Dunjohn

I'm not a fan of clone brands. In fact, I can't stand them and don't own any, in case they "infect" my collection. However, I'd never seen a Bionicles clone before, I had no idea they even existed. I presumed all clone brands tried to emulate System, but then I saw this on a shop shelf yesterday, and figured €2 was a fair price to satisfy my curiosity. Don't expect to see me do this too often Another thing to keep in mind is that I'm not a Bionicle fan. I only own a couple of Pirraka that I got in a closing-down sale because I thought it might buff my Exo-Force brickset, but I've yet to use them. So do forgive my lack of knowledge in this area. INFORMATION Company: BELA Origin: China Set Name: Invincibility Robot Pieces: 48 The thing that made me notice it on the shelf was the shape of the container; I don't know if it's exactly the same as a Bionicle pod, but it sure had me thinking for a second that it was the real deal. The Engrish on display isn't too bad, but it's still definitely Engrish. This guy is one of six, though the shop I was in only had these brown guys. As far as I can see, the only differences between them are the colour schemes, and the mandibles. The pod contains two bags and the instructions. The colouring was badly shifted on the front and back, but the instructions themselves on the inside were fine (or should I say, "grand show"). The instructions used the same kind of 3D graphics and occasionally used box-outs, but were still hard to follow. They included half of the instructions needed to combine this set with one of the others. Here are the parts. I recognise a few parts from my limited collection, but I don't know which, if any, of the others are completely original. One elastic band is spare, and it includes two spinning blades, even though it can only hold/fire one at a time. The plastic is strong and sturdy but rough to the touch and well below LEGO standards of finesse. A close-up on some pieces that I do have direct equivilents to hand for: Bela on the left, LEGO on the right. As you can see, there's quite a bit of flashing still intact on some Bela parts. I could have removed it with a hobby knife, but since most kids wouldn't, I left it there to see how it affected the build. You can also see the differences in texture and plastic quality. There's barely any shine on the Bela parts. There are four different shades of brown among the parts, here compared with two LEGO rods. The ball joint's reddish-brown is pretty much the same as LEGO's. the dual-socket element in the top left is actually trans-brown. It's the only trans-brown element in the set, and I don't know why they bothered, because it's not visible on the finished model. Specifically, this finished model. The other blade isn't visible because it's somewhere under my bed. At least the mechanism works. For a small set containing four shades of brown and two shades of red, the end product still manages to look garish; those two bright red bits stand out a little too much. Overall, the colours just seem so random, with no real thought put into applying them organically. I had fairly sore thumbs after assembling this guy, some of the connections took a lot of effort to make, a fact not helped by the flashing issue. The ball joints are squeaky and difficult to position right - it took me an age to get it standing even this straight, and the camera angle is hiding some remaining problems there. The elastic band is supposed to give the mandibles some snap but fails miserably; I could have positioned them closed for this shot and the band wouldn't have drawn them open again. I'm so anti-clone that there's not really a chance of me getting any more of these, in fact I'm thinking of just leaving it here when I move back home at the weekend. For €2 it's quite a god toy, it could easily not have been Bionicle-compatible and still been worth the price.

