Merlo

I want to support the line and see more of those kind of sets in the future. Also, I have disposable income. If it weren't the case, I definitely would not buy them. You're either not serious or you're missing the point. Designing your sets takes a lot of time and money and no one guarantees you would get picked. Besides, the themes dictate which sets get picked much more than the "quality" of the sets does. On the other hand there are plenty of Lego sets and every time that I watch reviews of new sets there is a big overlap between what I thought initially and what the reviewers notice. This seems to indicate a lot of the stuff we're talking about is kinda obvious but slips by Lego as they might be churning out the sets too fast to have them perfected. This in turn eliminates all the guesswork and guarantees your effort would not be futile.

I was not a big fan of the castle, so it's good that Lego put out this set to make the castle look good in comparison. It partially lacks detail, looks like it's aimed at a younger audience, has a bit of that Eldorado Fortress "I don't quite know what I'm doing" feel at places and is generally too big next to the castle. The plain "oops, I'm nearing the allowed brick count" roof is harshly contrasted against the new detailed roof introduced with the castle. There are nice parts too, though. It has some colors, for a change, and finally we have two sets that tie in together, even if it's in a clumsy way that seems like they were made by designers of different skill sets. The price seems better for what you get? I'll know more when I finish the build. Hey, psst, wanna get rich? Make a youtube channel about improving Lego's priciest offerings. Just scour all the reviews and systematically address the criticism and improve the sets wherever possible without breaking the bank.

It looks all right, I guess. Not as bad as I imagined it would be. I like that it's colorful. I love that the tower is straight from 10305, finally bringing together some elements instead of making each set stand on its own. Design-wise it sadly suffers from the same inconsistency that 10305 suffers from: some parts look really elegant and others look something I'd MOC myself, my lack of skill included. But worse than that, once again, is the inconsistency in detail with parts of the scene that are rather detailed and parts that look like they're from a set for a younger audience. The roofs on the left catch my eye immediately with regards to this. I understand that there might be added value in breaking the consistency of detail to depict something you otherwise could not, but one should not drop below the baseline level of detail assumed for each set as that just makes it look rough and unfinished. If the suggested price remains, I might buy it.

I dig it. Some of the classic space sets really did all they could to be round or round-ish, actually.

Interesting, do you have a photo of these newly made figures?

Exactly. And I didn't even see that bump above the zipper the first time. That torso is a big no-no for me.

I both agree and disagree on the account of minifigure changes. I believe that minifigure changes would be good if done well. The space police guy looks great, not so much because of the design, but simply because he has a badass outfit. But the design is also simple enough to be effective. If any old space factions were given a similar treatment, not in terms of looks, but in terms of approach, that would be great. But if they would be changed to be as 10305 minifigures, I wouldn't like that. The beauty of old minifigures is that they're simple and elegant and the lack of detail means the user can just imagine and project anything onto the blank canvas, they're sort of like the Keanu Reeves of the Lego world. The space police guy works because he adds new objects and shapes more than anything. If however, everything is drawn on the minifigure, like creases in the fabric and such then the blank canvas of what you imagine it to be is replaced by something very specific, and that specific thing is drawn, thus looking like a sticker and not like something that's built or molded or brick-y in any way. And for me minifigures are fun as a cute, blocky representation of something real. If they get closer to something real than that not through 3d detail, but through prints, they become like every other toy out there depicting the same thing, only more Lego-shaped on the outside, instead of feeling like Lego through and through. P. S. Another important thing I forgot to mention is that for maximum cuteness factor the visual complexity of the minifigures has to match the visual complexity of the build (at least as much as it's possible). The minifigure on the left surpasses the majority of details on 10305 by a big margin and thus looks like it doesn't belong or it's not "Lego enough". 10497 didn't have this issue, obviously. It looks like the figures needed more details if anything, but then again if something truly has no detail, you can't show it no matter how much you up the resolution. This is why "overly simple" figures can work, but "overly complex" look out of place. P. P. S. And if Lego would produce a MOC-looking set with some crazy over the top greebling, etc., then yes, a complex looking minifigure might match that more than an overly simple one, even if it's all prints.

