Dorayaki

Well, I didn't say I'd like to see Batman in this case . Mostly it's just another way for TLC to save a space, unless Green Latern is also confirmed to be in upcoming Superhero regular sets.

I don't think there would really be licensed character in physical TLM set, but however I might rather see another renewed old Lego character (Pippin Reed), non-phisycal character or a minidoll to be in this time.

There is indeed a gray zone, but IMO as long as the customization creators have announced their own non-original works, they don't hurt or violate TLC's rule. For example, there are also custom Mr. Gold on Ebay but many of them don't pretend to be the real thing, not to say making original characters. Also, the minifigures are based on real materials but adding original parts or weapons. For Decool and other copycats, they never make announcement and just pretend to be the original maker, and manufacture the fake toys as they wish. Their aim and measure are both different from customization.

Nice. I remembered that Samurai X's Meach had a very good posing ability. Has there been a duel between Metalbeard and Samurai X?

Sorry, I disagree with 90% of your comment or maybe your viewpoint is different. The topic never said that we should force all targeted consumers to love certain product (like asking all Hot Wheels lovers to play Barbie and throw mini cars into trash can). The part I agree with you is that Friends is an entrance that can more easily introduce construction toys to girls, which is a very good thing. This topic is about how TLC define "Friends". In the actual needs of the Lego system, Friends represent a "theme", not a seperate toy "line". Consumers can buy "Friends" but they won't forget they're playing "Lego" at the same time. We all know that Lego System toys can integrate with each other, even they're from different themes. And for those who get a Friend product as the very first toy in their life, they can also diversify their own town by getting sets of other themes. However I don't think TLC have done enough job to spread this idea for Friends (while in The Lego Movie, we can see Lego City and Batman together). As a viewpoint of parent, you may encourage your kids to get what they like. I respect you or your kids' choice and interests, since even not all KFOL boys buy Lego action theme products. Still, we can only say that girls are the major target of Lego Friends, but not all girls should naturally love dolls or Lego Friends and don't touch other things. That's all I can say.

Very magnificent details as a licensed house. Hope that we can see more of this product in Lego (regardless of wallets).

Similarity still has to be avoided, or licensed themes with a better character design and backstory are still preponderant. If OE has a chance to return, it should also be deeply considered and redesigned in order to be more unique and popular. Or in other cases, like Clutch Powers, this series also includes different themes together but they're with unique characters. I personally want to see this series revive instead.

What I felt surpised is this is the most complete and magnificent Lego single family house in Lego history (thanks to the effort of City ). It's a must-have to me, but the detail inside the house is to be determined. It's alittle weird that Ned comes without his own family. About other sets, it's weird that TLC don't confirm to make any more regular set for this "theme". If the result is the first wave would simply be CMF series, really strange. Not saying there can't be sole licensed CMF series, but Simpsons has lots of building potential while some other licenses don't (eg, Disney mascots). It would have been better if previous licensed themes such as Toy Story could also come with their own CMF series.

In the view of customization, yes, modders do care. But I think balancing hairpieces is not for modders in the first place, but more for diversity of products. Here you go. But generally these cases are not doing with "overuse" since "overuse" mostly happens in City or action themes, even though these uses of Friends hairpieces are smart.

I'm not sure Lone Ranger has achieved the standard of Lego western fans. However, the fact is still that as long as it's not a longeterm film series, the license doesn't mean any future of this generic theme. The Lego Movie also give pirate and western materials (though no western building sets).

The Star Wars Dark Bucket was obviously an army builder. I'm not sure it can be used for sole uses, though it is indeed a minifigure pack product. Regradless of any possible license limitation, the major reason why Cuusoo project banned minifigure-only project is to focus on buildings more than minifigures, this is what I could agree. However, CMF Simpsons created a weird situation since Lego themeselves forbid Cuusoo users to ask for licensed minifigure pack but they do it by themselves. Almost like one may steal a horse, while another may not look over a hedge. In Simpsons' rumor, for now we've known that there would be Simpsons' house but other regular sets are still unknown. If that's what the first wave is, most CMF characters would have no place to go and we can only play them solely (if we don't put them in other uses). 8401 City Minifigure Collection was somewhat a "sample" of City. However, most City citizens have no place to go (that means they don't star in any regular set) since City focus on making some kinds of stations. The real sample of City might be 60023 Starter Set.

