ElectroDiva

I hope you’re right on both counts @Aanchir and honestly despite the tone of my original post I’m reserving final judgement until we get further into the year. Happy to have my doubts proven unfounded. With regard to controlling leaks - perhaps they’ve gone a bit too far in that respect and killed off some of the anticipation of previous years? @ShaydDeGrai - some very good points raised - particularly around the “really good stuff” being kept in reserve until later in the year. I just remember being more excited about the 2017 and 2018 line-ups at this stage. Maybe that’s rose tinted glasses Agree with you that part of the reason is licensed theme fatigue - there does seem to be a lot of repetition in those. Having said that - if they announced a revamped UCS Imperial Star Destroyer or UCS Blockade Runner I’d be first in line for those :)

It’s only bad if your goal is investment... Personally speaking, the rarest MISB retired set I’ve bought is the Green Grocer modular - finally picked this up for about £750 about a year ago. I didn’t even consider not building it. I had coveted that set for a long time and very much enjoyed the experience of opening up a pristine new set and building it up for my modular street :)

Hopefully their demise will clear the way for a re-introduction of Castle at some point - or even a wide ranging new History theme with Myth/Fantasy elements (yes I know it’s unlikely - but a girl can dream... :) I’d love to see a Castle reintroduction in 2019 but can’t see it happening tbh. 2020 is more likely (if it happens at all given TLGs current focus on Licensed and Big Bang themes). A Systar space theme would be pretty cool - perhaps with both minidolls and traditional minifigs for different races. My favourite sets from the LM2 line up are the two Systar sets and Benny’s Space Squad)

Yup - and I make no apologies for that. It’s purely my subjective view based on the sets I’ve seen so far. I started this thread to hear other people’s subjective views on the same subject. Thanks for posting your views and I’d like to respond to a couple of them. With regard to the Lego Movie 1 sets seeming better due to “nostalgia” - sure - that’s possible, but I genuinely think they were more interesting and thoughtfully put together. I picked up nearly the entire LM1 series at the time whereas I can’t see myself picking up more than a couple of the LM2 sets. With regard to the “vintage” factor - as you say that depends on whether you collect sets or merely see them as parts packs for your own builds. Personally I do a bit of both (although weighted more towards the collecting). There are a lot of other AFOLs out there who do the same and calling that “pointless” is unnecessarily dismissive and antagonistic. There are people out there who enjoy Lego in a different way to you - neither is wrong or right. I do agree with you on one thing though- it’s always worth seeing the sets hands-on before making any final judgements. I do that as a matter of course and have sometimes changed my mind as a result. 2019 will be no different in that respect.

Appreciate there are topics already for individual themes going into 2019, but it would be interesting (for me at least) to hear people’s thoughts on the overall line-up for 2019. I have to say from a personal perspective it’s not shaping up to be a vintage year (yet). Maybe 2017 & 2018 were particularly good and thus set very high expectations but honestly, I’m not feeling a lot of the sets that have been revealed so far. Pretty much every theme seems to be weaker than its 2018 counterpart. Even the Lego Movie 2 sets (with the notable exceptions of the party bus and classic space figs set) seems much weaker than the Lego Movie 1 line up from a couple of years ago. The highlights for me so far are these two Chinese New Year themed sets - and they may not even be available in the West..

Another vintage year. Here’s My 2c: Best Theme: Harry Potter has been the standout for me - a great reintroduction of a much loved theme Best Minifigure/Figure: I really liked Dragon Suit Guy from the CMF 18 series Best Set: 75955 Hogwarts Express (the best official HE yet :) - slightly biased by the fact that I’m a sucker for train sets Worst Theme: BrickHeadz - there are no redeeming qualities of that series for me.. Worst Minifigure/Figure: The 2 Brick Suit figs in the CMF 18 series were a bit meh Worst Set: First Order AT-ST for me although the First Order Heavy Scout Walker was a close second Most Anticipated for 2019: The Chinese New Years sets (I really really hope we get a chance to pick those up in the West without having to resort to scalpers

Beautiful model of the TEE @HoMa - really well executed (arguably your best yet :) Do you plan to make the design of this one available for sale? Regarding the colour question - the light grey looks much better to me.

Saw this recently and thought it would be nice to share here: I love the concept of a dystopian city and it is executed really well here. Having a monorail as a central component tying it all together is just the cherry on top. Note - this isn’t my work (I wish it was :) The creators appear to be a mother and son team call the “moctologists” - active on Instagram )

@sed6 - they sent you that motor free right? Seems like you’re still ahead :)

Very nice design and a contender for the “ultimate” Hogwarts Express. I’m currently working on an 8 wide Venice Simplon Orient Express project and have been looking for an 8 wide steam loco design (since I have no experience at all with steam train MOCs). I don’t suppose you could be persuaded to share/sell your design so I could adapt it for that project?

