Faefrost

OK Wife will insist that I get her the Karate one. I may need to get two, there are some interested pieces for the Dojo I'm building. Also is that some sort of mirror piece in that one set?

While we are talking about SWTOR do those new Droidecas in the clone BP strike anyone as looking a bit more imperial Sith tor'ish than CW era?

OK to sort of play off someof the "worst set evah!" threads in a few other forums. With the final wave of Ninjago revealed, as we say farewell we can look back and ask. What were the best and worst sets of the theme? Is anything worth adding to the lists of all time Lego classics or failures? My take on the Best is probably an easy one. http://www.brickset.com/detail/?Set=2507-1 2507 The Fire Temple. Just a perfectly designed set with something for everybody, from the young Ninjago fan to the more display minded AFOL. It has appeal to Historic or Castle modelers City or Architecture modelers. Ninja fans, Dragon fans and the normal expected Ninjago story fans. A great selection of minifigs including a few of the rarer ones. That gorgeous and colorful Fire Dragon. The wonderful little Asian themed side bridges with the blooming cherry trees and the Temple itself. A spectacular display piece of Asian themed styling. Friends that visit are taken aback when they realize it is actually Lego on my shelf. Perfect colors. perfect styling, and unless you bought the thing at TRU pricing, a not unreasonable price. PLEASE LEGO MORE SETS LIKE THIS! :cry_happy: Worst is probably a near tie between these two for me. http://www.brickset.com/detail/?Set=2520-1 2520 Ninja Battle Arena A truly glaring mashup of wildly clashing styles. I understand the effect they were going for, and the play features. And they failed at every step. The set looks like it was designed by a color blind schizophrenic just as the meds kick in... or out, whichever it's kinda obvious the neighbors dog was starting to talk to him as he built it. Even the fig selection is kinda bipolar. You've got the great Cole DX plus some random unremarkable Skellie thug? About the only reasonable positive to the set? At least it came with 2 spinners. A near runner up would be it's "season 2" cousin http://www.brickset.com/detail/?Set=9456-1 Spinner Battle Arena. Not quite as bad simply because there is a lot less to it, so the shear ugliness isn't as immediately glaring. Some technic bars to do spinner battles in with a pair of truly horrid 'Hungry Hungry Hippo's" heads. This probably ranks as one of teh most disappointing things to find beneath the tree Christmas morning. "Oh Boy Ninjago!... oh...". What makes this one truly obscene is they want $50 usd for this one. So what's everybody else's take on the theme as we bid it adieu?

It looks like we should have a little more context for Cole's Power Driller, and a look at the TV version of it next week in episode 23. Maybe it will look better in motion?

The Eagle plane has sort of sparked my interest. It reminds me a bit of the classic "Hawk ship" from the old Buck Rogers tv series. I'm normally not a huge fan of the stylized animal vehicle themes. The Fangpyre and Skeleton vehicles really did nothing for me.

I did notice that it suspiciously does not appear in the 2012 Holiday Catalog that just arrived. The GE, TH and PS are all featured but no FB.

Won't be able to doit tonight. But there is a link to a pic of the back printing a few posts up in the brick set review of the book. I hope that helps.

Oh my! That is really... wow! I had never noticed that one before. That's just... Wow! Did they legalize weed in Denmark that year or something?

It's different. It is a front on gold snake head, similar to the original 4 ninja elemental emblems. The torso is black, the emblem is the gold snake head on a green circle with an ornate gold trim border. Much like some of the other ninja figs, the round emblem lines up with the gold colored sword holder part of the pauldrons. So it shows through the center of the back piece.

Woot! My Ninjago Character Encyclopedia just showed up on the doorstep days earlier than expected! So some initial impressions. The exclusive Kimono Green Ninja minifig The good- overall its a very good little minifig. The printing is sharp and clean. The patern is nicely detailed and gorgeous. Lloyd is now sporting green trim to his ensemble with pearl gold pauldrons similar to Zane and Kai's and a gold helmet crest. The head is the standard Lloyd with no changes. The helm is the standard Ninjago ZX piece. There is a neat new Green Ninja emblem on the back. A snake head in a green circle with stylized gold border. The not quite as good? - not to detract from a great little figure. It is obvious that it is a Chinese minifig. The plastic has that feel and the joints feel noticeably looser than a standard Billund minifig. I can't be positive of this without a direct comparison,but the green arms and helm leave the impression of being a slightly different shade of green from the regular green Ninja. That may be an illusion caused by the darker adjacent colors (the black of the torso). Also some of the green printing on the body and legs gets lost in the black base color. The fig does not come with any weapons ( although technically as the Green Ninja Lloyd doesn't use one, he shoots his green balls.) Overall a great little fig. Seeing it I am really looking forward to the full Kimono Ninja's in the next sets. As far as the book? From an initial glance. It's decent. Even by the decidedly questionable standards of the DK character catalogs. It actually seems to have a lot more info then the similar HP and Batman books. There are a few fun errors in the book that immediately leap out (one of the Shellie's photographed with the torso backwards for example.) lets be honest most of we AFOL types will be getting this forthe fig. But in this case the book has a bit more value than some of its brethren.

