Lyichir

I don't think it says a lot, to be honest. Boxed combo packs at big-box stores like the one you linked aren't that unusual, especially as we start to approach the holiday season. Separately-boxed online-only bundles like the ones on Shop at Home are also not uncommon. For the Lego Mario theme in particular the online bundles might be done because the sets are designed to be linked together into larger levels—sets like the starter sets and "Master Your Adventure" Maker set have more appeal in conjunction with the various other expansion sets than they do individually.

This isn't really super-related to the sets, but did anyone get Vidiyo vibes from these robot musicians in the new chapter of Deltarune? It can't have been just me, right? Anyway, I've ordered a couple more of the Beatbox sets as they've gotten cheaper on Amazon. Despite the priciness and my general indifference to the app, I really do think this theme has its charm. I'll probably continue to pick up more of the sets here and there, especially since with the theme taking a year off to reevaluate its strategy there's likely to continue to be good sales going forward.

To be honest I'm not really sure where you'd improve the water dragon with a second set. The head size is pretty much fixed, so the main thing that could be done would be to make it longer—and it's already relatively long for a Ninjago dragon. Lengthening it even more might just make it harder to move and articulate effectively. If I were to try to get a second of any set this wave to modify into a larger, more detailed version, I think I'd sooner go for the Hydro Bounty. Considering two of the other sets include matching mini-subs to the one in the Hydro Bounty set, it feels like it's just begging to have its vehicle bay lengthened to fit all four—or maybe even six, with another two pods MOCed to fit all six ninja!

It's hard to guess whether there will be additional "digi-figs" and if so, what characters they'll be. Mario and Luigi are the easy picks—pretty much every Mario game with multiple playable characters has Luigi as an option. But beyond that it can vary greatly. Super Mario Bros. 2/USA had Peach and Toad, Super Mario 64 DS had Wario and Yoshi, New Super Mario Bros. Wii and New Super Mario Bros. U have two differently colored Toads, Super Mario 3D World has Peach, Toad, and Rosalina, and Super Mario Maker 2 has Toad and Toadette. Peach and Wario would seem like some of the most "likely" choices (since they haven't appeared as NPC characters in the sets yet), but have their own issues. In particular, beyond Luigi, how they'd work with existing power-up packs comes with a lot of issues. For instance, many of Peach's power-ups look different from Mario and Luigi's (since she doesn't wear overalls). Wario's power-ups, in games where he's had them, are completely different from Mario and Luigi's—he's never had most of the forms available in the current Power-Up Packs, some of which (like the Cat Suit) would require entirely new sound effects to be created for him. Considering all that, plus the fact that physical gameplay with more than two characters might just be too chaotic to be practical, I'm not actually sure whether there will even be any other digi-figs beyond Mario and Luigi. It's possibly more likely that any other characters will instead appear as buildable "allies" like Toad, Toadette, and Yoshi in the current sets.

I really don't understand this attitude... if you understand that bringing her back is a narrative inevitability for a theme like this, why draw it out? Especially considering she's the most important female cast member, it doesn't really make any sense to fridge her for more than a full season's worth of story. The poor girl has only just gotten her first season where she was the main focus, and it would send a pretty poor message to follow that up with a whole season that takes her out of the picture entirely. I'm not really going to comment on the new set news because, lacking pictures, many of the details might be misinterpreted or vague. Comparisons to 4+ sets in particular seem like they could be unreliable because AFOLs sometimes have a tendency to sometimes assume something is simplified or made "kiddy" because of a few big parts or a play-friendly form factor—a mistake that could be especially easy to make if working from low-quality images. Combining sets sounds pretty cool, though—it's always fun when different sets are designed to interact with one another.

For people who are interested in converting the set to a Super Mario 64-style ! Block, I sketched up a rough idea of how it could be done on Stud.io: As tempting as it is for me to turn this into a full conversion, probably best for me to wait until instructions are available so I don't end up tearing my hair out over having to redo a bunch of it.