The Galaxy Explorer, sure. But was the Intruder really angular or just the best approximation of curves they had? I love the original canopies as angular looks "bricky" to me. But even if they could remake those, would they be useful outside of this set? And is the ship big enough not to get a boost in size? Curved and angles can also be combined. They could also just print a bubble piece to make it look more similar to the original piece. The monkey kid canopies are not angular either. I don't think details will matter as much if the final product is attractive, just like with 10497. Renegade seems much easier to make, though. It's possible to retain the same shape but just dress it up a little. It would be awesome though (and AFOL aproppriate) if they leaned a bit into the greebly mechanical/insectoid nature of it.

Yes, please. But could/would they create a ship that's merely inspired by SP and still make it feel authentic or, alternatively, do they have all it takes to remake one? Also, with how safe Lego has been playing, is SP popular enough to be the 2nd entry in this theoretical space remakes list, or would it be more of a B-side?

I'm not sure if the designers would be tasked with adding new features, but if we draw parallels to 10497 it's clear this set has a more unusual shape that I feel works even to this day when looking at the silhouette, while the original GE perhaps has that "old car" look nowadays. But since the hull/cargo area here is much bigger it would make sense and probably be a lot of fun to fill out the previously "empty" parts with bricks, actually outlining a ship that was only hinted before on the account of brick limits and younger intended audience. Given that the ship already comes with some level of visual badassery despite the limitations, giving it the 10497 treatment might make it truly wicked looking. Same. But I am not really aware of all the available parts nor of all the methods skilled designers might use. I do not think they really need to be polyhedral though. Don't we have some round or round-ish canopies from SW sets, etc?

Aerial Intruder could be upscaled.

Good point, but I'm not sure that is possible if Lego is counting with adults buying the sets on the account of nostalgia. Would a one of a kind "generic Lego space ship" stand a chance next to the Star Wars ships? Yes, it was a safe bet Galaxy Explorer would not stray far from the original. However, unlike the Star Wars ships, where every new iteration can come closer to a known real reference, there is no real reference here in terms of a more complex ship this one could try and emulate so it feels like a reprise. I liken it to seeing an old show I enjoyed as it gives me a feeling of "this was a great show back at the time, too bad I've seen this episode so many times I can't properly enjoy it anymore". I agree about the Creator castle and pirate ship. For me a big part of the Lego fantasy was "see something new, build something playful". There's plenty of both in those sets, the castle especially. I think when the design is good Lego almost never gets it wrong with something that's trying to be fun. Problem is that "fun" and "realistic" often don't gel. Imagine if 31120 was just all grey like real medieval castles. It would hardly be an upgrade over the Lego castles of old. A more interesting shape would be needed to give those flat gray walls something for the eye to catch onto. Alternatively, the shape could be functional and not very interesting but it might look just like the real thing, prompting a different kind of interest. But when you merge things whose qualities are on the opposite sides of the spectrum, e.g. 54321 and 12345, you get a 3/5 set. Plus the effect supersizing a set has on you :)

Oh, I'm partially with you on that actually. Having grown up with simpler Lego, I am to this unable to see some of the later sets as beautiful. I don't like seeing specialized parts and details shown with stickers. For me 6984 was the first time when I thought "what is this"? It was messy and complicated in a way that didn't seem artistic to me but just "thrown together" somehow. Yes, Lego space was kinda like that in that time, but for me 6986 was still on a level where it looked appealing. And it even had a more interesting design in my eyes, whereas 6984 was just rough. Ice Planet had an interesting color scheme but by the time we got to the UFO line, it didn't even feel like Lego to me. It started to be more like a cheap overly colorful plastic toy or a Lego knock-off at best. No offense to the fans, this is just my perspective. But for me complexity and weirdness are great if the design language and color scheme support it. You can get away with more architectural complexity if the color scheme is subdued and vice versa. But at some point it becomes too much. Sure, isn't that the case with our views of later Lego space lines? :) Oh, I know. I've commented before that some of his sets are among my favorites. But personally I would've given this to someone who would've made it a bit more whimsical rather than looking like a real ship. When they said they wanted to make the Galaxy Explorer be like the ship you remember it being back then - that to me is equal to a chance to buy the original Galaxy Explorer, even though now I can appreciate it more as a piece of Lego history than I think it's a better spaceship than a lot of other Lego spaceships. I think for me the new GE is very much like the old one. So if the original designer was still making Lego sets and was told "make a Galaxy Explorer 2" and he made 10497, I would think "what happened? You had all these ideas for one ship, but for the sequel you just repeated yourself". Oh I didn't think worse of you based on anything you wrote. I know for a fact that I lack social skills and thus can be annoying :) But, yes, if you would suddenly claim here you think UFO is the best Lego space line, we could "argue" for the fun of it, but obviously I'm aware these things are entirely subjective and if we did a poll it might have turned out that whatever I happened to like was much less popular than the UFO line.

