Shakar

Sweet to see those two t. metallic pieces confirmed! "Cockpit with ballsnap"..looks like I might have been right, the Machines use standard Hero builds, with the head and torso plate replaced by a cockpit/shell hybrid. The cockpit piece is much smaller than I thought however (which is good, I guess). But the lower part...wait. The pictures show JB and SP with black lower jaws, while their upper jaw/head pieces in their main colour(s). Maybe in the final version, all Beasts follow Flyer Beast's colour scheme- that is, upper jaw+head in black and lower jaw in their main colour? Either way this does confirm that azure is being used on SP: I guess one head is tr. orange and the other one is azure, while his bones are transparent like the other 2 Beasts.

Weeell, this is getting weirder and weirder. Lord Business looks hilarious, then again I guess that was done on purpose. I wonder how his cape can be reused... And what did they do to poor Unikitty? She (?) 's got glasses and a € cutie mark.

Front, you brilliant man. Since they're the only recoloured bones in this wave, I'll have to assume you're talking about the "azure" bones- now that makes a lot more sense for all 3 villains to feature those. I wonder if it has a story significance? Maybe it means they're charged with energy. Returning to the sets themselves, I wonder which colour is going to be used, I'm personally rooting for tr. light blue (like the cladding on Frost Beast for example). And I assume that Splitter Beast's..uhm..second head, which appeared as azure like the bones, is transparent as well- which would mean SP's main colours are both transparent..very elemental like. If it indeed is tr. light blue, that just encourages me to develop that mod idea I had in mind even before pics came out.

Wow, I must say they all look great. My favourite is Wyldstyle, that dress is fantastic.

..wow. I actually like some of these, namely the villains minus XT4. CH looks like he wore pieces of dead Heroes as armour (I can see why they scrapped THAT). Voltix looked crazy, but quite probably more fun than what we got. SD used to be a sort of small Titan actually, and the bike had 3M shells in tr. purple.. wow. Thanks for sharing.

Eh, I'll pass on these. Don't really like the Legend Beasts or the other sets. There are only a few things I'm truly interested in: 1)Shields! 2)CHI Ultrabuilds jagged blades (Cragger, Worriz and HF's Frost Beast) in silver 3)Eris's new outfit.

All right, this theme gets crazier and cooler everytime I see new pics/read news. Truly in Lego's zany and fun spirit. I'll get some Series 12 bags for sure, as for the sets I need to see the pics of course.

