Brainbox

Oh, thanks. Way to rub it in ;-) . It's quite cold here, and it's made all the worse by the fact that I'm feeling a bit ill today.

I think it's going to be an expensive year: Mini Trains Skeleton Chariot Knight and Catapult Builder Good Wizard Knight (several) Troll Warrior Dwarves' Mine Defender Troll Assault Wagon Race For The Stolen Treasure Batbuggy Tumbler Batcycle Robin's Jet-sub Castle Advent Calendar River Dragon Arachnoid Stalker Chameleon Hunter Assault Tiger Dark Panther (Tiny Turbo) Ferrari F1 Truck Mission 2 Mission 3 Mission 5 Lego Indy game Lego Batman game And dependant on price, final set aesthetics, etc: Maybe some Indy 4 sets Some Speed Racer sets Some of the MM sets Some of the SW sets Mission 1 Mission 4 Mission 6 Other stuff that takes my fancy. Price? Oh, what does it matter? It's justifiable.

I'd be inclined to agree with you there. It's perhaps not 'interesting' per se, but it makes sense. On another note, my TF: Movie calendar image for this month is Screamer. Not as nice as last months Ironhide though.

Wow! They look really cool. I was hoping to maybe get a couple of the TF: Animated figures this year, but I'm sorry these take precedence. Powerglide I'm not so fussed on. He's not bad, oh no, far from it, I just don't like him as much as the others. Onslaught looks very nice in robot mode, really capturing the look of the classic character. The vehicle mode is slightly less nice, but still pretty cool. Tankor/Octane (I would've preferred Octane personally) is also quite cool. Considering he's a triple-changer, the figure's very well executed. As for Sunstreaker and Prowl, well, what can I say. They both have aspects of the new IDW designs, which I love, so that's definitley a good thing. Again, both look like they should considering the G1 versions. And Prowl has shoulder cannons! "Interesting head reveal" eh?

We've actually been forcast snow for sometime over the weekend. Finally, we've got a 'snow warning' somewhere in the UK that's not Scotland or Cumbria. Troble is, the forecast can't make up it's mind. It wnet from 'snow on Sunday, rain till then' to 'snow tomorrow, rain from then on' to 'snow sometime, rain sometime' in about three hours *wacko* . Today, it was just really windy and really quite chilly. :-|

Why thank you. It's always nice to be complimented on my comedic ability. Hmm... :-D Oh, of course. I didn't think of that. It's only the design TLC used once, and everyone else copied :-| . Thanks for reminding me of it.

Yeah, I was wondering about that. Why couldn't they have stretched to 50% off? Why? :'-(

Nice new pictures, there, so thanks to whoever brought them to our attention. Not sure why the catapult has lever controls, but never mind. Just another one of those TLC weird moments, I suppose. I know! Isn't it hilarious? You know Batbrick, I really wouldn't have guessed. ;-)

Very nice Piranha, successfuly melding the two (very different) subjects of steampunk and Star Wars. In fact, with all the Steam Wars MOCs cropping up, I'm almost inspired to try my own. You know, that's exactly what I was thinking. Well, actually, the astromech is already shaped a bit like a boiler, so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to turn it into some sort of steam-droid (sorry, I couldn't think of a pun). Just change the colour(s), maybe make it a bit higher, add an exhaust, there you have it.

Yes. The cockpit shuts, but I can't tell whether it shuts completely or not. It's pretty close to 'completely' if not, but with all the black, I can't really tell. You realise I'll eventually steal someone's MOC, then realise it's actually mine! :-D

I think it's highly possible we might get a TDK suit, seeing as how the boxes are TDK-design. I mean, sure, that might just be to capitalise on the film, making the sets 'official film mercahdise' but I don't know. We're getting a Tumbler afterall, and the Batcycle may well be the Bat-Pod. It'd seem silly not to give us a BB/TDK Batsuit, especially if they do want to jump on board the film's bandwagon- give filmgoers what they want in the film merchandise. It's unlikely we'll get a TDK Joker, but I'm not too bothered about that. Because the Bat-suit can be smothed over as 'just another Batsuit.' We got a Batman (1989) suit, so why not one for the new films? And I still think a fifth set is a possibility. I mean, we're getting quite a few 'special edition' sets this year, so on the one hand that could make it less likely that we'll get another, but on the other it could be seen to increase the chances.