My friend, I don't think you have thought this through. If you are on a/your high horse, "you are talking or behaving in a way that shows that you think you are better than other people". Yet you came here to say that you keep away from this thread because you're free of the accusations you throw at others. Additionally, if you're toxic you're "causing social tension or unpleasantness", yet I cannot see this quote of yours as providing anything other of value than that. One of the rare acceptable forms of social tension in today's society comes as a side effect of free exchange of thoughts and ideas, because we recognize that it's a small price to pay in order to avert single-mindedness, yet you seem almost offended by that. Where I'm from we humorously call that behavior "everyone has the right to my opinion" :) In any case, it'd be nice if we kept this thread 10497-adjacent. What do we know about that rumored Renegade? Is it a rumor? Someone described something looking like a Renegade in production? Any guesses on possible release or if it'll happen for sure?

I was a fan during the classic space era. It was already when sets became white instead of grey, but my friends with older siblings often inherited older sets too and I remember thinking about them as if they were these ancient Lego sets from the past, which from a grown up perspective is very silly since it was just a few years before my time. My claim about seeing things in the context of the time they were made in was not addressed to you or the designer, but the person I was replying to. From one perspective all things that are different are ugly. At its very core, this is why have racism and many other needless things. It takes getting to know something to start seeing it as something other than the initial gut reaction. So old Lego sets (and everything else) can easily look ugly if you want to look at it that way. As far as my claim about the Galaxy Explorer, it was not made based on some special property of mine, but rather the fact that the MOC designers saw what I saw in it (and likely more, that I'm not yet able to see or at least describe), while 10497 stopped short of those things. It's a simple common experience, just like you can hear music theory and chord resolutions and common practices in songs even if you don't actually know anything about it, but just go by ear. Validity was never a subject of conversation, well, unless someone was implying that I feel only my take is valid. All I said was that I wish the designer saw what other MOC makers saw. It's possible that he did, but that he trimmed away the things that would work against making the ship as sleek as possible. If we're getting into the age thing, on the other hand, I feel the world here has many "disconnects". E.g. every day I see millenials discovering things that were not possible for anyone not to know perhaps just 15 years ago. I also see younger people (get off my lawn!) have a much more modest knowledge of the events preceding their lifetime than my generation and many others did before, where it was common knowledge. If I have to guess, it's that the modern world has too many things vying for our attention, and really fun, engaging, even addicting things. So a lot of people are a little bit of an expert when it comes to their specific interests, but don't really have a more superficial wide view on the most important happenings outside of that. Of course, I imagine there are many many times more of those (or we have a lot more information and disinformation about those) to make that possible. And this disconnect is evident at Lego as well, on many fronts. It was evident with every imaginary generation change and is even more evident now. Sets had certain qualities, other sets had certain qualities, latest sets have certain qualities, etc. But once you go far enough you stop seeing the qualities of what came a lot before your time. This is because you don't need to look hard to look what was lacking, but often you would have to look hard to look for the subtle things that made something excel. We're just wired that way as people. If you switch from 60 hz to 240 hz monitor you may or may not be able to see the difference right away. If you try switching back later, your eyes will bleed. I disagree with that approach too, that's why I haven't suggested it. The first thing you quoted just states that each time period comes with its own expectations. A set that might have had everything anyone thought of in the 1980's might be very basic by today's standards because bit by bit we did think of many ways to improve upon them. I don't also compare them to the fanciest MOCs expecting them to be the same. The designer of 10497 is more to "blame" when it comes to reaching for grandeur than I am. 10497 I feel looks great as a simple recreation of the original (visually), but for whatever reason is inflated by 50 %. This makes it non swooshable and less rebuildable. I don't agree with their idea of "to make something for adults make it 50 % bigger". My guess (only) is that adults would probably like something more sophisticated because their tastes are now more refined and that is, in fact, a much bigger change that happened in their life than the fact they become 50 % bigger. This also ties in with the designer interviews, where it's clear they're oriented towards technical aspects and thus would do great recreations of existing objects. If 10497 had the same number of detail but was smaller - it would look more detailed. Another thing I liked as a child is having different ships, builds, etc. and contrasting them for play then and for display now. As much as I'd like a lot of old space remakes, it's going to be difficult to find space for them if they're this big. And by being that big, without the real need for it, the level of detail per square cm will suffer, making them less appealing as display items. No, I just somewhat overemphasize the points. Enough to make them clearer, but not so much that they would be obvious lies and one wouldn't be able to take them as is and adjust the ratios in their head. The original presumably meant a lot in the time it came out but not primarily due to its size. The size was there to give decent proportion to everything it had to include, the interior, etc. The remainder of the space, which would then constitute just boring necessities (wings and the rest of the exterior) were then spiced up with huge engines and an impressive rear spoiler. So the question is just "what's the best galaxy explorer we could make in 1979" (not in terms of size, but overall experience) and "what's the best galaxy explorer we could make in 2022". In this my only claim is that the original was closer to achieving its full potential in 1979 than the new one was in 2022. I hear you. I wasn't crying for an inflated GE to start with. Maybe if it needs to be bigger to incorporate new details or functions, but not just so it could be more like the star wars ships in size, but not in detail. Is it? I thought it was meant for adults. As we've talked before, it's not very swooshable and demands care not fall apart, that the children wouldn't have. At least one of the previous posters claimed that it falls apart anyways, but I don't agree with that. I feel that as an adult you sort of have an idea where you could and where you couldn't grab the ship in order for it to stay in one piece. I might be wrong, don't have any data on this. Sure. I don't mind things being upscaled. Just, as I said, there should be a need for it. The large Lego spaceships of old had a lot of ugly (for today's standards, as described before) detail in terms of overlapping shapes and colors or the design paired with the size made them seem like big space vessels with a little imagination. Both the "smooth" design of 10497 (separated colors, straight lines, no greebling) and the fact that the glass parts are completely separated from the hull of the ship and open like airplane canopies makes it seem like a small, simple vessel that has very little detail by itself, but was enlarged to an extent where the few details that it has were able to be reproduced faithfully. We got a boost in size, but not a boost in size-related boons - or in other words, a cool playset that got stretched and by that accidentally dilluted. I would go for that. These days everything is a marketing decision for Lego. I guess at some point they had to work hard to stay afloat. With the popularity they have today, letting us have more than the sum of the parts that we all expect to see (10497) and maybe even less than that (Eldorado) would be a waste of resources and designer time. I don't really feel anyone is wrong about this. I'm glad if people enjoy these sets and since I'm just a single person and Lego is not my entire life, I feel the ideal situation would be if the sets would appeal to as many people as possible, instead of just me. And since Lego has many designers whose ideas gel differently to each set, there are many combinations possible. This is a positive side effect to the fact that there are no space/castle/pirate lines but just a string of unrelated sets. I'll keep buying those sets because at the end of the day I hope for the string to continue and I'm sure to like some of them.

