BrickG

What's the quality of the pieces? Last time I checked (quite a while ago) they were printed very rough (though maybe I could do something about that myself). EDIT: Looking at pics... Maybe that's the best way to go... I haven't mess with 3d modeling in years.

I'm completely new to customization of minifigures. I've been wanting to do it for a while. As someone who's professionally into computer art I think I have the stuff you can paint/decal on the minifigures down. I'm just deciding what method to use. Now... my biggest problem is that I'm probably going to need to create some completely custom pieces (shape and all?) and that's where I'm stalling. I'm very strict and need perfection (visually) with awesome smoothness and stuff. I don't know where to go here. The problem is I'm looking to probably going to do Star Trek and Dalek customs first. Now for Star Trek, my favorite character is Geordi. There's no hair I can find that fits his style (flat top without being ridiculous), I'm probably going to hope I can find something like a waster that I can cut to make the visor. Then there's the 4th Doctor which I might cut up the Lego fro and one of them hats and try to merge them... I want to add a tiny unique piece for the Star Trek characters that acts as their collar with the pips (rank). Then there's freakin' Worf's head... Basically, I got me some problems and the perfectionist inside me wants to solve them. I've not dealt with non-computer art in years, especially anything that's sculpted. But I'm also insane. Playdough and stuff like that probably won't do since I don't like how rough it looks. I'm wondering how some of those pros make those custom pieces. Sorry if this question is answered somewhere here already. I couldn't find anything. Any help would be appreciated. I think once I know I have a chance to actually do what I plan I'll go through with all of this. :)

Any aspect you can think of. Just your opinion. For me it's playability. I don't "play" with them. I build stuff. I can make and imagine scenes. But even as a kid I didn't really play with my toys. I'd instead Muppet Baby style around and use the toys as inspiration for my imagination (the best toy of all). I don't really go muppet babies everywhere anymore (if there's anyone else in the room ;) ) but I still enjoy collecting and building and soon will start making customs. :) Playability matters nothing to me. Never has. But I understand that it would be important for a lot of people.

99.9% of the time I'm 100% Lego. The other brands are cheaply made and almost always stupid. I was tempted to buy the TMNT sets from megablocks just because of nostalgia and my love for the Ninja Turtles. I didn't give in. Then I saw the Doctor Who Character Building characters. Ugly super deformed minifigures. Terribly ugly sets. One thing stood out though, the Dalek minifigures. They weren't deformed. I checked out the size comparison. They were almost right. Daleks being daleks there's multiple models of different heights. They're good for some but not the common Golden Shorties we usually see these day. So I took a risk and bought them. They're pretty good. The size is good enough. Yes, the plastic is a bit cheap but not the cheapest I've seen. It's a tiny bit tall for most modern daleks (with the scope going just over the face of the minifigures) but not really so tall that it's a factor. I wish it wasn't as plain. But... I've been wanting to make Doctor Who custom minifigures. The Doctors, some companions.... I might start with these Dalek. I might give them a proper painting lego-minifigure style detailing the "Eggs" ;) and some other stuff. I might ATTEMPT to sand down/cut the bottom piece to be 1 plate tall instead of 2 (I might want them to be 1-2 shorter so the eye stalks are at face level). Basically... I kind of like them. It's a first. And it's probably just because I'm in a Doctor Who mood and they work surprisingly well with Lego (unlike the other super deformed minifigures from Character Building). 8/10 for something not built by Lego. Usually those things get 0/10. I'm currently in the process of trying to find places to buy the other color of Daleks individually. I have 5 reds and now find myself wanting the white, yellow, orange, blue and gold ones (found white and blue on a few sites, the others... no luck... these things doing have good places to buy them like Lego).

I'm a minifigure guy. So if they have good photos, clearly state what they're missing then I'll buy. I've gotten incomplete sets missing lots of pieces that are in great condition for pennies on the dollar. I could easily resell the minifigures in several of them for like 10x the profit. "Used", "Incomplete", etc scare people off to an illogical extent. There are some real gems in there for sooooo little.

exclusives often are more expensive outside of Lego simply because they have to buy them at full price, then sell them again when they want to sell from other places. (usually)

