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Yeah, I had quite a break myself. Seems like "dark ages" is not a thing for no reason. and the propeller housing? yes, I do feel it's an evergreen, even though according to Rebrickable it was last used in a set in 2005.

Funnily enough, I believe that age group was targeted back on the cusp of studded/studless transition for Technic, around 1997-1999. That's when Technic tried to rebrand from "nerdy" to "cool" and "edgy" and targeted older, rebellious kids and teenagers.

Oh dear, as a huge fan of unlicensed LEGO I'd definitely have a bunch of ideas. I know underwater themes have been done a lot, but I'd definitely give this another try, perhaps Aquazone II - a proper reimagination of Aquazone with similar-looking and directly inspired factions but modern moulds. I wouldn't mind the return of those octagonal tubes, since today we've got way better ways of SNOT building than before, so they'd be easier to integrate into builds in ways that don't seem awkward. The propeller housing should deifnitely make a return though. It'd feel right at home, seeing as how TLG have been making a slow return towards angular shapes after almost two decades of roundness (if the Lego City yellow bulldozer is any indication). Regarding a newer theme, I picture: dark bluish gray and neon green. spaceships, vehicles - combo of sci fi and Lovecraftian fantasy. exploring deep tunnels in search of ancient civilizations and creatures, uncovering mysteries. Think a combination of space with the character of Adventurers and Rock Raiders, with a dash of the mid-late 90s sci-fi themes such as UFO and Insectoids in terms of aesthetics. I know it's all vague, but that vibe might end up leading to something pretty cool Funnily enough, I believe that age group was targeted back on the cusp of studded/studless transition for Technic, around 1997-1999. That's when Technic tried to rebrand from "nerdy" to "cool" and "edgy" and targeted older, rebellious kids and teenagers. As for System themes though? you're probably right, nothing to my knowledge ever targeted teens directly and explicitly

Yeah, you may be right about that, when you look at themes like Blacktron etc they used mostly universal parts from the previous years' assortment, which is ironically what Lego would return to after 2003. And I agree that mid to late 90s and early 00s had the biggest concentration of bespoke moulds. Just look at the Aquazone, Ufo and Insectoids themes. Rock Raiders too tbh. I can understand how this was not particularly sustainable for Lego, since those parts were few in number and limited in use, which is pretty much just bad economics of scale, simply put. So it stands to reason they'd reverse course from this approach. But damn, were all those sets and themes memorable and fun, can't deny that! BTW, on an unrelated note; I only just realized Lego introduced 16x16 plates only as late as 2011, and red ones as late as 2024. When I was a kid, I played a lot with a red 16x16 plate serving as a baseplate (a proper plate with antistuds on the bottom, mind you). That thing came from an old Cobi town-themed set from the late 90s or very early 2000s where it served as either the floor or the roof of a gas station. Pretty stunning if you think about it, how fast Lego's competitors innovated compared to Lego themselves. If Lego has been playing catch-up for literal decades even in regards to basic pieces like that... oh boy

Well, since the 2003 restructuring the idea is to only add parts if they are really useful, multipurpose and justified, so as to avoid a repeat of the 80s and 90s where moulds only ever used in a single set reigned supreme (which almost brought the company under). I agree it seems like there might be some bloat recently but then again, are sets made in 2015 really that different to sets made in 2025 really? Talking about both System and Technic. I haven't seen a leap half as big in the last 15 years as say, the 5-year leap between 2002 and 1997 for Technic was. I think the biggest revolution for the system was the 1x2 plate with rounded edges and open studs, that thing has completely revolutionized builds. At this point the only way there could be another revolution of a similar impact is if Lego finally agreed to introduce plates with studs on both sides.

