Aanchir

That's not the business of the writers, it's the business of the set designers. Nya's role in the Stone Army arc was reduced in part because the 2013 set lineup was not very big, leaving less room for a huge cast of characters (only one of the Ninja, Lloyd, even appeared in more than one set) and less budget for new minifigures. Also, the set designers and show creators may have been concerned that her samurai outfit and mech would make her allegiance unclear to younger viewers, when at that point in the story she should have been very clearly on the side of the Ninja. By having her in her classic outfit in the show and omitting her from the set (bringing her classic outfit back in the sets was probably not a plausible option once it had been out of use for a year), that potential confusion was eliminated. And from the viewer's perspective, it's not hard to imagine she just didn't get an opportunity to retrieve it before she and the Ninja left Ninjago. Overall, I liked the most recent season. It was good to have some "filler episodes" that could explore wacky scenarios without upsetting the continuity, and I think the Stone Army arc was handled marvelously. The Mega-Weapon was eliminated from the story in a very confusing fashion, and that probably could have been handled a bit better, but the time travel story was still a neat concept to explore, and a good way to finish up that filler arc so that the story could start fresh with the Stone Army. Anyway, Takanuinuva, I agree with your theory about why the Ninja didn't use their NRG forms after their weapons were stolen. From a storytelling sense, it would have completely defeated the point of them losing their elemental powers if they could just turn them back on at full, mind-blowing capacity whenever they needed to. So having them lose their NRG forms as well as their other non-Spinjitzu powers gave the loss of the golden weapons a little bit more impact. Of course, that doesn't explain why after they got their elemental swords they didn't go back to using their NRG forms when they had fought themselves into a corner.

True, but I'm just hoping the four female characters in Chima are an indication that this trend might be changing and the LEGO Group is aware of it. Of course, it's possible that kids just aren't as likely to discriminate by gender when dealing with animal characters. Only TLG can really tell us what their reasoning was, but overall, I think we're getting to a point in society where gender differences aren't as much of a hurdle when it comes to identifying with characters. I read this article recently that dealt with that issue. It may be overly optimistic to think this breaking of gender barriers is immediately going to apply the same way to toys and merchandise as it does to media, but I have to hope we're heading in that direction. Who knows? Perhaps if enough adults are willing to look beyond gender in both toys and media, that cultural shift will eventually begin to rub off on the younger generation.

True. I don't think Ninjago has nearly as bad a problem with gender issues in story as in the sets. Still, the sets are the foundation of the theme, so it's a problem that should be addressed. As a BIONICLE fan, I recognize it's a tricky issue. With action figures in particular, boys are not as likely to buy visibly female characters. BIONICLE only once exceeded a ratio of one female character to every five male characters. In 2009, there was only one female character out of twenty-four characters with specific genders. It only had three female villain sets in its entire lifespan (its successor, Hero Factory, hasn't had a single female villain, and only one of the nine recurring heroes is female). BIONICLE, like Ninjago, had its share of dedicated female fans, but most of them were interested primarily in the theme's deep, character-driven story, not its sets. Still, it's frustrating to see girls who are passionate about the Ninjago story, but who have barely any female characters in the sets for them to identify with, and no female villains they can use as a foil. Sure, Nya's a pretty awesome character who is talented at building and engineering as well as fighting (even in her debut appearance, she was established to be a better blacksmith than Kai, even if her only story role was as a damsel in distress). But suppose a girl has a very different personality, or very different interests? Is it any surprise that about 90% of the original Ninja characters I've seen illustrated are female characters designed to offset the theme's imbalanced gender ratios? I don't want to get my hopes up too high this year, but wouldn't it be awesome if one or more of the Nindroid baddies were female, or if Misako were added to the sets? I'd certainly love that, and I'm sure a lot of the theme's female fans would as well. Of course, as far as social progress is concerned, I'm glad so many female fans have been able to identify with the theme's male characters in spite of their gender. But I feel like girls who love Ninjago deserve more diverse options.

Chima is better than a lot of past action themes, with FOUR female characters out of thirty minifigures, and at least one other in the show. I hope it's a sign of things to come. I've seen a large number of dedicated Ninjago fangirls online, and TLG really ought to try and capitalize on the theme's potential appeal with that demographic.

Being on Brickset isn't confirmation of any kind. They're getting those names from the same source we are, so if you are skeptical about that source, Brickset doesn't make the names any more reliable.