There are four Games in Wave 3: 3862 Harry Potter Hogwarts, 3849 Orient Bazaar, 3850 Meteor Strike, and this. I can't find Meteor Strike anywhere so it's probably an Exclusive. That being the case, I figured I'd fill out the available Wave 3 reviews while they're still new. ____________________________________________ Navigate your submarine through the murky depths to find sunken treasure in the new LEGO Atlantis Treasure. Fire at obstacles and block other explorers in a deep sea quest where only one sly sailor will triumph! A family adventure game for 2 - 4 players. INFORMATION: Set Name: Atlantis Treasure Set Number: 3851 Theme: Lego Games Year Released: 2010 Number of Pieces: 278 Microfigs: 1 Price: €24.99 on release _____________________________________________ FIRST IMPRESSIONS: The box features are very nice little illustration, done in deep shades that make it very eye-catching on the shelf. You too could be that cruel diver, laughing and flipping your die at the impotently raging Atlantean king as you plunder his kingdom and legacy! Despite the name, it's fairly obvious that this game has nothing to do with the current Atlantis line of sets, though I have thought about modding it to fit that theme. Replace the crystals with rings, redo the submarine colour schemes, maybe use Atlanteans instead of seaweed... It would likely look awesome. The back gives a good close look at the board and the various game elements. Notice how the microfig in the centre of the board is suddenly facing a different direction. I've noticed tiny differences between the game boards on the fronts and backs on a fair few boxes, I wonder what's up with that. The box side, in a revolutionary new photo format. Now with 90% less table! The box contains five bags and the die. Most bags are mixed, but all of the dark blue elements are in a bag by themselves. It was a bit strange that a game this size and shape didn't have a baseplate, but it makes sense, once I get into it, why the board is brick-built. The instructions on the left, and the rules on the right. That tentacle is something those two guys should probably be paying attention to. The instructions are well laid out and very clear. They also don't beat around the bush and will lay as many elements per step as needed to keep things moving. The rules are also clear and concise. Just remember, you may not move diagonally. I can't stress this enough. I think they send someone around to your house to beat you up if you do. I'm too terrified to try. Both booklets have a couple of ads at the back. I hadn't seen the two on the top before. Those two kids finally have something to look at. It works better if you turn it to face you, idiots! The other ad features the Harry Potter board game, with one kid pleading with his family to move the board closer so he can actually reach it. The mother has to physically restrain him. Danes, eh? Strange people. Here's one half of the Parts Square. It's a big square. This half contains all the regular tiles, and there's a good few in some useful colours. These guys are obviously going to form the bulk of the board. These are the more specific bits. Man, I haven't owned any of those blue rods since Ice Planet! And there's plenty of those 2x2 jumper plates in the set. And some of the cooler bits. Eight crystal formations is neat. Some people are attracted by shiney things; in my case, I'd step over my own mother for some trans neon yellow, so keep it coming! The printed compass tiles may have potential as masonry details on some buildings, and other architectural things like that. The torpedo one could serve as a naval logo of some sort. The set has two of those spiffy hollow round studs, eight non-trans seaweed elements, an Atlantis trident, and the single microfig. Here he is with the four submarines. His printing is entirely red, and he freaks me right out. It ain't right! He represents a statue and doesn't actually do anything in the game. The four minisubs are quite cute. Awfully good of LEGO to make each one unique. Moving on.... THE BUILD A couple of steps in and the basic board is constructed. That thing over to the right is the red corner; the corners are built early on but not attached until the very end. Here, the central structure has been built and the various markers placed around the board. I don't know what the trans-blue tiles are for. They don't affect the game. Maybe it's just to make placing the other tiles easier. And now it's finished. It looks quite cool, all dark and creepy. It'd make quite an acceptable display piece. The spares. Ten! JACKPOT! Moving on.... GAMEPLAY Alright! Let's get started! If there was two of me, I'd have to get three crystals to win, but any more players than that, then I'd have to get... three crystals. Hmm. Okay, so either the rulebook writers are being paid by the word, or there's a mistake there somewhere. Note also that "compass" is misspelt up in the diagram. Fortunately, Ich spreche ein wenig deutsch! With two players, you need four crystals to win. Makes sense. Fewer players, fewer torpedoes. Okay, so playing with all four subs, let's get going! Most rulebooks say to begin with the youngest player, but this one says to start with the eldest. Take that, brats! We'll start with Yellow, in the bottom-left, and go counter-clockwise. Yellow begins by rolling an East, knocking Red off the board in the