Lyichir

Maybe after the theme has been around a while this could work... but I think doing so this early in the theme's lifespan would risk losing a big part of the theme's appeal: taking ordinary, familiar subjects and making them unfamiliar and spooky.

I think the trendiness of the theme's focus on hip young kids with cell phones has the potential to make the theme seem "retro" in the future, if anything. Then again, I often prefer when themes try to capitalize on a really specific sort of aesthetic rather than opting for a more generic, "timeless" sort of look. It makes them that much less likely to be rendered "obsolete" by whatever subsequent iteration revisits the same sort of subject matter with several more years worth of new parts and set design in its favor. The app is a trickier thing—Lego's apps do generally have a more limited lifespan, as technology races forward and the optimization of newer apps has to take priority over maintaining previous ones. That said, I personally find Hidden Side's builds to be pretty solid with or without the app features.

Looks like just Trans. Neon Green and Trans. Neon Orange, yeah.

The challenge I think would be to find what sort of concept would allow for the largest number of previously unreleased characters while still having a cohesive sort of story placement. One option that could be cool (and would tie in with the current set of seasons for Legacy) would be a people pack associated with the Tournament of Elements arc, featuring the elemental masters we hadn't gotten (Bolobo, Jacob Pevsner, Gravis, and Chamille) as well as possibly updated/redesigned versions of some of the ones we have gotten (like a metal version of Karlof, or perhaps redesigns of Tox and Paleman that differentiate them from mere Ultra Agents cameos). And probably at least one of the main ninja, because let's be honest, they aren't gonna release a Ninjago people pack without any of the ninja in it. Here's hoping. Assuming the summer Legacy sets focus on the same cluster of seasons (instead of moving ahead to seasons 5 and 6), there's always the chance that Lego could capitalize on this sort of concept. Otherwise a people pack based on those characters might be harder to credibly tie in with other current sets, which could make its business case weaker.

I can think of at least three potential reasons for the size. First and foremost, a full train wouldn't fit in that price point. That's a huge consideration, since Lego often starts with a range of price points they want to hit for a wave of sets when thinking of what kinds of subjects they can feature. Most of the sets in this upcoming wave are fairly small compared to the largest sets from the previous wave, probably because Lego tends to save their bigger releases for the Summer wave closer to the next upcoming Christmas season. Story-wise, the subway seems designed to be a system that was abandoned (hence the outdated subway car model as well as the portal to the Hidden Side being located there without having been discovered previously). This is in line with the sort of neglected Americana aesthetic of the theme as a whole. A full subway train might be considered a little too similar in content to the current wave's Ghost Train Express (which may well still be widely available only one wave later) to stand out. It'd also require the scenery to be bumped up in size to look like it's scaled well with a larger train, which as mentioned above, may not have been an option for this wave.

Wow! Do you have the source of this image? I ask because not only does it give another view on the set, but also features the de-possessed version of the fig from that set. If there are pics like this for the other sets it could give us a lot more insight into their contents!

For animal fans, one of the City Great Vehicles sets features a lioness (same mold as the tiger, leopard, and panther from the Jungle Explorers sets last year). Not quite as traditionally heraldic as a male lion would be, but could still be useful depending on what type of historic/fantasy builds you're interested in. Ninjago offers less of use to historic builders since it's taking another hard tilt into sci-fi, but two of the sets revealed so far do include the newer, more curved style of circular straw hat in gold.

If anyone's interested in those blade pieces it's worth mentioning that they also appear in Trans-Neon Orange in 71712 Empire Temple of Madness.

Thank you so much for this. It's so frustrating when people complain about two sets depicting similar subject matter in pretty much completely different ways being "practically the same". The build is such an important part of a Lego set, after all, so for people to dismiss one of the most unique lighthouse builds we've gotten in years based on the most superficial similarities is pretty reductive. I'm liking these sets in general, even though as typical of a January wave the range of sets is less dramatic and substantial overall than a summer wave. The lighthouse is one of my favorites, and mirrors a concept I had been trying to come up with digitally, but much more effectively. The plane, too (I guess it's not that original of me to have thought that a stuntman like El Fuego might get a stunt plane to complement his stunt truck). The abandoned subway has some wonderful Night in the Woods vibes, even if small (and I love how it and the Portal set complement one another). The beach buggy and the ghost fair I'm less impressed by—the beach buggy has a sort of neat build for that price point but I'm not too keen on its color scheme, while the ghost fair feels like it would need to be bigger to truly impress. I'm hopeful that the subsequent summer wave will feature some larger sets that can compare a little better to the current wave's train, bus, and school sets.

It's always been pretty clear that Lego Ideas has different guidelines than Lego in general. The Ideas guidelines are not just about what Lego themselves are willing to consider producing, but also keeping the Lego Ideas community positive by ruling out controversial topics, or ones that hew too close to the border of what Lego would consider acceptable. Part of it is also that where the line gets drawn internally might be too dependent on context to write into a succinct overarching and public-facing policy. In the case of Hidden Side, it's worth mentioning that all the deaths alluded to are part of the backstory, not part of scenarios explicitly depicted in the sets themselves. Like including a minifigure skeleton in a dungeon scene, that kind of allusion to death and danger is a lot different than explicitly depicting a murder or death in a set proposal.

When did Lego ever claim this (apart from a long, long time ago, before the first official minifigure skeletons)? The theme this topic is actually about is practically all about death, being a ghost-hunting theme. You might be confusing Lego's policy on modern warfare being depicted in sets, but that is specifically against modern weaponry and military equipment. That's less about death and more about a particular form of violence that could very easily hit too close to home for many members of Lego's global audience.

