Lyichir

I'm more than a little confused by the premise of the article, not just in terms of what it's asking but also why it's asking it. Is your primary interest in having building toys of these brands, or is it to "break the monopoly" (as you put it) and compete directly with Lego on its own turf? I think there are some pretty strong reasons why Bandai might not be exceptionally keen on breaking into that space. Lego's business model, in terms of their production output, is a lot different from other toy brands. For many toys, particularly model kits like Gundam, parts are designed more on a per product basis, engineered for a very particular individual use. This allows for the kind of high detail you describe, but at the expense of versatility—a Gundam kit is designed to build one particular model, not to be rebuilt into other things. Breaking into the building toy space Lego occupies would require a hefty up-front investment to design a full range of more versatile bricks, and to really be rebuildable to the extent of Lego it might have to sacrifice some of the accuracy fans of the franchise expect from it. The alternative—relying on a large number of bespoke parts—would be a middle ground that would risk satisfying neither fans of high detail models or of rebuildable building toys. It would be much easier, and arguably more effective, for a brand like that to partner with an existing building toy manufacturer like Lego or Mega Construx that already has the difficult groundwork of designing an overarching system laid for them, and tailor it to the specific needs of the brands being adapted.

Licenses being owned by another toy company is one thing, and could certainly be curtailed at the submission stage without much issue. But a license merely being held by another company currently could be a challenging thing to keep track of at the submission stage, in part because the terms and expiration of such licensing agreements isn't always obvious to an outside observer. Some licensing arrangements with other toy companies might lack an exclusivity clause, or expire between the submission of a project and the point at which it begins review (a period that can last over two years).

Yeah. And one other factor I neglected to mention was that you can generally do more with a greater number of smaller parts than with a single larger one. That's especially important in sets like Technic or Creator 3-in-1 sets where the parts need to be used for different things in alternate builds, but even in other sets that don't have "official" alt builds, having, say, two 2x4 bricks instead of a single 2x8 brick gives you way more options when rebuilding (which is still one of the core appeals of Lego).

Because licensing negotiations are a part of the review process, not the submission process. Most rejections at the submission stage happen because of "brand fit", a decision that can be made based on Lego's own brand standards, without the input of external parties. But licensing is a much more complex beast than that, involving the input of two or more parties, and there's never really even a guarantee that licensing talks that fail once won't have the potential to succeed some time in the future. It would be practically impossible for Lego to vet the feasibility of licensing for every single project that gets submitted. Heck, often even with less complex licensing scenarios, it's impossible to know whether or not an acceptable agreement for all parties can be reached before a dialogue has been started between Lego and other licensors. That's part of why the review stage can take so long.

It was also more recently used for gatling guns in the Exo-Force theme a few times.

I built the NES set yesterday and really enjoyed it. I also got two of the 2021 sets for Christmas (the Chain Chomp one and the Maker Set) and am looking forward to trying them out. They were found at Kohls in the U.S. so if you're interested in getting any of them before the "official" release date, you might try checking there.

Pins being inserted into a 1x1 brick with studs on all four sides has been done before without issue. Unlike standard bricks, the version with four side studs allows the pin inside just enough room to expand due to the holes in each stud. It's an unconventional connection, and a loose one, but not an illegal one. One way you can tell that is the way the pin swivels cleanly and without excess friction—if the pin were in compression, it would not move nearly as smoothly. Usually for good reason. There's plenty of cases where a larger brick can be used instead of a variety of smaller ones, but doing so isn't always the ideal decision. Sometimes using a larger piece instead of smaller ones would make a set harder to disassemble (for example, stacking two 4x4 plates on top of each other instead of four 2x4s stacked perpendicular to one another). Sometimes a stack of three plates instead of a full brick can make it easier to prevent mistakes in the build (such as in the Stranger Things set, where that was done with 1x4 plates to prevent a 1x4 brick from having to be used and potentially confused for the many 1x4 bricks with side studs used in the same section of the build). And sometimes it just comes down to number crunching—if you're up against the budget for a set, it can be cheaper to add another pair of a smaller part that's already being used in the set than a single larger part. There's a reason why that page lists those considerations as questions rather than imperative "rules". The process of design isn't limited to just clear-cut rules and restrictions, and most decisions instead take the form of judgment calls—considering a variety of options and deciding which works best for the specific needs of a model. And the choice made on one model might not always be the right decision for every other.