I checked New Elementary and apparently the only new mould for November (not counting some minifig hats) is this: https://rebrickable.com/parts/5850/brick-arch-1-x-3-x-2-straight-end/ doesn't feel like anything revolutionary, in fact it's one more piece that feels like something obvious which might as well have been made for 40 years by now. Looks like Lego is slowly filling in their functional backlog

Hah, gonna be an unpopular opinion, but I actually think Rock Raiders is one theme that would have benefited greatly from the new grays. Old gray was decidedly superior for Castle and other non-sci-fi themes, but this one practically begs for these colder, fresher looking grays haha But regarding keeping things period correct, I was always fascinated by mixing eras and techniques. For example in Technic, I've always greatly appreciated models that combined studless and studded rather than going full studless - same goes for MOCs that use modern parts, but also incorporate long-retired moulds. Check out this little thing for example - almost all modern pieces, but tastefully incorporates key Aquazone parts. I really like it. https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-47760/Sylon/aquanauts-aquahawk/#details

Yeah, except as Aquazone MOCs have proven over the years, some new moulds and building techniques that have arisen over the years can really benefit those old themes. It's a bit of a conundrum, since you can really be tempted to want to use new pieces, but not if it could come at the cost of having to discard theme-defining specialized moulds.

How do you approach the idea of MOCing for themes that relied heavily on old grays? Do you stick to the old color, replace what you can with the new grays or just mix them without worrying about the consequences? Sadly the old grays do not extend to any new moulds released after the transition (around 2003), so if you want to moc without colors clashing, you need to restrict yourself to old parts. On the other hand, many of those specialized parts that permeated those sci-fi sets were made in the old grays - for example the entirety of the UFO line including the X-wing parts, the saucers and all that. That's why for example Aquazone is a great theme to MOC for, since none of its subthemes ever relied on either of the grays to any significant degree... except the Stingrays, which did, unfortunately.

Well, there is one sloped tile part with a 2x2 start, the 3043, which has endured all the way since 1958. It's not exactly the same thing as what we've discussed though, and probably functionally equivalent to two 1x2 cheese slopes put against each other. But I also agree that with Lego's move away from play features and more towards shelf models in the vein of Cobi, they might be incentivized to start introducing some of the pieces that competition's been using for years. If you look at New Elementary, it seems like that's exactly what they've been doing. All those new moulds feel distinctly like something I've seen used by clone brands before.

I suppose Lego never wanted to go heavy on odd-length plates since System builds are even-width (since otherwise you couldn't seat a minifig centrally). Cobi on the other hand go absolutely ham on those, since their tanks are odd-width, which explains it entirely.

Yeah, I've been following New Elementary and Lego have been slowly catching up on some moulds, but looking at these - most of them look so obvious that it's mind-boggling it took them so long to bring them in. Competitor brands have a decade-long lead on Lego in regards to many of these, especially as far as slopes, tiles and curves are concerned. Lego are making a respectable effort, though. It's kinda fun how recently they introduced something as obvious as a 1x3 Technic brick with 3 holes. But what I was reminded of are studless slopes bigger than the cheese ones. It's ok to want to extend the cheese family, but for example Cobi have been doing 2x2 and 2x4 slopes with no studs on top, different heights too (3 plates vs 2 plates etc). I wonder if Lego ever want to make ones like those. Cobi uses them en masse to finish out the hulls of their tanks - while I understand Lego were never quite as obsessed about leaving no visible studs as Cobi were, those would still be worthwhile aesthetic additions - especially given that Lego have been more than eager to make just that but curved rather than angled. EDIT: checked out the category on Rebrickable and apparently there's part 5404 from 2024 (Slope 18° 2 x 1 x 2/3), which may count as a possible beginning of such a line of parts.

I checked out New Elementary and indeed, some parts introduced in January 2025 are quite exciting and definitely feel like catching up to the competition, such as that 1x2 by 2x6 bracket, a full height curved slope and a 1x3 Technic beam with an axle hole in the middle. They also made a 2/3 stud height variant of 6091 and associated extensions. All feel like very nice steps in the right direction, the only question is... what took them so long?

Welp, while the ship is an excellent sculpture/model, it's a little light on articulation/play features, which I suppose could be counted against it. An absolute marvel to look at, though.