Technically while all the blocks in the original Super Mario 64 did have exclamation points instead of question marks, yellow ones DID exist in the game. Specifically, while red, blue, and green blocks contained the Wing Cap, Vanish Cap, and Metal Cap respectively, yellow blocks also existed in various levels containing Power Stars (a great early-game example is the block at the end of The Princess's Secret Slide). In any case, it doesn't make much sense to feud over which is BETTER or more appropriate for this set, since ultimately it's a matter of preference. Lego probably opted for the more iconic modern question mark block design because it'd be more widely known and recognized (even for people who hadn't played Super Mario 64, or hadn't played it in a long time), but it probably wouldn't be too much of a challenge to modify this set to use a more classic block design (especially since for an authentic Super Mario 64 design, you could use regular bricks and tiles in place of the rarer beveled edge and corner pieces). I look forward to seeing what modifications folks come up with for this set once it's released!

I've thought about that! Especially since it'd be a great excuse to make additional level dioramas for a blue and green block. The issue I ran into is that the authentic N64-style blocks have a checkered border with seven alternating white and colored squares along each edge—which the 22x22 stud dimensions of this block aren't quite conducive to. I suppose you could fudge it a bit and have 3x3 squares along each edge with a single 3x4 square in the middle.

Logical thinking can be good but it's important to keep in mind other priorities besides the ultimately impossible to truly achieve goal of realism. Is it creative? Is it fun? Those things can sometimes be more important than whether something would make perfect sense in the real world. Making a spacecraft cockpit airtight can add realism, but does your solution for filling that space have a positive or negative impact on the overall look you're going for? Adding a crane to the back of a rover might make the rover function better independently in theory, but if all your rovers have that feature, does it make it feel redundant—and if so, could it be replaced with something fresher and more interesting? Having a toilet stowed away somewhere in your moonbase is arguably essential, but unless you can both make that accessible to view from outside and use it to tell an interesting story or further develop the world you're creating, maybe it shouldn't be obligatory. Coming from the perspective of a former Bionicle fan, I've learned the hard way that just because something is realistic doesn't mean it's the best or only way to do things. Making an articulated figure with a fully "realistic" range of motion means very little if it compromises the overall aesthetic, can't support its own weight with so many joints, or just isn't fun to pose or play with. Sometimes using shortcuts, cheats, or just omitting features you don't plan to utilize for display may be less "realistic" but still better suits the practical needs of a model.

Regarding the presence or lack of "representation" in a set like this... please keep in mind that the only reason anyone even feels like a set like this is "supposed" to represent the full spectrum of queer culture is because up until this year, there's been a serious dearth of that kind of representation in Lego. Sure, there have been the occasional licensed characters who, independently of Lego's own depictions of them, fall into LGBTQ+ categories (such as Dumbledore, who was revealed to be gay outside of the text of the series he came from, or Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, who have been portrayed as a bisexual couple in some comics and TV portrayals but have only ever even appeared in two sets together). But there's never been any canonically queer characters or depictions of characters in Lego's own story media, nor have there been any queer relationships portrayed as a focal element of a set (despite how prevalent family arrangements are in themes like Friends, City, or Duplo). So the Everyone is Awesome set served as the first real acknowledgment of LGBTQ+ identity in a set, and now this is the first set to portray a whole cast of "out" LGBTQ+ individuals. I get that the show isn't to everyone's taste. I've never watched it but understand that, as a product of the '90s/early 2000's when even things like gay marriage were still a mere glimmer on the horizon of history, it has sometimes felt like queer culture commodified for the enjoyment of a mostly straight, cisgender audience. But I think the solution to that isn't to decry something like this as poor representation, but to call for further LGBTQ+ representation in Lego. If more sets shoulder the burden of representing an inherently diverse community, it will no longer feel like any one set has to be the be-all and end-all of how that community is depicted in Lego. Anyway, as far as this set is concerned... it's cute! I am a big fan of designer Matthew Ashton from his work on The Lego Movie and graphic designer Diego Sancho from his work on Dots. Again, not having watched the show, I can't really speak to accuracy, but like many of the sitcom-based Ideas sets this one continues to have an interesting assortment of clever furniture builds. The white masonry bricks will definitely be a boon to all sorts of builds. I doubt I'll pick this one up personally, but I hope it finds its audience and maybe convinces Lego to consider including LGBTQ+ representation in some of its own in-house franchises in the future as well.

