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Lord Insanity

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Everything posted by Lord Insanity

  1. Lord Insanity
    Honestly, I have always thought the Renegade was the worst looking of the original Blacktron sets. At the price point LEGO chose they should have done a 10497 style upgrade to the Invader. Unfortunately they wasted that remake on a stupid "gift with purchase" that wasn't possible to just buy outright. A good remake of the Renegade needed at least double the price point. Basically it should have been closer to this MOC showcased on BrickFanatics than what we actually got. If they made a $200-$300 version that looked as good as this one, it likely would have been as highly regarded as the Lion Knights Castle. The biggest problem is that the corporate suits at LEGO won't see the design failure of what they released, they will chalk it up to a theme failure.
  2. Lord Insanity
    Well I wasn't necessarily thinking full corridors that could fit a minifig so much as the illusion that it could. Maybe like the current city space sets airlocks that can technically fit a fig through but it's not something you're likely to do much. It is more the implied feature. Now that I think about it and look at the shape of the connections on the Renegade Mk2, they should have recolored the airlock piece to black and used those. That would have been a massive "tie the sets together" feature. We could have had the "not a cockpit" end be a docking boarding pod. The missing cargo section could have been compatible with the city space pods to "steal" them. Okay, now I really hope they recolor that airlock piece black at some point. That will make for some fantastic mods. This here is exactly how I see the solid yellow on trans yellow. It makes the windscreen "disappear". Trans yellow on black, that pops. I really am happy for the people that like the yellow on yellow. Hopefully that means more sales. Let's be realistic here, if this doesn't sell the corporate suits won't hear: "the color scheme was wrong", they'll hear: "customers don't want Blacktron". Like most artistic preferences, one person's masterpiece is another person's trash. For me that yellow on yellow is the first thing that needs to go.
  3. Lord Insanity
    This looks like a fantastic modern re-imagining of the worst Blacktron set. It certainly looks like a wonderful parts pack. Unfortunately on the main build the color balance is all wrong. It is supposed to have a yellow stripe with a few yellow accents. The large yellow color "blocking" on parts of the ship throws off the whole Blacktron aesthetic. The solid yellow immediately around the trans yellow cockpit is by far the worst offender. The trans yellow needs to be up against black with the solid yellow stripe away from the trans yellow. Despite the color scheme the overall build is very good. The only major critique I have there is the main body of the ship is missing. The rover "dropship" function is very good but why isn't the top covered? It just looks incomplete. That missing section then causes the re-imagined Alienator to also be missing it's main body above it's legs. Maybe my preference for Space ships having large interiors is to blame here. To me a re-imagined Renegade should have had "corridors" connecting the command section on the starboard side and the science lab on the port side to the cargo bay and engineering section in the back. I'll probably buy several copies of the set just to support the printed parts and overall selection of "parts in the right color" for what I want to build. Overall it is a massive win on that point.
  4. Lord Insanity
    So the main one I wanted sold out before I (and most people) get home from work. It amazes me that a multi-billion dollar company can be so completely out of touch with what there own consumer base actually wants. Here they have a perfect opportunity to find out exactly what demand would be, and they artificially cap the quantity and never find out. The entire point of crowdfunding is so they know how many to make. Once again they have completely failed. The bootleggers will be laughing all the way to the bank.
  5. Lord Insanity
    Wow these are the best City Space sets so far. When the first pics showed up it looked like the windows might be clear and I thought it is a shame they aren't trans dark blue or trans purple. Then the Friends set showed just how well trans purple works with the new reddish orange. The pics confirming most of the windows are the new trans-black really makes them work well. The space station is the first one that has multiple connection points allowing combining multiple sets. That was an obvious flaw of the first two space stations. The new one does have the flaw that the main hub doesn't actually allow internal movement between modules so it is still far from perfect. Unlike previous station sets it probably does have all the parts in the box necessary to make your own multi-connection modules using only the parts from the set. So overall I think this new one is the best actual mini-fig compatible space station set Lego has made so far, but there is room for improvement. The space base looks like the kind of industrial operation that I have wanted since I was 10. Easily up there with the all time greats of years past like the Futuron Monorail and Blacktron MIB, seriously. It can so easily be used as anything from a command tower to a mining operation with only the power of your imagination. The designer hit a total home run with that one, it looks awesome. The rovers and ships (even the 4+ one despite its target age restrictions) are really nice looking too. Yeah I am in for at least one of all these "City" sets and the Friends one too. The Technic sets are sort of a question mark. If I can't make them mini-fig compatible I am not really interested. I would rather buy duplicates of the "City" sets for MOC/MOD fodder.
