Meaf

Well, I just read the last 8 pages for some reason, so I suppose I might as well throw in my 2 cents. Yavin IV is very cool. Kid me was always disappointed that the one from the Visual Dictionary wasn't an actual set, so if this one turns out good then I might get it at some point. I saw some people suggest that the $650 D2C could be the Sail Barge, but I cannot see that happening. Maybe I lack the right mindset but I just can't imagine why it would need to be that big. As for the OT Battle Pack thing, I kind of agree. I think it's just a combination of Lego having a ton of material to cover and only one battle pack a year. Even if they do a 4 year cycle with OT -> PT/CW -> ST -> D+/Miscellaneous stuff, or even ignore ST altogether, I think it's obvious that the current system severely limits how much we can actually get. I guess if you want to start army building Stormies you'd better make room for a whole bunch of mechs too.

I actually had no idea that had happened. I guess it does hit a lot of the Lego checkmarks: action-y, colorful, and based on an already popular franchise that's only going to keep growing. I don't know how interested I'd be personally, but I've played enough Splatoon 3 that I'd probably pick up at least one just to check it out.

I don't know how I forgot Kirby, though I don't think he's too likely to get sets anyway. HAL (the makers of Kirby) aren't owned by Nintendo, so it's up to them whether Kirby could ever make the jump to Lego. I know it'll never happen, but a Smash Bros (or even just generic Nintendo) CMF makes so much sense. There are a ton of iconic characters that are just a bit too obscure to get their own sets, like Samus, Fox, Ness, Marth, Shulk, and so on. Even if third parties weren't an option, and we exclude characters that couldn't be minifigures, there's at least four or five series right there.

Now that we know Zelda is going to be a thing, I have to wonder what (if any) other Nintendo franchises might also get adapted into Lego. I think the biggest problem for most of them is that they may be a little too niche. Lego doesn't really do licensed themes for non-mainstream IPs, so I don't see us getting stuff like Pikmin, Kid Icarus, Fire Emblem, Xenoblade Chronicles, etc. The most best selling series other than Mario and Zelda are mostly Mario spin-offs, but I suppose Animal Crossing and maybe Splatoon are options, though Splatoon's popularity is mostly concentrated in Japan so that may hurt its chances. Pokemon is likely off the table since Nintendo jointly owns the franchise (plus there are/were Lego rip-off Pokemon sets). And of course there's Smash Bros, but that seems impossible with how many third parties are involved now. The only other notable Nintendo series that I think may have a decent chance is Metroid. Despite not actually being that popular (in fact the aforementioned Fire Emblem has sold better for a while now), Metroid has a massive legacy and is hugely influential. Alongside it's past successes as a Lego Ideas candidate, I think there's a chance we might get one eventually, though it'd probably be a one-off. That said, this may just be copium since Metroid is one of my favorite Nintendo series. So yeah, now that I've written all of this out, I'm beginning to think we won't get anything beyond Mario and Zelda. Maybe an Animal Crossing theme in the vein of Friends could find success, and perhaps we could get one-offs based on somewhat more niche themes, but I don't expect we'll see a whole bunch more themes even if Zelda does end up being a huge success.

I think in the case of the X-Wing they probably just couldn't see Leia and Dodonna since they weren't prominently featured on the box art. Lizard almost certainly would be if he were to be included, do I don't think he's going to show up in this one. I can't think of a good reason why Lego would make him hard to see on the box but not the other nine minifigures.

A Guardian seems like a shoe-in if we ever get more BotW sets. It's kind of perfect in that it can recreate a very iconic part of the game at a reasonable price point (something that I find other licensed themes often struggle with).

Maybe it wouldn't have made much difference but I think the stand really hurts the Bowie's size. If they'd incorporated those parts into the ship it might've felt more substantial.

Rex still seems like he's guaranteed to show up relatively soon given both his popularity and relevancy in current Star Wars projects, but I am surprised that he's not coming this year (or at least in whatever Mandr saw). I'd guess they want to save him for a big set and didn't want to do another this year, but I think they could have gotten away with putting Rex in a cheaper set and doing a larger one next year with another popular Clone Commander.

That's a pretty good point. Perhaps the logic behind having both exist (for now) is that Lego wants to make sure the new sets sell well enough to replace microfighters before they ditch them completely. Personally I don't care about microfighters in the slightest so I'm cautiously optimistic about whatever is coming up. I think the problem is that for $15 (these days), you can't do too much that I would find overly compelling. Of course I may simply be lacking in imagination, but I guess if they have decent minifigs then we're not really losing much.