Very interesting and useful report. I think you're a very typical case that TLC think what most consumers are: AFOLs love minifigures but young girls love minidolls more. Adults can ignore the shape and just focus on the design or print, while younger girls also focus on shape. Now more and more minifigures have printed shoes (even though that doesn't mean your daughter would love them), and it's owed to the growth of printing technology. Maybe after a decade we can hardly see more non-printed legs. As for names, it's actually happening in many other themes. The Chima warriors (Lennox, Ewar) and The Lego Move citizens (Cardio, Sharon) are given a specific name but have little to do with the main story. (but again, that doesn't mean your kid would love them more than Friends) In the past, usually generic minifigures are not given names because there are over hundreds of them being created every year, or TLC weren't able to produce specific characters in early years. Also TLG should leave consumers some room for naming or creating MOCs. I think there are still some girls who want to create their own MOC minidoll character and gives it a name. The reason why TLC name each generic Friends character could be that their combinations of faces and elements are limited, so they need to give each combination a name. Also girls enjoy a story canon more than boys who play City. You may check my signature below if you're interested in Friends having minifigs.

Well, I'm not saying that I root for the male characters in animation, but compared with them it's still difficult to define the characters beside the five protagonists (even for girls, comparing Kate with Lacy). After all, Friends is based on a story canon and having more than one appearance doesn't ensure their position in this theme, much like Crooler and Crug from Chima.

Oh, are you suggesting a new theme?

Today I got some time to finish the rest of experimental stickers, and here is the result of Friends minifigure prototypes. Olivia Andrea Unfortunately Andrea's face sticker didn't match her skin color. And for now there is no dark tanned skin color in minifigure lines, so this Andrea looks darker. Emma Mia Stephanie Some AFOLs might already know that Stephanie's hairpiece has long fringe that doesn't look good on minifigures. Here is the best I can do. Also I can't find magenta leg for minifigures. Joanna Ms Stevens IMO Ms Stevens is one of the most successful MOC. Andrea: Hooray! Finally we can team up for my own band! Ms Stevens: Today we're very honored to invite Professor Hagrid for a special owl training lecture. Ms Stevens: And by the way, girls, let's welcome our new principal of Heartlake High, Ms Umbridge!

I think the value and definition of "minifigure" changes from time to time. There were't diversitile minifigures in early Lego production line, so it didn't hurt to make such kind of minifigure pack. The closest version of City minifigure pack might be 9348 Community City Minifigures. There are also some elements included that allow minifigures to use. Perhaps, for a 5yo child, they might not be bored if they just get it or avdent calendar for Xmas gifts. And recently there are also police officer, firefighter, pirate minifigure packs. They nominally don't belong to their own theme, but we can still obtain minifigures from TLC without buildings. But when we talk about specific characters with backstory, that's a different story. City/Castle/Pirate minifigure packs were somewhat meant to be "army builder", but it's not the case for Ninjago/Chima/Movie "characters", There are seldom packs for action themes because you're not going to populate Kai or Wyldstyle, unless you plan to make MOC characters and you need lots of same clothes. There are only few examples such as 853219 Pirates of the Caribbean Battle Pack. After all, I don't think a child can get a generic trash cleaner instead if s/he didn't get the golden ninja And we can see that even generic minifigures are getting more and more polished today. CMF series also have their own minifigure collection packs, and they're mostly not for army builder uses but specific uses. A diffirent case could be minidolls. So far there are no real minidoll packs. Maybe it's TLC's strategy or they don't have enough generic elements.