process. Hmm, something similar happened in my playthrough of Orient Bazaar. Maybe the die is naturally attracted to the colour red? Either way, there's clearly not going to be any love lost between Red and Yellow in this game. Rolling an East allows Yellow to put an East compass in any free space on the board. A submarine that hits one automatically changes direction to follow the compass. Yellow cannily places it right next to the crystal nearest Red. Yellow then moves - your sub can move once per turn, either before or after you do what the die rolls. Subs move py picking a direction and moving as far as possible in it, stopping only if they meet an obstacle or crystal. It's a bit odd, designing a sub with no brakes or steering, but budgets are obviously tight. Yellow decides to head along the bottom of the board, where he hits the East tile and nabs the crystal, burning Red even more. This is gonna be a dirty game. Because it's been hit, the East tile will now be removed from the board. A wee note, it feels weird having "south" where "east" should be and "east" pointing up. That's how the instructions told me to do it, but I've since changed it. You guys'll have to think crooked for the time being, though. Red went next and rolled a West, placing that tile you see there. He decided not to move, preferring to wait and maybe set himself up a bit better. White rolled the green tile, allowing him to move one of the seaweeds (technically "coral reefs"). He moves one up to the top edge of the board and rams himself into it, setting himself up nicely to collect that crystal Red had been looking at. Looks like two subs are out to get Red. Then it's Orange's turn, and he rolled a Torpedo! Torpedos can be used to destroy seaweed and compasses, and to attack the other subs. Right now, there's nothing much he can do with it, so he zips down to the bottom of the board... ...And fires! Direct hit! Torpedoing an enemy submarine lets you steal one of their collected crystals. Of course, Red doesn't have any yet. Orange only did this because he didn't want to feel left out of all the Red-bullying fun. Orange's spent torpedo returns, pigeon-like, to his base. He can collect it next time he's around that way. That means each submarine can only fire two torpedoes while they're out on the hunt. Skipping on several turns, and it's finally time for some payback! On his previous turn, yellow had nipped into that space to nab his second crystal. On Red's turn, he rolled a Green, and sealed Yellow away behind a wall of seaweed! Yellow won't be going anywhere unless he rolls a Green or a Torpedo. Many turns later, and it's Orange who has emerged as the greatest threat. He's relatively safe behind a wall of seaweed, so the other subs have resorted to filling his little lair with compasses to keep him away from that last crystal. However, on his turn he rolls a pigeon-class Torpedo and blasts that East out of the way. He scoops his third crystal and wins! Unfortunately for Yellow, he never did break out of that snare Red set him. And now, the photo you've all been dying to see... will it fit back into the box??? The diagram suggests so! Everything point to yes! LET'S DO THIS!!! CRAP!!! TLG, help! Moving on.... IN CONCLUSION This turned out to be a lot more fun than I'd been expecting. I got Orient Bazaar because it had some excellent pieces but Atlantis Treasure is just a fantastic game in itself. In fact, at the risk of exposing how pathetically sad I am, I've played quite a few games of this by myself now and had fun every time. Despite the complexity, it can be quite quick to play, because most turns you'll roll a compass piece that'll let you reach a crystal piece somewhere (as I saw on the very first turn here). That's actually fine, it means the game has an enormous one-more-go factor. Design: 8/10 I do still kinda wonder why this needed a brickbuilt base when a baseplate would have worked fine; I can picture a number of factors, but I imagine the main one was to keep the piece count at an acceptably high level for the price. It's a very solid board (though the corner bases are held on by a single stud each and can fall off easily - but they must be removed in order to fit the box anyway) and looks very pretty. Gameplaywise, the design is very good, with a chesslike feel in the piece movement and forward thinking. Parts: 9/10 Certainly no complaints. They leans towards the eternally useful rather than the exotic and the colour scheme is very nice. I really like the compass tiles and I'm itching to find some good alternate applications for them. And eight crystals of trans neon yellow goodness is always gonna score points with me. The single microfig creeps me out but he probably has his uses too. Build: 8/10 Speedy, efficient, and more fun than you'd imagine from looking at the finished board. It never got repetitive because the instructions usually got you to do the similar tasks in a single step. The minisubs are quite cool, too, though removing and reattaching torpedos can be a pain. Playability: 10/10 I'm going to play it again as soon as I finish typing this. I imagine it's even more fun with more than one person.... Price: 9/10 About right for the contents. Total: 90% A really, really solid entry in the Games line and one that impressed me way more than I'd been expecting. Thanks for reading! Hello? Guys? Can Somebody Let Me Out? - Dunjohn

