Mario Kart K'NEX sets.

[Mrlegoninja]

These look great! I won't be buying them though. I am already in debt by all the great sets that came out this year!

The licensing makes the set great. We all prefer LEGO, but these, you gotta admit look pretty good.

I also have Mario Kart Wii. I really hate because of that Damn Blue Shell and how you get cheated out of a victory. Other than that, its a great game and is very deserving of that licensing.

[IAmWillGibson]

I assume they're wildly out of scale, but I'd be interested in seeing Mario next to a standard minifigure. I'd be curious, but I don't know if I'd pull the trigger on any of these. Maybe if/when a Toad set comes out, 'cause he was always my favorite character.

[HighFlyer]

Looks pretty cool, but if only it were LEGO!

Anyhow, is there any idea on the size and price of these sets?

[greeny]

I guess they are pretty neat... but they are very expensive compared to Lego

You could easily MOC some karts and make around 3 for the same price as one K'nex one. However I like the idea and the courses look nice. But there is one MAJOR FLAW!!! There is no Toad!

[Vindicare]

You do realise people, that this is KN*X, not Lego

I don't know as much about here, but over at Brickset we don't talk about Clone Brands, such as M*ga Bl*ks, and we censor some letters from their name (!)

I don't know why you're getting excited. I would be if this was Lego, but it's just some cheap plastic Chinese rubbish, made to mimic the building brick we all know and love.

Not everyone here is close minded when it comes to building blocks.

Amen to this. The level of blind and one-sided LEGO fanboyism on these boards sometimes astounds me.

Seriously

[trainguy111]

Hope they do more characters in the line like Princess Peach and Princess Daisy.

[lorax]

Looks pretty cool, but if only it were LEGO!

Anyhow, is there any idea on the size and price of these sets?

I have only just seen this question, but here is a size comparison.

Lego k'nex - size comparison by tikitikitembo, on Flickr

[Laura Beinbrech]

Hope they do more characters in the line like Princess Peach and Princess Daisy.

Heck yeah! Peach and Daisy are my favorite characters... I may end up getting Yoshi on the bike for my girlfriend, though (Yoshi is her favorite character in Mario Kart Wii, while I usually play as Peach or Daisy).

[Lasse D]

I don't see how that makes much of a difference, though. Does superior quality permit a company to use dishonest business tactics? Is it somehow more honest for a company to copy an unsuccessful product than to copy a successful one? If LEGO had purchased the patents before producing Automatic Binding Bricks, then they might be able to argue that they had greater dignity than their competitors. But as it is, can it really be argued that K'nex bricks or Mega Bloks are dishonest just because they can't match LEGO's quality? Seems a bit unfair, since that means that no competitors could ever feasibly compete with LEGO in that regard-- after all, LEGO is already a successful and well-known company that can absorb higher materials and production costs, whereas a competitor is almost invariably forced to begin with a lower-quality product.

I don't think that we should be saying any company can freely copy their competitors' products by any means. And I'm not saying that LEGO has figurative "blood on its hands" today for what it did over fifty years ago. But to treat LEGO like some sort of shining white knight of the building toy industry without acknowledging that their most successful product line began with a business strategy that wasn't much purer than the actions of today's clone brands (particularly the higher-quality brands like K'nex and Mega Blox).

I have to applaud you for an excellent execution of a straw man.

The clone brands thrive on the success of LEGO (using the same dimensions, interchangability of parts and similar design*) in a similar way as mockbusters do with movies, but by diverting to the slightly obfuscated history of how LEGO started out with interlocking bricks (you can find something bad on any large coorporation), you successfully won the argument: "Other companies should be allowed to clone LEGO products to a point where parents think they are buying the real thing because LEGO isn't perfect".

I wonder how the history of LEGO can remain unclear. Wasn't there some guy who actaully did the reasearch and found out what actaully went on, and who you can simply reference?

[Snark]

"Other companies should be allowed to clone LEGO products to a point where parents think they are buying the real thing because LEGO isn't perfect".

The difference really lies in the fact that unlike Lego itself, companies such as Knex, Hasbro and Mega are acting in their legal right.

The entire concept of patent law lies in the fact that protection is time limited, and once it expires, it is legal for others to copy it. This isn't a loophole in legislation, it is the central reason for having a time limit in patents.

In regard to the accusation that there is deliberate obfuscation on part of these companies, consumer protection laws (or whatever the equivalent is called in your jurisdiction) are in place that require companies to take reasonable steps from preventing a reasonable consumer from mistaking their products with those of another company.

