TeriXeri

I like the tree design, and yet again another Camper Van with nods with a VW Surfbus, which isn't a bad thing as it's a well known "Camper Van" in the real world, and a recurring design in LEGO vans. Overall, the Forest sets look they will go really well together and not just the trees, the colors just work very well.

Alternate builds on the Shuttle look fantastic, a Saturn V and a Lunar Lander, both still decently sized and well detailed.

Not a pirates set but City will have a small set with 2 monkeys, certainly a nice addition to what used to a regular animal in many sets in the past 80s/90s Pirates and even up to 2009.

Same here, 2 monkeys in a small set is a good deal imo, and the monkeys can even go well with the 2020 Pirates sets.

Not very interested in the vehicles, but the Temple set is nice on it's own.

Love the shuttle, fully brick built is always nice, the red/blue stripe reminds me of the 1995 Town Launch Command (and also used on previous "Space" 3-in-1 sets) Ferris Wheel certainly looks nice as well, It's also less then half the price and piece count , but yes it does use the same colors for each section, this one I am very interested to see what Alternate builds they can come up with those parts.

Ok, with a picture of the shuttle on brickset I assume it's ok to link it : Overall doesn't look bad, certainly a followup to the 2017 Shuttle, but with what looks like more system parts for the tail engines, and landing gear and what looks like wing Flaps. Blue/Red stripe is continued , so it's certainly keeping the same space company feel there. (and also the Town Space sets from 1995 Launch Command) Update : Ok just saw a picture with the alternate builds , a Lunar Lander and a Saturn V , for a 3-in-1, I think that's very nice budget alternative to the Expert/IDEAS sets of the past.

Small Monkey set = amazing Lion set is sadly 4+ and those tend to be overpriced, also doesn't have a female lion so if you want a family , you need to go back to the 2020 60267 Big wildlife set looks great but I don't think the Helicopter was really needed in it, could've had a winch on the tracked vehicle to "fix" the tree instead a helicopter, still nice to see Land/Water variants of the new "Road" plates however. Overall, I think this is still a huge improvement on direction of City, adding more focus on terrain and animals.

For me it's Nexo Knights, at least most of the figures and the 2 Castle (Jestro's / Knighton, and Fortrex/library in combined mode perhaps) sets and some smaller sidebuilds, while not Classic or Historical by any means, to each their own preferences (I also wasn't collecting LEGO from 2001-2015 however), my last Castle set before that was 1995 Drawbridge/King/Tower. Strong point that Nexo Knights has to me are the shields+5 sided tile, still useful to depict some interesting things to this day, be it a transparent printed tile, a stickered tile, or just a plain color. And when it comes to most recent Castle-Like themes, It'd be the Dungeon/Dragons wave of Ninjago, can easily replace the ninjas with knights and it's just another Skeleton/Lava faction, to me that wave was great, vehicles/Dragons were mostly optional/seperate sets, and the biggest set was just 100% a location.

Well, from that point of view, yes, it's not an army or Knight accesoires set by any means, also no horses, but structure wise I love it. And yes, some small to medium minifig/horses set would be very welcome, greatly prefer that over a Siege vehicle imo.

31084 Pirate Rollercoaster and the 31078 Treehouse might not have been fully fledged Pirate sets, I agree with that, but I don't see the ship set as a slap in the face. I got back into LEGO after the 2015 Pirates (and 2013 Castle) were retired, so having IDEAS + Creator at least provide something nice in 2020/2021 is still much better then a pseudo theme-park Pirates attraction via earlier 3-in-1 or Friends sets in the last couple years. I didn't get 2 or 3 of the ship set since Barracuda Bay existed, but this Castle looks to have much more potential, for the 3 builds to display together, and 3-in-1 isn't uncommon to get a decent discount. Harry Potter doesn't interest me much in terms of LEGO , but I can see how that theme would be better suited for a cohesive look over many years, but personally I don't mind the more colorful style of 3-in-1 sets. I also didn't mind the colors on Knighton Castle, so that might've helped me get used to it, Darkblue parts from Nexo Knights and various Creator 3-in-1 roofs certainly can go together in MOCS. Overall, it seems LEGO likes Dark Blue roofs in recent times, as they appeared quite a bit in Friends as well. In LEGO Masters NL Season 2, the Brickmaster even called Darkblue a color mainly only used as "accent color". Personally Darkblue and (Light)Yellow go much better together compared to regular blue+yellow, except when it's mean to be an overly Classic design like the Benny Spaceship House.