I'm not sure the discussion would be in the wrong place, but it's actually not happy to see that some potential buildings in the trailers weren't made to be actual sets in The Movie or City theme. Well, the 2-in-1 vehicles do have unique features, but it's more like that TLC tends to sell veheicles as they usually did.

Suppose they're just cups without any surprise, I wish that they can be used to do other things. For example, they're round or square columns that can be used to be a building or a large signboard in Lego System (another Octan banner, for example). Or there might be useful pieces included in the cups.

They're still nice as movie products, since we've predicted that Lego bricks can hardly be Happy Meal toys. Unless these cups have studs and can be compatible with bricks. My opinion (not toward these cups) is I'm alittle disasapointed not going to see more important characters from this movie.

As long as there are spoilers of summer wave sets, I don't worry about TMNT or Superheros. The others I worry about are: Ninjago doesn't have too much progress even though TLG continue their story, and LotR still have lots of non-physical content but we don't see any more news (though there would be at least the final wave for Hobbit). You may discuss that in licensed forum. And for Lone Ranger, I personally think TLC can still consider to make own western/pirate themes if there is no film in theater.

It's nice to see that Friends would come to outlands jungle adventure , which is a very good subtheme. As I know the only summer-camp-like things in City were the trailer and campers (which Friends also had some of them). In the amount of female protagonists, yes girls should have more clothes. My question is that there is no recurring boy characters (regardless of Jacob from animation). While many other generic girls can have own new clothes designs, boys can't. If TLG think they don't need to make boy clothes, they should just leave only one or two recurring boys in Friends sets, and they only need one clothes to wear everyday.

Sometimes the big moulds would fall to ground and have a bad equilibrium, if they're not standing on plates. I've wanted Pearl from Spongebob, but if giving her a mould head with normal body, the outcome is predictable. For characters who should use a newly molded body, there could be a standard to see who really need it. Mostly they're non-human being and natural big creatures. Hagrid is a hybrid. I'm not sure Beast from the Beauty (who would possibly appear in the future) need it since he's between an orc and a human. Still, it depends on its actual design and the playability with Lego bricks and normal minifigures.

Sorry. Collectible minifigures, though no "collectible" in official catalogue.

Minifigures do play an important role since their debut. All buildings scale are considered to be played with minifigures and TLG only leave few different scales such as Creator or Technic. When you say "minifigures are just part of my building", that is acutally the beginning of the whole story. CMF is one of the example that TLC obivously give consumers sole minifigures (and we decide whether we would put them in other building sets). Generic minifigures can't afford the needs from fans who want to create a scenario of more sophisticated characters, so it shows the real value of minifigures. TLG is trying to make own original characters more unique and visible from consumers, and write a specific story for them. When TLG began to get licensed themes (because they wanted to compete with other companies at first), they realized that how can they make own original products more appealing to children. Children now buy sets not only because the buildings, but there are Olivia, Laval and Benny, those who they love. You may imagine that if Ninjago is just a rehashed version of the old Castle Ninja, the profits wouldnn't be that big. Playing with minifigures solely could be alittle similar with girls playing with Barbie (there are Barbie houses and playsets but isn't the most important part in Mattel's line), though minifigures/dolls can't change "clothes" but only swap bodies. Well, there are also Bionicle action figures that allow us to play solely in the "official" way. There are different kids. Inventing themes with stories doesn't mean that generic themes would disappear, though it has actually been a topic that whether licensed themes are replacing old original themes. Like others said, if there is no character, buildings would also be boring and lifeless. IMO, what TLG can do is highlighting the connections between the buildings and the characters. If Ninjago ninjas are not driving any vehicle, they're no "ninja". So no matter if kids love buidlings or characters more, they won't just get one of them. Oops, beware of small parts. It's one's will if they just buy for minifigure or play sets in a way that TLC didn't recommend, however, in your case maybe I'd go Bricklink and get the character.

Uhmm..... the next CMF series after The LEGO Movie would be "S Series"? It's interesting to see Max&Nina appear together in the end. However, I think Nina is still lacknig in most Lego Club websites.