Aine

Insane work. Desolate ground is epic.

Yeah, I thought about the same: I'd prefer to play this with my family rather than with friends, who can be ultra-competitive at times, and that gets old after two decades of MtG.

Wow, that's beautiful! Such a clean build, nicely done water, and lots of figs!

Hey Mitsman, that's cool idea! I'm not into tabletop (war)gaming, as I had real bad luck and experiences in the past, but with a group of good friends this might be a blast! ;-)

Yeah, I work in a factory for twenty years, but this didn't hit me. You're right, the moulds can be totally worn out. Otoh, if they can create each year an insane amount of new moulds, they should have some spare gulden to recreate the spangelhelm at the very least. Also, I'm not sure how well the nostalgia sets sell, especially considering that I can't tell what is and what isn't such a set - e.g. Barracuda remake is quite obvious, but what about sets like MVV made the 1980's fandom roar, yet they are modern sets - but I'd be surprised to realize that they weren't popular. I beleive that the GenY people would love them, and they'd pass this passion on their children, as written above. Maybe I'm wrong, I haven't read any data no those sets' sellings...

You're rght, both of you are right. But that's the exact reason why Lego's reluctance to make a great nostalgic line surprises me. They'd rake in money, I'd guess, and they'd put to use all the old mouldings that gather dust instead of gold. Lego bosses either know something that we do not, or maybe it's just easier and safer for them to play it easily and safely.

Thanks for this thread, it made me warm and fuzzy, even though it was cold and frozen! :-)

@zoth33 I didn't write my thoughts well. I meant that there may be no real Castle line made by lego for years, similarly how there's no Vintage-only based set in MtG. However there surely will be some kind of support (an equivalent of occassional Eternal playable) in the form of MVV-esque sets, useful parts in other themes, and maybe even some Castle-like line in the vein of Ninjago and similar stuff. But a 1980's XIIth Century England Nostalgia Line may not return any time soon due to the factors that we've discussed already. And yes, a lot of what we're talking about is more about nostalgia than anything else. Maybe we want to go back to our childhood and relive the days when we were small kids drawn into the world of lego knights and castles, and thus we search for that perfect imitation of that perfect moment, that's why we collect the old school worn out yellowed scratched stuff because it has that spell that works on and for us. I guess that if only I'd take of my old-fogyish glasses, I'd see the lego world much differently. @SteamSewnEmpire Why are you doing this to me?

Could you send the link to that "troll site", please? I'm not that much into fantasy, but this may be a cool addition for Castle fans, so I'm pretty interested! Duh, uhm... yeah, I googled the theme and well... not my cup of tea. https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/11/20/trolls-world-tour-lego-sets-revealed-news/ But there could be useful parts, I just thought that it'll be a classic fantasy stuff. That line was pretty short, unfortunately. I like the King's Castle, but it looks like the two bigger sets used a lot of big specialized parts and the rest were small collections of few minifigs. Double the amount of sets, make a few of them more brick-heavy, and I'm all for it! I wish to return to this post once more. I think that we're done with any major lego support, at least considering afol-friendly sets. The recent Löwenstein set is insane, and I hate the fact that I missed it, but it's still an exception similar to MVV and such. This reminds me of the situation in Magic: the Gathering and its Eternal formats; they are not abandoned by Wizards of the Coast, but they are not really supported anymore: they turned into community driven formats years ago, in case of Vintage even decade ago. Afols, and more specifically Castle fans should acknowledge that time has come for them to build their own kingdom without any direct support from LEGO. There are ton and tons of medieval/fantasy MOCs, just the one thread on EB shows hundreds of castle armies, YT is full of fanmade videos (although these might be in jeopardy due to recent policy change), and BL offers nigh endless opportunity for solid deal, at least for the ones who got enough gold. I really think that the future lies in a DIY community approach. Use the old parts, repurpose the non-Castle stuff, print your own decals, maybe even find the pad prinitng company close to your home, share the MOC ideas and instructions, support Brick Warriors/Forge, 3D print your own stuff if you can. Last note: I know that I'm guilty of blathering, and that I offered very litle from my own work, and yeah, this is directly linked to lego's nonexistant support of Castle theme as it's hard to build something when the purchases are limited to BL offers, but seeing projects like the Troll Town by @TheCook give me hope for a brighter future. And nope, when I write "brighter", I don't mean translucent pink... :-)

That's... that's... wow! What a lovely pair!

I sifted through the Castle sets on BL and was amazed by the absolute military nature of the theme. It's close to a wargaming mod of lego, rather than a building-and-collectible system. This is especially interesting due to the Lego's play-good policy (although there's nothing bad about playing with soldiers, inho). I'm a bit surprised that this theme was so heavily into warfare and conflict, and that there was never any sizeable portion focused on the non-military aspects of medieval/fantasy life. But I guess it makes sense, as that's what defined and defines the very theme: castles, sieges, battles, conflict, swordsmanship, etc.

