Aanchir

You're not at all the only one to notice that. I mentioned both things in multiple posts. In fact, Evo's the main one I'm upset about with the change in Hero Core color and eye color, because there's no trace of his old colors. Furno has yellow flame print and transparent fluorescent green eyes, Breez has red torso print and transparent fluorescent reddish orange eyes, Rocka still has a white Hero Core, and Surge has lime arms and transparent fluorescent green eyes. The only one without a trace of eye or Hero Core colors he had before is Evo, and it's a little bit jarring for me. I fully expect Breez's ankle rockets and Furno's pike to stay at this point. My reason for thinking this is that unlike Black Phantom, all of the new parts we have seen on the Hero sets look to be finalized. If the intention were to use a different, not-yet-designed part for these sections of the heroes and villains, then I'd expect to see a preliminary part design rather than an already-existing part-- especially because the Hero pics seem to be renders and so the physical existence of the new part would not be a limitation. Anyway, why do Toxic Reapa's tanks work better for you than Breez's rockets and Furno's pike? IMO, the System parts on the Heroes work way better than Reapa's tanks because there are no obvious studs, whereas the studs on the System parts used on Reapa are almost annoyingly exposed. I don't think that the torso piece's "six pack" is really evocative of either gender. Muscles aren't normally that well-defined on women, but they're also not normally that well-defined on men who aren't bodybuilders. It's just meant to imitate the shape of the abdominal muscles, which isn't much different between males and females-- females just tend to have more fat covering them up so they're not as well-defined.

About people complaining, or about collectible minifigures not needing extra pieces as a safeguard? Frankly, since I haven't heard many horror stories about collectible minifigures being missing pieces, I think the "more precise equipment" scenario is most likely. Especially considering that the collectible minifigures are some of the smallest sets by far, so a more precise weight check would be extremely important. There's a cost component to it too, of course, in that including extra pieces in a set that isn't likely to be missing pieces is just a flat-out waste of money. So yes, TLG is "being cheap" in that regard. But it's not as though they stopped caring about your personal collection of extras-- the fact is they're being just as "cheap" as they are in any other set, and never cared about giving you useful extra pieces in the first place.

That robot doesn't look that much like Wall-E... not compared to the robot from Mars Mission which actually had a chest compartment. Proportions on this one are maybe closer, but I think in general it's just a generic "cute robot" look. I like these minifigures... For my own collection, I'd be more likely to buy them if they were regular minifigures. But again, people who want regular minifigures can just as easily buy regular minifigures as they could before this theme, and contrary to what was expected next year's City sets have a somewhat generous concentration of females even than sets in some past years. Meanwhile, they're not much less compatible with today's minifigures than Exo-Force figs or "fleshies" from licensed themes. Being particularly nitpicky, I don't even use figs without the modern "eye sparkle" together with ones that predate the eye sparkle. So these figs all in all aren't anything outrageous to me in the long run. All in all I think compatibility with regular minifigures is overrated in some respects. Not everyone has the same love affair with the minifigure that AFOLs do. A girl graduating out of Duplo might not object at all to these figs-- and a good thing too, since TLG's market research suggests many girls leaving the Duplo age range tend to stop playing with LEGO altogether. It's entirely possible that those girls could be a key component of the market this theme is meant to appeal to.

I noticed! Also, the studs on top and anti-studs on the bottom are now aligned the same way. This means that the brick separator itself might be easier to incorporate in MOCs, if you have a good use for it. Of course, it feels a bit sad saying goodbye to the old brick separator. Also, the Technic axle is something I'm unsure about, as it makes most uses of the top studs (for removing plates from the underside of other pieces) useless. Out of the bricks and more sets, the Safari set seems to have an unusual colors-- Medium Nougat or maybe Sand Yellow for the jeep. There's also a girl-oriented Bricks & More set that, yes, includes a minifigure, and a seemingly unique one at that. That's good news for people who feared that from now on the figs of the Friends theme would be the only figs in girl-oriented sets. At the same time, it could just be that TLG wants to test the waters with the Friends sets before seeing whether other applications of the figures would be profitable. Either way, this box is a good opportunity for AFOLs who can't stand the Friends sets to get some of the great "girly" colors like Medium Lavender. Regarding the actual Creator sets, 7292 looks cool, but its B and C models look a bit lacking compared to those in other plane sets from the Creator theme. 6914, the dinosaur set, is also kind of lousy-looking compared to other creature-based Creator sets in the past. All the other vehicle-based Creator sets seem perfectly satisfactory, though. I wonder why there's no sign of any houses/buildings?