I’ve seen occasional reports of deep clearance, but as a U.S. consumer I’ve seen scarcely any such clearances myself (outside the 10–20% discounts on sites like Amazon that are fairly common for a wide variety of themes). So if anything, I sort of wonder if the sets might be selling more poorly in non-American regions. Especially considering America has a more robust and ingrained Halloween tradition than Europe, which could be driving sales more here at this time of year.

The new BrickHeadz are great, but do raise a question. Since this year, the vast majority of BrickHeadz sets have been non-licensed, yet this topic remains in the licensed forum. Honestly I think Special Lego Themes would be a better fit for both this and the now necessary 2020 topic, considering that like The Lego Movie, BrickHeadz has shifted into a subcategory that includes but is far from limited to licensed characters.

You know... since the theme for next year seems to be a sort of gaming/cyberspace theme, and “gamer’s market” suggests a shop of some kind, I wonder if the pink Zane gi will be available at the market to purchase (like an in-game costume or “skin”) rather than on Zane himself. That could explain why the person who leaked the fig didn’t use a Zane face. And it’d also help account for the large fig count if there are a selection of “costumes” at the market like the unused suits in sets like the Iron Man Hall of Armor or the Lego Batman Movie Batcave.

Not necessarily. Lego can’t license everything at once. I would not be surprised if with several huge movie licenses this year including The Lego Movie 2, Avengers Endgame, Toy Story 4, and (soon) The Rise of Skywalker, Lego had to pick and choose what to prioritize in their licensing portfolio for the year. Next year, on the other hand, there won’t be any new Star Wars or Lego movies, and Marvel will be returning to smaller-scale character-focused movies instead of the culmination of several movies’ worth of crossovers. So if the release dates to the Trolls and Angry Birds movies had been swapped it would not surprise me if we would have seen Angry Birds sets returning in place of this new theme.

It wouldn't connect the slopes together more on its own, but you could put SNOT bricks on the back of the slope bricks to give them a little more stability. Something like these could work wonders: https://brickset.com/parts/6228923/brick-1x1x1-2-3-w-vert-knobs You could then use plates between the bottom of those parts and the top of the next slope down to link things together more securely.

I think a big factor is that the debut year of almost any theme (especially a "big bang" theme) often pulls out all the stops to offer an impressive, cohesive lineup of sets. By contrast, follow-up years (especially the final year of a multi-year theme) sometimes feel a bit stunted by comparison. Even some of the ones you mention (Atlantis and Power Miners) suffer from this phenomenon—their second years each offered a smaller and less "complete" feeling lineup of sets than their first. Single-year themes simply don't get the chance to experience this "decline".

One thing about figure leaks is that even when they seem authentic, certain aspects of them need to be taken with a grain of salt. There's no guarantee that a figure that gets snuck out of a factory was assembled with the correct head, torso, legs, and accessories. So while the face of that leaked pink Zane doesn't look like Zane, we can't know for sure whether that face was intended for that figure or if it was from another, different fig and the person who leaked it merely assumed that the pink ninja would get a face with feminine eyelashes.

All this talk about differently colored ghosts reminds me of the new Luigi's Mansion game coming out at the end of this month. I'm kind of hoping it might give me some ideas for Hidden Side MOCs, since I've been in a bit of a MOCing rut this fall and would love some inspiration that gets the gears turning in my head again.

Good review. FYI the seats are Sand Yellow (Dark Tan on Bricklink), not Medium Nougat.

We've seen various new Serpentine baddies (like in the Skybound and Fire Season sets) as well as the return of villains in other contexts like the team-up in Day of the Departed. So it's not outside the realm of possibility that old villains or classes of villains might appear again in the future, even if it's aligned with a newly created faction of villains.

This site may have the answers you seek: https://www.planet-gbc.com/planet-gbc-tutorial-get-your-gbc-balls/

They're not that similar apart from being based on the same type of subject matter (one that Lego has already depicted before in sets, natch). The architectural style, scale, and details of the set have very little in common with that Ideas project.

"Free" isn't necessarily always or even often the case with video games. Any games on a dedicated console require an upfront investment on the hardware (often a substantial one). Most games on PC and mobile cost money as well. Even "free to play" games often rely on incentivized "microtransactions" to get the full enjoyment out of them (many of which can, over time, rack up an enormous cost). Notably, Lego's own apps are often an exception, especially those which tie in with physical toys like Hidden Side (since their purpose is to advertise Lego's own sets and extend engagement with them rather than rely on their own independent revenue stream for profit). Lego still remains a pretty solid investment for kids and families for a number of reasons. It's high quality and for the most part compatible with all past and future bricks. It provides an open-ended play experience that kids can adapt to their current building level and interests, rather than only providing one type of play that kids might tire of or grow out of. By comparison, video games can be a more fleeting interest and don't necessarily retain as much value used—especially "free to play" games which are monetized as a service and as such can't be resold. That's not to say video games are all bad—I'm a huge fan of many games! But Lego has its own inherent appeal that is wholly different from what video games can offer.

Love this! There's so many good details here, and I particularly love the dark brown accents on the roof that keep it from looking too plain. The solution for the windscreen does feel a little rough, though, and reduces the interior space it would otherwise have... I wonder if the new 6-wide Speed Champions windscreen in the recently revealed 2020 set might be able to better serve that purpose in the future.