Aanchir

My guess? For variety's sake. The 2007 Matoran were a great design, but they didn't have as much variety as the Matoran from the year before, so instead of releasing a full wave of near-identical Matoran the designers decided to divide up the year's small sets between Matoran and Hydruka.

A few notes: first of all, note that Dareth is not wearing the helmet in the flashback picture, and the Ninja are not standing in the same order. This indicates that the two screenshots are not meant to depict the exact same moment, but rather different moments from the final battle's aftermath. Additionally, neither Zane nor Dr. Julien are in the picture. With that in mind, it's entirely possible that the flashback is being shown from Zane's perspective, and consequently, that Dr. Julien could be standing beside him, just as Lloyd's whole family is standing together. I wasn't watching the scene in question too closely, but I don't really see any obvious contradictions. Anyway, yesterday the Fold released their latest Ninjago song, "Spinnin' Out In Color". The music video features video clips submitted by Ninjago fans. It's neat to see how diverse the fans who submitted clips are, especially in terms of age and gender. There's also another song coming out next year called "Eye of the Storm", according to Amazon.com. I'm very much looking forward to it! All of their songs this year have clearly reflected the official Ninjago storyline, which is something I always like in a song based on a particular story or franchise. EDIT: Also realized I never posted another song of theirs from last month, "We Are Ninja":

I liked these sets, even though they weren't perfect. Batman and Iron Man were probably my favorites: Batman because he lacked a lot of superfluous mechanical details, and Iron Man because he indulged in character-appropriate mechanical details. Characters I would have loved to see mostly include some of the really well-known heroes who were left out of the original wave: Superman, Wonder Woman, Wolverine, and Spider-Man. Maybe also some additional villains like Doctor Octopus (who would be quite well-suited to the building system, in my opinion) and Lex Luthor (naturally, in a battlesuit like he has sometimes worn in the comics, rather than a boring business suit).

Just pieces from those sets! It was a really interesting challenge for sure, since obviously a lot of the building techniques that were used for the original Toa Kaita and Toa Nuva Kaita wouldn't work with the 2008 versions. But I still tried to take inspiration from the Toa Nuva Kaita in particular, since they demonstrated more diversity than the original Toa Kaita. In particular, I sought to make Akamai Nuva big, burly, and masculine, and Wairuha Nuva smaller and more effeminate (this image from BionicleLegends on Brickshelf shows the difference in height and physique really prominently). I built a Toa Metru Kaita way back in the day as well, but since I never got pictures of it, I have no idea whether it was actually any good. In that case I do remember keeping more of the traditional Kaita three-torso build, something that's much easier with gearbox-style torsos than it is with beam-style torsos. I haven't really tried building a Kaita-style model with Hero Factory sets, and I honestly don't know how easy or challenging it might be. Certainly it might be difficult to make a model with the same towering height as the original Toa Kaita from smaller sets, since the increased number of hinge points in the legs might make it difficult for the model to support its own weight. Also, since they have beam-style torsos rather than gearbox-style, the classic three-torso build might not be nearly as effective. Still, I'm sure that with enough clever MOCists working on trying to build Kaita models from the new Toa, somebody's bound to come up with a solution!

Thank you! They're some of the oldest BIONICLE MOCs of mine that I'm still really proud of. A lot of my older stuff does not hold up nearly as well in hindsight. If the parts weren't so prone to breaking (some of them, like Wairuha's right hand, are even already broken in those photos) I'd probably take advantage of the instructions I made and rebuild them. Maybe even take better pics this time.