  6. Lord Insanity
    Oh that is fantastic. Two coaches that are easily the best ones Lego has ever produced. I am in for at least two copies of that set just for the coaches alone. I had to buy three copies of the Emerald Night just to have one good train so I absolutely love the decision to focus on the coaches with the Orient Express. If anything I would have preferred them to not include a locomotive at all and lower the price on those fantastic coaches. There are lots of options for buying extremely good brick built locomotives available on Amazon right now from other brands. What we are sorely lacking for options with are good coaches. Lego absolutely knows what the wider public with no neurotic brand loyalty will be buying this set for. I will flat out say it... this may very well wind up being my favorite Lego train set of all time.
  7. Lord Insanity
    I consider that a good thing. Most torso prints have no need to be anything other than gender neutral so you can use them as you see fit. (Dresses and swimsuits sure, an officer tunic, not at all.) The lack of an officers hat for Sloane on the other hand automatically makes the set $10 overpriced for me. I just consider Vader to be free with the set but I would really rather main characters NOT be in army builder sets. (If anything Vader's inclusion lowers the value even more because who wants an army of Vaders) 75300 TIE Fighter is the perfect army builder vehicle because of the generic figures that makes sense to have multiples of. I can't be the only one that judges "fighter" sets by the metric of what does buying them by the flight group (3 craft) get me.
  8. Lord Insanity
    This looks amazing. This might replace the Police Station as my second favorite non-corner modular. Detective's Office still holds the top non-corner spot for me. It's about time we got another building in dark red. Sounds like we dodged a bullet with the color. Dark blue would have looked terrible. If the modular town was even remotely "realistic" half the buildings would be dark red because real life brick is one of the most common building materials. The only minor issues I have the is lack of any real signage for the front of the pizzeria. The the jazz club being open to the inside of the pizzeria is odd but that is hidden inside the building so it doesn't really matter. Jazz Club is probably going to go between Brick Bank (with the laundry mat face forward) and Detective's Office with Cafe Corner on the right end (so the hotel sign is facing correctly) That will look great as the seedy downtown portion of the modular city.
  9. Lord Insanity
    Well a classic space astronaut (that comes with the ship) does fit through the opening between the back compartment and the cockpit. Now if minifigs were alive and could move themselves through and bend their limbs at certain points it would likely be much easier. Point being if we assume this is a "real ship" then the astronauts would definitely enter the cockpit from behind. The front window would not open at all except maybe as an emergency escape hatch. I wouldn't expect the astronauts to go through that way anymore than I would expect Han Solo to go through the front window of the Millennium Falcon. That is only for us "creators" to control our figures. If you did want to raise the whole double window set by a plate to make more clearance inside it would probably be fairly easy to mod. That would probably allow visor helmet astronauts to pass through as well. Could always replace the first 1x tile in front of the 2x4 space logo with cheese wedges to offset the height difference and it would likely look perfectly fine. I literally laughed out loud reading that and my wife asked me what was so funny. She then rolled her eyes and said it's like pouring gas on fire. Looking through the instructions I think there is more overlap in parts usage than people realize. When you factor in the value of time and effort, I would not at all be surprised if it winds up being cheaper to just buy two sets rather than trying to buy the "extras" to make both with only one set. Then again I may be slightly biased in that I feel the set is a fantastic parts pack and worth buying if for that alone, so take my assessment with a grain of salt.
  10. Lord Insanity
    Luckily I got my pre-order delivery today. Now that I have built the 928 I can answer the most important question that none of the early reviews answered. An astronaut can in fact just barely wiggle through the opening from the back compartment into the cockpit. The chest will rub against the underside of a plate so I don't really recommend doing it with an actual classic space logo torso. A visor helmet will not fit through only a classic space helmet (and probably a few basic hair wigs) can fit through. Overall my initial impressions were pretty much right on for what I expected. This is easily one of the best Space ships Lego has ever made. It is an instant classic set that any Space fan should own at least one of. This set is a master class for anyone that is not already familiar with the geometry of modern wedge plates and tiles. I suspect this set will usher in a new era of design for a lot of people. I only have a few minor nitpicks. The bottom is flat with the landing gear retracted. I mean really flat, it looks weird because I never considered the bottom of the original Galaxy Explorer to be flat. Ironically I find the best way to swoosh the ship around is to leave the landing gear out and grip it from the gear wells on the underside. That is the only good way to do it one handed that I have found so far. Unfortunately there is some obvious solid red showing in the landing gear wells. This is really unfortunate because those parts could have easily been blue or gray. My last nitpick is that the ship has a very small amount of interior space relative to its size. Don't get me wrong the designer did an amazing job cramming as much space as he could inside. The ship can easily hold 8 figures and you could probably make 10 work. Compared to my favorite Space ship the 6985 Cosmic Fleet Voyager which can easily hold over 20 figs it was a mild let down. To be fair the new ship does have lots of actual computers and seats and beds and such that the figures can be posed "using" while 6985 is mainly empty space with nothing inside. It is that potential that always sparked my imagination though.