It's still around. And I wouldn't worry about Bricklink, those prices will plummet once availability becomes wider. Series 1 isn't anywhere near those prices, and it's far harder to get in the States than Series 2 will likely be.

France isn't in the centre of Europe now?

21007? With a number like that it should only have been Blofeld's volcano base from You Only Live Twice.

I also think that four may be pushing it - heck, I thought two was pushing it - but so far, they don't seem to have made many mistakes. At least they're starting an entirely new storyline rather than trying to wring something more out of the Elizabeth/Will plotline. I thought the first movie was great. I didn't like the second movie, I thought it was extremely messy and overly complicated, with twists every couple of minutes that were a pain to keep track of, and too much focus on ridiculous set pieces. And Barbarossa came back? His death in the first movie was terrific, but that completely ruined it. The whole thing put me off watching the third movie for a couple of years even though my sister had the DVD. When I did eventually watch it, it was more of the same garbled mess of implausible developments and pointless action. Hopefully a fresh start will mean they'll have to devote too much time to scene-setting to be able to clutter it up with nonsense.

It is! Look at those dead eyes, that vacant smile... this is a minifig that has seen some terrible, terrible things.

Maybe LEGO decided that the Americans were so mad about missing Series 1 that they'd accept nothing less than all of France's supply of Series 2....

That doesn't make a lot of sense. Why France? A huge country in the centre of Europe? The figs have already been filtering though to other European countries.

Was there a delay on those? They were released here at the same time as the second TS wave. I thought the Lego Woody looked creepy. He's nothing compared to the Duplo rendition.

Thanks for the enfrontpagening, WhiteFang! And for the title! I'd been planning to add "One Year Without a Title" to my sig if I didn't have one by September So they do already exist. I checked Bricklink before posting but I obviously didn't look in the right places. Thanks for the correction! I hope I have everybody well-trained in that fact by now I also decided not to mention the word "dice" this time...