Furno going underwater, combined with his overall design, immediately reminds me of 8111 River Dragon. Not that that's a bad thing. Agreed, because TLG might have finally found a middle ground that satisfies both criticisms and praising of canisters. If the containers are "soft containers", which the shape sort of suggests, then they can be collapsible and thus not take up as much space as canisters (a frequent criticism of canister-based packaging). But if they are sturdy enough to be re-sealed, then they still fulfill the same storage function as canisters. The only problem with them then is that unlike canisters and boxes, they are not stackable. This is almost definite seeing as they have "hooks" at the top to be placed on hanging racks in stores. But I'm sure it's a small sacrifice for those of us who stacked our canisters to consider alternate storage solutions for these new sets. I think the zipper motif could be stylistic, but because there's an actual zipper pull depicted on the box art that suggests to me that it's meant to show off the resealable nature of the packaging. Regarding the masks, I think that this is a much different case than BIONICLE... note that many people who wanted classic masks on BIONICLE characters disliked the complexity of the newer masks those characters were given. In the cases of 2.0 and 3.0 heroes, though, the newer masks tended to be simpler in design, with widgets like microphones and antennae placed on the helmet accessory pieces for the 2.0 heroes and completely absent from the 3.0 heroes. So rather than going back to a simpler visual design we're going back to a more complex and intricate one. That's just my perspective, of course. By the way, I love Thornraxx's design even more now that I realize his head is the same piece as Black Phantom's "bug blaster". All the villains are very creative, besides Black Phantom (but being an earlier prototype than the others pictured, it's hard to tell what might change in his design). As of right now, Black Phantom has the same problem as Witch Doctor, but to an even worse degree, as his design makes no progress whatsoever. At least Witch Doctor showed creative improvement of a sort. So did Rocka XL, even though Rocka XL had about as many negative changes to the design as positive ones. But this guy is basically a hybrid of Fire Lord and Rocka XL with most of the flaws from both and no really new ideas. The heroes are mostly excellent in my opinion. Things that bother me include the return to Glatorian heads (might be alleviated if they have reinforced joints), the increased size, and the fact that TLG no longer seems to be bothering to approximate Hero Core and eye colors from past lines. That last one's not really a problem for any of the heroes but Evo... besides him, all of the Heroes at least have one of their old Hero Core colors somewhere in their color schemes. His lack of purple isn't a problem for me because I desperately want purple parts, but rather because I want consistency. By the way, another thing I like here is the occasional use of System, for instance on Breez's leg-jets or Toxic Reapa's back-canisters. It demonstrates for me that the designers won't rule that sort of thing out from the beginning, instead leaving that option available.

First things first-- I don't see why you mind the feet and helmet of Breez being the 1.0 ones, since most people consider those more feminine than their 2.0 counterparts. Meanwhile, I don't see anything wrong with Breez's color scheme. It seems rather tastefully organized. The red upper leg bones are the only problem I could possibly identify with the color layering and organization. Also, I think you're bound to be disappointed by Thornraxx. The teal color you're probably expecting, the one from BIONICLE and Rock Raiders, has been discontinued for years, and Thornraxx almost certainly uses the new Dark Azure color introduced this year in Alien Conquest and used abundantly next year in the Friends theme. And how is Splitface a Thunder remake? Besides the face being slightly similar, there are no similarities at all. You might as well say that Maxilos was a Toa Mata Tahu remake. Anyway, I wonder if there will be any printed "name badges" in the upcoming wave, or if the only printed parts on the heroes will be the Iron Man torso pieces.

I personally love the Hoth game. I can see Snowtrooper microfigs, Rebel Pilot microfigs, and what might even be (however inaccurate) a Darth Vader microfig! In the background, what look to be Chewie and Han microfigs are visible. I also can't help but love the tiny AT-AT, AT-ST, Snowspeeder, and Tauntaun. As well as, of course, various decorated tiles which, if past LEGO games are any indication, will be printed. Of course, the Hoth game will be the largest LEGO game, meaning even without a licensed theme markup it will be the most expensive. So I'm sure people will be hesitant to buy it if they haven't tried out the LEGO Games for themselves. Personally, I think it should be fun, just like this year's Ninjago game was for me. I find the planets sets underwhelming. I am not impressed by too many of the mini models in them. They seem bigger than ordinary mini sets, but without a corresponding increase in detail. What I do like about the planets is that they have studs on the top and bottom.