10 to 20 floors sounds MASSIVE—I feel like in terms of price alone that could become prohibitive (possibly even more expensive than some of the largest sets like the Colosseum, especially if they come with figures and fully-decorated interiors). I think that's part of why most of the modular buildings have had floors you can duplicate, so that you can go bigger if you have the means to do so (and vary the interiors to your preference, if that suits you) but folks who don't want to spend that much can just be satisfied with the base height of the set. I think with the recent sitcom-based Ideas sets we're starting to see some apartment-style sets with more detailed interiors, albeit ones without exteriors and which are typically far more large and lavish than you might realistically expect for affordable city living. I'm a fan of the more modest apartments in some of the Ninjago City sets as well, though by their nature as smaller parts of a larger set, they often can't manage the level of detail of those larger apartment sets.

Good review! Very in-depth. I look forward to when you get the app and can review its functionality. It sometimes surprises me how many new recolored parts a set like this can have even in a "common" color for Technic like yellow! I feel like this is one of the more unsung benefits of numbered bags in modern sets. On a Technic set, especially one this massive, it's good to separate things out into smaller stages so that if you make a mistake you can catch it more quickly—and hopefully have less that you need to undo to fix the mistake once you do notice that you're a part short.

Are you looking on regular Amazon Prime? Unfortunately (and somewhat confusingly), the show is starting out exclusive to their "Amazon Kids+" streaming service for kids shows, which is a separate streaming app for kids with its own separate payment plan (Prime customers get a discount but still have to pay for it on top of their Prime subscription). It's supposedly going to be available on standard Amazon Prime at a later date (possibly alongside the release of the sets on Amazon).

I think you could potentially look at it from the perspective of the ? Block acting as storage for the dioramas, if you wanted to help justify it to yourself. With the dioramas folded inside of the block they take up less horizontal shelf space than the dioramas would take up positioned side by side, and you could quickly fold them out for easy access when you wanted to look at the various scenes.

This is gorgeous! I love the detail and how sturdy the construction seems to be—I've seen a lot of medieval builds that rely heavily on flimsy connections to achieve a ramshackle sort of look, but this one manages to incorporate little imperfections that give it a handcrafted look (like the uneven stonework and roof tiles) while still feeling remarkably solid. The tan and medium nougat recolor looks good (I almost like it more than the black tiles), and the little bird in the rafters is such an adorable touch!

It looks like it'd be a challenge to do so given the varied angles of the floor plan. Probably not impossible, but you might need more than one additional copy of the set to do so, and it might be a complex build to figure out to get the angles of the roof to cooperate.

Yeah, this is great news! So we've still got not just one but at least two more years of the theme in store for the future—I think that should be evidence enough that the theme has sold well enough to be considered a success by Lego. I hope that the wider release of the TV series only buoys that, giving the theme a long overdue "second wind" in the west!

This one is light royal blue instead of medium blue. Next to each other the two colors do stand out from one another—a good set to look at to compare the difference between the two is 10246 Detective's Office, which used both colors together on the upper floors of the rightmost building. Personally I think the blue color works well to convey the cool colors of a snowy nighttime scene.

