Artanis I

Couldn't even give me 5 minutes of hope, could you. Yes, that already occurred to me, but remember last year we thought from the photos that the dragon knights had pale skin. 1% chance...

I'm hoping that the darker blue parts are not standard blue, but that the lighter blue parts are standard blue. Why? Because of the castle wall turret thingies. It would be good to replace the yellowed ones on that little ship I have, the only previous set with that part in blue.

Metalbeard's Sea Cow is now available to VIPs on S@H. Yeah, $390 if you hadn't already decided not to get it.

Video of the stud shooting guns for those that haven't seen them yet. Better than expected. Video of the spring loaded shooters for those that haven't seen them yet. A zillion times better than flick fire missiles.

Some fresh jokes! No mistaken identity ones for a pleasant change! Your panels are always well photographed and minifigs always posed perfectly, the presentation is excellent. Plus you make the extra effort to get expensive minifigs. But the same joke all the time drives me nuts, thanks for some new ones.

Actually... the materials are not inferior, terrible quality, cheaper etc. Battle packs (not the boxed type, but the blister pack type), CMFs and many polybags etc are from China. It is true that the stuff we get from China is different from that of Denmark, but it is not actually from the quality of plastic, but from the finish due to the molds used. There were Chinese laws preventing the importing of molds from what I gather, so they had to make their own? If not that, then something similar. Over time there has also been a process of trying to get the colours and opacity of the dye in the ABS to be consistent with that of the European made Lego. It was really noticeable in the earlier days but has improved. Compare Series 1 CMFs with more recent stuff. Regarding the hands, the main issue seems to be that the minifigs in the blister packs come with the accessories already in hand. If they didn't, they should work much better. In case you hadn't noticed, the hand clips stretch out and then compact back when you place an accessory or weapon in them, likewise when you remove one. Something to do with the pressure of being in the blister pack affects this hand clip function. The softness of the part surface is an added problem, due to the molds used. I think that the molds maybe aren't as microscopic-ly smooth? Blame the packaging for the most part, molds for the other. (BTW, Chinese Lego is waaay better quality than other Chinese made toys!)

Well I assume that is what the German text all over the page that comes up is saying to me when I try to watch... Someone has uploaded episodes 1-4 of this stream as a torrent, in German but with no subtitles yet. Hopefully soon. Especially if these never make it to disc.

Was Friends on display at the NY Toy Fair? No one has posted photos, I can't find any at least.

Dewback looks to be 2 parts: lower jaw and everythingelse... I was somewhat expecting technic pin connected limbs. Jek-14 has different printing to before, nice other minifigs and ship, I think I'll be going for that one. The droid has the mold that the protocol droid in the Death Star set should've had. Having picked up all of the sets of the current wave I want on the weekend, I am aiming for the 2 Rebels sets & the Yoda Chronicles set for the midyear release. Not that I don't like the others at all, but you've gotta draw a line somewhere. I like it!

Ah, so the Phantom's wings fold in, didn't see that before.

Luke's hair is still wrong anyway...

Looks like I won't be in a hurry to pre order the game.

Just to update, I did some more yesterday. Some were printed 9 days earlier, they weren't too bad but not as clear as ones I'd printed just a couple of hours before. Anyway, I'm getting closer to the goal:

Or was it the Shadow ARF?

I can't remember if I did batch 2 on Friday or Sunday night, but I printed the sheets on Friday afternoon. At the least it was 2 hours.

Myer online only selected sets @25% off. Too many to list, and not obvious to me as to why some are discounted and others aren't. Olivia's House is $87.

I think you could replace "demand" for a monorail by having train tracks (or a brick-built alternative) that take up less space and can be elevated. The Horizon Express train looks a lot like the old monorail trains. I don't think the "draw" to Lego monorail that isn't satisfied by regular Lego trains is to be able to reproduce real-life style monorails in Lego, nor the notion of one rail. I think it's the way that the tracks are compact (a bit more invisible), and can go up and around buildings in multiple levels. If train tracks provided these two things, Lego monorail fans could be satisfied by Lego trains. So we don't necessarily want new monorails, we probably just want the trains be more versatile and less daggy*. (*More like a Lamborghini and less like a Volvo)

impressive! The first 2 sets are the only ones from the line I don't have so I can't tell what you've done to them, but what you've done to the castle is fantastic. And of course you had to keep the organ, that was hands down the coolest thing about the original set (besides the overall look and feel).

Oh no, the dropship looks awesome too. I'll just have to keep trying to tell myself it's a City set not a Space set, that might work.

I'm not bothered so much that there aren't going to be any new monorail sets for sale, it's more the fact that there won't be any more tracks or train parts entering the after-market. Once they're gone, they're gone. Also we'll never get the battery box, motor or tracks in other colours. We won't see it back again, but it's such a sad thing to consider that I still like to dream that maybe, one day...

Has it been reported yet about the Red 5 X-Wing in Myer? Well I've seen them recently anyway. Slightly more than twice the price of the other X-Wing, but probably less than twice the coolness. Problem with introducing Lego shops here is that the chains will lose exclusives and those that live in less metropolitan areas will miss out. If only every city could have one.

That they still haven't fixed Myser or removed Lego Stores after however long.

Must be the tape I'm using, I need to soak longer than that to get the paper to come off easily. Here is round 2. I have left the others as they are for the time being, to see how long the tape stays on, but intend to redo them. The ink just got on the back of the tape, not the Lego.

Well I've fixed my images and I'm going to have another crack at it over the weekend. Hopefully I have enough white torsos. That photo includes my 5th, 4th & 3rd attempts. Green guy got ruined by a pink thumb print...

I did notice that. Very curious.