Neat, innovative, original (in comparison to the other entries) idea, with great execution. The bedroom is very nice, especially the chair which I really quite like. The shape of the house is good too, a little different, and the garden is a cool touch. And that last pic was really quite funny.

Thanks everyone. I'm feeling a bit tired today, so you've really cheered me up. Yeah, well, I couldn't get it in otherwise. I'd rather it was arranged better as well, but this was the best way I had of getting the necessaries in. 8-

Happy Birthday mate. Hope you had a good day. :-)

Obviously you're working very hard ;-) .

Nice quad LuxorV. It's nice and bulky, without losing anything for being anything that some people might consider 'oversized.' The colour scheme is good too, but that's mostly because I like TLC's dark red anyway. As for the windscreen, maybe it is unecessary, but I also have a fondness for that particular piece, so I say keep it.

Trouble is, it happens all the time here...

I like it, it's nice. It's nice and detailed, but relatively compact. I mean, it's not that wide, is it? The rocks are nice, the tracks are even nicer, and the dwarves are fantastic as ever (wish I had some). It's kind of 'fun' as well, which is good. I want to try something like this now...

Oh I agree. And I'm not much of a fantasy fan. But the way TLC's doing it is good. We're still getting plenty of humans, and nice 'real' buildings/weapons, as well as some fantasy stuff. They seem to have made the fantasy stuff real. It doesn't feel like fantasy, but rather as though the living dead, dwarves, mages and trolls could actually have existed. Besides, it gives us more scope for MOCing. We don't now have to build Castle within strict, real parameters. We can build something 'weird' with trolls, dwarves, mages, the living dead, etc. And seeing as how it's, like you say, it's what's popular. If that means sets get sold, I'm all for it. The more Castle sets are sold, the more Castle sets we get. And with the proposed 12 sets for next year, it obviously is selling.