Brickset posted their review of Zane's Titan Mech. Among other things, I'm happy to see that the back of the mech has had the same attention to detail paid as the front.

Though it's getting a bit off topic, I personally like the way the City and Docks look together. The difference in height to me feels natural and is well-transitioned from either end. My preference for placement is to have the docks to the right of the city, both because of the transition looking nicer to me and because the signage on the rear of the docks points correctly to the fish market in that arrangement. I'm curious how the gardens will fit into that considering that the silhouette we've seen (assuming that it is a correct interpretation of the form) has one very tall module and one that seems to barely have any height at all. When it comes out I may have to find a new spot for the Temple of Airjitzu since I currently have it displayed on my chest of drawers in my room with both city segments but there may no longer be room for it with another section of the city added.

Curious what you mean about the clutch power being "better" than Lego's. It's not a metric for which stronger necessarily equals better—Lego parts are designed to both hold together securely while also separating neatly and without too much exertion. My personal experience with clone brands (limited as it is) has often found parts fitting together too tightly to be just as big of an issue as parts being too loose (worst of all is when both issues are present in the same set, in the case of the more inconsistent brands).

That's kind of interesting! I wonder what sort of figures it'll have. Worst case scenario it's mostly common figs (like MK, Mei, and a couple of Bull Clones), but recently Lego has tended to offer at least one unique fig in those sorts of packs, so who knows. It might potentially include a new variant of one of the existing heroes or villains, or a new hero or villain (for instance, Nezha is teased on a video screen in the Quadcopter and so could appear here, as could a villain from the show who hasn't appeared in the sets yet like the White Bone Spirit or Six-Eared Macaque). Heck, even if it doesn't have a unique figure, it might at least still have a rarer one that's otherwise only known to be available in larger sets, like Monkey King, Tang, or Mei in her street clothes.

Fun! I love the color variation as well as the slightly cartoony shape. I almost feel like the hanging foliage elements are a bit superfluous, and that the use of the bricks and plates for the bulk of the "leaves" is stronger. Maybe it's just the mushrooms making me think this but I'm imagining a brick-built Alice (perhaps miniland-scale) sleeping under this tree to turn it into an "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" vignette.

They're a March release, and relatively few of those have been "formally" revealed (i.e. with a press release or a listing on Lego.com), coming mostly from early catalog uploads instead. The one that has been revealed was announced alongside the Chinese New Year sets releasing in January, at a Chinese expo not unlike the Toy Fairs or Comic Cons of previous years where getting a single "flagship" reveal before the rest of a wave of sets is known isn't entirely uncommon. It wouldn't surprise me to see the others revealed early next year. I'd guess February 12th at the very latest (since as the date of the lunar new year it'd be a good time to reveal something new) but very possibly much earlier.

It's not just Technic. Pretty much every theme is mostly sold out on the U.S. shop. People being stuck at home has dramatically increased demand this year (especially online) even as supply has been impacted by intermittent factory shutdowns. If you need to get a set before Christmas and can do so safely, I'd recommend checking out physical stores (either a Lego Brand store or a store like Target or Walmart), since they might be slightly more likely to have what you're looking for.

I feel like I might have recently read that the sets would be getting a wider release next year, but I forget where. In any case, confirmation that that does seem to be the case is good. Hopefully that means that the western release of the TV series will follow.

I don't always (especially for smaller sets) but I definitely appreciate them, since like my sister mentioned up-thread we've built sets collaboratively for many years and the parts boxes provide an easy way for the builder who's not working on the current step to prepare their parts for when it rotates back around to them. And of course even when building on my own, if I get to the end of a bag of parts and find a leftover that shouldn't be there, the parts lists for each step make it slightly easier to backtrack through the last stage of the build to see where it might have been missed. For that matter, that's an additional benefit of the numbered bags as well, since dividing the build into "stages" like that makes it easier to verify completion throughout the build instead of only noticing a mistake when the entire thing is built!