What an absolutely incredible model. Not only does it show off how extremely powerful the inclusion of rounded edge plates was, the guy excels at building dense structures, sculpting shapes, ensuring sturdiness, has a great eye for color themes and guess what - also seamlessly incorporates long-discontinued parts to great effect in the form of the small Insectoid legs discontinued all the way back in 2004 or the 2463 wedged slopes. Perhaps there are even more old parts used here, but I didn't catch them. Such ways of combining most up-to-date building techniques, unbound creativity and incorporation of old pieces are a combination that I'd judge to be the pinnacle of Lego System building.

Yeah, but 4261 works with no apparent incompatibility with those too. They're meant to be plate-wide too, albeit with indentations. I think Lego should have kept something that would be plate compatible, since as is, without a compatible piece all you can do with holed plates is put axles through them or only put pins through two at a time.

welp my man, you would be right! I never in a million years would have thought this piece's pins were longer than that of the 3/4 pin. And I find the decision doubly weird given how well 4261 works with indented, half-width beams in the first place. There is some up and down give, sure, but too little to notice.

Self-explanatory. I've noticed that 3/4 pins will not securely attach to System plates with holes in them, due to there not being a groove on the rim like there is in 1/2 width Technic beams etc. But strangely enough, when you put 2 holed plates on top of each other, a full-length pin will clip securely. Is that by design? I find it a bit frustrating, since it'd be pretty cool to be able to use half-length pins on plates and such. It's particularly egregious with part 3176, which could work really nicely as a trailer attachment on a half-pin or something to that tune, but seems like you need to stack 2 on top of each other to make it work, and us a full length pin then.

Well, like I said, it's mostly a one-off. I have some serious nostalgia and emotional attachment to Lego, so I'll just be rooting for them to catch up in terms of versatility. Too bad they're very rigid when it comes to their design philosophy and refuse to introduce certain part families for reasons which I consider less than reasonable.

Oh yeah, by Technic "going back" I definitely didn't mean returning to the oldest friction pins hahah Those were absolutely brutal. But according to Rebrickable, we're like on the 4th revision of the friction pin already, honestly not sure they needed to go past the first revision where they added the slots. I do have some of those old ones in my 80s Technic sets and the difference is serious

Interesting, I thought the only consideration was Lego's arbitrary refusal for some obscure, idealistic reason. Didn't know there were practical considerations as well. I understand for example with the "loose stud" part that Cobi so specializes in, it's possible to lose that part beyond retrieval if inserted into a brick rather than a plate. That's a rather serious problem. But I never figured there were similar ones with the inverters. No one has complained about structural problems or durability of those, to my knowledge.

Sooo, we all know that Lego have been playing catch-up with their competitors and introducing some pretty revolutionary pieces in recent years, this late into the game (which just shows how behind they can be sometimes). This part family when, you think?

There's an easy solution for that "safety" concern - just add a thin, bracket-width ring in the middle, perhaps a square one even. Won't be quite as clean, but it'll work. But agreed, this piece is insanely useful, as are many SNOT solutions and brackets that Cobi has. I really do wish they'll continue appearing as proper Lego.

