Nabii

Nice, and no offense taken! Perfectly hit the colour balance for the theme. This would have fit in nicely with the early concept models for Alien Conquest!

Time for a hard truth: no monorail set EVER made money for TLG, I've been told that in fact they all lost money and had an incredibly low turn over. Why would TLG want to invest the cost of at least 5 molds (3 tracks, a chassis, and minimum of 1, probably more, on a motor- and a motor is itself a massive investment) and again try to build a theme around a hugely expensive set that most kids do not understand or want rather then in a new theme that will make money? They have tried three times and despite being pretty good sets it has failed each time. Hard as it is for AFOLs to accept Monorail sucks as a toy, otherwise other toy companies would make monorails. I think it'll only ever come back as a LEGO set if in real life monorails replace trains and buses so kids understand what they are. Sorry.

You might be right this news report is all over the gaming news sites: US studio NetDevil has axed a significant portion of its staff, while many connected to the matter are claiming the company is to close. Management at the Colorado-based studio made calls to staff overnight to inform them of their redundancy, according to a blog post from one of their animators. Numerous affected workers have posted an image of tombstones on their personal Facebook pages, etched with “NetDevil RIP”. “Unfortunately a lot of talented folks lost their jobs as we have found out on Facebook,” said one of them. “I personally think it's pretty terrible to find news out that way and not to be correctly notified. We all were receiving phone calls tonight and I just got mine about 2 hrs ago. A handful of artists will be kept on board, for now, to continue work on the studio’s key project, Lego Universe." But he added, “at the moment that will be a very, VERY small team. As the count continues to rise on FB, they've cut over 20 people.

The colour guys at LEGO told me LEGO purple is no harder to get consistent then any other colour, but the human eye is used to Earths atmosphere which tints everything blue and apparently this gives us excellent vision for differentiating purples. Differences in red or grey LEGO bricks are therefore hard to see, purple turned out to be very easy to see, and the bricks all being right next to each other caused the big problem with the Knightbus. So yes currently the Smash n Grab spacecraft is about as purple as LEGO sets can be, (though to help negate the problems caused by human eyesight I've been told the purple colour is much more consistent now then it was before). I pushed the limits by putting several purple elements next to each other in Smash n Grab, but with black bricks between most of them it wasn't considered a major issue. I love LEGO purple - I used it in Exo-Force and Space Police and I'll use it whenever I can in future!

Though this is purely personal opinions from what I’ve picked up, I think these are considered the ‘big’ changes: 1. Starting to make toys instead of furniture during the great depression. 2. The fire that burnt down the wooden toy factory. Many workers slept above the factory and it is considered a minor miracle no one was injured. The move to plastic was only decided following this fire! 3. The plastic toy tractor that sold insanely well in Germany and allowed TLG to buy the brick patent from the British inventor. 4. The invention of the LEGO tubes allowing the bricks to bind together. 5. The creation of small plates for the LEGO modular architecture series for adults to design their own house in the 1960’s. Before this the only 1/3 brick high elements were relatively large base plates. 6. LEGOLAND. 7. Adding technology to the bricks, from early trains through to today’s NXT, this striving to remain at the cutting edge has been considered crucial to TLGs future for over three decades now. 8. The mini-figure. Created by Jens Nygaard Nielsen for LEGO space sets and instantly jumped on for earlier inclusion in all mini-figure scaled sets (hence many early town sets with mini-figures were designed before the figures were included and cannot fit the figure in them!) 9. Star Wars. The first (and best) license. 10. Galidor, the first attempt at multi-media story telling. Yes it was a failure, but everything learned here was then used for Bionicle and many other LEGO themes. 11. Bionicle, almost by accident a buildable action figure line was created and then combined with the learning’s from Galidor’s failure to be fine tuned to a decade long story and best selling toy line. 12. The early/mid 2000’s reorganization. After a decade of losing sight of the core idea of LEGO being a construction toy and consequent slipping sales, Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen returned to appoint new leadership and as part of this culled many of the LEGO elements in existence, cutting parts from over 12.000 to between 6 and 7,000. Also shutting down LEGO Computer Games and beginning to license out computer games. 13. Return to the core, the idea of the evergreens of City, Space, Castle, Duplo and Technic – and arguably Star Wars – always being in the line up. 14. Colouring raw plastic with dye instead of buying pre-coloured plastic. 15. LEGO Board Games, LEGO Mini-figures and LEGO Universe (believe it or not). The last one might be surprising to you, but they are the first real signs after years of hard work of regained confidence in the core of the company allowing experimentation into other types of product. As AFOLs the hiring of Jamie Berrard and Nathaniel Kuipers could also be seen as important, their success and hard work opened the door for more adult fans to be hired. What’s generally doesn’t seem to be considered a company turning point is the grey to new-grey (bley) change, it was a ‘minor thing’ at the time and the backlash was completely unforeseen and unexpected. It has however had a big effect and any changes are now considered very carefully for any possible impact on AFOL collectors/builders before deciding if they will be carried out. But this is only what I’ve picked up, I’ve probably put things on here The LEGO Company wouldn’t but they seemed important to me when I learned about them! And I’m sure I’ve missed out a ton of stuff. (BTW These days Chinese produced mini-figures and the plastic are identical to the western produced ones. There are identical measurements to the molds and even the same batches of plastic sent to the different factories around the world, so any differences should be insignificant. If you have had the printing flake off your mini-figure or the arms or legs fall off I’m willing to hear the complaint, but anything else is starting to sound like the automatic assumption in the 1950’s that Japanese products were inferior, it’s just wrong. There will always be minor differences between factories, slightly different mold temperatures or polishing to the mold, but the variation from China should not be any more then that between Europe and North America.) Nabii.