There were adult exclusives for older Lego lines? I thought AFOL sets were a relatively recent invention, unless we count complex technic sets and such. IMHO it's a cool and fun build. The set is exactly what you see on the box. I doubt many Lego sets do bad now that they're raking billions. Let's hope we get a 10497-like Renegade and not an Eldorado-like Renegade :)

It's my guess that in the time the original Galaxy Explorer came out, you weren't really spoiled for choice when it comes to brick built space ships. I might be wrong, but the ship seems to have a legendary status at least partially based on that. It's also my guess that the new Galaxy Explorer didn't sweep the world off of its feet. I mean, I hope it did and I'm wrong, but I didn't hear no immediate plans to continue with Lego space remakes, even though the designers themselves expressed the wish to do so.

Ok, so how could I not think, after this, that you aren't able to see things in the context of the time they're made in, the intended audience, the available pieces, etc.? For example it's quite obvious that the new Galaxy Explorer is a much better set than the original, yet the original was *everything* when it came out while the new one is "it's ok" in the time it came out. And this is the only way we can rate sets. We look at what's available and what's possible and compare what we got. Well any set is suited to any age to some extent. Were 10305 as detailed as that church, or at least halfway there, I'd like it a lot. Even if it was much smaller. Had 10305 been just as it is now, but also much smaller, I'd still like it. I like AFOL sets, I like kids' sets, I don't particularly like hugely inflated kids' sets as it's a lot of money and space for something that won't be as awesome as a full blown AFOL set and won't be as playful as a full blown kids' set.