I love Lego cuusoo. I just wish Doctor Who stuff could pass but stupid Character Buildings has that license so Lego can't get it... one awesome project seemed to be going places but they confirmed, no Doctor Who. :( I really hope the Zelda one wins, but that franchise might have difficulties. Nintendo and Lego haven't always seen eye to eye. Also, the set technically sucks but they don't have to stick to that build. The Back to the Future one is pretty cool but I'm not sure they'd pick it since it's based on an old movie. I really don't want the plain western to win or that EVE ship. I'm not always for Lego franchises but when you pit Zelda and Back to the Future against a generic western I really hope the western loses. As for the one that recently ended with the Portal stuff, Sandcrawler and Mars Rover... that's a tough pick. I'd almost say the Sandcrawler will lose but still appear really quickly in the regular Star Wars sets. Valve is probably a wonderful company to work with and I doubt getting that franchise would be hard at all like with Minecraft. The Mars Rover, Cuusoo has already shown love to technology and it stands a good chance but the set is so simple I can build it myself and being a minifigure guy I want good minifigures in whatever set wins.

Non-standard stuff like the baseplates are more expensive on Amazon because they don't have much of a supply there compared to Lego (stuff I don't generally buy). But basically every standard set will be cheaper. And they go on sale quite commonly. I check for lego sales most days. I just got Jabba's Palace for $102 with free shipping. Amazon loves putting Lego on like 20% sales every now and then.

I still don't think it's worth it. That's potentially saving 10% (not including tax) on future purchases as opposed to the normal 5%. I can almost always find better deals even at the doubling rate with Amazon being one of the main sources of cheaper Lego. Plus with Amazon Prime I get free 2 day shipping (which for some reason half the time is ONE day shipping or even once SAME DAY shipping). So... not sure if I'm going to end up buying Lego direction from Lego again because it's just more expensive. I saved up a lot of VIP points previously and just ending up thinking "that's it?" when I spent them. They really don't go very far.

Which goes back to the creativity thing. You're just building another X-Wing.

I don't buy Star Wars often but I just got Jabba's Palace and the Skiff. I mostly bought them for the minifigures and will maybe not even build the Palace and build my own (if I have enough pieces of those colors). They should arrive the day after I get four teeth pulled. Had to give me something to do during a potential recovery.

Now I just hope the Man of Steel movie doesn't suck... and honestly I don't look forward to the interpretation of the costume from that movie or even the newer Superman comics. No red undies and it's not Superman to me!

I've come to hate the short legs due to their inability to move. Minifigures should be as articulated as possible while still having that Lego feel. If there was some magic way to make the current minifigures poseable like in the CGI I'd freakin' love it ;P. I used to like my Dwarves but their inability to pose their legs just became too much. Their poses were therefore almost always boring. I hate the hobbits from LotRs too for the same reason. But making them smaller has it's problems. Simply cutting out the middle part so the circular top part meets the feet is kind of ugly. Makes them look like they have circular ugly legs.

Who would buy every single set? I mean, a rich person I guess... The offers are pathetic. 100 and 2,500 pounds. I want to offer $200.

I really hope we get more females. Lego.... way too many d00ds. I want a Wonder Woman set at least. One that makes sense. The Superman one was a great set but the box didn't make sense. Wonder Woman was playing damsel in distress. She was captured by Lex in a full Kryptonite suit. Superman was there to save her! Wrong way round. Lex in a Kryptonite powered suit would freakin' be harder to defeat for Superman. Wonder Woman should be saving him... I'd love to see characters like Hawkgirl, Starfire, Raven, etc.

Great model. Terrible name. But that's not your fault of course. I loved the movie but when they simply named the vehicle "The Bat" I felt waves of lameness wash over me. Like a name that tries too hard. Batman is already called "The Bat" sometimes... Call it something new. Hoverbat, Batwing, I don't care. :P

I really do HOPE they make a classic set. I really want a Bebop and Rocksteady. Maybe even Tokka and Razzar... But I'd probably be willing to bet they only will have the license for the new CGI series coming out and won't be paying attention to the old series or movies. I'm not sure if Nick fully has the rights to that... they probably don't.

Pretty good. :) I love the lighting. I plan to do a Batcave later. I'm going to include that ridiculous T-Rex and am waiting for the next wave to make mine (so I can put stuff like Freeze's armor in a display).