Ah. Okay, sorry I forget about that, it's never been available anywhere I've lived and you're right it is the sort of content that would be nice in a LEGO publication, but Brick Journal isn't a bad option particularly now it can be bought on Shop at Home (in the books area). Cheers Aanchir! Mark.

Okay, clearing up a few misconceptions for those who can't be bothered to read the whole thread (it's only 3 pages guys, it's not that much information to go through). Killzone - Read the thread before you make such a know it all comment, unless you're a troll, in which case congratulations you annoyed me enough to bite! It's real. ThatLLDGuy - This is from around 1984 it pre-dates ALL of the underwater themes LEGO has ever done, it's got nothing to do with Atlantis or today's sets. Hewman - It's BRICKJOURNAL, I took (or scanned) these pictures. I've never heard of the magazine you claim it's from. Snefroe - I wish I could find prototype pictures from that early, this mid 80's is the earliest files I've been able to track down, maybe one day I'll find earlier but for now there's no chance of classic space! And I don't know about any problems with the monorail motor but if that's true you could be right. Cheers, Mark.

From what I understand this is about the same as all the US events charge just for people to display their MOCs to the public, but in this case you get two private days including talks, lectures and show and tells from LEGO Designers, TT Games Designers, LEGOLAND Designers/builders and a bunch of other LEGO specialists. Seem like a good deal to me, but I would say that, I'm one of the confirmed LEGO Designers who will be there. Anyway, there is now a press release, just hinting at some of the funky goodies the organizers are throwing the way of the attendees: AFOLCON Press release - it's a PDF (sorry). Believe me this is going to get more and more exciting as we get closer to the date and myself and the other guests can start to confirm what we will have there. Plus there are only a limited number of spaces - just a heads up in case you decide to go too late! Cheers, Mark.

Actually I threw my MOCs in the display cabinet because on the first and last day of LEGOWorld none of the other Designers had enough material to help fill it up! They were not made as part of development, they were made at home with my own bricks, prototype models are the property of LEGO and I can't put them on my MOCpages/brickshelf (though I'd love to). Most of the visitors would never be spot this, but I guess Eurobricks is all seeing! The large spacecraft in the 'Galaxy Patrol' picture is by Tim Ainley (Squidman himself), but it was considered to be too Mars Mission in Design, and the function too complex to make building instructions for our age group, however his loss was my gain as I got to design Galactic Enforcer. Those prison pods looked great, but did not have the pop open function that was required. The car is of course the original concept model by Adam Grabowski (Mister Zumbi) that I got to adapt for the 'Hyperspeed Pursuit' set. And yes, the 6890 was the inspiration for that sketch model, it's one of my all time favourite LEGO sets, believe it or not there's room for a droid (same one as the Galactic Enforcer) that fits in just behind the cockpit! Cheers, M.