Probably the most interesting Wave 3 Game from a parts perspective, I've wanted to get this one since I first saw it for the huge number of exotic bits and bobs in it. ____________________________________________ "Take a magic carpet ride to find Far East fortunes in the LEGO Games Orient Bazaar. Discover exotic treasures in the colorful nooks of the bustling market! Spend your gold wisely and battle for fortune by collecting priceless matching items to sell! A great family trading game for 2 - 4 players." INFORMATION: Set Name: Orient Bazaar Set Number: 3849 Theme: Lego Games Year Released: 2010 Number of Pieces: 198 Microfigs: 5 Price: €21.99 on release _____________________________________________ FIRST IMPRESSIONS: The cover illustration does the job, but the colour scheme is oddly washed-out and the box doesn't stand out too much on the shelf. It kinda gets lost in among the other, more vibrant Game boxes. The guy on the right is busy contemplating his next move. It's difficult enough without your opponent constantly trying to bounce the die off your forehead. The back shows off the huge number of interesting elements, plus a few mechanical closeups. Very little of the set is actually built; the game's high piece count is almost half made up of individual moving game parts. The box side, in case you're in one of those little shops with no room to display boxes from the front. This layout is pretty standard for all Lego Games. Inside are four bags and the die. It was tough work resisting the urge to split the bags immediately - Look at them! Look how awesome the contents are! For some reason, the red and orange crystal formations are in a different bag from the yellow and blue ones. Normally I show the manuals after the bags but TO HELL WITH THEM! The Parts Square is where the action is. Unfortunately, it's an oddly fuzzy Parts Square this time, sorry about that. As you can see, the colour scheme runs the extremes of boring whites and tans, and madly psychadelic warm hues and blues. The cooler parts. I could probably have just copy/pasted the last image, because the cool/mundane ratio is exceptionally high, but I'll be nice. In the golden department, you gots the full 4-part Prince of Persia dome plus a smaller dome to cap it, two goblets, and a whopping 60 2x2 round tiles to serve as coins. In the trans section you gots eight crystal formations across four colours, and eight jewels across four colours. There's a single printed element, which is probably completely useless for anything outside of the game. And lastly, you gots the four sprues, each containing the new perfume bottle accessories that look rather swell indeed. As my lovely assistant demonstrates, the square bottle is the only one that a minifig can grip by the neck. The others must be held from below. Unfortunately, to offset that, the square bottle doesn't have a proper round stud slot on the base, and is largely hollow with only two buttresses to grip a stud. It's completely inadequate and slips off easily. I do like how the square bottle looks kind-of like a bottle of bourbon, in case anyone has any hobo MOCs planned. Here are the five microfigs, with another assistant for scale. Hmm, wait a second, these guys look awfully familiar... Hah! They're the same explorers from Ramses Pyramid! Except this time, they're wearing trousers. They must have struck it very rich inside that pyramid. I think this is the first time that microfigs have been repeated in another game. Why they all decided to go into the perfume business is beyond me. Maybe they just can't stop themselves from competing with each other. And finally, here are the manuals. For some reason, the instruction booklet was folded in half and the rulebook wasn't. It's a pain, but whaddyagonnado? The interiors aren't anything amazing. There's very little building in the set so the instructions are brief. I took this photo before starting to build so it's quite serendipitous that I opened it to this random page. Note the big gap in the Bazaar's floor, that will be relevant during gameplay. The rulebook is clear and concise. The usual three pages per language, two for basic rules and one for variants. There are ads at the end but they're the usual ones. Moving on.... THE BUILD: Like I said, there's very little building work involved, so I didn't take any photos during the build. Just four identical stalls and the central bazaar. Most of the parts remain separate and transferable. Here are the spare parts. Not too bad a haul, but nothing too valuable either. Then there's this green tile. It's pictured in the "Completed" illustration, up beside the coins, and listed in the parts inventory, but the rule book doesn't mention it. I have no idea what I'm supposed to do with it. Moving On.... Gameplay Okay, let's begin! Caveman, Cheerleader, Dummy and Diver have agreed to help me demonstrate how this works. It's a trading game, obviously, and a fairly simple one at that. Starting with three coins each, the objective is to be the first to make 15 gold. You do this by buying individual items, then selling them back as sets for a profit. The shapes of the items don't matter, all that matters is quantity. Each side of the die has two tiles, and the player chooses which ability to use. Caveman rolls the die, partially demolishing one of the stalls in the process. The result lets him buy an item from either the red or yellow stalls. The Caveman decides to apologise by buying some red beard perfume. Alternatively, instead of buying anything, he could have sold any number of items of one colour, but it's a bit hard to do that on turn one. Cheerleader's up next, and she rolls green/black. Green lets her trade an item with another player, but she doesn't have any left. Black it is, then. Black lets the Cheerleader close down one of the stalls, preventing anyone from buying from it. To do this, she physically picks the bazaar up and places it over the stall, which is a tad extreme I thought, but if she's got that kind of arm strength, who's going to say she can't? She picks red to slow Caveman down a little. She also gets to buy one of the bazaar's golden goblets. These act as wild cards and can be sold as part of any set. Overall, black is definitely the colour to roll. Skipping forward a few turns, and everybody's had three turns. They're all out of coins so they've no choice but to start selling. On his turn, Caveman heads to the bazaar with his two red items and smelling like a garden of roses. Hoping the dealer won't notice that the bottles now contain only water, he trades them in for a tidy sum of three coins. The wheeling and dealing can resume! Umpteen turns later and a winner is finally declared! Diver hits the 15 mark first and goes off to buy himself a solid gold camel. Moving on.... IN CONCLUSION Forgive the exuberance, but this ROCKS! The parts selection is well above par, and 198 is a high figure for a game of this price and box size. The game is also a lot of fun; it's a very simplified version of other trading games but it retains much of the decision-making, forward planning and Machiavellian market sabotage of other, more serious boardgames. The only problems I had were tiny: the issue with the square bottle, and the somewhat unsatisfying building process, but they're completely overshadowed. Design: 9/10 The structures are extremely simple due to the high proportion of non-building elements. The bazaar doesn't slide on and off stalls too easily and tends to pick them up when you try to lift it off, but that's not much to cry about. The game rules are excellent; simple enough for younger players (but probably not really young) and deep enough for everyone else. Parts: 10/10 The selection is fantastic, with the huge number of gold disks and perfume bottles and some basic, eternally useful building elements too. The updated Ramses Pyramid microfigs was a very nice surprise that I hadn't known about until I examined them up close. Build: 7/10 I barely noticed this stage, it was so quick and simple. This is a Game that's very much focused on playing over building. The buildings are very functional while at the same time good to look at. Playability: 10/10 Max marks again. The expected play time is ten to twenty minutes but games could easily go on for much longer than that. Good fun with very simple rules. Price: 9/10 Most games of this box size are €2 less, but this set has a lot more parts and many of them are very rare or unique, so this feels very fair. Total: 95% Probably my favourite game out of all the ones I own so far. It does pretty much everything right. Thanks for reading! He's In The Money - Dunjohn