STAMPs were also an issue with the Maersk train a few years ago. I wonder if perhaps some of the STAMPs are a mandate from Maersk, so their logos and trademarks don't have to be chopped up into several sections. I hate STAMPs, but having grown up in the 90s I'm fairly used to them. Hopefully nothing a careful cut with a craft knife can't fix. Stickers in general have never been a problem for me. Maybe the containers could have been printed since so many are identical, but I feel like sets with lots of unique and specialized prints just seem wasteful, and those can be a necessity in a licensed product where the accurate patterns and textures can't be achieved with bricks alone. Anyway, this set looks lovely. Love that engine, and the little window showing it off. The scale is impressive, as is the detail. Look at the little lifeboats!

It's an excellent book. I can't guarantee it will maintain everything you find most compelling about the Hitchhiker's Trilogy, but Eoin Colfer is a great writer and I feel like he did an admirable job maintaining the trademark humor of the series. Better to read it and form your own opinions than to skip it on the off chance it won't meet your expectations, I'd wager.

Just because high-quality pictures don't normally appear this early doesn't mean they don't exist this early. Chances are that if production of these sets hasn't started yet, it will soon, so final art would be needed for the packaging and instruction manuals. And K-Mart has leaked high-quality, finalized images this early before. Just this year, I believe we got pics of the Hero Factory sets 40012 Evo and 40013 Aquagon in April on the K-Mart site, when those sets were due to be released in August. Anyway, I don't think the ramp is that silly. Maybe Lloyd or Cole used his earth powers to pull up a strip of asphalt.

Another tip: if you just want a parts list, you can click File>Export BOM to create a spreadsheet!

I like the bags because you can collapse them flat to save space, but unlike boxes you can go back and use them for storage without having to tape them up. Basically takes canisters and boxes and combines the best of both worlds. At least they've never used blister packs like Ninjago spinner sets or Chima Speedorz sets.

Post office, no, but there IS a pizza restaurant in this year's 60026 Town Square. Furthermore, this year LEGO City got its first museum ever in 60008 Museum Heist. Overall, I feel like we're seeing more buildings in LEGO City since the LEGO Group's designers have shifted towards giving even the perennial Fire and Police themes complete play scenarios, so we have an abandoned house in 60003, a creepy old boat shed in 60009, and of course the aforementioned museum in 60008. It's a far cry from the days when the only emergencies for the LEGO City police to respond to were breakouts from their own prisons! I think this is a great way of giving the kiddies what they love while also giving us AFOLs a little bit more diversity for our own LEGO cities, and I hope to see that trend continue. Anyway, back on topic, I think it's possible 70725 or 70726 might have some substantial structures, since they're likely the biggest sets for this upcoming wave. But there also could be more structures in the summer sets (assuming Ninjago isn't simply switching to an every-other-wave release schedule like LEGO Castle). Let's not forget that one of the criticisms of the FIRST wave of Ninjago was its lack of buildings (other than Garmadon's Dark Fortress, the closest thing it had to a building was the Spinjitzu Dojo, which was more of an open-air arena). Then the summer sets wowed us with the Fire Temple and Blacksmith Shop.

Seriously? This year's LEGO City had eight buildings, the most since 2009 — and that's not even counting the City Corner re-release. Only three out of over twenty LEGO Friends sets this year are focused on vehicles, while last year had more than twice that. There are plenty of non-fig-based themes that lack buildings entirely, such as LEGO Architecture and LEGO Minecraft. The new Castle theme has a vehicle in every set, if you count siege engines, but four out of the five sets also include a structure of some kind. Only one of this year's Lord of the Rings sets has a vehicle of any kind in it, and none of the Hobbit sets have had vehicles. (that will change this year, since at least one of the sets due for release towards the end of this year has a boat in it). Meanwhile, just grabbing a few random examples, there were just two buildings in Town sets released in the year 2000 (a fire station and an Arctic base). Like this year, there were only three major edifices in Castle sets in the year 2000, but that's out of more than four times as many Castle sets as this year. Many of the other sets included siege engines and nothing else of consequence. You're welcome to complain about things that you think LEGO should be doing more of these days, but you ought to have some perspective, unless you feel thirteen years ago still counts as "now-a-days". I would also like some kind of larger buildings or structures, and hope there will be some in the other sets we haven't seen yet, but I don't feel like there's anything particularly undesirable about vehicle sets.

The HF summer set names and numbers from that list are almost certainly just a hoax, and the official set names that accompany them (notably, all from January or May releases) are just included to make the fake names seem more believable. I'm not sure if the person who owns that Brickshelf account created the fake names himself or found a list someone else had created, but either way they were created just to deceive people. The similarity of "Hunter" and "Core Drainer" to "Core Hunter" may be complete coincidence, or it may be that at the time the list was created, there had more official hints somewhere (like a book synopsis) and the creator of this list based some of those names on said hints. EDIT: Random thing I just saw on the LEGO website: LEGO Hero Factory Music Video.