On animals - they could be far more common. Instead of n-th iteration of Fire Station and the next Police Dept. version 158, lego could make farms, zoo, obviously castle, whatever the idea that wasn't done ad nauseam in every past year. Otoh, lego is a building system, so it's more about bricks than animals, I guess, and I'm not sure how well my ideas would sell. I knw that girls like horses, ponies, and pegasi, but maybe duplo is better suited for this kind of things. Idk. I just miss the animal life in Castle. Stallions weren't the only domesticated animals.

I value and share your opinion on the old school lego's ambiguity. I never thought about it that way, but I'm tempted to say that it made an impact on my imagination and development. Speaking about the bullet helmet: I'd love to add one another word to what you've said, but you've missed nothing and anything else would be superfluous. I simply love it, I wish they'd return it back. One and only remark considering the 80's Castle: weaponry was mediocre to awful; ymmv. imho, etc., but I ranted about this every other day, so yeah.

Chiaroscuro, the Castle line of old missed the girls-also-exist phenomenon. There could be more of the feminine aspects present, be it princesses, peasant life, animals, elaborate dress/furniture. If you check the old school stuff, and lets narrow it down to the late 1980's, you got very few girls friendly sets: in fact 6023 Maiden's Cart may be the only one. I understand that the foucs of Castle line is well uhm castles, but lego kinda overdone this. There's more to Middle Ages than just warfare. Instead of the throng of pointless minirams and microballistae, there could have been at least few civilian sets. But of course I can only pretend that I know that they'd be successful, and maybe the whole spell of 80's Castle is the military nature of the setting. edit: Yep, I would like to see more animals than just the horses, and no, it's not just about me wanting the goat that badly, but even the pigs, fowl, rabbits would make the castle more alive.

We're getting into my favourite stories, and I like it, I like it a lot! :-)

This is not about just GoT, Witcher, Vikings, and whatever other show, HP including. Back in 1980's lego made Castle line without any TV and/or movie to prey upon, and I don't know if they had their own show, I'm from East Europe. They could somehow work around the Robin Hood series that coincidentaly came out the same year as Castle, but nobody knows how that show helped in lego marketing. There's a continuum from child to adult, and we cannot tell if, when, and why does the interest in fantasy or history spark in a person. (Btw, I first read Witcher when I was 13.) They changed the horses just to please the small boys, and it's possible that they could target the 8-12 y/o boys with a new Castle line. Even 12-16 guys could like that. Maybe lego could target the AFOLs even more, idk how many resources they'd need to divert from their more profitable and more easier designs, but this is not a crux of the issue. IF only they'd wanted to make a solid Castle line, it's definitely more than doable. Speaking of Nexo Knights and its (relative?) failure: I know nothing about the line and the show, but it's a weird mess. Maybe a more classic line could have sold better? Because parents buy the stuff, and they have their own ideas about aesthetics. I'd rather buy a classic Castle set for my children than some of the hideous monstrosities that tlg produced. @leafan you've beat me to it :-)

Yeah, lets get back on the track! Lego missed the opportunity for the 35th anniversary of the 1984's novel line of Castle, not to mention the miss of the 40th birthday of the Yellow Castle, and if they don't watch TV/netflix/YT and are completely oblivious to the success of the recent fantasy series, then there's no way to wake them up from their self-imposed stupor. I really think that a DIY approach is the best what we can do, and by this I mean a real customization, including the heraldry and stuff (bardings, torsos, storylines, MOCs/instructions.) For example prices of printing dropped significantly in past decade, and it's not just about decals anymore, even (semi)professional solutions are available for the common folk. I made some tiny attempts in this direction, but I didn't move any further, mostly coz I'm not having any reliable company around me. But with a price of 100-200 USD for a serie of 100 pad prints, this is not completely out of this world. What I lack the most (and nope, BW, BF, Alibaba don't help) is weaponry. I know that I'm repeating myself, but seriously, what's so damned impossible about a solid sword molding? There are dozens of totally unreal, oversized, spikes-be-everywhere nonsensical swords that lego produced since the turn of millennia, but not one of them is close enough to be useful for me. From the plethora of hits that BL offers, I found just two swords (Gladius and Sting) that are aesthetically pleasing, but both of them have their downsides. Firstly they are not period-true when it comes to my needs, then they don't have the iconic cruciform form, and they sport the lego logo that ruins them for me: I don't like runic swords. They are also a bit too flexible, and I'd love them to match in colour with old helms, but yeah, enough of that. Lets not even talk about spears. And axes. And halberds... /rant

Geralt being a handsome dude is the least of the Netfilx's butchering the story...

Wow, that's cool idea! :-D

Samurai's house is really nice, but man, that castle! I nearly cried, this brings back memories of 1986! :-)

Nice one, it's a cool little set!

Insane, absolutely insane work! I LOVE IT!

that cat! :-D what a cool minifig!

Wow, another amazing MOC. I really like what you'Ve done with this journey theme! And thanks for the hidden content! ;-) Btw, very nice color scheming, I appreciate the warm colors, and the brown (horse, bridge, tree) and especially red (tree and fig) accord!

Very nice MOC. It's cool what you've done with such a limited pallete, mostly white!