That's only if you think of the parts strictly in terms of what they were originally used for. And in fact, that's part of the reason combi models exist — because often people have to be trained NOT to just think of parts in terms of how they were originally used. Nobody will ever get the most fun or value out of a LEGO set if they think of it solely as a character made of function-specific parts and not as versatile building blocks for original creations. Take this Hero Factory combi model, for example (photo not mine). The technique it uses to beef up the legs and give them an animalistic look is brilliant, and it's a technique I might never have thought of using on my own. But I've actually used it in MOCs now that I've seen it demonstrated. It doesn't matter that the model isn't flawless — it's still beautiful for what it is. There are plenty of older examples, too. The Kraahu from 2004 demonstrates how to make a multi-legged model from Vahki parts. The Kralhi demonstrates some creative ways of using Vahki parts. The Dagger Spider and Lava Hawk both demonstrated how Matoran parts could be put to use to create non-humanoid creatures. Every one of these models uses techniques that might not occur to people who are used to thinking of parts simply in terms of their intent — thinking of tool pieces as tools, and head pieces as heads, and leg pieces as legs, and arm pieces as arms, and mask pieces as masks. You suggest simply making more sets, but the truth of the matter is that most of the time this is neither a goal nor an option. The LEGO Group already releases exactly as many sets each wave as they feel they need to to maximize sales. Release too many sets at any given time, and they compete with each other, potentially resulting in poorer sales for the entire line. Furthermore, the goal of these models is never to satisfy a need for new characters. BIONICLE was already so bloated with characters that could be difficult to make room for certain combi models in the story at all! The combi models are designed to enhance the playability of the sets they're built from and to encourage buyers to think creatively. Writing those models into the storyline is just a bonus that helps further encourage people to build and play with them. In my opinion, the unconventional color schemes for many combi models can actually be an asset rather than a liability. And the reason for that is again to quash narrow-minded thinking at an early age. If you're trained to think that only strict adherence to a narrowly-defined color scheme is acceptable, you limit yourself creatively. It might never occur to some people that a model made from a red set, a green set, and a brown set can still be beautiful if you distribute the colors a certain way. Or for that matter, that any color scheme that they've never seen in sets can be beautiful. I know people make fun of how some kids will build "rainbow warriors" with no regard to color scheme, but training yourself to think the opposite — that there are a limited number of acceptable color combinations — is every bit as hazardous. Just earlier today I was talking with somebody on BZPower who insisted that there was no effort put into this set's color scheme because — I kid you not — black and orange "clash". Never mind that the set only has three main colors which are organized even more logically than the colors on this set that the same person was praising as an example of an organized, sensible color scheme. I recently saw this MOC which has a brilliantly unconventional color scheme. No BIONICLE set has ever used Bright Red, Sand Yellow (Dark Tan), and Warm Gold together. But the chaotic nature of the color scheme is a part of what makes it so exciting. I also have a MOC of my own, built earlier this year, that uses colors together in wild and zany combinations. If the LEGO Group only ever taught kids to use colors together in limited, rigidly-defined color schemes like this, there are many who might never consider "thinking outside the box" in this way — only combining greens with greens, or reds with oranges, or blues with blues. If the LEGO Group doesn't provide official combi models, you can always try to MOC them. I had great fun building Phantoka/Mistika versions of Akamai Nuva and Wairuha Nuva (I even posted instructions here and here if you own the sets and want to try building them yourself).

You're supposed to use your imagination. Just because a piece was designed as a mask doesn't mean you have to use it as a mask or even a face. That's the point of combi models, really — to point out the different ways you can use the parts of one set together with parts from another. The official story roles are just a bonus.

Well, if given the choice between buying them new and buying them used, I'd buy them used without hesitation. Of course, that's in part because I'm not a Ben 10 fan, so the characters themselves have no sentimental value for me — I'd just think of them as parts packs. For a theme like Hero Factory it might be a different story. Same goes for any set that was notorious for having fragile joints, like the later BIONICLE sets — buying them used in that case is a risk I wouldn't be willing to take, unless it was at a convention or yard sale where I had the luxury of inspecting them before I buy.

Even if functions were to come back, I don't know if they'd be in the form of gears. I honestly think a lever/switch that you can push with your thumb, kind of like the ones on the back of the Turaga or Tarakava, would be simpler and more effective. I know the lever for Bruizer's swinging arm function was not the most elegant in its design, but that doesn't mean that there is no good way to integrate a function like that with the CCBS. Gear functions are not the most efficient in terms of space. And the gear functions of most BIONICLE canister sets (Toa Mata, Toa Nuva, Toa Metru, Toa Hordika, etc.) didn't have a whole lot of justification — since the rotational input was identical to the rotational output, they might as well have just used levers. In fact, if you were particularly clever about how you worked the levers into the design, you could even control the two arms move independently like in the case of the Tarakava, rather than having either just a single moving arm or two moving arms linked to the same control point. Considering that a lot of the small figures in the early years of BIONICLE were built mostly from Technic (not BIONICLE) parts anyway, and the Technic parts palette hasn't changed a tremendous amount since then, building smaller figures like that with current parts would not be out of the question. They just wouldn't necessarily have the same articulation as larger figures. Also, smaller CCBS models are totally possible! I built this Matoran as a hypothetical example of what a CCBS Matoran roughly the same size and piece count as a 2003 Matoran might look like. He's very slightly taller (about 13.5 modules tall rather than 12 modules tall), but he's just a simple example of what's possible without getting too large and elaborate. Small creature models are also easy to create, like this dog and this hawk, which are 25 and 26 pieces respectively and have more articulation than most Rahi from BIONICLE's first three years. As it is, it looks like the new BIONICLE sets will stick to mostly the same price points as Hero Factory sets, and the Defenders/Protectors/whatever will thus be closer to the height of the 2004 or 2008 Matoran than their 2003 counterparts (though thankfully, not with such pitiful piece counts). But you shouldn't let that discourage you from modding the sets into smaller versions if that better suits your particular tastes. EDIT: I was just trying to sketch out the Defender/Protector of Fire. I had compared its torso build to Toxic Reapa before, but now I'm thinking it's a bit more like Frost Beast in terms of using Glatorian necks as its shoulders. It also appears to have at least 50 parts — perfectly in line with what I would hope for at the $10 price point! It's also shorter and stockier than the rest of the Defenders/Protectors (it appears to lack knees and elbows).