As far as spinner sets are concerned, the NRG Ninja (9570 NRG Jay, 9572 NRG Cole, 9590 NRG Zane, and 9591 Weapon Pack) are easily the finest. The minifigures are beautiful designs with stunning metallic printing, and are exclusive to these sets. The spinners also have very nice printing — instead of character emblems of similar iconography, there are simply swirling elements that, together with the transparent-colored surfaces, really do a great job representing Spinjitzu powers. Even Chokun's spinner in the Weapon Pack is nice, and can be used as a spinner for Lloyd ZX if you decide not to get his dedicated spinner set. The sets also include some great weapon parts. The one I'd most highly recommend is 9591 Weapon Pack, which gives you the most parts for your money and a great assortment of useful weapon pieces. 2516 Ninja Training Outpost is a great army-builder and parts pack for people who aren't interested in the Ninjago story, since it has the black ninja Cole in his plainest robes. Easily one of the best impulse sets, especially since you stated you're primarily a historic themes builder. Among more sci-fi sets, 70500 Kai's Fire Mech or 9441 Kai's Blade Cycle would make a lovely first purchase. The former is just a really well-refined and compact mech that is fun to pose and play with, while the latter has an amazing spreading-blades function. Both are nice and sleek in their design. And regarding the more massive sets, 2507 Fire Temple is a work of art, not just architecturally but in terms of functions. It's got a great selection of minifigures too. The dragon is also a work of art — despite having a lot of joints, it balances curves and sharp angles just about as well as non-brick-built dragons and monsters. It would be a fantastic purchase either as a display piece or a parts pack. The set as a whole has a decent price-per-piece and is a great way to acquire all four of Ninjago's signature golden weapons. It's another set I'm perfectly happy to recommend to a historic themes builder.

His robes end up in the wash with Lord Garmadon's. In all seriousness, I don't really anticipate a "purple ninja", though General Cryptor DOES have purple trim on his robes, and it's possible some other Nindroid characters might have the same. Rumors about a purple ninja have been circulating since the Green Ninja was revealed: it's easy to assume that we'll see a new ninja each year. A lot of people want or expect said purple ninja to be Garmadon, but I don't think he's any more likely to take on the role of a ninja than Sensei Wu, and will probably just play the role of a second mentor to the ninja and a father to Lloyd. As for timeline placement, I imagine this will take place a little bit after the series left off, but not as huge a difference in time as between Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. The Ninja will have had a bit of downtime since the Overlord's attack, but they will not have aged or matured noticeably (of course, Ninjago's timeline has always been a bit peculiar anyway, so that's pretty much a given).

Actually, the name of the setting (New Ninjago City) makes me think it's set after the previous arc, and New Ninjago City is built on what was previously the Overlord's dark continent.

Lovely sets and figs! The one vehicle I was uncertain about was Cole's mech, which looks rather bare-bones, but it became a lot cooler when I read the descriptions and realized it can attach to Jay's vehicle. Its torso still looks kind of scrawny, but I love the cockpit, feet, and claw-cannons. I wonder what they look like when connected. Lloyd's bike is cool, although I wish it had a sticker with Lloyd's emblem or something similarly magical-looking. It is probably the most lacking vehicle in terms of play features, though the enemy vehicle makes up for it. Kai's plane is cool. I'm curious what play featurers it will have. It's definitely not going to displace Jay's Storm Fighter in the "awesome plane" category, but it's still pretty cool. Random side-note: the Techno-Blade piece has been in LDD since the last update! Its Design ID is 15621.

Not to mention that Stringer was missing from the early 2011 roster, and people weren't used to the idea that HF heroes don't do all their missions together.

Not really. Using villains who were captured in missions other than the ones we'd seen helps to establish that the Hero Factory has been fighting villains for decades, plus avoids repetitive sets and story. Using villains who had appeared in less than two years of existing HF sets would have made the galaxy's criminal underbelly seem rather small and pitiful, IMO. Perhaps one or two "legacy villains" could have been used, but I think introducing nine new villains resulted in much more exciting sets and a much more exciting story. "Fusion villains" might have been more interesting, but I think brand-new characters ended up being better still. The Breakout villains ended up being some of my favorite villain characters.