I voted for TLG, though I'm surprised the majority is so large in its favour. I prefer the face printing and the separate lekku headpiece. I'm also not a fan of Arealight's curved torsos, I think they make the hips look very odd, but I will admit that Arealight's stuff is great quality overall.

Hmm, so that's what the little runt's been up to while I've been working. Space deliveries? He's probably making five times what I do, too...

Ha! I just got Lotso today and I was also looking at his arms and thinking there had to be other uses for them. This looks great, though, nice work!

NOBODY CALLS ME AN AUBERGINE HEAD! NOBODY!!!

It's a common issue across multiple colours. In my own collection, I mainly see it in orange and brown, while Clone 'O Patra hit it while reviewing Toy Story's Army Men set: It gets talked about a lot but there doesn't seem to be much that can be done about it.

Hmm, yeah, maybe it's best not to call him that... I hate the look of the Studio Frankenstein so yeah, I'd like an update.

I took advantage of the Toy Story 3 for 2 sale at Argos to get Construct-a-Zurg, the Pizza Planet Truck and Lotso's Dump Truck. Zurg isn't in the new catalogue so it didn't count at first, sending two staff members into conniptions, but it's on their website, and they had it in stock, and it's obviously Toy Story, so they managed to give it to me. Woohoo, now the only minifigs I need are Zurg and Twitch.