The only one I agree with is the Baseplate stuff. I miss baseplates. The rest... Idunno, some seem unreasonable. Instructions are just better done these days (the build sucked more as a kid, probably more due to organization and having to find the pieces.. and I am a "finished product" guy who prefers that to the build). Boxes? Who cares? I care about the toys and I throw away the boxes... the lack of a story? There's nothing stopping you from giving them your own story and I never pay attention to the stories anyways. I agree with the points with the license themes but I still love them. I mean, when I get a Star Wars set I'm not going to use my creativity to build an X-Wing because I already have it. And I don't really want to build a ship that doesn't exist for Star Wars because there's so many good ships to choose from (but the best ones ALREADY have sets) and I don't think it would fit. If I made an "XY-Wing" I probably wouldn't like it.... But it's different with some franchises. I think like Superheroes are easier to be creative with. The Batcave for example can be defined in any number of ways unlike an X-Wing. Also there haven't been many sets yet so I can go and make a lot of the missing things without feeling like they suck compared to existing sets (that don't exist yet). I still want to build a Daily Planet. So... I agree with 1 1/2 of them. ;p

September 29th here in the US is the new Ninja Turtles. I'm... cautious about it. I really wish they'd do one that's less kid oriented.

I understand Lego's concern but I don't really care. "Lego Bricks" "Legos" One of those is shorter and easier to say. I tend to not say "Legos" in Lego forums just because I've gotten crap for it before. But I'll say "Legos" anywhere else.

Ninja Turtles has a chance. Nickelodeon owns the Ninja Turtles at this point. They already have good ties to Lego through Spongebob. Ninjago is disappearing. I'd love to see them. What I don't want to see is that new Micheal Bay Ninja Turtles where they're aliens and it's terrible just like those horrible Transformer movies. Luckily that movie seems to be stalled (hopefully killed) so the Lego sets would likely be based on the new CGI movie coming out. Hopefully they'd have a classic turtle set too.

Okay, I'm new here but my first thought is... "Lego Historic" lol? I must not have paid attention in school enough.

Well I thought of that but was lazy. I'm still lazy so I'm not going to bother finding a GOOD example. Here's the new Jabba's Palace: And here's the B'omarr Monk droid d00d: The reason I said that's not a good example is because that's actually one of the better built ones. I'm talking the "minifigures" made entirely of little lego bricks and stuff (technically I guess they all are but the ones I like are usually specially made for the purpose of a minifigure). My laziness is not letting me find a specific example of one I hate but I've seen them in passing. They're advertised right by the minifigures as if they were of similar quality (IMO they're not) and most of the time in my opinion they suck. Again, in the case of Jabba's Palace it does not suck and is pretty neat (and you get 4x katanas if you don't like it ;) ). I just don't like the tiny creations most of the time but that's just me. To me they contrast too much with the much more organic form of the other minifigures. EDIT: http://lego.wikia.com/wiki/852001_Castle_Chess_Set That's a good example. The stupid rook pieces (Skeleton Rook and Crown Rook) are called "minifigures" by Lego. They shown off as though they're such. I mean, seriously, that's lame as heck. A perfect example of ones that are terrible (unlike that Star Wars one). When they're THAT bad it feels disingenuous. This is NOT a minifigure:

In my mind Lego is made of of two main parts. The bricks (and objects) that build things. Then minifigures. I can't say I own a lot of Lego. The price is the main factor. I got back into it during the Fantasy Castle era after a good break. I bought a few sets and got those large dragon guys. My siblings would comment "that's barely a Lego!" and stuff (I'm 27 btw). I looked at those "giant trolls" which had a similar "issue". At first I agreed. But they grew on me. At this point I kind of consider them minifigures. As do I the large Hulk, the Dinosaurs, etc. I kind of personally classify anything that's a character as a minifigure. I think it fits too. I don't mind building characters and creatures but I also don't mind having them being large or small molds. I think they fit as a more "natural" part of Lego than when you build them. On the other hand I hate when sets advertise ugly little creations as a minifigure. Like the chess sets with their Rooks... those are NOT minifigures at all (to me at least). Much of the time they just don't mesh well with the other minifigures and I just don't like them. Sometimes if they're good enough they pass in my eyes but this isn't often. I think it's incredibly lame when I see ugly little creations made up like that advertised as minifigures. I've noticed that some people don't like too much detail on theirs (like the new gnomeregan guards vs the old ones). At first I admit I was kind of like that. It didn't feel 100% like Lego. But eventually I changed my mind. It may not feel like the old Lego but in my mind right now it feels evolved and better. Basically... Minifigures are characters and creatures depicted in a more specific form and organic way. Usually just placing bricks together to make peeps or creatures doesn't do it for me (I wish it did... I've been trying to make Daleks that I like but I can't!). I think that the way the minifigures, including all those big and small ones, have diverged in recent years is just fine. I'm personally looking forward to the nice large Rancor next. I think this way works very well and they're good enough to be called "mini"figures in my heart! But that's just my opinion. I know a lot of people don't agree.