Just looking at them on Bricklink, all but one of them are available used for $10 or less, a considerable discount from their original $15 price. Jet Ray and Spidermonkey are especially cheap. The only one that IS extremely expensive is Swampfire, which can only be bought for ten or more dollars over RRP. I guess that set's plentiful Sand Green might be the deciding factor in its higher cost.

I don't understand at all why you think those designs were bad (perhaps you could clarify), but it's unfair to hold $8 sets like the Hero Factory 2.0 and 3.0 heroes to the same standard as $13 sets like the Glatorian. The reason they were near-clones is the same reason why sets like the Toa Metru were near-clones: to establish a sense of unity. The heroes were not the ONLY sets in 2011, and the mid-size villains (which actually WERE $13 sets like the Glatorian) showed a much more meaningful level of diversity. I'll admit the Fire Villains were rather awkward and inelegant, but they still attempted to innovate in their own way, such as the reinforced right arm on Drilldozer (oddly, omitted from the set's official images), the wings on Jetbug, and the reinforced left arm on Nitroblast. Meanwhile, the Savage Planet villains were very diverse. Waspix was the plainest, using an extra leg joint, wings, an extra set of arms, and a tail for an insect-like design much like Gorast from 2008. Raw-Jaw brilliantly combined elephant-like and gorilla-like features and proportions, and featured both an articulated jaw and a creatively-armored torso. Fangz used smaller shells creatively for a hyena-like arched back, and was also a quadruped, unlike any previous $13 set. Meanwhile, the variety of sets that use the CCBS has increased greatly since 2011 — calling it the "same build with different add-ons" is completely off-base. The heroes tend to be generic humanoid characters, so of course they tend to have generic humanoid builds, but the amount of complexity and diversity in their "add-ons" increased greatly in 2012 and 2013 (just look at Evo's tank arm, Stringer's sonic cannon, Bulk's high-impact shoulder armor and missile launcher, or Stormer's sword, ice shield, and missile launcher). And the villains of 2012 and 2013 demonstrated amazingly creative designs — just compare Toxic Reapa, Jawblade, Thornraxx, XT4, Bruizer, and Frost Beast. Same build with different add-ons? Not by a longshot. And of course, with the latest Invasion from Below series, nobody with half a brain would insist that they're all "the same build with different add-ons".Stormer Freeze Machine and Rocka Stealth Machine are the only two machine sets that are CLOSE to being generic humanoid designs. And while the beasts are strangely more humanoid and generic in their designs, there are still two — Tunneler Beast and Queen Beast — whose builds are not only completely unlike the other beasts, but also completely unlike any other sets ever built from the CCBS.

Yes. Same with Pirates. But we've been seeing long gaps between Pirates releases lately, and it's starting to seem like the same thing is happening with Castle and Space. Only City seems to consistently rank among the top-selling themes and get new sets every wave.

I've suggested it multiple times (even if the fig always remains exclusive, there's no reason the character has to), but for some reason some people continue to insist that the SDCC versions are perfectly realized depictions of iconic versions of the characters, and any altered versions would fall short of the originals. I personally feel like this is overstating things. The current Han Solo minifigure ostensibly depicts the same version as most previous ones, but has managed to make changes that I consider improvements. And as happy as I am with the current state of minifigure design, it would be shortsighted to assume that all of today's minifigures will always remain the pinnacle of design in hindsight.

Seeing this picture of Kardas Dragon, I was surprised at how bad it looked from that angle, so I did a Google Image Search for Kardas Dragon and found... it's not that photogenic from any angle. Kardas Dragon definitely has a creative and memorable build (that brilliant ribcage!), but as is often the case with combi models, the end result ends up looking somewhat scrappy and even a bit flimsy in places. This is not to say the designers didn't do a good job with that set. Being a designer means working with limitations, and a combi model has even stricter limitations than a typical set since usually your parts palette is already set in stone. Also, Kardas Dragon unquestionably offered a fantastic value for money — just $50 for three sets that would have cost $70 total if purchased individually! It's a little bit strange how that worked out — ALL the titan combi models had the same $50 price, and originally with Takutanuva it was equal to the cost of the individual sets (the $30 Takanuva set plus the $20 Makuta set). Ultimate Dume and Voporak were each built from three $20 sets, so you'd be getting a $10 discount by buying the combi set, and finally Kardas was built from two $20 sets and a $30 set, saving you the full cost of one of the $20 sets!