No, any 400$ set can be a lot of different things and interesting for many different reasons. I just find 10305 interesting as a big castle to play with, and that's not in my sphere of interest. What? :) Well, as I said, those are two different things to me. 10305 is playable, it can be played with. Playful to me means having a playful look. It's not bad that 10305 is great for play - it's great! It's just not for me. No, 10497 is also right in Lego's territory of trying to have its cake and eat it too. I'm in the process of moving and it's on my shelf right now between 21322 and some non-Lego modular buildings. 21322 looks very playful. The buildings look very lifelike. Looking at both sets it's difficult not to say something like "Fun!" or "Cool!" depending on which one you look at. 10497 is right between those two. A little bit fun, and a little bit cool. But no one ever exclaimed "a little bit fun and a little bit cool!" I think the words you're looking for are: I've been forever spoiled by some great Lego sets that likely demanded a lot of time and thought (or maybe incredible talent? no idea) and am finding it hard to adjust to a time where Lego just churns out sets that often look great, but lack vision. You can change a MOC to make it stable and to use available colors. Also, please note that the two are not mutually exclusive. A fully 18+ looking set can have all the play features a child would want. And a smallish set aimed at children can look good enough for adults to actually want it. I usually only bail on adult sets when I see it looks too much like a playset for me to able to display it unless it's fun and relatable to me. I don't think I've ever expressed any kind of preference for greebling. If you took the literal wall parts of old castles and smacked them together into an interesting shape, evocative of some different or nonexistant time and place, I'd be fine with that level of "detail" and "greebling" :) It's actually really simple. Look at the Galaxy Explorer - as I said it looks simple, sleek, elegant, it has that striking classic space color scheme. It's maybe not interesting enough to display with its clean and straight lines but, hey, what if... what if we made it the size of the original Galaxy Explorer? Or smaller!! It would be much more rebuildable, it would be swooshable, it would have an overkill of details for a simple playset. Imagine how silly my comment of "oh, it's kinda flat on my shelf next to more spectacular display models" would sound then? I would (hopefully) quickly be buried by replies of "because it's not a display model, dum-dum, now be quiet and let me swoosh and rebuild this ship just one more time!" I love play sets. I love display sets. I don't have a particular need for inflated play sets. The only thing that does is dillutes the "level of interest / square cm", rebuildability and cuteness of the set. IF the real life inspiration for the set is actually very detailed so you absolutely have to enlarge it to show that faithfully for older fans - I'm fine with that too. This is neither. Or, Lego could say "the castle can only be this big for the level of detail to suffice in an 18+ set". Or, Lego could say "the castle will be aimed at kids but, by God, it will be so cute AFOL's will buy it too" (as was sometimes the case with the castles of old) Also, here's a random MOC in 10305 style. This is overdetailed and oversized for its own good. Take this, compress it, don't go full "and here someone carved their name in the wall" and you'd have a set that's cute, wonderful and affordable and 10305-ish done good. Look at this: This set has 3 pieces from today's perspective. Yet see how the pizzeria is reminiscent of the real thing? And how cute that silly van is? Lego used to excel in "going around the limitations to capture the essence of a thing suited for any age". Now they excel more at "disregarding the essence to just add a thousand pieces more to boost the price".

Well I've been (overly) specific about how I feel about certain things and there's plenty of written proof and yet somehow my entire take ended summed up like a caricature :) On the contrary, Mike didn't chime in on this topic, nor would I be able to claim he felt otherwise than he did when designing the set. All I can say is how I feel about it. There's no objective truth to it. I may feel something is beautiful, you may feel something is ugly. But I can't feel you said 2+2=5 if you did not. Accusation is a charge of wrongdoing. The designer of the set had no legal or moral obligation to make the set into anything remotely close to what I would like, so there's no wrong done. This is nothing more than lighthearted forum banter to add some spice to an otherwise stale argument :) Yes, of course. To state why the GE is disappointing to me. I can't really *know* what the designer was thinking nor what any of you were thinking for that matter, all I can say is how it feels to me. But just like I told to someone before, I don't think anyone is wrong to like the set nor was Lego wrong to make the set. Presumably, sets are made to sell and for people to like, not to meet some specific criteria. I'd say if you're redoing something the two ways that come to mind are a cover song - interesting take on the original, and a tribute song - that tries to capture most of the different things that the original meant to different people. 10497 is just a bit of both, but not a lot of either. It's not interesting enough to be a true cover, as evidenced by many more interesting MOC's in existence, and it's not deep enough to be a true tribute, as evidenced by the many things about it that I miss and can find in the original, a 40 year old set. It just tries to substitute both by superior execution. Fair enough, but I've seen a few of these before. They seem to weirdly collaborate with my thoughts on their design process. It turns out they were inspired by Benny's Spaceship. They never had classic space sets. They're focused on technical aspects and execution rather than the specifics. They've been looking at real castles for 10305. I think I've mentioned MP does wonderful renditions of realistic-y sets and aspects, but not so much the ones where imagination is involved. 10305 takes a lot from the immediately preceding Creator Castle. There's no talk about what the Galaxy Explorer meant to any of them (probably nothing, aside from its know place in Lego history). It's all just written from a very professional point of view: there was an assignment, there were challenges to overcome, here's how we overcame them. This is all in line with what I've been saying and much like asking a painter to describe what was like creating one of his painting and the entire talk ends up about finding the right thickness of canvas and mixing a proper shade of yellow.