I got this on clearance a couple of days ago, but I'm only getting around to doing the write-up now. It's been kinda difficult to get my enthusiasm up for it for reasons I'll explain further on. ____________________________________________ "Do you have what it takes to cross the finish line first and win the trophy? Use shortcuts, overtake or turbo boost past your opponents to get in front and change lanes to avoid the oil slicks in your way. The LEGO Dice brings a new twist on a classic racing game for 2 to 4 players." INFORMATION: Set Name: Race 3000 Set Number: 3839 Theme: Lego Games Year Released: 2009 Number of Pieces: 166 Microfigs: 0 Price: €19.99 on release _____________________________________________ FIRST IMPRESSIONS: One of the more madly colourful box illustrations in the Games line, and one that's particularly energetic too, with the cars whizzing around the track, apparently being controlled by the power of mime. I did try moving the cars by flapping my arms. Didn't work. As usual, the box is only shrink-wrapped and won't be damaged by opening it. It's designed to be used to store the boardgame on the shelf after building, so it's good and sturdy. The back shows a couple of pointless close-ups for anybody who doesn't know how Lego works, plus the blurb and contents list. This being a Wave 1 game, it refers to the die using the plural "dice." Every Wave does that, but I only forgive Wave 1 games. Spill the box, and you're greeted by a big bag, a small bag, a big 16x32 baseplate, a small 16x16 baseplate, the iconic die, the rulebook (left) and the instruction booklet (right). For some odd reason, the instruction booklet was folded, despite there being ample room and despite the larger rulebook being unfolded. Somebody at TLG's printing plant must have obsessive-compulsive issues. The English rules, and a random instructions page. There are fourteen stages to building the track but really, they could have just printed a single clear graphic of the completed track because the layout is 2-dimensional and very easy to follow. I didn't take pictures of the ads because there's nothing particularly noteworthy there. Both booklets feature the same ads (except for layout) for the other Wave 1 games and the Lego Club, while the instructions have a third ad for WIN. The old boring yellow one with three set images and a link to nielsen.com. Kinda makes you appreciate the win-shouty kid a little. The Rulebook is awful. Sorry for burying that potentially-interesting bit of scandal in the middle of the paragraph. It's entirely unhelpful and you need to be psychic to understand certain parts. I'll get to that in the gameplay section. The traditional Parts Square. Or it would have been, if that random extra white tile hadn't completely ruined it. No particularly standout parts involved. Some nice curved bricks and a rake of psychadelic handsets but overall, quite run-of-the-mill. Moving on.... THE BUILD: Well, here we are after about ten minutes, and as you can see, it's starting to take sha... oh crap it's finished. Um, yeah. It's a very quick, very straightforward job. Heck, turning the damn pages took more time than actually applying brick. That hated random extra white tile is used to make the starting line seven studs long. The black things represent oil slicks. Not barrels. Slicks. Yeah. Well, they come off during the game so it was probably easier for little fingers to manipulate cylinders than studs. I got the feeling during play that the game is aimed at the very younger range of Lego fans. The podium and cars. The design of these cars is simple but oh-so effective. They're just awesome. Gather the five core pieces from your collection and see for yourself. Most of the die will be built during play, but before you begin, you stick the two orange tiles on opposite sides, and then fill out the rest of those sides with a single tile for each car. The orange tiles represent a turbo boost. The single yellow 2x1 tile (seen in the Parts Square) is used in an optional variant game - rolling that lets you rearrange one of the yellow shortcut segments on the track. The spares. Nothing gobsmacking - one of everything you'd probably expect. Moving on.... GAMEPLAY: The Aim of the Game is, and I quote directly from the rulebook, "to complete one lap 'anti-clockwise'" first. Obvious, right? Clearly it's anti-clockwise, you can tell that just by looking at it. There can't be any reason why I'm making such a big deal of this. Alright then, let's get a game underway. The cars are positioned behind the starting line and ready to go. The road is a bit narrow but that doesn't bother White; he's clearly only here to run over the flagpost. White rolls a blank side, but that's fine. He just puts one of his tiles on that side and moves forward one space. Or, at least, he does once he figures out how. First of all, the instructions tell him to move "forward clockwise one space." Not anti-clockwise. So, am I moving backwards or forwards? On paper, it seems obvious that this must be a mistake, but when figuring out the rules... maybe rolling an empty side is penalised? Well, we'll assume it's a mistake. So he moves forward one space... one what now? What's a space? Again, the rulebook just sits there, silent, grinning evilly probably. Is a stud a space? I tried that, but the cars were positioned so akwardly it looked like a major traffic accident. I eventually figured that a space equalled three studs. There's a diagram in the rulebook - below the Union Jack, if anyone wants to scroll up - that shows a section of track with three little green arrows pointing to three studs. That diagram is NO HELP. That could just as easily - in fact, even more easily - mean THREE MOVES. Okay, so after a few false starts, White moves forward one space. After that stressful beginning, Green also rolled an empty side, and then Blue rolled a Turbo side. Blue nips forward to the next orange line. The other cars with tiles on that side of the die each move forward a space, so after just three rolls, all vehicles are off and jostling for position. Being on an orange line means that Blue can also change lanes, potentially avoiding oil slicks or taking a tighter inner lane. Short cuts and the pit stop can also only be accessed from orange lines, so they're quite desirable places to be. Skipping forward a couple of turns and someone finally hits an oil slick. These cannot be turbo'd through and stop you in place. It also forces you to remove one of your tiles from the die. The oil slick is then removed from the track. Hitting the pits lets you choose any two sides of the die and strip them bare (except for turbo tiles). A less extreme optional variant lets you just choose one enemy tile and replace it with your own. As usual, the whole lot fits back into the box with a little bit of disassembly. Moving on.... IN CONCLUSION Race 3000 has two big strikes against it. The unclear rulebook, I've already touched on. I'm assuming you can only access the short cuts if you're parked on an orange line, otherwise, wouldn't everybody take them? The rulebook specifies that they must be attached to an orange line. The rulebook isn't too dense, the mechanics are simple so it's not an issue of space, just poor wording. The other big strike is that the game isn't very interactive. It feels like Snakes & Ladders, which kids of a certain age will find enjoyable but everyone else will be left chafing at the lack of control. Anybody's die roll can move a pack of cars forward. The choices available at the orange lines are usually complete no-brainers. The only time that decisions need to be made is in the pit stop, and that's fleeting. Randomness is king in this game, and if that sounds like fun, then you'll probably have loads. Design: 7/10 Very clearly laid out but not especially interesting to look at. The only aesthetic bonuses - the podium, flagpost and racing tower - aren't a whole lot to write home about. The cars, on the other hand, pull this rating up a bit because they're terrific. The game rules strangle creativity but that's probably a design decision so I can't mark it down for it. Parts: 5/10 Nothing I really needed. Very straightforward and functional. No microfigs. Baseplates are always handy. Build: 7/10 Very quick and extremely simple. Normally I'd mark it down for being unimaginitive, but the boardgames are usually about getting the building done quickly so the play can commence. Playability: 4/10 You roll the die, do what you're told, the next guy rolls the die. Repeat ad psychotium. The part selection doesn't really lend itself to anything other than alternative track layouts, so yeah, not a whole lot going on here. Price: 7/10 Well I got it for €12.99 down from €19.99 off so I can't complain too loud. I wouldn't even consider it for parts at full price, and having seen the contents up close, I'd be hesitant about spending even €12.99 again. Total: 50% I own a good few Games titles now but this is easily the most underwhelming. The parts list isn't as interesting as I thought it would be, the game is boring, and overall it just feels like an afterthought entry in the Games line. So unfortunately, it becomes the first Game title that I wouldn't really recommend. Thanks for reading! In Loving Memory - Dunjohn