Bright Light Yellow has been used in City since 2019 as accent color for it's Police/Fire vehicles , this year saw this piece in BLY used twice on Police/Fire trucks: Overall, in recent coupld of years , more and more parts that used to be Speed Champions show up in other themes now in terms of wheels/fenders etc.

I mostly meant the change from the Polycarbonate to ABS for transparent parts, Baseplates, might even be ABS (looked it up and couldnt find it otherwise), but it certainly uses a very different structure and non-moulded production compared to regular plates. I never had a transparent baseplate, but I assume at least those ones might have been Polycarbonate instead of ABS. (16x16 transparent baseplates were made in 2007) I had various baseplates in the past, and older road plates were a lot less smooth, yet very wear-resistant printing (Classic Road Plates like the Classic Space Landing Pad). Overall, the difference between road plates over the years was more then just studs and printing. Some raised baseplates like this one could easily get a small hole at a corner of a raised part, while older ones like the Craters seemed more durable due to not having "sharp" edges. The late 90s green studs road plates were smoother, but the roads being printed could mean it could happen that there would be a scratch off the paint showing the green underneath , I never had the 2002 version of green road plates but they retired fast, maybe they had a paint scratching issue as wel As far as baseplates retiring entirely, nothing is certain until it actually happens (signals would be if something like the 2022 Modular being on plates instead).

I have this set, and after having the figures on their stands for many years (Basicly had the set built and untouched in a dark drawer for at least 10+ years in the 2000s-2010s), they don't clutch to studs anymore, so the stands are probably bigger then ideal to keep them on tight. Figs never flew off their stands either when the set was new for me. I had a version that came with an extra team of unprinted Orange torso (Holland Team) figures, and even while they weren't on the stands for many years, they still also have less clutch power due to having been used on the field.

3-in-1 birds like parrots/seagulls/songbirds could easily be replaced by moulds, but some dogs have been really nice in 3-in-1 form, bonus for moving parts : Usually the bigger animals with moving parts work even better in brick form. Good examples are the dolphin in 3-in-1 Surf House, shark with 3-in-1 Pirate Ship, but worse examples would be the crocodile in the Riverside Houseboat (talking mainbuilds here, the croc in the Safari Treehouse is a bit odd but for an alternate build it can be forgiven, it still looks better proportioned compared to the Houseboat croc imo.) I'd love to see more (City) sets with normal cats and not just Friends style cats, wouldn't mind if Creator 3-in-1 went with including regular dogs and cats in their set however. The 2021 Friends Kitten works well enough for a minifig cat, not as overly Anime/Cartoon eyes compared to the full sized cat. I also hope for more Moulded Horses again in non-licensed sets, minidoll horses have been dominant and frequently made, while the minifig horse it took a few years to appear in a non licensed set again (IDEAS Blacksmith)

Ok that's interesting that it was another company that made the baseplates (but it makes sense due to the different type of production method), wonder if LEGO will introduce 16x32 and 32x32 Plates (or not if they might have issues like warping) I didn't even know before, that Baseplate production was outsourced to another company, but if LEGO is going 100% ABS now (after also changing their transparent plastic) , it makes sense to also switch away from baseplates.

Ferris Wheel might be interesting as well, 1002 pieces, I wonder what kinds of size and alternate builds it could have. I also loved the brick-built animal series of recent years, so the Crocodile set could be fun.