I love the interior details. I like that they're there. I think they'll mean a lot to some people. But since I buy sets more to display them and I won't display the castle open... I always thought this was primarily due to brick limitations in the past, or some other reason. Yes, of course, the sets were boy oriented more than not, but if you've seen kids play they don't actually behave like stereotypical boys and girls. You won't get any opposition on this from me. Lego always lacked the interiors in my youth and I'm glad they're here now. Yes, more bricks brought more details and that's a positive change. I wish. It did yes, and it was a wonderfully weird feature. But since the blue bricks extended forward it felt like a semi-closed fuselage thing going on, with the rear part being closed off. Several of the images of MOC's on this topic handle this well. Looking at them now I don't even think glass was the problem, it's more that the 10497 glass doesn't look like a part of the ship like it does on both the original and the MOC's. It looks like the ship is just the bottom part and then it has an elongated double cockpit like a fighter plane. Some MOC's also have a lot of glass like that and don't have this problem because the glass part seems to make up the hull of the ship. That way you get sort of the best of both worlds. It feels enclosed, and yet you can see the interior better. So now that I've managed to put that to words, it seems this is also one thing that the MOCers have understood and felt about the original, there was more to it than "it's a ship and it has glass". The interplay between those two worked because it was carefully chosen. For an outsider to reverse-engineer, there's nothing easy about this, yes. For Mike, it wasn't a problem. I've seen Lego sets do these things before to great success. Yes, I agree. In fact, I've accidentally mentioned this exact thing before I read your post. However, "better-looking" is a big factor of alibi designing... i.e. you cannot make it interesting, or you cannot make it both interesting and looking great, so you just make it so it looks great. If you put your heart and soul into a design and it turns out unpopular - you're to blame. If you don't really think about putting anything in it, but just make it have the literal parts it needs and it look great - how can you be to blame? It looks great! This is why I loved Lego sets of old. Great! Then it's no worries for most people, they will probably enjoy a majority of the sets to come. For myself, I've found that a majority of interesting things are ugly. They're not really objectively ugly, of course, but their quality is not immediately apparent and since they don't conform to our expectations, they look somehow ugly or "weird" or "awkward" at first. That's why I said 10497 is a bit of a rice cracker. If you put on Barbie Girl for kids, they'll immediately catch on to why it's great. They definitely won't if you play them some jazz, because it's "ugly". It takes deeper look to see it can be much more interesting than Barbie Girl, just like it took a deeper look to realize what I've just realized about the cockpit of the Galaxy Explorer a few paragraphs before. The MOC-ers realized this because theirs was a work of love. Lego's was a work of skill, done professionally. I only say that because the end result is too close to the source in literal, banal, countable aspects. Whenever you love a subject, your problem is deciding on what take of an idea to incorporate into the final design. You never just look at the bare mechanics of it and try to smooth them so they're superficially more appealing. I think it set out to sell well, didn't it? I would hope it was not a failure at that because I'd like to see more space sets in the future :) Have I said that? Worst case scenario you're just people that are not hard to please, and that's a good problem to have in one's life :) Sure. This is related to what I said about some of the sets from before... if you make a set be a lot of things at once, a lot of people will be able to find something for themselves in there. If the set mainly just looks good, then it won't be for me.

