Gomek

Find some what? I got the Super Chief when it came out. (It was an example of when breaking things up and giving people options worked out for everyone)

I don't see the difference between buying an engine for $60, three cars for $20 each, and some track for $20, or buying a set for $140. If anything buying separately is part of the whole customizable concept that Lego is founded on. Also when comparing today's sets with the 80's, that why I was saying "twice as much". Four buildings cost twice as much as two, whether in 1980 or 2019. In 1980 I got a two building set and that was pushing it. There was no way I was getting a set that had twice the pieces for twice the price. They would have just gotten me more Kenner Star Wars figures instead. Exactly. This was the nice part of the Super Chief release. You buy the engine, then as many cars as you do or do not want. I'm sure people bought extra cars. For me, the engine was a stretch, so I didn't get any cars, but if you would have forced me to get two cars and track that I didn't need, I would have likely bailed on the whole thing (though would have also regretting not having the cash). I just know my buying habits as a parent and as a collector, and the buying habits of my parents. The phrase 'little things add up' sums it up. Getting a bunch of little sets over time is a lot easier for people to swallow than one big hit. In the end it usually ads up to more.

I really liked those train cars. We definitely don't get enough reasonably priced single train cars. If fact, I think a lot of Lego city sets in general would sell better as 4 $30 sets instead of one $120. I can tell you for a fact If my 80's main street set was twice times as big, had 4 buildings instead of 2 and cost twice as much, my parents would have laughed at me for requesting it.

Since they run on iPads which update their operating systems on a regular basis. Apple's business model runs on something called 'built-in obsolescence' which means that two years after you buy an Apple product, that product will not be able to run anything because it can't handle the new IOS, and all the programs will require the new IOS, so you're forced to buy new product. Lego won't be keeping up with ISO updates at the end of the theme, and the app will simply stop working. I will still enjoy my hidden Side sets in 7 years, and 10 year old Nintendo games and x-box games, but old apps will not be an option.

My only complaint about Hidden Side is lack of variety in monsters. Personally, instead of using normal figures with swapped heads, I'd have used totally ghostified versions of figures that were in the regular city sets. That would have been a cool continuity bridge. As 'Easter eggs' they could have put some regular city sets in the app and I think kids would have gotten really excited when sets they didn't expect to work did work. As it stands my son tried to use the juice bar in the app (after several failed attempts to get the app working on only slightly old devices), and was understandably annoyed when it didn't work. He then went right back to Roblox and never tried the app again.

Question: Do you like this many variations? Sometimes I feel like the Ninjago figures have so many variations that no one suit becomes really iconic.

I anticipate the app will likely work a good 2 to 3 months after the theme is retired, but that's more a criticism of Apple than it is of Lego

In one sense a Wizard of the Coast/TSR/Dungeons and Dragons theme seems like it would be really cool. In another sense, I think Lego would have just as much success with an unlicensed castle/fantasy theme which had a similar feel. There are some licenses which I think might have a negative impact on a theme. For instance I think a regular Western set might have more appeal than a Lone Ranger movie set.

Yeah, I have yet to see a 3 in 1 set that need for my Castle or Space set ups. A unique castle or space figure would certainly change that. I think like many mini-figure collectors, I simply don't get enough Space, Castle, Pirate or generally historic minifigures. CMF has gone a long way to correcting for this, but if you through in a new M-tron, pirate, ancient Eyptian or classic castle figure into a $15 set and I'm there.

yeah, I like the ships. I'm not sure I need a massive space station though (as I already have a few too many of those)

Thanks for the link. it's good to know what I should be looking for. Never a good thing to get a set of BAM figs to realize I missed an exclusive piece.

Not sure if mentioned earlier in the thread but there is another Mystery Shack that warrants some consideration. Also.. I see 10,000 classic space sets yet none are rising to the top. Someone needs to submit something undeniable.

Might be the case with green recently, but the story I heard about Reddish Brown and Blueish Gray was that a (small?) group of market research kids preferred those colors. Totally moronic, especially Light gray, which is barely different, but just different enough to not be usable together.

I'd like to find these kids and have a talk with them. It's like that Simpsons episode when Homer's brother has him design a car. Some people just have no vision, or worse, are enamored by the overly obvious. Ugggg. Somewhere there's a kid who told some marketing genius that Lego's old light grey needs to be subtlety different that small parts are hard to differentiate, and large pieces now won't look right together. Curse you light blueish grey test marketing kid. I bet that kid bought all of two sets and hasn't collected since.