With the 15th anniversary being next year, it wouldn't be surprising if Assembly Square went away to make room for another larger "anniversary" set like that or the Town Hall before it. No telling what subject they might choose for something like that, but it'd most likely be something grand and impressive, with easter eggs tying it back to earlier buildings in the series. Maybe a museum? Or a block with a Lego store?

I don't know where you're getting the idea that there's some max limit on the number of ideas that can be explored in the Ninjago theme, or that they can't revisit older ideas like the City theme does. Heck, you could make a strong argument that that's exactly what the "Legacy" sub-brand is there to allow them to do. Ninjago used to have much larger waves of sets tied to each new season (with many seasons even getting a full year's worth of sets instead of a half-year in the early days)—since the introduction of the Legacy subtheme, many of those waves of sets tied to new story arcs have become tighter and more focused as "Legacy" sets have filled out more of the rest of the year's sets. Even before the introduction of the Legacy subtheme, Ninjago didn't show any qualms about revisiting older subjects like the Destiny's Bounty or Ultra Sonic Raider if Lego thought they could do something new with them. I won't go so far as to say that Ninjago won't someday end (it very well might) but if it does it will be because for one reason or another it's no longer sustaining kids' interest, not because the well of potential concepts (which is effectively limitless) has somehow run dry.

The real answer is that varying the colors of similar-looking parts helps to prevent confusion. I'm pretty sure this is the style with four knobs in dark tan—and I think some of the other details on the walls use the style with two knobs and the ones with no side knobs in colors like grey and white. If all three styles of part were in the same color, it would be easy to mistake one for the other early in the build and be left with the wrong one later (since the version with two studs looks identical to the version with four studs on one side and the version with no studs on the other).

Regarding the unreleased print designs from the creativity box, unfortunately the designer has confirmed that those were exclusively designed for that: https://www.instagram.com/p/B-xCZolpOWD/ A bit of a bummer, though I like some of the other directions they've taken things as well. By the way (unrelated to next year's sets) I recently picked up another copy of the bracelet Mega Pack because I wanted duplicates of the bracelets from that to maybe use as collars for my two new kittens (one of them is already too big for a single bracelet to fit and the other will probably get there in the next few months). Not trying it on them just yet since they still have growing to do and I've gotten some more traditional collars as well in case they don't take to these.

For what it's worth, reprinting sticker sheets would not be a significant challenge. Reintroducing retired parts (and especially retired molds) poses a far more significant burden. That said, in response to the original question... yeah, like with the modular sets, a straight rerelease of an older set is unlikely. That's not just because of the cost of reintroducing parts but also because, on a more general level, a new set designed from scratch has much, much more sales potential than a rerelease of a set that a significant number of people already have (and therefore would be unlikely to pay high prices for a remake or rerelease of). The good news is that another Ninjago City set being released outside of the Ninjago Movie theme GREATLY increases the chance of further expansions to the city being released in the future. It'll probably never be a "yearly" thing like the modular buildings or Winter Village sets, but this certainly won't have to be the last expansion we get.

I don't have that specific part yet, but usually short sequences of numbers like that on Lego parts refer to which mold and individual cavity of the mold a part was produced in. That allows Lego to quickly identify the source of quality issues in the event of a quality control alert or customer service report. As for the gap you describe, if it's as small as you say it sounds like it's just a visible seam from where the components were joined. I wouldn't worry about it growing larger unless it actually starts to do so.

Not yet but if I had to make a guess it would be in summer Legacy sets (since the 10-year anniversary is likely to be celebrated all year long).

No? What would the point be? If people stop having things to discuss then the topic will "die" a natural death—until then, it might as well stick around for anyone who does want to discuss the last wave of sets (since just because all the sets are out doesn't mean everyone who has wanted to get any of them has already done so).

Still no news on how/when Monkie Kid will be airing in America and Europe, but in the meantime someone on Twitter shared a Google Drive folder of videos where they paired the English audio from the Malaysian rips of the series with the higher quality, commercial free video from the Chinese ones: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1S638X0GT9axPyVgE-tfH0XPSQcvYtwyn At the very least, it's probably a better way for English-speaking viewers to share or rewatch the series than the earlier versions.