I'm for all intents and purposes an exclusive Lego guy, but recently I've found myself watching some channels on Youtube that do reviews of all those military sets, and finally I caved in and decided to try Cobi - it's another European brand, manufactured in Poland after all, so I thought it might be nice to check out what it looks like in its modern iteration. I think I had some Cobi set in the mid to late 90s that mimicked Lego City and then had those parts mixed into my Lego without noticing (until I made the purge, anyway), but I've heard that in recent years Cobi have drastically improved not only their designs, but also their brick quality. So the set I bought was the Challenger tank (2627). So far, I've put together the first bag, here are my impressions: The bricks look fine, there are very minor occasional mold defects in hidden areas that don't affect the brick's look or functionality. There is something off that I can't quite put my finger on when it terms to clutch - the bricks give off kind of a rubbery feel when being put together (hell, they feel rubbery, period!), also sometimes they're really tough to connect, as if the tolerances were too tight or something. You feel like the bricks are struggling against you when you try to put them together. I'm pretty sure the tank's floor which I put together first, in fact bent upwards when the SNOT connections were first made, as if the bricks were stressed while they shouldn't be if their dimensions were perfectly calculated. After some time the bend eased and it's straight again, but it did get me worried for a moment. I know it may have something to do with the density - their models are very spacially dense in small parts compared to Lego's (which some describe as a "model-like" quality). Overall, I definitely prefer building with Lego, that much I can already say. Also, the grip that pins have on bars seems to be loose and wobbly, to the point of feeling unreliable. That would be all the gripes I have though. Other points of interest and observations (except for the obvious stuff everyone knows, such as that they only use prints and no stickers): - Cobi is very Technic-minimal, in fact probably the single brand least eager to engage in Technic stuff. Almost feels like it's a point of honor or something - kinda like Lego steadfastly refusing to do any military sets, Cobi refuse to involve any Technic elements. I think they had to finally cave in their biggest tank models where the tread wheels were put on Technic axles, but that's about all Technic you'll ever see from these guys. I do suppose that limits them quite a bit, compared to brands such as Cada who happily use and mix both part families liberally. - The tank is 11 studs wide, and Cobi appears to favor odd width models. To that end, there is a lot more odd-length bricks (such as 1x7) and plates (1x5 to 2x7) that are regularly used than I've ever seen with Lego. AFAIK, the latest odd-length plate Lego introduced was the 1x5 in 2021 - in Cobi you see this stuff all the time, including two-by plates, as I mentioned. There are overall plenty of exotic plate dimensions such as 3x4, 4x5 and more. Gotta say, pretty neat. - This is by now common knowledge, but Cobi are probably the market leaders in stud reversal techniques at the moment. They feature tons of brackets and plates with side studs - most of which Lego does have, but it's in fact because Lego has been catching up on Cobi's own catalogue. There are still many interesting piece families that Lego doesn't carry, such as the super thin plates with reverse studs (same width as the thin part of brackets), which are very useful for putting together high-density constructions with studs in multiple directions), plates with studs on both sides etc (although I haven't found any such in the model as of yet), and even 1x1 bricks which are hollow on both sides. What's really cool though are plates with studs on the side without the addition of a bracket, which lets you do more compact SNOT stuff. And the coolest thing are definitely the insertable single studs, which you can put into plates to completely reverse a build. There are also 1/4 parts of the circular plate (Cobi's equivalent to Lego's 4032) - you can put 3 of them into a round cylinder thingy (like fuel tanks), and the empty part can be left for an attachment point, which lets you preserve the circular shape of the whole thing, don't think Lego has something like this either, and it might be neat. - They have a wider than Lego family of jumper plates, such as 2x2 tapering into 1x2 in the middle and many more, plus a significant number of plates with only part of the studs they should normally have. That makes it a breeze to shift between even and odd at the drop of a hat, pretty nifty stuff. - They have tons upon tons of differently angled (and even truncated) sloped tiles, many of which make flush surfaces very easily. They carry some angles Lego doesn't feature at the moment. - There is a number of miscellaneous bricks that resemble Lego's, but are just slightly different, such as the 1x2 plates with indented slopes, 4 of which are used here for the engine base - these seem like they could be a really useful addition for Lego too. There are also hinged headlights built of 3 pieces which the tank uses - something Lego doesn't really need, but quite creative nonetheless. Likewise, there are decorative tiles with a mesh pattern that Lego doesn't have, and a 2x2 version of the grille plate (superfluous). So overall - I do not regret this purchase, and am enjoying the build so far, but I think I'll be sticking with Lego in the future, regardless. The SNOT-heavy building process is very engaging and satisfying and the model is very sturdy, but there is very little inherent rebuildability and the feel of the bricks and the difficulty of putting them togheter turns me off a bit. What I'm really rooting for is for Lego to keep introducing the SNOT and stud reversal-centered solutions Cobi is so dominant in, as well as some other miscellaneous elements, as they have been slowly doing already, to extend the system in ways where competing brands such as Cobi no longer have any sort of edge over them.

Welp, at any rate I'm pretty confident the number of total technic bricks 1x3 with 3 holes made was not high, since there are like literally 9 of them used across the entire 2024 catalogue, in places where none is really necessary. I just find it curious is all. We'll likely see more of this part in 2025 though