****ing Argos clearance sale is destroying my budget. Couldn't have come at a worse time, but I just can't resist the bargains on offer. I too got Pig Farm today, and got Ostrich Race, Alamut and Quest Against Time over the last week. PoP is actually the first line I've got every set for. Oh, and a Technic excavator at the weekend. First Technic set I've ever owned. Strange system, that. This is the worst Lego splurge I've ever been on but I think I have all my target sets now.

Ooh! A contest rules thread! Time to make CopMike's head explode. Does a carrot count as a fruit? Does a chicken leg? Can I carve an apple into lego bricks and use those? What if I don't want to use any fruit at all, can I still enter? Does a carrot count as a fruit? Okay, ignore all those. I'm gonna try and cook something up for this. Thanks, CopMike!

Very nice! I think you should definitely keep the health bars. The pose of Ryu and Ken are a bit stiff, though, maybe you could try getting one of them to uppercut the other? Ken's hairpiece looks a bit odd, do you have any Luke Skywalkers? I've made a few street fighters myself so I've been trying to get the looks down. I don't have them handy at the moment but I do have some experimental photos on my camera's memory disk. Apologies for the terrible quality, these were never meant to be displayed but they're all I have. And I'm certainly not trying to take over the thread, these are just how I've been doing it. Ryu's head is from Exo-Force, while his hair is the fairly common modern type from sets like Small Car. His torso's also from Exo-Force but I may replace it with the karate champ from Collectible Minifigures 2. I don't own any red hand parts but I'd use them if I did. Ken's torso is a girl's top, but it's the best I have. The boobs fortunately aren't too prominent but I need to use the flames to hide all the ribbons And unlike you, I don't even have a plain red top I could use. The head is from a different Exo-Force guy. Just to show they're not all from Exo-Force. Chun Li's mainly from Castle. Overall that's a fantastically colourful little MOC. Have you thought about printing out the health bars to display above it? I wouldn't build them from bricks, if they're printed they'll look more like part of the "screen," just like in this photo.

Put it lying on its back and it's tank armour.

I just went straight into town and got the Battle of Alamut set when I saw the online Argos price of €65.99. However, their store checker listed it at €72.99. After about ten minutes investigating, they gave it to me for the online price but said that the website was probably wrong, not their checkers. If anybody was thinking about getting it, drop everything and do it now before they fix the price. Like, right now. All the other reduced online prices were correct.