Wait, what!!!! What store did these come from?

I'm sure this is well covered territory... but being both a builder and collector this is the way I see it... A unique MOC I could conceivable reverse engineer. Now having done this a few times and attempted and failed many other times, I understand it's not easy and getting everything for a set pre-packaged with instructions is a whole ton easier. But it's still possible to 'get' this set if Lego decides not to make it. Getting additional pirate minifigs on the other hand is not so easy. I'm sure I'll anger a couple purists with this, but sticking a chef torso together with a eyepatch head does not a new pirate make. Pad printing is a tedious process, and as of this writing, pad printers such as Citizen Brick are not making new pirate parts. And we all know Lego hasn't made any for years. So having a new set with a ton of new Pirate figure parts would be very welcome. Especially if they land on Bricks and Pieces and I can get multiples.

To me the non-molded heads completely lack the likeness of the character. Molded head Woody looks like Woody. Non molded head Woody just looks like a kid in a woody costume. I get what you're saying about hats, but I guess I never felt that Squidward needed a hat. You can still swap the heads. Perhaps they just need to do with molded heads what they do with certain hair pieces and leave a pin hole for special hats. If you want something we can both agree upon though, I definitely feel like a little more thought needs to go into the design of the printed torsos and printed leg assemblies. There is no reason they can't be designed in a way that the printed lines on multiple torsos can fit with different printed legs.

While I hate Nexo Knights, I let these guys (and girls) join Blacktron and hang out together. I wonder if someone pitched having Blacktron be the enemy on that last season and then got rejected for some sort of licensing issue. That would have been so much cooler. Oh well.

By this logic Ninjago and Nexo Knight would also be considered "Licences". Ironically Lego considers them as such because I think Cartoon Network owns a piece of those. I've always said this has to be the worst contract negotiation ever.

Molded heads will be the difference between buying and not buying this. I can't imagine shelling out that type of cash for a set and having the figures look like the first generation Squidward figure with the non-molded head (i.e. so craptastic that I have one just to remind myself how crappy minifigures can look... Which is funny for a novelty figure that was given to me, not so funny in something I pay for.)

I'll be super interested to see how many figs we get and if they are mailed in or not. Seeing as I already have like 10 pirates with eye-patches and another 10 with peg legs, I could actually do with a little more creativity than that.

Where do you put this thing? Can you post a pic of where you actually have this displayed?

OK. Just a lot of points, all of which seem to be agreements of what others have said. Star Wars should NOT be an excuse not to have an unlicensed Sci-fi/Space theme. Most of the of the recent "Space" themes are more City than Sci-fi this doesn't cut it. Star Wars fans are of all ages, so new kids will be entering the Lego Star Wars demographic every year. So they can't stop. After Last Jedi, Disney needs the next trilogy film to not be a needless rehash. I'm not optimistic. For me personally Lego is going to have a hard time finding new Star Wars stuff to sell me, but that's more on Disney at this point than on Lego.

I kind of like the minifigures. I don't mind the recolors of the CMF figures as long as they make sense. Here are some things that make sense: S1 Spaceman on a Red figure S3 Spaceman/Blacktron guy with less robotic parts. Maybe a female. S3 Samurai on a grey figure with black armor S4 Hockey player that has a uniform that looks more hockey like (i.e. Black shorts with a white jersey that has stripes, and a clear visor as opposed to the football one) S4 Viking swapping the browns and dark tans S5 Boxer in a different color besides red, green perhaps S6 Intergalatic girl in any color but pink S6 Leprechaun in regular green S6 Doctor in sand green scrubs. Maybe switch the gender. S6 Pajama guy with Lego theme jammies S7 Evil Knight with a dragon shield pattern, fright knight head S7 Galaxy Patrol in red / black M-Tron pattern S8 Conquistador in gold and dark blue. S9 Battle Mech in any other color S10 Mr Gold with slightly different facial expression. --- I could keep going, any one of these would be really cool and I'd make a special purchase for.

yeah, I guess that was around what I was thinking. It's funny, as someone who's been saying for years that Lego could stand to target an older demographic at times, it's ironic that they are now at least target those with a bigger income. There is no denying it's a nice looking set though.