Thanks for sharing that - very interesting. The main feature I was hoping for from the new PU Bluetooth system was the ability to control multiple trains from a single PU controller - good to have that confirmed. If I recall correctly from @JopieK‘s cargo train review, there are 5 colour coded controller/receiver pairing options. Couple that with two channels per receiver and you should be able to control up to 10 trains with one controller if you want to

Great review @JopieK - thanks for putting that together so quickly along with the powered up tear down in the other thread. The main thing I was curious about was how multiple trains would be controlled. Interesting to see that there appear to be 5 color coded receiver/controller pairing options that you can set from the receiver. I wonder - can you also do it the other way round from the controller? i.e. leave the receiver on one pairing color and change the controller to another - potentially allowing you to control multiple receivers with the same controller. Also interested to see the app that accompanies Powered Up but I guess we will have to wait for the full launch in August for that. In terms of Power Functions vs Powered Up - I will reserve judgement until we see the full set of Powered Up motors and connection options. 2 connections per receiver seems very limited - but hopefully they will resolve this somehow with splitter cables or something. Also really hoping there is some kind of Powered Up/Power Functions adapter cable.

Yep - I was surprised they didn’t make the new Hogwarts Express a more complex D2C set. I’m ok with what they’re going to put out though (I will take that set as a base for expansion and MOCs) If only. That would be a dream crossover theme for most lego train fans

Fair point, but I don’t think thats on the cards. It’s not a very active theme admittedly but there *are* still occasional sets that come out. Of course I’d love to see them go big with it again- with multiple waves etc, but if that’s at the expense of butchering the theme the same way they did with Castle and Nexo Knights, I’d rather stick with fewer sets. YMMV

Very interesting - thanks for sharing that @Roebuck. For anyone that wants to skip to the trains bit - it’s the last 4 minutes of the interview. It basically confirms what people on here have been saying - the barrier with new Creator Expert trains is the size of the market for them. TLG clearly have a big enough market for regular city train releases every 4 years or so, but struggle to justify additional train sets outside of that. They were able to do it with the crossover appeal of the winter village train and look like they will have even bigger crossover appeal for the upcoming Hogwarts Express. I fear however that after this year’s bumper crop of new trains we will have a long wait in store for anything new again. We may get an Emerald Night re-release in the next couple of years (given how iconic it is) - but outside of that I can’t see what *new* set would fit their crossover appeal criteria. Thanks. If it’s anywhere near as thorough as that, it will be very useful.

There are already pirate elements in a Big Bang theme (Ninjago). The new pirates theme should be brought back in its classic form (same as they should have done with castle). If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it...

Amazing looking MOC - well done. Would be great to see it running

When are you getting your review copy @JopieK and will you be getting both sets? I am particularly interested to find out how control of multiple PF2/PU devices will work - whether that can be done with the new Bluetooth remote or has to be done with an app. I can’t imagine they wouldn’t have implemented the ability to do this somehow. If you could also somehow do a performance test against the old PF train motor that would be great. I suspect they are identical with the only difference being the PF1 vs PF2 connector.

It would make the cost of the set even higher if rechargeable PF components were included so I can understand them sticking with batteries. TLG may still produce a rechargeable version though (same as with the current PF1 battery box). This may even include more than 2 ports to differentiate it even further. I dread to think how much they would charge for that though - probably £60+

Thanks for the explanation although my brain hurts after reading that lot. Really intrigued to to see it now after your description. I don’t suppose you could be persuaded to pull it out of storage so we can see it in action?

How about you explain it to your fellow EB forum members on here first? I can’t imagine what legitimate reason you could have had..

I hate to ask, but why on earth did you feel the need to stuff 4 motors and 10 lights into a Horizon Express? :) Absolutely. They will alienate PF1 users if there isn’t some sort of solution to use old PF1 gear. The lack of controller backwards compatibility is understandable (you can’t expect them to support both Bluetooth and IR), but not making a simple adapter cable available would be inexcusable.

July for the City trains according to Brickset No date on the Hogwarts Express but will probably be around the same.

It definitely looks a lot better than the preliminary pictures, but to be honest with the quite large selection of trains I already have, I don’t really feel a need to pick it up. Maybe if it’s heavily discounted like previous passenger trains :) I certainly hope so. This is a step in the right direction for trains in my opinion. TLG can keep a couple of long running standard city packs with all the track, power functions kit etc, and then periodically release add on trains without all that baggage for a cheaper price - essentially what they used to do with Creator expert trains. It would be great to get one such train set per year - I’d like to see them mix it up by alternating between a themed train and a Creator expert train.

Wow - nice render! Yep - those dark blue parts are very limited in terms of their ability. That’s why I’ve decided to compromise on that and go with standard blue.