B-RV-9A Okay, so like I just said, this is my entry for the Neighbourhood Contest, and while all the pictures are present in the BS gallery, there isn't really enough explantation for some all the stuff in ther, especially some of the 'hidden' items. So, here we go. There are likely to be quite a few pictures (and links) here on in, so be warned :-D . The house from the front (obviously). It's quite big actually, bigger than it perhaps looks here. Back view. Here you can clearly see all the rooms bar the hall (not much to see there though) and the bedroom, which is behind the bathroom. Also, from the side to give a sense of depth: 1 and 2 Brainbox will give the tour In we go, throught the front door: 1 and 2. Notice the step detail, which took a surprisingly long to do, seeing as how I couldn't figure out how best to do them. Pay attention to the Viking shield on the wall, we'll come back to that later. There's also a bin under the steps. Directly through the front door is the hall, strictly utilitarian and rather small and plain. The upstairs has been removed here, btw. The entire downstairs, with the hall, dining room and kitchen, along with that mysterious hidden area... Both of the two downstairs rooms are removable, and to do so this piece has to be removed. It holds the two rooms together, and fills out the entrance. That, and every AFOL needs to have their hand in a photograph ometime, so here's my contribution :-D . Kitchen Okay, this I'm particularly pleased with. Brainbox won't be going in here though, as there are no studs on the floor ;-) . Anyway, the kitchen: Complete with fridge/freezer, sink, cupboards, hob, oven (sort of) and notice board. Sink are, complete with draining board. The hob can also be seen. I quite like the choice of tile for the hob, actually. Fridge/freezer: 1 and 2 And the notice board. I tried to pack as many little details in as I could, as that's what I like to see in larger MOCs. This is just one, and I think it worked out pretty well. It's emptier than mine though. Dining Room No the dining room doesn't bend, that's just the angle of the photograph. Those dark grey studs also shouldn't be there. They should instead be on the underside of the living room (on the floor above), but never mind. A shot through the doorway. The table is quite clear here. Other details include the phone and flowers (directly under the phone *wacko* ) and the lights. For some reason, Brainbox didn't come into this room either. Hmm, I think Brainbox needs some help here. It's a rather big house and it's taken quite some time to show just two rooms. After a quick phone call... *knock knock* I wonder who that is? Oh, it's my friend Kelsey (who I now realise was a stupid choice seeing as how you don't know her. Yes, I could've used someone from EB, but I didn't think of that). Rigth then, lets go and look upstairs: Upstairs overview: All the rooms are relatively easy to remove for playability, etc. Living Room With a sofa, a TV, a plant and a (very) small table, the living room is fairly simple, but I quite like it. Yes, the plant and the TV are quite unsafe in their positioning next to the stairs, but who cares? This is Lego, right. I quite like my sofa, and look, my legs blend into the cushions ;-) . And here's a pic of the sofa empty, along with the TV (I wanted to build it in grey, but I couldn't find any :-| *wacko* ) and the plant. The Bedroom Right then, moving across the upstairs floor, we have the two other main rooms, the first of which is the bedroom. So let's show Kelsey the bedroom (stop sniggering, that's not what I meant). Only really big enough for one person at a time (standing, that is), but there's still enough room for a bed, a clock and a table. The bed is actually nicely accurate, as my bedcovers are blue-patterend in real life. A shot through the window shows the clock on the wall (oh look, the camera's reflected in the window, another staple of AFOL photography): While a shot through the doorway is just quite cool: Bathroom The bathroom door actually opens and closes. There's a sink, a toilet and a shower area. I think this is probably the weakest room as far as content is concerned. The Loft Now, in the birds-eye-view of the bedroom, you may have noticed a grey pole-thing stood up in the corner. If not, have a look. So, what's that for? It's for the loft trap door. This is also where my photography goes a bit downhill as it was a bit darker due to the roof being on. Removing the grey pin allows the trpa door to swing open. The ladder then slides out. I didn't notice till I was taking the photos, but the TV stops the door swinging open enough to allow for the ladder to pull out and down. Never mind. And the loft. The top of the roof actually comes off, again to allow for greater playability: Viking shield, breathing apparatus (no mask or helmet though, which I forgot), katana, binoculars... ... knife, lightsaber (blue, of course), revolver (not sure why) and batarang. The jetpack seen earlier: 1, 2 and 3. But what were these instruments for? OR Okay then, that's it, the end of the-- no, wait, we've forgotten something. Something deep in the bowels of the house (use your imagination), hidden from view, containing all the secrets that are me... Back downstairs we go... ...and into the hall. Remember that Viking shield? Well, turn it. This doesn't actually work mind, it's merely for show. Hmm, a hidden lift... My hand again... The single stud here serves to keep the lift in place at the top of the shaft. The Lair Yes, okay, I forgot to take an overall picture of the lair, but it can be seen on a later picture reasonably well. Compass, map of Lego City/EB Neighbourhood, experiment board-thing and a slideways teleporter (a la Justice League) allowing travel to the Batbrick Cave, and several other strategic points around the neighbourhood. On the other side of the lair is my desk (with Lego) and a lamp: Next to that is a small table: Interesting package, I wonder where it came from... ;-) Behind Kelsey is a strange container: It's Kryptonite! There's also a bookcase, and all the books are interesting printed or stickered tiles, like this DNA one. The bookcase is under the hallway, which isn't supposed to be removable, but can be taken off anyway if necessary. Teleporter power unit, and lair control system, including the lift and the teleporter. Okay, that's it. Thanks to our participants, Brainbox and Kelsey (who doesn't yet know about this :-$ ). Thanks for looking, and hopefully lots of you will vote in the competition. There are loads of really good entries there, so it should be a close competition. Comments, questions and constructive criticisms welcome. Oh, and don't forget to check out the BS Gallery for more pictures. Notice though, that there are 3 pages.

Snow? The closest I got to snow was a weeks worth of rain, where it rained nigh on continuously, and everytime I stepped outside I got soaked. |-/

Frankly, I'm going to be able to afford it whether I can or not. I mean, it's Lego Batman, I can't get it after everyone else, especially if those people are non-Lego fans or non-Batfans (or both). I just couldn't live that down.

Wait till you see some of the other secrets hidden in there. I'm just about to make a thread now.

I cretainly hope not. I only really want one, but the fact is I want one. And I too think that civilian Imupulse would e a fantastic idea, as long as they're intreesting enough so that they sell well. I mean, I'd probably buy them whatever, but if they sell well, we're more likely to get more. Failing that, just stick some civilians in with some of the war-based sets. Like a jester in a csatle or a throne room, or some plebians peasants and some maidens in a barracks or something.

Ah, rght. There you go then. I actually realised the other day that Nightwing only just fits, and that I forgot to build it with him in mind. Never mind though, it'll have to do.