I generally agree with this. The quality of pictures is the most disappointing thing of all. At this time, I excepted finalized pictures. Not only is the watermark huge, the sets don't even look real- they look CG, in fact. So, really hard to judge these and I eagerly await better pictures, but for now I can say a few things (the more I look at the pics, the more things I get): HERO MACHINES (individual impressions): Evo Walker: my least favourite one, I think. It's good it has a cockpit and a plasma gun, but I really don't like the legs. Overall...eh, no point in buying it. But I saw that coming anyway. Wait, are those yellow 5M shells?! Evo XL M. : tr. neon green huh? Unexpected, but doesn't look bad. I don't like the cannon, I would've preferred a plasma gun but the return of the ammo belt is good. The flick missile launcher looks good. Not sure about the legs. I hope the secondary colour is titanium metallic, because Stormer XL feet and paws in that colour would be GOOD. Furno Jet M. : somewhat disappointing. The Jawblade blades are a cute homage, but without hands they make the arms look weak. I don't like the legs, they're short and I don't like when the upper cladding pieces are bigger than the lower ones. The jetpack looks cool (I hope the Pyrox flames are in a new colour). Rocka Stealth M. : this one looks better. Not enough gold, otherwise the colour scheme is good. More plasma guns, yes. The only things I don't like are the right hand (they couldn't have used a paw, right? Oh well) and the upside down shoulder armour (not a pieces issue, though). It's an overall good figure I guess, but it's somewhat plain. Stormer Freeze Machine: probably my favourite one. Once again, the paw is a good idea, so are the feet used. I see a printed piece, and that's good. The weapon is creative and looks good- once again, I hope the Pyrox flames aren't recycled (from BA Stormer this time) and are actually tr. blue. Finally, I love the use of Bulk 3.0 claw mounts- I use them all the time as armour so it's nice they get recognition. BEASTS (individual impressions): Jaw Beast: much cooler than Scarox and Aquagon, although still a standard humanoid (and therefore less original than the 2012 9 Euro villains). This one is the one where azure looks best (I'll get to that in the general section). Nice set overall, if only slightly plain. Flyer Beast: as excepted, the Batman wings suck- sorry, but they do. Zero effort to improve a design that had to be improved. At 15 Euro, I except a wing design as complex as Razar's/Eris's, especially since the rest of the model looks rather simple. One more thing I don't like is the 2.0 torso plate, AGAIN. Breakout armour, does Lego hate you or something? I'm tired of the 2.0 armour, it looks fat and plain. That's one weird weapon FB is using. I know I'm criticizing a lot of things, but I do like the set overall. FB is one of those good concepts, which is limited by some questionable design choices that can be fixed fairly easily. Splitter Beast: oh man, this guy (ehm, guys?) looks really cool. Looks his..non-azure colour isn't red but tr. reddish orange (much better, and more original as well). I don't think he's wielding a scythe or any weapon- that's just the first section/blade of his right wing. It's weird that on the top part of the bag Furno alone is fighting a beast with only the tr. orange head- maybe Splitter Beast does really split? VBBN beat me to it, ah well. I now understand the purpose of the limb pieces though. Anyways, no complaints here, this is an awesome figure. And now for some general impressions: MACHINES: I like they're keeping a coherent aesthetic among them, which overall brings home the fact they aren't just some cockpits with limbs of Heroes, but machines without personality with a distinct look. This goes both for the colour schemes (little room for accent colours, mostly main colour+metallic colour) and some cool design choices (Stormer XL feet and SP paws). I have no idea on what the transparent backpacks are, but they look pretty cool. No idea of what to think about the cockpits, I have no clue how are they built. I'm somewhat disappointed by the weapons, I hoped for more melee stuff (especially since 2013 gave use 2 very cool blade pieces) and most weapons they got look kind of bad. BEASTS: overall these 3 guys look very cool. Like the machines, they share a number of elements in common, from the colour schemes (black+azure+main colour) to the pieces (those awesome new feet we saw in the new Ninjago Mecha Dragon, and the ones I'm talking about next). It seems they all have a spiky tail piece on the back but I'm not sure. And they all have the same type of rhino-like head (probably the same piece, even), presumably featuring working jaws. Printed eyes aren't very cool..but it's better than having them replaced by those of alien mutant slugs (ha, burn!). I don't get why they all feature azure, though: it looks great on Jaw B., it's pretty good on Splitter B. too (though this way he slightly feels like a Thornraxx rehash), Flyer B. is the one it looks least good on to me. Overall it's a very weird choice, it feels almost random and I doubt it's going to get a story justification. Overall, Corydoras was right, these guys are indeed much better than the 2013 Villains, and they do look very menacing. MINIFIGS: first off the simple ones, the spider minions. These look much cooler than I thought actually. Now I am SURE they're related to their..big brothers, as they have the same rhino head. And now the Heroes: these blow the Bionicle minifigs out of the water. With the full poseability of a regular minifig, plus their close likeness to their big incarnations, these are a success I think. I'm generally happy with these. I'll get all Villains and Stormer Freeze M., I'll skip Evo Walker, not sure about the other 3 sets. Overall, 8/10.

I like Eris's new torso. I feel it could be easily reused for a fantasy female warrior (you can pretend Eris's skin is clothing).