What makes you so certain that Lord of Skull Spiders is a main villain? It could easily be a secondary villain, like the King Root of the Morbuzakh — which never even EXISTED as a set. In video game terms, the first boss or even a mid-boss, not the end boss. Splitter Beast was the biggest villain from the first wave this year, but I wouldn't call him a "main villain". He was just one beast out of many (or rather, out of three). We didn't get anything approximating a "main villain" until the second half of the year. Likewise, there was no "main villain" in the 2013 Brain Attack series at all, unless you count Dragon Bolt from the second wave. Another note: while there are no other dedicated villain sets in the first year, if the Skull Spiders do in fact perform the same function as Krana or Infected Kanohi, then any of the other sets could be turned into a villain just by swapping their mask for the Skull Spider that their set also includes.

I think they'll probably keep most of those traits in some form or another. After all, those traits weren't assigned arbitrarily — not only were they archetypical, but they were all thematically tied to the characters' elements in some way or another. I know some designers check in on message boards like this occasionally, but I think they'll be more interested in seeing how we react to the sets once they're properly revealed or released than in checking in on us before we even have a totally clear idea what we're talking about.

I'd like to enter! I think I would be a good candidate to represent Eurobricks at NYCC because I have valuable experience from reporting on Toy Fair at New York International Toy Fair in 2012 (you can find links to all my Toy Fair reporting in this topic). Since then I have greatly improved my photography and organizational skills, so I would be able to provide thorough and prompt coverage. I also have an extensive knowledge of LEGO themes past and present. It would be easy for me to get to the event, since there is a train that runs all the way from my hometown to New York City.

That all looks pretty similar to how I see them as well, with the exception of Lewa's. I don't see those wide cheeks like you do, particularly on the gold version. Instead, the shape seems similar to the original Lewa's mask, but with rounder sides, a pointier chin, and a narrow protrusion in the back. Kind of like a cross between Lewa's original Kanohi Miru and Preston Stormer's mask from the Brain Attack series.

Well, it doesn't necessarily work out like that if you just have one character per box. After all, if a kid starts out with just one set, their likelihood of buying a second set will depend at least partly on how much fun they had with the first one. And often having a built-in action play scenario can help with that. Of course, there's no telling if this is something the LEGO Group plans to do for most constraction sets going forward, or if in this case it's a temporary thing designed to help kids "army build" Skull Spiders and make up for this wave's imbalance between heroes and villains.

Well, just to throw the possibility out there... could there be a function built into the back of the sets, similar to what Scarox and Bruizer used but perhaps more refined? Since these Toa still APPEAR to use regular CCBS torso beams, that would require building the function off of the back, just as those two sets did. In my opinion, this would also explain something else that's been puzzling me — the apparent discrepancy between the visible complexity of the sets and their price points and recommended age ranges. Most of them appear to be fairly run-of-the-mill humanoid designs, and if that were the case, surely the mid-size sets would be recommended for ages 6–12 and the large sets for ages 7–14, like the Chima constraction sets. But instead, the recommended age ranges are consistent with this year's Hero Factory sets: 6–12 for the small sets, 7–14 for the mid-size sets, and 8–15 for the large sets. A Technic function would more than justify the increased recommended age range. What's more, without things like the pre-assembled, painted, high-detail head pieces used by the Chima constraction sets eating into the budget, you'd expect them to have higher piece counts than the Chima constraction sets at those price points. A Technic function on the backs would use a lot of pieces in a way that would not be plainly visible from the front of the sets.

I definitely agree that Toa should be much taller than Matoran, but I think most of the people who are worried about the size of the sets would prefer both the Toa AND Matoran to be smaller than what we've seen in the leaked photos.

As of this year, the Chima constraction sets cost exactly the same as Hero Factory sets of similar size ($15 for the mid-size characters, $20 for the large characters). The difference is that the Super Heroes and Chima constraction sets have ALWAYS been priced at $15 previously, whereas mid-size Hero Factory characters had previously been priced at $13 (a price that had actually stayed exactly the same since the Phantoka of 2008). So for two years, there was a price difference of $2.

