danth

I would prefer minifigs but I'm fine with the babies. I'm assuming this set will include stickers for all the logos which will kill most of my excitement.

Very cool!

Oops, I thought those sets were retired. They've been out as long as the GE or longer. Never mind.

I made it to a Lego store this weekend. Still had Optimus Primes, Nintendos, BttF Deloreans, Lion Knight's Castles. But they didn't have any Galaxy Explorers. I can only take that to mean that the Galaxy Explorer sold out before all the others. Either that or Walmart got all of them. EDIT I guess the other sets aren't retired yet.

I think it could be that. Walmart is weird. I got 60349: Lunar Space Station for a crazy price there, like $25 on clearance. I also saw some Marvel sets similarly marked down but didn't pull the trigger. Bricklink is awesome because it has actual data. The Galaxy Explorer has sold about half as many times in the past month as the most recent X-Wing and Tie fighters, even though it's twice as expensive, and even though it's not Star Wars. And at about the same discount when compared to retail. I think that bodes extremely well for it.

Don't worry, I've seen crazy a$$ prices for all kinds of sets recently, even very popular SW space ships. It means nothing. Especially at Walmart. They had the Galaxy Explorer at promotional prices right after it came out. And they were selling the Tie Fighter for $25. And for every comment I read about someone finding a Galaxy Explorer on sale, I see many more complaining that they never see it on sale. I'm one of those people.

I hope that means more trans purple.

You guys say Arctic isn't Sci-Fi but wait until you see the Arctic Drill Mech and the Seal Rescue Hover-ski.

I don't know how they're going to top the most recent Tie. It was 5/5. The most recent X-Wing can definitely be improved upon at least.

But then kids would be forced to buy original sci-fi space sets that would have fresh designs and exciting colors at prices not inflated by licensing fees! Won't anyone think of the children?

Aha! Yeah, I broke down and bought some off Bricklink a couple nights ago. It's just impossible to find polybags anywhere near me. Obligatory WHAT. HAPPENED? Although, if they're cute, at least it should stop the human minifigs from massacring them and we avoid a violence-based Space theme.

Lego is making another Tie, X-wing, Falcon, etc this year. Lol. Just kill me already.

I know what you mean, but on the other hand I have to laugh at another Tie, X-Wing, Falcon, etc described as "something new".

So last night I built the truck from 60434 that everyone says is underwhelming. After building it I like it much more; the shape and design of the cab is pretty great. But I think I know exactly what's "wrong" with it. It needs an extra set of wheels between the existing wheels. As a six wheeler it looks perfect.

Wow. Great alt build! I love the shape, and that you reused the mechanism from the original to attach the space ship to the rover. Also, I forgot how spectacular the back-of-the-box alt builds were for the Solar Snooper. I like all of them and they're so different. And the Solar Snooper itself is such a great design. It's my favorite SP2 set. It's more fun than the Galactic Mediator in my opinion.

I assume you've seen this:

Maybe red could be a Specialist designation? Whether or not they specialize in something that falls under the broad categories of engineer, explorer, or scientist.

Thanks for the heads up! Really good info to have going into 2024. I was shocked to find out (maybe it was you who mentioned it in another thread) about the Burger Truck having all prints. That set went from an auto-pass to a must buy.

Shows what I know, maybe I need to pay more attention to that stuff I hypothesize about. I was surprised when there weren't any red colored figs in these sets. It would be a good addition.

Random thoughts: 2024 City Space comes when there hasn't been a SW Trilogy movie for 5 years. Yes there's been TV shows like The Mandalorian, but it could be that Lego is noticing the Star Wars gravy train running a little thin. So a new sci-fi Space theme now makes a lot of sense. But it also gives Lego some serious leverage when renewing its SW licensing. It shows that Lego doesn't need SW. How great is 2024 City Space and the sold out Galaxy Explorer when re-upping a sci-fi license? They could get Lego a bigger piece of the pie if they demonstrate that Disney has more to gain from the licensing fees than Lego does from the license. Also, why suddenly turn away from the more realistic City Space stuff? Sure, City Space has been gradually getting more Sci-Fi (an actual moon base in 2022 being maybe the best example), but mechs and aliens and starships in 2024 is a pretty drastic turn. Maybe Lego sees a connection between going more sci-fi and better sales?

Yeah, I noticed that many (all?) 5+ sets seem to be getting all prints this year which is great. I didn't say that one was corporate! That one really is just about not humiliating the SW sets. Who says Lego sets don't have feelings? It could be that Lego (either the designers or sales people) think that more colorful windscreens would turn off fans of more "realistic" NASA concept style sets. Whereas more kid friendly themes can get away with it. I do think everyone (including Lego designers) knows that this theme would look awesome with trans-purple canopies, which is why they used trans purple for the Friends spaceship (which has the same white + new orange scheme otherwise). I'm sure trans purple was a contender in the concept stages of 2024 City Space. Actually it'd be really cool to see some of the concept designs!

That's amazing. I just looked through the instructions, and the three vehicle sets have no stickers (unless I missed them); the base has some but not on the vehicles. That's a huge improvement. Because of this, I just built the space ship from 60434 while leaving the rest for later. In theory this makes it easier to buy a set just for the build(s) you want, and then resell the builds you don't want as new/sealed in baggies.

I just built the space ship from 60434 and it's a very cool design. And also no stickers! Though there are stickers in other parts of the set. I like to think that the designers of the 2024 Space sets were trying to achieve exactly what I want and took it as far as they could within the constraints put on them by corporate. Can't do a separate Space theme because of Star Wars? Then we'll put Sci-Fi space in City! Can't do colored canopies because cool looking color schemes will embarrass the boring gray SW spaceships? Then we'll do trans black which is the next best thing. Penny pinchers in corporate hate prints? Then we'll put all the prints we can in a 4+ set and reuse them. I even see evidence that they tried to get more prints. Some of the stickers are reused in multiple sets or multiple times in the same set, which makes me suspect the designers intended for them to be prints. Like the matching console stickers in both bases. Also the danger stripe sticker on the dark yellow tile in the Space Construction Mech was probably originally intended as print; two of them could have replaced the 2x2 stickered tile in 60434.

Not a peep about the Icons/Moments black spaceship in quite a while. Hmm.

Right. I was jokingly excusing Castle for being similarly out of place in City as sci-fi spaceships and aliens, and jokingly discarding any concerns about what the box says. Obligatory smart-aleck example of why it should be allowed: Noooo!