I don't think it particularly matters what my ideal GE would be, Lego doesn't owe me anything. I think it's great, though, how the old sets could be so many things to so many people. If you have an interesting and messy, yet simple design with bigger bricks, you could always make it sleeker yourself. I used to do this a lot as a kid. If you like it as is, that's great. If you don't - very easy to rebuild it. It's a lot easier to make something seemingly complicated simpler than the other way around. The new GE I definitely cannot make more complicated with my time and skills and it's brick count. Thus, a completely unrelated comment on the Brick Artisan's GE: I like the execution on the official GE better. I also like square lines more than rounded ones. 10497 looks contemporary but this somehow looks like 1990's even. If those two sold next to one another I'd still buy the Brick Artisan's one. There's no alibi work in that one, it's just the author's vision and you can take it or leave it. I can respect that. I dig how simple bricks have been used in interesting ways. Also it looks "messy" enough that you cannot take it all at once and thus it doesn't blend in with the background once you've seen it two times. And the cabin look leaves some mystery about the interior so you can pretend it's a larger ship if you want. The greebling also helps with this. But this is not something unique to this ship. Lego used to be all about this. Making small sets appear like they depict larger vessels and buildings. 10497 feels a bit like the opposite of that. And the windscreen on "second deck" I also find to be like the Lego of old... it would be very very difficult to argue that looks better than the 10497 solution, but this one is interesting and strange, and that one is just the reversed front windscreen. All in all a great effort by the designer. The other ship is also cool. Perhaps a bit too child like for my old ***, but interesting. I still see a lot of Lego designs that are interesting, whether it's monkey kid or dreamz or ninjago, etc. I'd like some of that in themes I find appealing.

Thank you for the interesting breakdown. I think for me the roof was just a way to demonstrate what I was talking about, not the main point. If I did a MOC for myself, I think I would actually skip the sunroof entirely. "Better" was never an issue, the official set is plenty good. But in all these images you posted designers take a stand/guess on what the original designer meant or where the beauty lies in their eyes. Lego set stays as far away from this as possible and does literal translation of design styles. It tries hard not to take any kind of stand so it ultimately doesn't say much at all. It's not very brave and I'd think it'd be easier to argue that the entirety of the classic space period is just ugly and dated compared to the new GE than it would be to argue that classic space is boring compared to this. As good as this looks, we have other great looking sets, we don't have many weird and wonderful sets like those from the classic space era.

What's wrong with the Blacktron Cruiser? Isn't it close to the original? Aren't aviation helmets more Star Wars-y and more space-y? Weren't the helmets before that just bike helmets? I'm not trolling, I genuinely don't know. I think I can describe my complaints about Eldorado Fortress and 10497 easily. For example: Look at the Eldorado Fortress? You did? OK. Now look at the new Galaxy Explorer? You did? OK. Did you notice how the Galaxy Explorer design is so much better than that of Eldorado Fortress that it almost hurts to look at the Fortress in comparison even though it would seem logical making all those shapes in a spaceship would be much more difficult than making a squareish fort, which already looked good in 1992 and was easier to modernize? You did? GREAT! You didn't? Well then we can agree to disagree and there is probably such a big gap in our tastes that it would be a waste of our time to try and bridge it :) My complaint about 10497 is that it's a bit of a rice cracker in space. If anything, the original GE needed more flair, not less. However, related to your conclusion, I do feel Lego space sets of the past had plenty of models that were just... too much. Too many colors, shapes, details, everything. If someone with such great taste as Mike Psiaki took those models instead and made them more rice crackery and boring, I think the end result might be... perhaps not more "inviting to play" but definitely prettier and more display-worthy than the originals were. I'd be excited to see that = more interesting ships getting the GE treatment. As I said, I bought the GE, I'd be 1000% buying those too.