Personally I think the Mario movie has the potential to be decent. Illumination has a good track record for cartoony humor (especially slapstick), which at the very least should suit the franchise better than the gritty cyberpunk approach of the last attempt. I'm not necessarily expecting it to be high art, but to be honest the story of most Mario games isn't exactly groundbreaking either, and this movie at least feels like it has the potential to look and feel like the franchise it's supposed to be based on. The fact that, after so long swearing off Hollywood entirely, Nintendo has decided to give it another shot with this also isn't a bad sign. Anyway, part of the reason I'm not really in any rush for minifigure-based sets is because I just don't see them being a better fit for the franchise. Yes, some people prefer minifigs on a purely character-based level (and I get the appeal of being able to put Mario in your streetscapes or whatever alongside other licensed minifigure characters, so if there were ever something like a CMF series I could see picking some up). But even the best MOCs I've seen of Mario locations often feel weirdly sterile. Mario levels, in general, are playgrounds, areas designed for action and jumping and kinetic motion. Purely diorama-based sets lack that appeal, even if you get the details exact—and standard minifigures are in no way as conducive to the kinds of incredibly clever functionality the "digi-fig" is capable of. Add in the fact that 90% of Mario characters and enemies aren't a great fit for the minifigure form, with most being non-humanoid and even the ones that are humanoid tending to have fairly distinctive features and proportions that could be lost with a one-size-fits-all figure type. Like, beyond mainly being a Lego fan, there's a reason why the Super Mario and Mario Kart K'nex sets didn't really appeal to me at all. The action of the gameplay seemed poorly tacked on to figures who couldn't meaningfully engage with it, and the figures, beyond just lacking the iconic simplicity of Lego minifigures, also tended to poorly conform to a couple set sizes of blocky humanoids (even the ones like Bowser, Donkey Kong, and Koopa Troopas whose stance and appearance weren't a good fit for that. Even when I'd try to conceptualize Mario sets myself on LDD or Stud.io, I couldn't find a way to make minifigure-based figures and scenes to put them in that felt like the minifigure framework benefitted them (rather than just being there because it felt obligatory for how I conceived of a Lego theme at that time). The Lego Mario sets we've gotten up to this point have largely felt good to me BECAUSE they opted for builds and play features that didn't use minifigures, rather than in spite of it. Regarding the pictures of the new set... it's certainly not what I was already hoping for (that being a big expansion set to the current Mario sets based on Peach's Castle). But I like the overall display this seems to offer, the way it all pops out or folds away seems clever, and it at least seems to offer SOME gameplay with the existing Lego Mario and Lego Luigi (even if, like the NES last year, it's not really compatible with the other sets from the theme beyond those two figures). And I also generally like that Lego is experimenting like this with new and unique ideas for D2C sets, instead of feeling constrained to a certain "type" of set for this theme. There'll still be time to get the kinds of set I was expecting some time in the future, so a one-off Super Mario 64 tribute doesn't hurt my feelings any. I might even try to see how customizable this is—maybe I could even try to design some alternative levels to swap these out for!

I'm gonna be honest, I feel the opposite—I wish this were a big set that's compatible with the existing Mario sets. I don't really have much desire for things to be split between that and minifigs (especially since so many Mario characters and subjects are not all that conducive to traditional "minifigure scale" in the first place), and this set, while an interesting microscale diorama, doesn't really scratch quite the same itch. I hope that this maybe has at least some form of compatibility, like the NES did, but I also can't wait until we get an actual Peach's Castle playset with a "Lego Mario" version of the princess herself to add to levels.

Hm... this is neat! Sadly, it loses some of my favorite distinctive features of the original Assault Tiger (the extremely bulky shin guards and the fully enclosed trans-orange cockpit windscreen). I also feel like it could afford a little more dark red since with only the stripes and drone/cannon being that color, the yellow starts to feel slightly too dominant. Still, despite an almost 15 year difference in the types of parts and building techniques used, it does manage to capture that Exo-Force feel!

I don't think externally licensed Ideas are likely to get the same chance at new life through the Bricklink Designer Program as non-licensed projects (or on rare occasions, ones based on Lego-owned IP). Engaging in a licensing deal for something like that would probably be deemed to be more complex and expensive than it'd be worth for a niche, small production product of that sort.

I'm not sure what exactly you mean by chinese bricks not degrading? I'm certainly not aware of that (though since Lego has not been manufacturing in China for as long as they have in other countries, there's less data on long-term degradation available in general). I know Lego used to use fire-retardant additives in bricks that was a cause of older bricks yellowing more easily. Lego has likely moved away from those specific compounds for standard ABS bricks (given that yellowing of older parts has become less prevalent over time) but I expect that there are other additives that have replaced them. And of course, Lego is more than just ABS—they use other plastic formulations for certain parts, many of which have their own particular additives, such as plasticizers that make parts more flexible, glitter, and phosphorescent dyes for glow-in-the-dark parts.

Oh this is great! Coming from a non-Technic builder (mostly), I like the technique you've used for the front wheel wells... by using multiple flex axles with liftarms spaced along their length, it feels like the best of both worlds between the versatile but flimsy-looking ones that use flex axles alone and the more solid but less versatile prefab wheel arch elements. I can't really speak to the mechanical elements but the fact that you've made a working model that looks as clean and accurate to the real thing is impressive!

The above post is correct. And the only set with Trans Neon Orange this year was one of the Chinese New Year sets that released in January. Even the Bull Clone in the Red Son's Inferno Jet set from this March was given Trans Red eyes/head, rather than Trans Neon Orange eyes like last year's. So all in all rather than "going" out of production, it's more likely already out of production, with the sets available from last year being the last reliable source of it.