Yep. It's from the old Alpha Team arctic mission theme. I think one of the old Batman sets also used it with Mr Freeze.

I think that TLoZ project is kind of doomed no matter how you slice it. They already have a Zelda project under review. Chances are they will not do two CuuSoo Zelda projects back to back, assuming they can even get the license. do they have some mechanism to merge projects or combine elements from differing projects of the same subject matter?

I just got an e-mail from Amazon.com (US) that it was out earlier than expected, my pre order book has shipped and should be here by Monday.

I could live with a Super Heroes CMF line. But I still like he classic ones best.

Is the mask and shell straps printed, or has TLG finally started doing multicolor injection in the molding?

Sadly they can't just split the difference and present the 2014 designs to Legoworld ;p

I think my favorite is that SWTOR battle pack! He red Sith Troopers + the new helmet on the Republic Troopers is to die for. :D The Umbaran MHC set looks interesting too. I like the new helmets on the Umbarrans. They look like they have a lot of MOC potential. And they finally gave Asohka some clothes and a second Lightsaber. (Although they still managed to get it wrong. It's supposed to be shorter than the main one, and a different color green. But I'm just being picky.)

I love that the Nick Fury set is a classic Shield Flying Car... But did nobody tell Lego that Nick Fury normally prefers the flying Porshes? The Mr. Freeze set looks almost exactly as expected. No surprises there, but nothing to complain about either. Looks like a good set.

Honestly? Not really. The Minifigs are decent. Especially if you are a fan of SwTOR. But the ship itself is not overly exciting. It's not bad. In many ways it is a nice design. But it is neither iconic, nor particularly attention grabbing. ( the Sith Fury is a much better looking ship, but also grossly overpriced.) The Striker would be great if you can get it on sale. But it is a so so value at full price.

Well yes. But that is with a highly successful CuuSoo set that they have gone back and continued production on. The base production run that I believe they star at is 10k. Minecraft sort of sits on the high point of CuuSoo success, not the typical or expected outcome.

2013 looks like it will be a really really good year for city lovers, just because it looks like there will be a nice onslaught of city style buildings spread across a number of themes. In recent years we have mainly gotten vehicles, with yet another Fire house or Police station. Then out of the blue this year we are getting not just the headquarters, but places to do things. We have the museum and the house on fire in city. Plus we have the Daily Bugle and Arkham over in Super heroes. A new modular theater. So far 2013 is looking like a good year for those seeking to add to their city, not simply their fleet of vehicles.

I am making a concerted effort to not judge any such things based on more modern and refined aesthetics. So I am not going after the in hindsight hideous and cliched fad stuff such as the overblown neon colors, holo effects etc of days gone past. Yeah it seems horrid now, but it was kicking back in Reagan's era. But my eye keeps coming back to the Mars Mission sets. They were more recent, so days gone by aesthetic does not apply. They had that horrible cramsicle color scheme. Truly yech aliens. And the thing that puts them at the top or rather bottom of the list, these were the first attempts by TLG to really start blending the elements and features of their technics and Bionicle lines into one of there more traditional system lines, and the fitness just wasn't there yet. We complain about plated over technic beams in SW sets and huge open spaces etc. these sets were the worst offenders. http://brickset.com/detail/?Set=7644-1 I know some love this set. But I always find it as an example of too much going on, and the cramped and crowded use of all the technic stuff just doesn't hold up over time. http://brickset.com/detail/?Set=7690-1 Another example of how much disparate ideas they could pile into one disjointed set. Tons of technic, an almost interesting looking ship, but then orange tubes and nerd rockets everywhere. Kind of a mess. And then we have what is possibly one of the absolute worst space sets eve, from the Life on Mars theme. The infamous Solar Explorer. Looks pretty on the box, until you realize that there really is nothing there. It's just a beam with a piece of sail wrapped flimsily around it. http://brickset.com/detail/?Set=7315-1

I just got back from a vacation At DisneyWorld, and while there it dawned on me what we may see as a new license. And if they do it, it might be a back door into some of the odd ball licenses we have been begging for forever. Disney has been pretty heavily beating visitors to their parks about the head and shoulders with info on their next big animated movie. The non Pixar, cgi video game fest Wreck It Ralph. From TLG's standpoint they have a base product around the main characters plus a lot of vehicles in the "Sugar Rush" cart racing game that is one of the center pieces. And it gives them a back door for some inclusion of classic video game characters.

The Twilight is one of the more disappointing sets. Not simply because its an ugly and unloved ship, but because its a horrible Lego rendition of a ship that should have been tailor made for Lego. It's a box with wings. The actual interior is well mapped out and defined. Cockpit, opening back hatch to cargo bay, etc. it could have been well done without all the technic carp and gears and such.

It's pretty easy to do the math on this one. I vaguely seem to remember reading somewhere that the base default production run on a CuuSoo project is somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000 units. So assuming a full production sell through on a $50 usd set the 1% return would be $5000. If you are looking to create a charity funnel you would almost be better off offering the PDF design file and parts list as a reward for a $10 donation. Although it would not have that satisfaction of having it as a full packaged set.