emails to express my concerns.  

the only castle theme on worldbuilder has new idea that lego might build

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/41752046-34f4-4bf8-9c26-90228dfa1c62?page=1

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/b552179f-590d-4e8a-a7c8-6673f40e489d?page=1&type=INCORPORATED

 

if lego build a pink castle theme if the vidyo castle does well i will be very mad

[Alexandrina]

22 minutes ago, DaleDVM said:

Sorry about the empty quotes.  I literally couldn't figure out how to delete them completely.

The only way I've found is to exit out of the thread altogether and return to it again. Which is a massive pain when you've already typed up a long comment!

12 minutes ago, valon said:

if lego build a pink castle theme if the vidyo castle does well i will be very mad

Why, though? It doesn't matter what colour it is - if a castle set does well, it bodes well for more castle sets in the future. In any case, I don't believe we've had a pink castle yet. That might be very interesting.

[valon]

Just now, Alexandrina said:

The only way I've found is to exit out of the thread altogether and return to it again. Which is a massive pain when you've already typed up a long comment!

Why, though? It doesn't matter what colour it is - if a castle set does well, it bodes well for more castle sets in the future. In any case, I don't believe we've had a pink castle yet. That might be very interesting.

what would a pink castle be usefull for in a knight setting ?

[Alexandrina]

2 minutes ago, valon said:

what would a pink castle be usefull for in a knight setting ?

Plenty. The past was far more colourful than it would appear based on the relics that survive - lots of old statues have lost their paint to the centuries, and art has faded away. Craigievar Castle is a late medieval castle that is pink, and though the pink pigmentation was a later addition it's still based on the colour of the natural granite, and that pigmentation would have existed in the middle ages. Add in a touch of fantasy and pink isn't at all an outlandish colour.

[valon]

1 minute ago, Alexandrina said:

Plenty. The past was far more colourful than it would appear based on the relics that survive - lots of old statues have lost their paint to the centuries, and art has faded away. Craigievar Castle is a late medieval castle that is pink, and though the pink pigmentation was a later addition it's still based on the colour of the natural granite, and that pigmentation would have existed in the middle ages. Add in a touch of fantasy and pink isn't at all an outlandish colour.

i know, but that is light pink, a very bright pink would be good for a medieval house, but not a fort, if it is the color of that castle, it would be cool

[Lego David]

28 minutes ago, DaleDVM said:

I don't think Worldbuilder is going to save any of our classic themes.  Worldbuilder is for giving TLG new creative content.  A castle theme no matter what the backstory is nothing new to TLG.  It sounds like they have made a decision about historic themes and these classic themes are only going to get a nod now and then going forward.  I personally think anyone pushing them on worldbuilder is wasting their time.  
 

Perhaps the Blacksmith and 3in1 will sell in such numbers that TLG will realize their mistake.  I recommend everyone who cares to write to TLG today.  I have already sent a pair of emails to express my concerns.  

They specifically said in that World Builder guidelines that new creative twists on already existing LEGO themes are allowed. That implies to me that they are still interested in reviving their classic themes in some form, but only if they have a very unique new twist that will make it stand out from previous iterations of those themes. 

Sending emails to LEGO isn't going to do anything, trust me. Do you think they even bother reading all the emails they get from LEGO nerds asking for their favorite themes to come back? I can bet they have a lot more important things to focus on. Creating new unique ideas for Castle themes on World Builder is much more constrictive than spamming emails at LEGO in my humble opinion.

[Alexandrina]

1 minute ago, valon said:

i know, but that is light pink, a very bright pink would be good for a medieval house, but not a fort, if it is the color of that castle, it would be cool

The closest match in the current Lego palette is Bright Pink - which is also almost certainly what colour a pink castle would predominantly be. There might be darker pink/magenta parts for detailing/roofs, but I'd be very surprised if the main model is pink.

[valon]

Just now, Alexandrina said:

The closest match in the current Lego palette is Bright Pink - which is also almost certainly what colour a pink castle would predominantly be. There might be darker pink/magenta parts for detailing/roofs, but I'd be very surprised if the main model is pink.

if it is bright pink, then it can not be used for a knight

3 minutes ago, Lego David said:

They specifically said in that World Builder guidelines that new creative twists on already existing LEGO themes are allowed. That implies to me that they are still interested in reviving their classic themes in some form, but only if they have a very unique new twist that will make it stand out from previous iterations of those themes. 

Sending emails to LEGO isn't going to do anything, trust me. Do you think they even bother reading all the emails they get from LEGO nerds asking for their favorite themes to come back? I can bet they have a lot more important things to focus on. Creating new unique ideas for Castle themes on World Builder is much more constrictive than spamming emails at LEGO in my humble opinion.

have you see arkratha on worldbuilder ? it is very very very very cool and i think lego maybe would build it 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/41752046-34f4-4bf8-9c26-90228dfa1c62?page=1

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/b552179f-590d-4e8a-a7c8-6673f40e489d?page=1&type=INCORPORATED

[Alexandrina]

7 minutes ago, valon said:

if it is bright pink, then it can not be used for a knight

Only if you don't want to use it for a knight. There's absolutely no reason pink and knights have to be mutually exclusive colours.

[valon]

Just now, Alexandrina said:

Only if you don't want to use it for a knight. There's absolutely no reason pink and knights have to be mutually exclusive colours.

bright pink for a knight that would be look very strange to me but ok if you think that is good

[Alexandrina]

2 minutes ago, valon said:

bright pink for a knight that would be look very strange to me but ok if you think that is good

I think it would look perfectly fine. No stranger than a yellow castle. And aside from that, Vidiyo sets aren't supposed to be facsimiles of different time periods, but they might send a message regarding the sort of periods that are popular. 

[valon]

i would not use these for a knight, because i do not think ir would work, execpt maybe the second one in a medieval village

[DaleDVM]

@LEGODavid... If the LEGO company was to receive hundreds/thousands of emails about upset fans in the next few days, yes they would pay attention.  It can't be just a couple of fans.  It needs to be a lot of fans.  And unlike many other themes castle does have a big following.  Unfortunately, most LEGO castle fans are tuned out right now because of the lack of sets.  Spread the word everyone!

If you think that your creative castle ideas are going to get them to release a new castle theme they have already discounted you are deluding yourself.  First off, any new ideas that you have for castle aren't likely to be all that new.  There are decades of sets and there is really only so much you can do with castles and medieval sets.  But more importantly, if you do think of something totally new it is doubtful anyone would recognize it as castle anyway.  Nexo knights was new.  And... most castle fans hated it.  

A bright pink castle is not castle.  The yellow castle would not be castle either... if it wasn't the first castle set and had nostalgia value.  Nobody would be happy with a yellow castle released today if it wasn't for the original set.