Are they riding on the coattails of Lego? Most definitely. But it's not like we condemn low cost alternatives of other products for doing the same thing, now do we?

Edited November 2, 2011 by Snark

[Laura Beinbrech]

Are they riding on the coattails of Lego? Most definitely. But it's not like we condemn low cost alternatives of other products for doing the same thing, now do we?

Exactly: Accusing the clone manufacturers of "ripping off" LEGO would be like accusing Dell, Compaq, Gateway, etc of ripping off IBM (or each other), since they use the same system architecture, or for that matter, accusing AMD of ripping off Intel, since both their CPU's have the same machine code/BIOS type.

Seriously, the rabid LEGOist Fanboyism that sometimes goes on around here makes me ashamed to be an AFOL at times.

[Lasse D]

The difference really lies in the fact that unlike Lego itself, companies such as Knex, Hasbro and Mega are acting in their legal right.

Is it too much to ask for a source for where LEGO didn't act according to the law? I'm not talking about the idea of patents, so there is no reason to bring that up.

In regard to the accusation that there is deliberate obfuscation on part of these companies, consumer protection laws (or whatever the equivalent is called in your jurisdiction) are in place that require companies to take reasonable steps from preventing a reasonable consumer from mistaking their products with those of another company.

Are they riding on the coattails of Lego? Most definitely. But it's not like we condemn low cost alternatives of other products for doing the same thing, now do we?

LEGO's patents ran out a long time ago. LEGO has been relatively successful in keeping clone products out of markets because they carried too much of a resemblance to the real products. They are walking a fine line here. My question is. Is this really necessary? Can't the clone brands invent a superior building system, or at least use a scale that isn't LEGO "compatible"?

Exactly: Accusing the clone manufacturers of "ripping off" LEGO would be like accusing Dell, Compaq, Gateway, etc of ripping off IBM (or each other), since they use the same system architecture, or for that matter, accusing AMD of ripping off Intel, since both their CPU's have the same machine code/BIOS type.

Seriously, the rabid LEGOist Fanboyism that sometimes goes on around here makes me ashamed to be an AFOL at times.

So it's wrong to not completely embrace the clone makers because LEGO should be considered a basic architecture?

LEGO doesn't have a multitude of 3rd. party vendors relying on this basic architecture of 8x8x10 mm. bricks in a way that software relies on instruction sets. That is. I don't buy your analogy.

If I was less of a fanboy, would that make you less ashamed of being an AFOL? I mean. I can't have that on my conscience!

[Peppermint_M]

The brick is now considered a basic functional element the standard and tube connection method.

Other manufacturers adopted it to compete, after all, if you cant beat 'em (with your own type of construction toy) then join 'em.

It is hard enough them being a toy that does not talk, sing, dance and recite the alphabet backwards in Russian. Being a cheaper but still compatible block is about all they can muster.

On the next level is licenses and themes. You want army building toys? LEGO won't go there, others fill the gap. Halo? Smurfs? Mega covers that. Cobi had a robust Romans line when CMFs were not out of development (or even yet concieved fully). Oxford covers a Castle theme drawn from Korean history and architecture, not Western castles. Doctor Who is far too niche outside of the UK for TLG to sell it, Character makes their sets. So far TLG has stayed away from any videogame franchises K'nex and Nintendo looks like fun.

I have to say, rampant fanboyism shoved me more towards the compatible brands. Juvenile behaviour like ****-ing out letters or whole sections of a brand name as if it was the foulest of swears. Decrying other brands simply for not being LEGO... It all adds up to a rather shameful and embarassing fraction of AFOLdom and even more childish than using a childrens toy.

And hey, my opinion by no means reflects the opinon of Eurobricks, it is my own.

[Lasse D]

The brick is now considered a basic functional element the standard and tube connection method.

Other manufacturers adopted it to compete, after all, if you cant beat 'em (with your own type of construction toy) then join 'em.

It is hard enough them being a toy that does not talk, sing, dance and recite the alphabet backwards in Russian. Being a cheaper but still compatible block is about all they can muster.

So LEGO represents a de facto standard (like Word documents)?

Then the clone makers should get together and formulate a real standard, give it a name and grant seals for the products that adhere to it and establish themselves as great alternatives because they follow a widely-accepted standard. They will then stand as an honest alternative to LEGO rather than "Sorry Jr. I thought these were real legos!"-products.

The difference is subtle, but it makes all the difference IMO.

[Peppermint_M]

I have to say, there is very very little mix up these days. People know that Megablocks isn't LEGO. I have encountered snobbish parents who unload their children from a fancy 4x4 and then sniff that their little darling wants a set that isn't LEGO because LEGO is the best.