  11. Lord Insanity
    I came really close to buying one of these today because I really like the concept, but then I saw the price was $39.99. I was hesitant when I thought it was going to be $29.99, at $39.99 that is a big fat nope. No where near enough parts in colors I care about for that price. If those canopy parts were in trans-yellow, trans-dark blue, or trans-green (regular not neon) I might have gone for it even at $40. Trans-light blue is never gonna happen at $40.
  12. Lord Insanity
    My local Wal-Mart had two sitting on the self with a base tag of exactly $100.00. (Don't know why the local Wal-Mart always rounds up that penny for the first month or so.) I guess that confirms this is in fact a general release set, at least in the U.S. It was really hard to not grab another right away (or first considering my pre-orders haven't arrived yet.) I decided to laugh at the 75315 Imperial Light Cruiser on clearance for $124. (its pretty bad when the clearance price is still higher than I am willing to pay for a set.) I did finally grab a 76156 Rise of Domo for $59 so that's a win. (had that not been on clearance I would have gotten "another" 10497.) Far too many people forget one of the most basic tenets of capitalism, new price = new item. Knowing that the 10497 Galaxy Explorer is general release is going to make getting multiples way easier.
  13. Lord Insanity
    Let's not bury our heads in the sand and pretend the competition doesn't already have a superior Halo branded sci-fi helicopter set on the market. (The suggested retail is $80, don't feed the scalpers, wait for a restock. ) I wanted to like these, I really did. When the best thing about new sets is the terrain side builds, they have failed spectacularly. See this is the problem right here, Avatar made no significant impact on pop culture. Most of the people I know that saw the trailer during the latest Marvel movie thought they were re-releasing the original. I literally had someone at work tell me, "Hey did you see they are re-releasing that blue space elf movie?" That is not a good sign for drawing crowds to the theater. Terminator Dark Fate would like to say hello. The "real Terminator 3 by James Cameron" bombed at the box office. Terminator has had way more impact on pop culture and thus nostalgia pull than Avatar. Avatar had two major things that lead to its massive box office success. First it had the draw of being the first James Cameron movie after Titanic so all the fans of Titanic went to see it. Second it was the first really good digital 3D movie so all the tech-geeks saw it multiple times. Neither of those two things matter for the sequel. The story itself was completely forgettable. (hence making no significant impact on pop culture) I hope I am wrong and the new movie is really good and does really well. More sci-fi in the mainstream pop culture can only be a good thing for the types of movies and Lego sets I like. Unfortunately I see this as more likely being the next Eternals. Sure it did well in the box office but well,,, no cares and the Lego sets (and all the other toys) are on clearance.
  14. Lord Insanity
    The logo printed on the 2x4 tile is one of my favorite parts of the set. I find tile logos far more useful than slope logos. Beside we have lots of slope logos already, we have never gotten a good tile logo print of the classic space logo. The same applies to the computer tiles. We have tons of computer slopes (surely you have "bricklinked" a lot of those over the years right?) but we have very few tiles that work as displays and screens. One of my favorite legacy tiles is the "M-tron computer" 1x2, so getting three of the the modern "almost the same thing" is really nice too. The classic space legacy 1x2 tile remake being combined with a 1x2 grate is the biggest miss of the new prints for me. I mean it is better than not having the print at all, but they really should have just dropped the grate and made a straight up 1x2 legacy computer print. I noticed that too. Seems like minor miss. I dislike how flat all three versions of the ship are. I always saw the wings as being low but not the actual bottom of the ships. 918 looks really off because it wasn't just landing struts and downward rocket cones causing an optical illusion. 918 actually has part of the ship below the wing line. An excuse to build and modify, oh darn. Minor nitpicks aside, this is still easily the best Space set in years.