Yes indeed. Transparent colors DO appear somewhat funny on LDD sometimes, though I don't think any are quite as misleading as Tr. Fluore. Green. That's the only one that I think really needs a major adjustment. Most of the others do not appear considerably different than the "visual shorthand" you'd see for those transparent colors in modern-day instruction manuals.

Bricklink's Trans-Dark Blue is already in LDD and has been from the beginning. Its official name is 43 Tr. Blue. 42 Tr. Light Blue is Bricklink's Trans-Light Blue, 143 Tr. Fluore. Blue is Bricklink's Trans-Medium Blue, and 229 Tr. Light Bluish Green (not on the default color palette in any mode) is Bricklink's Trans-Very Light Blue. Sheet two of this spreadsheet I created cross-references Bricklink color names with official color-names. The Peeron color list does the same, though it basically treats official and Bricklink color names as having a 1:1 relationship, which means there are errors that can be somewhat misleading here and there. Superkalle's LDD Manager software also has a color lookup section with a convenient chart comparing Bricklink names with the official ones used in LDD.

You forgot to mention Bulk, who, just like Stormer, has also appeared in five sets to date. But at the same time, no hero so far has appeared in fewer than three sets, and all but Nex and Stringer have appeared in at least four sets, so Rocka's number of set appearances isn't really too far from the norm. He was probably chosen to appear in a second set in 2013 just because he was the hero the set designers and focus groups decided would look coolest in the jetpack. That hardly seems to me like he could be considered "overmarketed". I'm going to decline to speak on the 2014 lineup just because it is still extremely vague what the contents of each set will be.

I don't think HF minifigure-based playsets are a terribly unworkable idea, but at the same time I certainly wouldn't want or expect them to replace constraction sets, and I feel like they'd be quite lackluster unless you took advantage of the possibility of making location-based sets as well as vehicles and whatnot. I strongly doubt that there will be any Hero Factory playsets anytime soon. Kalhiki, your idea of what the "Machines" might be sounds cool to me. Reminds me a bit of Rescue Heroes. Of course, it still leaves the question of price point up in the air. Even Brain Attack Surge is at the $13 price point. Now, the smaller price point has been increasing in base price every year for the past couple years (it's currently $10), so it's possible that TLG might do away with it entirely, but I'm not entirely convinced that would be a good move.

One thing I contemplated last year is that the Brain Attack helmets could be reused next year, but instead of visors, they could have unique accessories like the 2.0 wave had. It's not especially likely, but it was just a thought regarding how the versatility of those helmets could be expanded. If that does happen, a Bright Yellowish Green version of Breez's helmet would be a nice treat, though I'm personally quite happy it exists in Silver Metallic — it's much more versatile that way, and being one of the most explicitly feminine masks in existence, more versatility for MOCs is a very good thing. Regarding the question that comes up every time about "why does ______ get an XL form?"... it's same reason as always: because the designers thought it would make a cool or popular toy. It has NOTHING to do with whether a hero "deserves" such a form. It's not a special reward for certain characters. It's just a way of diversifying sizes and price points, just like how we have had small and mid-size heroes since 2012. An Evo XL will be cool in my book simply because we haven't had a big yellow set since BIONICLE, and because I figure Evo will look epic as an XL character. A Breez XL would also be epic (I've tried designing one on LDD, to little avail), but there are some more complications there, not least of which is that she's a female character. With a decidedly feminine physique, she might not sell as well, while giving her a generic pumped-up masculine physique at a scale that allows for greater freedom would be a major disappointment. Anyway, I can't disagree with Chro's theory that the "Vs." names might just be based on catalog images or misinterpreted captions. I think it's highly implausible that each of the "Vs." sets would have two or three full-size characters in it. The other, absolutely ridiculous possibility is that the characters WILL be smaller and will be based on the new ball joints in the Mixels. I'd love to see those ball-and-socket joints in other themes. But that would be bittersweet if it means the CCBS that has been so brilliantly engineered over the past several years becomes obsolete. It would also seem like a tremendously risky move if it meant the new sets would not be as compatible with older sets as with each other. In one of Advance's behind-the-scenes videos about the Hero Factory theme, "multiple sizes of ball joints" was even included on a list of "ways to #### up the building system" (no joke).

Some parts of this list sound a little dubious, but at the same time, if it is real it is interesting what the prospects for next year might be. Five heroes, same as the first Breakout wave, but it sounds like they're repeated across multiple sets, which is VERY peculiar... makes me think that either the heroes, on average, will be smaller, or the sets, on average, will be larger. Of course, it could be that the set names for the "Vs." sets are just misleading and those will actually be independent villain sets. Not 100% convinced that this list is authentic, but if it is, it's very intriguing.