snefroe

well, you don't see any human on the pirate pages :P also: 1) most children undergo changes in their approach to playing with lego. they start with storytelling and evolve to building models. by the time they get to the old pirates, they're probably spending much more time on building good models for their stories. 2) the concepts of "afols" and "children" are problematic. you can easily be an "Afol" at 14. in my book, an afol is some one who first of all enjoys building models, and doesn't necessarily tells stories to support the models... 3) you're right, the internet turned a few individuals into groups... and the star wars line allowed adults to relive their younger days...

high season in Europe starts in september... i'm sure TLC will try and get the most out of star wars before years end... the vikings will arrive in summer... the current star wars line isn't even here yet and we're already April. i don't think TLC can set up another star wars line in May, June, July or August... the newspage of eurobricks also says we can expect star wars sets in october...

Yep France has all the sets (at least Paris). Actually where I buy them they had a delivery problem but I think TRU might have some (I'll check on that sunday). Concerning your second

maybe you can pre order in august, but actual release, as mentioned on the lego website, is 30th september. that's good thinking, by the way... it will most likely launch the second star wars line of the year...

Master Yoda, you interpret "imagination" in a limited way. to you, "imagination" is creating models. for many children "imagination" means "storytelling", they build a model that is just a part of the storytelling, they don't see it as an isolated element, to them, the model is a part of the story. their focus is not on building many models, but creating many stories. that's also why TLC is using fewer but larger pieces: it allows young children to focus more on the story, than on building the model, so they "won't waste quality time on building the model, when they should be telling a story..." the "basic" sets, by the way, show many alternative models in the booklet... it seems to me that whatever topic we start, we always end up at the same point: children and adults are not the same audience, therefore need different products. TLC hasn't found the product (yet?) that satisfies both... we're very often refering to the old days, but WE were children back then. we looked at lego in a different way.

i had a pick a brick the other day and the bags were for free ... 1 for every CHILD. Suddenly, I became a father of four :P the company should at least try and be a bit more diplomatic about Lego being for children, especially if you mention the Afols in your financial reports... sure the boxes didn't show children in the old days, but the catalogues did.

release date was April. the company should be sending the sets to the shops before the release date, but she doesn't seem to succeed. is it because of distributional reasons or lack of organisation, i don't know... there also is a difference between many european countries. France seems to have them already, or at least part of the line... darth Ewok's idea might work, however, i think there might be an availability problem in the future. For instance, i'm not sure if the firefighting/police themes (all the sets) will still be available around June... it seems to me that many sets will be gone at that point. the firetruck is already an endangered species... especially if the star wars sets hit the shops in the next couple of days... there won't be any room left for the police/firefighting themes...

Easy for you to say! but we're the guys who have to do the waiting!! :P

yes they do. that's why it's so amazing that they stick to their strategy... especially when other toy companies come up with opposite research conclusions and other strategies... besides, they used to have a lot more diversity in their city theme when i was young. i don't think the new generation is that much different from mine... so i don't know why they're producing the same themes year after year... right now, some shops are still trying to sell the police theme of last year, next to this years' sets... must be confusing for people who are not really informed about TLC's products...

well i guess every set should have enough basic parts that allow you to build whatever you want to build and enough specialised parts to add something extra to your model... the problem with TLC and imagination is this: TLC seems to think that children only want sets that are action-based, like police/firefighting themes. As if the imagination of a child is limited to only traditional stories that are closely linked to these themes, like police catching thieves, firefighters putting out fires... with just a little more incentives, like a school, garage, hospital,... TLC would find that children create stories that are a lot richer/creative than the one dimensional stuff TLC is producing for them.

to a certain extent, yes. for example: TLC created a one piece seat many years ago. it's the seat we all know today. Any one recognises this piece as a seat, even non-lego fans would see this piece as a seat. it's, give and take, realistic. Unfortunately, you can't turn it into something else, it's just one specialised piece. before this creation, TLC used to build seats with different parts: 1 plate 2 x 3 and 2 bricks 1 x 2: together, it has the shape of an "L". it's less realistic, it's also not very aesthetic. it is whatever you want it to be. but you can also build other designs with these three parts, if you want to. in the end, specialised parts limit your options to build other models, but make them more realistic and in many cases more aesthetic as well. i don't know the answer for your second question. it depends on your own criteria. however, realism scores pretty high in my book... next to the quality/creativity of the design and looks

one of the reasons why europeans don't buy their lego in an american shop on line: 1)these shops, like Amazon, can't send these products to europe: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...s=toys&n=507846 2)people do buy stuff on american on line shops (books, cd's,...). it will become more popular in time 3) manny people are not really concerned about/aware of high euro/low dollar. they're probably lazy as well...

i do agree with TheBrickster that specialised parts limit your options as a builder to build something different. Not just the windows are problematic, but also the other large bricks. take a look at the inventory list of the firestation, for instance... http://www.peeron.com/cgi-bin/invcgis/inv/...-1?withpics=yes however, quite a few sets are much better looking and are far more realistic than their older counterparts. Especially the police/fire lines of the last couple of years are terrible. Not any of these sets came even close to the police/fire vehicles in my own country. the current firetruck, the police motorcycle and transport car, on the other hand, look very much like the real thing... the policestation is unfortunately not good

i think belgium and Holland are in the same boat here, meaning, any time now...

the catalogue in Belgium doesn't say anything about the new alpha team sets, in fact, about sets 4745/4746/4748, it says "as long as these sets are in stock". this sounds to me that TLC is dumping this Alpha team line...

naturally TLC would have to change a few things on every new legend. A galaxy explorer wouldn't have the old grey color, but the new light grey color... Former legends have been changed as well... would that be a problem for a new legend? i don't know... i guess it depends on the set.

sure... i'd like another one as well... :P

what's weird is that the AT AT is so popular now, but obviously failed to meet expectations in 2003 when the entire star wars line tumbled... why didn't you guys buy this one in 2003? why now, when the thing is out of production?

remember the star wars set number 7133: bounty hunter pursuit? http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItemPic.asp?S=7133-1 the cockpit of the largest of both ships didn't close very well either, because of the hinge. however, it's a lot stronger than the old system, what makes it ideal sometimes.

there is firefighting theme, but TLC doesn't build houses, garages, busstations, or anything else that might catch fire... the city theme needs more substance... yeah... we complained about this before... even though the current sets are great... you can't create a city with just these sets...

to be honest, i'm happy with the 7242, look alike or not... it's a very fine and cheap set that is a good addition to any town... i just wish TLC would't use these subthemes like "police", "construction", "fire",... in the citytheme... that is why i'm still more attracted to the old sets of the past, when all was one...

isn't this against Scandinavian ethical principles?

you should compare sets 6645 (1991); 6649 (1995) with the new 7242. talk about look-alikes!

well... there are at least rumours about a rerelease, but they refer to 2006 or 2007, certainly not this year...

i checked the Belgian internet store of lego, and it's not available for me... i also fear that TLC is not going to distribute this set to retailers... i can't find it in the catalogue for instance...