I have heard parents say aloud, "Are you sure it will be very good? After all, it isn't proper LEGO" and "All right, you do like Doctor Who after all..." or even "You'd never believe! It is just as good as proper LEGO!" when in the supermarket, the toyshop and the discount shop.

Bootlegs are the ones that pretend to be LEGO with confusing branding, white text on red polygons. Theme logos that look like TLG products.

Like the above.

Legitimate Clones look nothing alike actual LEGO. Sure there are a few confused types who see studded bricks and think LEGO, or like in the US where if it is a toy brick it is a Lego (Legos make me shudder, ewwwww).

LEGO represent a benchmark for quality these days. A standard of product to aspire to.

The gemoetries of the brick are now a standard product on their own, like the clasp in a ringbinder file. A design someone came up with and held patents on but is now an ISO standard that everyone has to use. The brick doesn't have an ISO number but all the building brick manufacturers use it.

[Laura Beinbrech]

Well said, Peppermint M... Although for some reason, I find the idea of ISO/IEEE standards for plastic construction toys both hilarious and strangely appealing at the same time.

Anyways, to get back to the subject at hand, I really DO hope they come out with Peach and/or Daisy... I'll still likely get Yoshi for my girlfriend, since she's a huge Yoshi fan.

...Not to mention I'm curious how the quality stacks up vs LEGO... I had some K'Nex when I was in middle school (I built a space fighter plane thingy), and was rather impressed with the quality, but didn't like the fact that I couldn't use them with my LEGO bricks.

[Snark]

Is it too much to ask for a source for where LEGO didn't act according to the law? I'm not talking about the idea of patents, so there is no reason to bring that up.

Interlego A.G v Tyco Industries [1988].

That said, it is worth nothing that patent law seems to have been rather different back in the 40s and 50s as opposed to now. Patent law requires that the proposed patent be sufficiently different from the prior art base. To put it in laymans' terms, the prior art base is pretty much all the stuff that has been patented or published in the past.

However, modern patent law involves a global prior art base, meaning anything patented or published anywhere in the world forms part of the prior art base. Based on the words of Lord Oliver in the above mentioned case, it would seem that the prior art base was relative to the jurisdiction, as opposed to a universal one.

I can't be bothered to check patent law in the various countries Kiddicraft and Lego marketed to in the 50s, and who had patents in what jurisdictions, but will grant that there is a possibility that Lego may have acted in its legal right, should it be proven that Kiddicraft held no patents in the jurisdictions that Lego dealt in.

And in regard to your second statement, patent law should be a given in any discussion about Lego and alternative brands, as the acts so many AFOLs are decrying are in fact, not only allowed under law, but are encouraged as a means to foster competition and prevent monopoly.

My question is. Is this really necessary? Can't the clone brands invent a superior building system, or at least use a scale that isn't LEGO

Sure they can. But why should they?

Research and development in creating a new class of toy and the marketing required to create a consumer need for this toy would be an incredibly costly venture, both monetarily and in time investment. Furthermore, there is the clear risk of failure even after all the resources invested in such a project.

If you would like to fund such a venture, be my guest. But until toy companies find a way to have unlimited funds, you can hardly blame companies for wanting to enter the market that has allowed Lego to post double digit growth for six consecutive years.

Ultimately, I don't really care about the morality of the matter, which seems to be an issue regularly brought up in discussions regarding alternative brands. Personally, applying concepts such as morality and loyalty to companies that don't actually care about you beyond how much money you can throw at it, seems rather illogical.

What does matter to me is that alternative brands provide many advantages to construction toy fans. They provide cheaper alternatives, some of which, such as Oxford and Kre-O, being pretty much the same quality as Lego. Furthermore, they provide new themes, new licenses and new ideas. That alone should justify their existence.

Edited November 4, 2011 by Snark

[Lasse D]

I have been unable to find the blog post where the history of LEGO vs Kiddicraft is analysed, but I have found these:

http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=54084

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/03/lego-stole-their-now-patented-bricks-from-kiddicrafts-patented-self-locking-bricks/

It seems like LEGO, and many others, tried to market plastic bricks in the different markets of Europe. Kiddicraft was first to use the mold, but all companies that tried to market bricks had very little success with the toy. Kiddicraft focused on other toys while LEGO finally invented the tubes and started having success.

[Omicron]

So far TLG has stayed away from any videogame franchises

Which I am happy for. Cuz then what else would I make? :P

-Omi