I actually don't mind the colors, as it'll work well with other Creator 3-in-1 sets parts.

48x48 Light Grey + 32x32 Bright Green , Blue, White Baseplates are also still sold via Classic Theme. Road Baseplates however, indeed haven't been part of sets for quite a while, until the new but different 2021 City system. 2012 was the last year with City sets with baseplates , and the 2011 Police Station and Spareport still had smooth "road" parts on their baseplates. I don't think 32x32 or 16x32 baseplates are entirely retiring yet, and even then, the first signs probably would be if Modular buildings would be on standard plates + the retirement of ClassicBaseplates, which I don't see happen soon.

DOTS series 1 had some 1x1 tiles that could represent minifig fruit : The old Pizza tiles from Xtra food series 1 could also act as a really large 2x2 grapefruit slice : (interestingly enough the 40309 Xtra description even names them as Grapefruit)

Creator 3-in-1 has done Shuttles regularly with 2017 (minifig scale) , 2019 (microscale) , so it's not a huge suprise if its a shuttle again in 2021, still doesn't take away that alternate builds could be nice as well. I actually really liked the 2017 shuttle despite being non-realisticly proportioned, it's a great playset and had a good selection of parts.

Those Homemaker / Aquazone arms (and variants like the claws/magnets/insectoid wings) were rather fragile, and I can see that might be the reason for retirement, but I agree that the magnets and claws have no real current day replacements. When the sets were new, they worked great, however over time, they just get loose, or crack entirely. Over time, we got the mixel joints, which could potentially still be expanded, for example pieces that originated as "ammo" (nexo knight crossbow) are now more frequently used for the towball itself , but it still doesn't fully replace the old magnet or Claw, but does allow more interconnectivity with either bar, axle or pin , or more recent plates with hollow studs. Currently in use : Not in use : Now another part, but still in use (probably most commonly known as the Classic Space Robot Arm as also seen in Benny's Space Squad) is the 4735, surprisingly never got a bigger clip.

Great rework of the original for sure. I certainly have good memories of my family's 2x sabre island, used those 16x16 baseplates a lot alongside a 16x32 blue plate from a Castle set to form more sea/islands for the river that comes with the Islanders Enchanted Island. Also were my only Soldiers/bluecoat sets so extra nostalgic.

I agree Creator 3-in-1 is certainly my most anticipated theme remaining for summer pictures, not just the Castle but also the Shuttle, Ferris Wheel and even the Crocodile/Fishbowl could be fun. On Topic, the 3-in-1 Castle was rumoured to have Black Falcons , makes sense with the prints being used for the Blacksmith, but it makes it wonder if LEGO will go into more factions going forward, maybe 1 faction per release year to keep the requirement of conflict down, and also make prints reuseable, but also keeps the need for side builds like siege vehicles lower. I don't think all themes need to turn into action vehicle themes, so sets via IDEAS/3-in-1 having 1 faction is no problem to me, even so, the Pirate captain from the 3-in-1 and IDEAS ships are still different enough to be roleplayed as rivals, etc. 2020 Summer Ninjago changed up the action-vehicle routine however, and I loved the skull journey+dungeon set a lot, probably the closest to a "Castle" set that I own of recent years, and unlike Hidden Side Castle, it's still available for now. And before I forgot the Hidden Side Castle, it was very short lived (5-6 months?) and didn't even get a Jangbricks or Brickset review ( I don't have it either as I was focusing on the Ninjago Wave instead)

Classic theme does have it's "themes" as of recent years ,like eyes, wheels, windows, transparent, lightbricks and such, so I think a themed Classic box could work. I don't know how succesful those 60th anniversary 2018 Building Bigger Thinking sets were overall, but those were my favorite type of bulk boxes, containing generic minifigs + minifig accesoires and a little bit less of a rainbow compared to Classic. That said, Castle and Pirate themed builds frequently do appear as the minibuilds examples / instructions.