It's no mystery at all. What incentive could they possibly have for giving their competitors explicit tips on what works and what doesn't? It's not like they have any public shareholders who have to be kept in the loop. And as much as we fans would LIKE to know how our favorite themes compare to one another, none of us need to, and I imagine none of us are going to stop being fans just because the LEGO Group keeps that information from us. Actually the small sets in 2012 were just $9 each. Though that's not a big difference. Multiples of $4 wouldn't make sense to me. Stepping back to $8 for the Defenders? That could be plausible. After all, the 2011 heroes were around that price, and the Defenders don't look TOO much more complex than those. But stepping back to $12 for the mid-size sets? Mid-size sets were $13 for five years before they were bumped up to $15 dollars. So I can't see the LEGO Group dropping them to below their 2008 price. If they found that $13 was too expensive for typical buyers, they'd have dropped those sets' price years ago, but instead they actually raised it as of this year. I'm a bit conflicted about the price points as well. The new Toa appear to be roughly Toa Metru sized, or maybe Toa Inika sized in the case of the larger ones. I would kind of prefer them to be Toa Mata or Toa Nuva sized like the smaller Breakout and Brain Attack heroes, mostly for sentimental reasons. I thought it was really cool when the 2.0 and 3.0 heroes reset things to around those proportions, and was not super-thrilled with how tall the mid-size heroes of the Breakout series ended up. Still, higher price counts should hopefully come with greater complexity and greater piece counts, not just greater height. Also, I was initially worried that with larger Toa, it would be difficult for any villain sets to really measure up effectively. Hero Factory and BIONICLE generally had very few sets higher than the $20 price point, except for larger vehicles, and we haven't even seen a lot of those since Hero Factory came around. But the larger number of sets for BIONICLE's initial wave gives me some hope that it will end up like a lot of other LEGO themes, with the summer wave bringing an assortment of sets at higher price points to supplement the smaller sets from the first half of the year. Truly, when Witch Doctor was first released, I was not terribly fond of him. I felt his towering height was overkill compared to the Toa Mata sized heroes, and that his elaborate design would not do a lot to provide a template for future CCBS titans. Even though I now recognize that Witch Doctor was a beautiful set, I guess I wasn't entirely wrong on either count. But with taller Toa comes the possibility of larger and more elaborate sets once again, and the possibility excites me.

Onua uses the bulky Hulk/Stormer XL/CHI Gorzan chestplate design, and his hammer seems to be a fairly bulky weapon. So even if he's not as tall as Tahu or Kopaka (which is hard to tell, since his pose obscures the length of his legs), I think he could VERY easily merit a similar price point. Overall, Tahu's the only character for whom I am almost completely confident about the length of his legs, which seem to be about the same size as the legs of CHI Fluminox. And even then, I have no idea if his torso is a larger 9x11 torso beam like you normally see for $20 sets, or a smaller 9x9 torso beam. If it's a 9x9 torso beam, then he could be as short as 26 modules tall — the height of Toa Lhikan, Nokama, and Nuju. I expect Gali, Lewa, and Pohatu to be 23 or 24 modules tall, in which case that sort of height difference is negligible.

That is something a lot of people have assumed. The sets call them masters of their elements, but there's no indication that "masters" will be used as a general term for them, or that Toa will not be used as a general term for them. Keep in mind that only ONE "Tahu" set in the past (the 2008 version) has ever been called "Toa Tahu" — the other three were just called "Tahu Nuva" or "Tahu", with the word Toa appearing nowhere in the set name and nowhere on the packaging. The heroes of Ninjago have also been called "the master of fire/ice/earth/lightning" in various media, but that doesn't mean they weren't also called ninja. Well, there's very little chance the small sets are more than $10 unless the United States gets a random price hike. Their piece counts seem about the same as the small 2013 and 2014 sets if not smaller, and the figures themselves are also smaller than most small Hero Factory figures. So you can rest easy there. Also, keep in mind that we have every reason to believe that Tahu, Kopaka, and Onua will be larger and more expensive than the other three Toa (the recommended age ranges, NZD prices, and package sizes vary between the two groups). Based on the NZD prices we were given a few pages back, it seems likely that in the United States the small sets will be $10 each, the medium-sized Toa $15 each, and the large Toa sets $20 each. In that case, it will cost $105 for all six Toa, and around $185 or $190 for the entire collection (I'm not sure of the price for Lord of Skull Spiders, but it's probably $20 or $25). You might be exaggerating things a bit. I don't think the new Tahu is any larger than CHI Fluminox, who is just about 28 modules tall — around the same height as a Toa Inika. 2.0 heroes were around 21 or 22 modules tall, around the same height as a Toa Mata. It's a big difference but not nearly as big as you're making it out to be.