If you mean Shop@Home sets (Taj-Mahal, Star Wars Shuttle etc.) than yes, there has been a Shop at Home stall selling only these sets (so as not to interfere with the standard retail store sets in the onsite toy-shop) for the last several years, but they tend to sell out well before the final day, so get there in the first few days if you can. The second hand/bricklink stores also have their best stuff on sale at the start too! See you there! Mark.

Anyone come signed up for this? AFOLCon Website Seems like a mixture of a US style event, European events and something new. The guests look pretty good so far! Should be cool.

Bjarke the LEGO Quality guy was at the Skaebaek LEGOfan weekend last week and gave a couple of talks about LEGO quality to the fans who were there. First - exactly the same plastic, bought from the same plastic manufacturers, is used for the china figures as the rest of them, there is no difference, and all measurements are exactly the same to within 1000's of a millimetre. There might slight surface finish differences due to use of different molds. Second - LEGO colour is added across the world using chemical colouring bought from various chemical companies, the same batches can be used across all the LEGO factories so it should be close to identical. However the colouring is bought from several suppliers (apparently buying only from only one company would be a problem if they have a fire or something and LEGO cannot get colour for their bricks until the chemical companies factory is rebuilt!). Anyway, one company has drifted slightly green in it's yellow dye and one has moved slightly orange - though well within LEGO's strict tolerances when these two batches are used alongside each other it can be obvious they are different. As minifure hands and arms are different types of plastic I guess they were coloured using these different batches of colourant? That would explain the issue some of us are having. According to Bjarke the colourants are now both being returned to a more centre of LEGO's yellow colour and this problem should therefore disappear in the next year or so.

I think it’s our obsession with this cool little plastic building bricks that means that whenever LEGO talk about their competition it almost always swings to a discussion about clone brands (Mega, Oxford, BestLock whoever) and their ability, or not, to quickly copy LEGO’s themes rather than the reality of LEGO’s business. They are in the TOY market, their completion is everything: Barbie, Hotwheels. Top-trumps, Pokemon, bicycles and Halo and Mario video games, anything that kids (or parents) can spend their entertainment budget on. Leaks probably cannot be turned around in time by the clone brands, but they can alter the colour or content of some cheap plastic toys that already have moulds ready to go in China, Malaysia or Taiwan. Anyone notice how quickly ‘spy’ toys turned dark blue and silver in the wake of LEGO agents, or how many toy submarines are suddenly red (instead of the yellow predominant ever since the Beatles sang ‘Yellow Submarine’) and branded with ‘Atlantis’ on their cheap packaging in the toy shops today? These cheapo brands don’t get the LEGO retail catalogue, they search the internet for images of toys with western appeal, the easier and earlier they can get hold of these the quicker they can impact or ride on LEGO’s marketing. No, we fans are not going to be fooled, we know LEGO is the product to buy, but how many times has a relative bought you something *like* the product you actually wanted? All granny has to do is remember you wanted a red submarine and something to do with Atlantis, and you end up with some cheapo rubbish that copied the colour scheme and theme they saw LEGO was going to use next year. It impacts sales, no doubt about it, and it’s LEGO’s right to restrict where and who sees these images and if we claim to be fans we should support them in this. Hell, they can’t stop us sharing the images in private on email or whatever, but if they turn up on public image sharing sites they have every right to stamp on it, and honestly we should probably be helping them.

There is a registry on Neo-Classic Space showing most of the numbers that have been used so far: Neo Classic Space Registry Cheers, Nabii.

Here's mine: 11th Doctor on MOC Pages Cheers, Mark.

1. Yes. 2. Whole series - particularly if the mini-figures are unique in the sets. 3. Parthenon - preferably as it was in it's glory days rather then today's ruins (Include some Greek figures and I'll buy two!) 4. A big spaceship - it's time LEGO made an official non-Star Wars spaceship of over 100 studs in length! Preferably a civilian cargo transporter or an exploration ship with lots of equipment for new planet exploring on board! 5. It would be nice if S@H sets came in a larger variety of price points, sometimes I'd love to buy a smaller adult aimed set (around $50ish) that concentrated on interesting building techniques, some new elements and where I end up with a beautiful display model (that I actually have room to display)! It won't stop me buying the normal retail sets, but might get me buying some more S@H models instead of computer games - I more often have $50 free to spend at the end of a month then $300!