Just beautiful. Makes me kind of tempted to get the Samurai X mech so I can do something similar.

Assuming the $15 sets are in fact a new line of gimmick sets (which seems likely), I wonder what will happen with microfighters. Having two similarly priced sub-series at the same time seems like a weird choice, but if any theme is popular enough for it to make sense I guess it would be Star Wars.

I'd definitely prefer the sets to be more grounded in specific locations/scenes, but I think it could work well either way. It does also depend on how long the series lasts. If it's just two waves (for argument's sake) then I'd be more amenable to less accurate sets if that allowed for more bases to be covered, be those characters, enemies, items, whatever. But if Zelda is here to stay then I think waves each based on a specific game could be fun and last Lego for years. Whatever we end up getting I'm just happy it's happening at all.

My guess is that the Wind Waker version wasn't included as an option since it's quite different from the others. The face is much more human-like and the trunk is fairly different too, so it would've taken a lot more pieces to do him justice.

What a strange assortment of sets. Is venomized Groot based on anything or did Lego just mash together two popular characters for that one? To switch gears completely, while I get the disappointment over Kang not being made, I think the bigger problem is everyone else. We already know he's coming back, whereas we may not ever have a shot at getting most of the main cast again. Also, on the topic of big figs, I'd just like to throw out the idea that maybe Lego is working on improving them. I think the big weakness has always been that they're stuck kinda hunched over, so perhaps we will see a new design with adjustable legs at some point. Big figs fill a role that can't really he replicated fully by minifigs or brick built characters, so I doubt they'll be completely axed.

At the moment I'm leaning towards the BotW build, though better pictures could change that. I like OoT slightly more as a game but I love both and in-game the BotW design has more going on. Not sure what I'll do with OoT Link but I'll think of something.

I'd love to get Rivendell but I have neither the space nor budget for it. As I imagine is the case for everyone else, I hope we get some more affordable sets soon, especially ones covering stuff that the old ones missed.

I'm still feeling confident it'll be out sooner rather than later. It doesn't look anywhere near as incomplete as most of the other survey leaks, and it makes a lot of sense for it to release the same year as a new mainline game (something which only happens every 5~ years nowadays). I wouldn't be surprised if it's not out until later, maybe this fall, but I can't see it missing 2023.

Set looks interesting, but I'm not sure if I'll end up getting it or not. Lloyd's mech looks sort of incomplete, though maybe that's the point. I hope we get to see some higher quality pictures soon, though I'm not expecting them since it's still a bit early for that.

I love the idea of a "build your own vehicle" set for TotK, Lego would be foolish not to do it assuming they make sets based on it. There was a lot of cool stuff in the new trailer I'd love to see adapted into Lego form, but I'm not sure how worth that is discussing right now since we don't even know if Zelda is going to be a full theme or not.

Directs are pretty much entirely designed to market games specifically, so that's why they're mostly just software trailers. Publishers pay for the spots, so aside from first party stuff whatever shows up is there in large part because the game's publisher had money to spend on advertisements. Back to the specific topic of the Zelda set, the (frustrating) lack of information about TotK in the new Direct does have me somewhat hopeful that we may get a dedicated Zelda Direct, wherein we might see the set too.

That might make more sense. Nintendo doesn't usually spend much time on any one game in their Directs these days, not even big ones like Zelda and Mario. They still need to get the marketing for TotK going so a Direct with more specific details at a later date could happen, and that'd be a spot where there would be time to reveal merchandise too, like the Lego set.

I don't think we'll get TotK stuff for a little bit, but I guess it's possible. I think BotW centric sets make the most sense because they are still sort of adjacent to TotK while also representing the most popular game in the series. That's a good point about the Direct but I don't know if they'd do it. The only time I can remember merch being a Nintendo Direct was that Mario Direct back in 2020, and I guess technically the most recent one if the Pikmin T-shirt counts.

I had completely forgotten about that leak. Unfortunately I cannot say I remember the name of the website.

That seemed like a really weird rumor when we just got the Mandalorian version last year. Obviously they aren't exactly the same but I can't remember many times when Lego had more than one version of a ship on sale at the same time (aside from UCS of course).

Yeah, supposedly the Rivendell set is out March 1st, and the UCS Jabba's Sail Barge is for this fall. I think those are the only two that we know about right now, so it might be too early to hear about the Deku Tree (also not sure if Rivendell was part of the same leak or not).