  15. Lord Insanity
    @Merlo Those examples of the old car and the crazy tricked out car kind of illustrate your point very well. What I think you're missing is that I and apparently several others feel that the example is the other way around. The original Galaxy Explorer is the plain old car and the new Galaxy Explorer is the crazy tricked out car. While that does look like a really cool digital MOC it clearly uses parts that were replaced by newer versions and could never be built as is today. I find it fascinating that you feel the Galaxy Explorer looks "fighter-y". To me it looks like it would be really fast but have the turning radius of a beached whale. It feels more like a "Stardestroyer-y" cruiser to me. I think the one thing we call all agree on is at least it is a fantastic parts pack for Space.
  16. Lord Insanity
    I find it really interesting that you think the original was more imaginative and "starship" like than the new Galaxy Explorer. I actually feel the other way around. To me the original is like the Yellow Castle, it was interesting for its time but has aged poorly. The original is basically just a concept art false color space shuttle from when the idea was that it could be used to ferry things to a permanent base on the moon. (Obviously that capability never materialized on the real space shuttle.) The new Galaxy Explorer on the other hand actually feels like a starship that could explore the galaxy to me. That additional room behind the cockpit and the cargo bay airlock door does wonders for the design. As a kid I always imagined the large colored windows and canopies in Space sets a being "trans-plate armor". In complete defiance of the laws of physics I always treated those as the strongest armored section of any build. When the visor helmets came out I treated the visor as a "trans-plate armor" blast shield. After all even on box art the visors were often up and clearly not the main air holding cover. Those are so perfectly clear you can't normally see them like all the classic space helmets.
  17. Lord Insanity
    Regarding the sizing of the Idea's Blacksmith Shop relative to this new castle, I think more people need to actually count the studs across and bricks high. Look at the 6067 Guarded Inn compared to the original castle. If you add a new castle compatible wall section to the side of the Blacksmith Shop it would be right about the same scale to the new castle as the Guarded Inn was to the original. Now that said I do prefer the smaller scale buildings from Medieval Market Village and Mill Village Raid just because it makes the new castle look that much bigger. Of course one could always rework the Idea's Blacksmith Shop into a tavern or inn and use it with the others because not all buildings are the same size.
  18. Lord Insanity
    That is a cool looking ship and I would absolutely buy it if were adapted into a set. That could be done very easily unlike most modern MOCs with their ridiculously over the top and highly fragile detailing. I value stability in a build. If I can't fly it around without parts falling off, it fails. ( I will go one step further and say if a small craft or fighter can't be dropped onto a carpeted surface from waist high and stay together, it fails. Yes seriously, I test my fighters that way. Pictures often fail to convey the rock solid stability of a "boring" MOC.) All that said, I don't really see a 6985 Cosmic Fleet Voyager tribute in that ship. The color blocking is all wrong, the shaping is wrong, and it doesn't have several side windows. One of the best things about 6985 is the massive internal space it has. You can easily fit over 20 figures inside that thing. I do think your ship managed to have lots of internal space relative to its size so it gets a win there. Really though, can any Space fan honestly tell me they wouldn't want to see 6985 given a similar faithful modern upgrade at the quality level of 10497 Galaxy Explorer?
  19. Lord Insanity
    Oh that interview was fantastic. Lots of good insight into both sets. The best part is the confirmation that the new Galaxy Explorer uses all prints, no stickers. Well I would love to see a similar modern deluxe version of the 9685 Cosmic Fleet Voyager but that was blue, white, and trans yellow classic space. I still think that was and is the best Space ship Lego ever made. I would love other color schemes represented by quality builds too. It's funny back in the mid-90s I thought that a hypothetical Blacktron 3 should have gone back to mainly black with yellow trim, but how cool would it be to get a trans-neon magenta as a counter part to M-tron and Ice Planet trans-neon green and orange. The modern trans-pink is pretty close to the color I imagined back then and thanks to the upcoming Ninjago sets I will finally have a windscreen to test out the color scheme. (black, yellow trim, and trans-pink sounds awesome to me.) Its funny I am thinking the other way around. I will totally get 3 copies of the set to make one of each LL series ship and use the extra parts for MOCs. Realistically I will likely get a 4th set just as a parts pack. I rarely buy a whole set just as a parts pack but we rarely get a set that is such a perfect Space parts pack. (the no stickers pushes that right over the edge into perfection as a parts pack)
  20. Lord Insanity
    Up till now I definitely would have considered 6086 to be the best castle Lego has done. I always viewed 6081 as more of a small fortress like the Black Falcon Fortress. For the tree, of the currently produced colors dark brown would have been the best. Seriously go outside and actually look at trees. Most real trees are more grayish than brown. Old dark gray with its greenish hue was probably the closest Lego color to what most real tree bark actually is. Between modern reddish brown or black I would have to go with black. Reddish brown just looks wrong as a tree, like its made of mud or chocolate. Now making several trees a few of them being reddish brown can look good when balanced with other trees in black and dark brown. This analogy seem a bit off. The new castle would be more like comparing it to Hydra Agents fighting Captain America during WW2. If half of them are women it doesn't matter because in real life none of the soldiers were Hydra Agents fighting Captain America at all. The new castle has a wizard and "Robin Hood's" merry men included. Historical accuracy is no where to be found. What is really funny is you don't even have to swap heads, all you have to do is keep the knight visor down (or full helmet on) and you can't even tell what gender the figure is one way or the other.