Might be my bad English then. I meant playful as in full of wonder and whimsy and such, not playable as in you can easily play with it. I think 10305 is likely more playable than any previous castle with its detailed interior, but the outside look is almost halfway to a real castle, and not one of the interesting ones either. But most of 10497's play features have been inherited and/or improved, rather than invented. Ah, don't get me started on this. Remember when Lego had alternate models on boxes that were often more imaginative than the main model? The second sentence I think it's an exaggeration. The Creator 3-in-1 rover - I think that could've been in classic space colors and I'd like that very much. It was a good set. Speaking of which, Mike Psiaki also designed 31052 Creator 3-in-1 set and absolutely crushed it. Not only is the main model great (the things he might not do as well are not as crucial here), but both B and C models could have been sold as is and no one would have even noticed they were made from the parts of something else. And the models are entirely different -a camper, a house and a boat! I think that set surpasses my expectation for what a 3-in-1 set can be by quite some margin, unlike 10497's alternate models. This is almost akin to quote mining. This is just a strawman that goes against everything I've ever talked about and that probably anyone would consider insulting just on the basis of how deluded I would have to be to even entertain such a thought. As I've repeated many times, I don't mind and would not insult anyone's vision of the GE. I would not like all of them, sure, but I would not consider their taste inferior to mine because that makes no logical sense. My only complaint was that the new GE is what over here we'd call an alibi-job. I.e. you hire a professional, the professional look at all the superficial aspects of the product and absolutely nails them and doesn't really care or feel or think it's his job to try and reach the heart of the matter. Instead of thinking how to translate between two design languages or just admitting that it's not possible to know what every part of every ship meant to every person and just taking a stand on whatever the designer likes, or maybe consulting with his colleagues, the solution here was not to take any stand, not to translate anything and just do a "oh, it's a ship that goes vroom, so now it can be a ship that goes vroom and looks more badass and contemporary". And that's okay, I guess? I would just argue all these old sets were, even if it was by accident, just a little bit more than that. No, why? I think GE had a good size and price for what it was. I'm not an expert in these things, but looking at it as a consumer, it seemed fine to me. When I say something's a tad too plain, I don't mean it should be huge and greebled all over. I think that it's perhaps a bit of a rice cracker. It might still be tasty, well priced, filling, and all that, but at the end of the day it's a bit of a rice cracker :) I love the look of the 10497. I've already praised the fact that it doesn't have nearly as many tiny pieces as some of the other sets I've built before and since, but absolutely doesn't need them to look good. In fact, the only thing I don't like about Lego is when it tries to look detailed and fails. I believe this designer could make a toilet bowl look stunning. I would just prefer it if the first question that comes to mind when seeing a space set that's supposed to be in the vain of classic space (and even the factions that came after) is less "bro, did you work on this for 12 years?" and more "bro, are you 12?" In my experience adults have much fewer issues making something technically sound than they do finding their inner child. Also, I do not find this opinion of mine controversial, especially not amongst comparisons between the new GE and 6931 and other takes. Ah, maybe because other designers attempted to highlight and emphasize what they liked about the original GE, while this one just inflated it and smoothed it. Also, I think you're still exaggerating when you try and make it seem like you were in awe with all the features because my initial reaction after the build was disappointment that this set is one of those rare sets that you build and find nothing really surprises you. What you see on the box - is what you get. What really surprised me instead was how cleverly it was built and how the build process was more fun and less of a chore than usual with Lego. I cannot quantize these things. I can just say if a remake contains something truly new that would excite me or perhaps translates the original idea differently than I would have imagine, thus surprising me. This all goes hand in hand with the lack of vision I've mentioned with Lego these days. Everything is a one-off. Look at the creator castle, 10305, medieval blacksmith, forestmen GWP. In this case, much more so than with the sets that don't even match in scale or product line, I would think someone would say "okay, let's look at what classic space meant to us. we can then unify that into a design language we could reuse if we ever delve into the sets from this rough era again". Instead over the next x years we're bound to get a few more sets than don't match one another in any way because that's the easy way out and everyone here will be praising them and I'll be feeling kinda sad inside that I imagined Lego 30 years in the future would be so much more than what I have imagined not really "failing to meet some of the standards I foolishly took for granted". Let's get back to the Galaxy Dropship for a while - that doesn't look contemporary. It has a design that's kinda hard to place or at least the kind that'll look like a good classic car with time. And it's not because it's greebled or because it has round edges. It's because it has a uniform vision. It's not like borrowed ideas that would make the final set be easier to make or sacrifice logic for looks. The old GE also had a uniform vision, Lego back then often had. This vision can differ wildly and doesn't have to be anything even remotely similar to the Dropship. Same. But that's also what I've been saying: things that are attractive to AFOL's are not being specifically catered to. They're kinda there partially so instead of being able to completely enjoy something, you end up partially enjoying and partially feelings the sadness of a lost opportunity. I dig this. All except the printed parts on the roof. I wouldn't hugely mind a curved classic space set (if it's consistent!) but I do prefer square lines myself. Not only on the aesthetic front, but also because I feel it takes a lot more bricks and effort to make an attractive curved vessel, and it would equally take more effort and skill to build such sets. If 10497 is any measure, I think we should all find great pleasure in saying the exact same thing, but shaping it smoother this time and making the posts much larger