Yes, Jawbeast was described by Corydoras as having mantis like claws instead of hands. I hope those aren't the pieces he uses, however- they just don't look sharp enough to me. They're still very interesting pieces, don't get me wrong. I hope they connect in the same way as other HF add on pieces (via two small pins). I'm already thinking about a few ways to use them.

I am SURE at least one HF set uses those pieces. They look like they could make for some great shoulder armour. And I quite like Pixal. Do we know anything about her? ​

I might be wrong, but I think he isn't light bley but sand blue instead.

Am I the only one who doesn't like his head? Seems too goofy and cartoonish- the Crows, Wolves and Crocodiles looked far more malevolent and serious. Unless the Bats are good guys, which would be a first for Lego, but they're fighting one of the 3 good tribes in a set IIRC.

Not sure about his head, but wow- new bat wings! The old ones were a bit outdated. More 2014 pictures coming out. Good, good...

I'm pretty sure vexorian was being sarcastic.

I know it's sort of weird to bump this, but I got Razar for the parts last week and I still haven't disassembled him. Why? Easy, I love him. The guy is just great and the wings are a lot of fun to play with. Looks quite menacing too. I have Worriz too, and while he's in pieces now he's a great figure. I got Laval and Gorzan as well. All 4 figures look impressive and fully armoured. It's no secret I didn't enjoy this year's HF sets very much, especially the Villains (in fact, there are only 2-3 of them I actually consider good sets). And indeed, I only wish the Villains looked more like Razar, Worriz and Cragger- unfortunately the HF Villains were severly limited by the Brains, large expensive pieces that took a lot from the budget of each set (Pyrox being a glaring example, a 13 Euro set with the size and complexity of a 9 Euro figure). And these CHI sets more or less crush the Superhero sets which, while innovative in many aspects, often didn't work well (Joker being the worst offender). These guys are innovative and do look awesome. This is why I'd love a second wave in Summer.

Nothing changed from last week- only Ninjago, Friends and The Hobbit (December wave) got pictures. When the other themes are going to get pics, so will HF.

I've had that idea as well. It just seem too convenient that: 1)The creator of the Brains hasn't shown up yet. 2)BA webepisode ends with Brains still present in a cave (plan B?) 3)2014 story is called Invasion from Below. Corydoras said the Beasts are mostly black. Maybe, just maybe -I know, it's farfetched- they are mutated Black Brains? Either way, I'm sure there's a connection. The Brains, the Beasts and their small minions are all related.

Doesn't mean much, but it's fun to think about it. Hmm, indeed, why making and including a Breez minifig if she doesn't even have her own Machine? I thought she'd get her own in Summer, but your idea sounds feasible too.

Wow, I forgot about that guy. Yes, he's awesome, but he was built just to be repainted IIRC, an experiment of sorts I guess. One thing that I wish they reused from him is the head- what point is there in wasting such a unique and well done part? That head looks properly robotic, evil and serious. I hope the Beast heads give off that feeling - most 2013 Villains looked too cartoony to me.

I thought about "Dark Maker" too. Either way a villain would make more sense since the bad guys are currently out numbered at 5 vs 3.

Hmm..I hope you aren't trolling this time We've been lacking exclusive and 35+ Euro sets since 2010- that's one thing I miss about Bionicle, between exclusives and limited edition it was so unpredictable. As for the size, 2014 is the year of giant villains so a big set makes sense in a way. Will it be a Villain or a Hero mech, though?

The Legend Beasts are 9/10 Euro sets, I wouldn't except something huge. They could be useful for Fantasy settings, I think.

The mechs do feature cockpits, thankfully. I've often wondered how the torso looks since Corydoras gave us the descriptions. My theory is that the torso cladding is replaced by a special cockpit/armour piece, with the right shape and size to house the minifig and attach it, and including a connection point for the cockpit window piece (via clip? Or hinge articulation?). The cockpit would probably feature ball sockets to attach to the torso bone.