  21. Lord Insanity
    We are basically in uncharted waters space here. Lego has never made a second modern remake of a classic set before. For whatever reason Lego doesn't seem to embrace their own brand legacies without two separate movie producers (The Lego Movie and LIghtyear) smacking them upside the head with it. Up till now I would have insisted that anyone who skipped Benny's Spaceship because is was a movie tie in set had completely missed the boat ship and was never going to see the likes of an LL series ship again. I am super happy to be wrong. Anyone that claims to want blue,gray, and trans yellow classic space back and doesn't save up a buy at least one of these just can't be taken seriously anymore. If this thing isn't everything we ever hoped for in blue,gray, and trans yellow classic space I have no idea what could possibly be.
  22. Lord Insanity
    Best. Castle. Ever. Seriously I have been waiting for the deluxe direct to consumer castle set ever since the 10193 Medieval Market Village came out and made it a possibility. It doesn't disappoint at all. The design manages to exceed my expectations in every regard. It's like the perfect modern design quality blend of 6080 King's Castle and 6081 King's Mountain Fortress. I mean it should have had 4 horses like a real castle set but I can forgive that by having two new horse bardings and 8 new shield prints. Of course that also leads to the biggest flaw in this set... it has no smaller supporting sets. I don't want only 1 of any given shield or barding, I want several of each. The figure (and horse) parts are the most important aspect to me. I can acquire the parts to build structures easily. I can't print my own bardings, shields, and figures. Back in the "fantasy era" castle I bought 7094 King's Castle Siege but I bought 8 each of 7009 The Final Joust, 7090 Crossbow Attack, 7091 Knight's Catapult Defense, and 5615 The Knight. See a castle without the army to defend it is completely pointless to me. If the barding, shields, and lion guards show up on "bricks and pieces 2.0" (like the falcon parts) and I can get a few dozen extra guards and knights, I will happily buy this new castle. Much like the random officer in the UCS Stardestroyer I would rather have none (and not buy the set) than only have one of a figure that should be common and easy to army build. Unlike the Imperial officer there is no license rights barrier to the parts being sold so it should be all good after a few months, right?
  23. Lord Insanity
    Wow! After getting an obvious tribute set in the form of Benny's Spaceship, Spaceship, SPACESHIP! I would have bet this was just wishful thinking. I am super happy to be proven wrong. This looks superior to the original while maintaining the originals design language. Most modern MOC versions are way over detailed, but this strikes that perfect balance between classic styling with modern building techniques. This is one of the few sets I actually want multiples for the main build and as parts packs. I will definitely be getting at least two of these. If it sticks around for the normal 2+ years I could see myself getting half a dozen.
  24. Lord Insanity
    I'm confused. How is LEGO delivering your order earlier than expected not considered a good thing? You do know how crowdfunding works right? When I ordered a Fishing Boat it very clearly gave me a delivery estimate of approximately 18 months out. Getting it in only 10 months in impressive. It is almost unheard of for any company to deliver anything crowdfunded in less than a year. But then shipping and distribution is one of the few things LEGO actually still does better than the "knockoff" brands. LEGO certainly hasn't had superior part quality for a few years now. But I am supposed to be a "cult member"
  25. Lord Insanity
    Wow that grocery store exceeded my expectations in every regard. When the rumor hit I was hoping we would at least get the shopping cart mold back and have a passable facade. The final set has those and one of the best interiors of any modern town building. It actually has an aisle in it! I dare say this is the best actual store Lego has ever released in town and/or city.
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