I spoken to both the LEGO Designers of Classic Space through to Ice Planet and the new generation of today. They have the same things in common; they build what is cool, what appeals to kids and what is iconic to the genre of Science Fiction at the time. The Designers of the 70s through to mid 90's grew up on Forbidden Planet, From the Earth to the Moon, 2001 and the original Star Trek. Spacemen in their era were educated explorers interested in the expansion of knowledge and using semi-realistic technology. And men walked on the moon. A spacesuit is a necessity. The Designers of today grew up with Star Wars, the original Battlestar Galactica, 5th Element and Starship Troopers. Space is an exciting new frontier ready for colonizing and full of dangerous foes and almost magical technology. The heroes are every-men or rogues with a golden heart and the atmosphere can be maintained by force fields and magnetic shielding, realistic spacesuits are therefore optional. In reality there is a far too frequently exploding spaceplane, a space telescope and space stations. In 15 years todays kids will be there at LEGO - brought up on Stargate Universe, Ironman, Michael Bay's Transformers and District 9 - and in reality possibly no-manned space exploration. I'm willing to bet tomorrow's fans will think their work is not good enough too. But the basic truth is no matter how good or bad or retro-styled a set is it will not make you 7 or 8 years old again and you will never quite have the same enthusiasm or feelings of awsomeness that you did then. Sorry, you've grown up. BTW - Great review. Thanks for doing this. Cheers, M.

If anyone is really interested in the new laws and directives LEGO and all other toy companies operating worldwide now have to work with they can try to hack their way through these: New 2010 European Toy Safety Directives US Consumer Product Safety 2008 (Only the part relating to toys) Best of luck. Nabii.

Really nice MOC.

I wrote the Brick Journal Article. These are genuine LEGO concepts from the early 1990's that I was given special permission to use ONLY in Brick Journal (These images have been scanned in and used without crediting either Brick Journal, Joe Meno or myself and without any indication of how they have been obtained - ignoring the rudeness it is of a breach of Brick Journals copyright too!) But putting that aside; the original article is in issue 6 and is an interview with Jens Nygaard Knudsen - the creator of the Mini-figure and LEGO Space (he headed LEGO Space from 'classic' space until the end of Ice Planet). Sea-Tron is one of the concepts that became Aquazone - the most interesting thing for me (and explanation of the 'tron' post-fix) was that it was conceived of as a space theme - it is an alien water-world, much like Ice Planet is a frozen water-world, hence the alien mini-figure. This idea was actually carried over into the final sets of Aqua-zone, but was never communicated to the public. This means that anyone who thinks they are LEGO-Space complete in their collections had better make sure they have the Aquazone sets! And yes, in some ways the figure is the ancestor of Frenzy as it was the same LEGO Designer who sculpted both! Cheers, Nabii.

Those are just printed editions of the digital issues (volume 1 of Brick Journal), although they are a good read in themselves they will not complete your collection of volume 2 (the printed magazine). Send me a PM and either I can put you in touch with the European Editor who still has one or two copies of the early issues to sell - though postage might be a bit pricey or if in the US, I might still be able to help. BTW if you are in the USA Brick Journal is now available on Shop@Home - why not in Europe TLG??

LEGO is a Danish company - they still pay most of their staff and their all of their corporate tax in Denmark. The only way to truly check if prices are going up is to compare the historical value of your local currency (be it Euro, USDollar or whatever) with the Danish Krone over the last few years and see if the prices have gone up or down. I have a feeling that in Danish Krone the US prices have gone down, but of course that is because the USDollar has been devalued when the economy was badly damaged by bad bank loans and a subsequent recession, you can try to blame the LEGO Group for this if you like but that seems a little unfair! It's a bit tougher to explain price differences between Euro-zone countries however - even given local taxes...

Great review. Thanks Government Guy!

Brick Journal is fully supported by LEGO, it has at least two articles in every issue from deep inside the development of LEGO sets or/and from the history side of LEGO. Plus features instructions, interviews, MOC showcases and discussions with LEGO fans from around the world. What else would you want an AFOL magazine to provide?

A couple more from the business cards on Brick journals site! Brick Journal business cards 2 Cool!