I fully expect TLG is counting on Ninjago continuing. How long depends on how successful the theme can remain. But so far, Ninjago has been a phenomenon. The one-hour TV special was successful enough that the theme is getting picked up for a full TV series later this year, kids have fallen in love with the spinners, and there is a heavy multimedia aspect to promote the theme, much as was the case with BIONICLE. In fact, some stuff I've read has suggested that TLG might very well expect this to become their next BIONICLE, and are giving it just as much of an initial push as they did for that theme. Seems to be paying off so far. The Samurai is almost certainly Nya-- look at the torso as well as the face. It's the same as Nya's for this year. And with a continuing TV series (and a boy-oriented product line) which do you consider more likely-- introducing a brand-new female character or increasing the presence of the one already written? The name "Samurai" given for the set also suggests to me that she is meant to be a sort of a "mystery character," much like the Blue Spirit in Avatar: The Last Airbender. And mystery characters like that almost always tend to be already-known characters, at least from my experience. Well, Ninjago was a bit of an anachronism stew to begin with. We had ninjas with traditional buildings and dragons and skeletons with crazy trucks, motorbikes, and helicopters. In the TV series and other story media, it's even more striking. Kai's very traditional-looking village is wired with telephone lines, Jay comes from a huge metropolis, etc. In the original concept video I keep linking to, all the characters' origins were from a decidedly modern setting-- Kai is found in a dance hall, while Jay is (amusingly) playing a rather familiar game system with a nunchuk-like controller. In this wave, the things people will recognize as being ninja-inspired-- for instance, the characters' Japanese-inspired costumes and weapons-- will probably evoke the idea of ninjas about as well as the first wave of Ninjago stuff last year. There are no rice-paper windows this time around, but keep in mind that most people were also underwhelmed by the amount of traditional Japanese stuff in the first wave this year, and then the Fire Temple came about and showed how this theme could truly match the artistry of the original Ninja theme.

Looks to me like the ruby from Adventurers. No idea what she'd be doing with a ruby in this sort of lab. I hope she's not planning to give that robot a laser-- that could end badly.

Police stuff looks nice, although it kind of bothers me that the color scheme is so different than this year's police stuff (heavier use of blue in many cases) and that the police badge logo has been changed. Really, we were doing really well with the old one, having seen it in multiple years of Police sets and the Collectible Minifigures! Even if they wanted a new police badge logo for this one I'd rather if it had been a variant of the old one with the studs than such a generic-looking "badge with star". That new tree piece used to attach the branches is indeed cool. The Police Dog set seems unfinished, since the "Police" stickers on it are inconsistent with the ones in the other sets, but I love the "Gold Mine" sticker that seems like a deliberate callback to the Wild West one! I hope that isn't just a preliminary design! The new hats in the Police theme are very nice. Faces and torsos in many instances still seem preliminary. Here's hoping for a face with aviator sunglasses and a thick mustache! The new police station is very unique compared to any and all old ones. The new brick wall relief bricks work well for it. Now, as for the vehicle sets not connected to the Police and Fire subthemes, I'm largely impressed. The Ambulance looks nice, though I don't think that huge side window is the most realistic. The recycling truck is cool even though it bugs me that none of the "trash" seems recyclable! The camper is amazing, but a bit large-- here's hoping the size accounts for some awesome interior play value. The motorcycle transport vehicle is generic but still stylish. And the gravel truck or whatever is very realistic-looking and attractive.

You feel Breez is the manliest? True, she doesn't look all too feminine, but to me if anything she resembles Samus Aran, a very well-known video game heroine. Given that the giant spherical shoulders don't actually resemble muscles or form-fitting armor in any way, it arguably could contribute to her feminine appearance since you are forced to visualize a lighter frame underneath. Meanwhile, I just noticed the new torso seems to be the same one used in the Joker and Iron Man sets from the Super Heroes theme. Also, the blasters of the heroes have a lot of cool details. Furno's has a System halberd/pike clipped on top, and Rocka's uses Technic click-hinges to attach blades forming a crossbow-like weapon. I don't think Jawblade has legs-- it would be weird if he did-- but he seems to have some of Furno 3.0's wing pieces on his "hip" area that could probably fold down to act as legs or 'struts' in certain poses. Thornraxx, on the other hand, seems to have no limbs but his wings and arms, similar to the classic Nui-Rama from BIONICLE. Again, his tail could probably act as a balancing point of some sort for display. And I just realized that Black Phantom (while an early prototype from the looks of things) probably confirms that we're back to using the Glatorian head piece. I hope they redesign it with the new, sturdier joints if they plan to keep using it.

The 4.0 heroes look cool and unique, but they bring a lot of changes I didn't really expect (new Hero Cores, old helmets, new packaging style, and taller-looking Heroes). The new cuff pieces are cool, but there are things I hope change by the final version-- for instance, I want the Hero Cores to maintain the same colors they had before or similar ones, if possible. I like the Hero weapons which use the same Thornax launcher design but with a new piece for a new twist. Black Phantom looks like the worst Fire Lord-based villain yet, but this is still a prototype, and a much earlier one than any of the other figures by the looks of things. Even Fire Lord changed significantly from prototype to final version. But in this case, I don't know what to expect... he looks painfully spindly in design. The minor villains are all cool. "Flying Shark With Fists" is the most creative villain concept I've ever seen. Splitface looks awesome, Toxic Reapa has Transparent Fluorescent Green cladding, and Thornraxx reuses the wonderful wing pieces introduced for Gorast. Interestingly, the Heroes and minor villains use the same packaging, but with a twist-- there are two sizes of this packaging, and some hero sets-- and some villain sets-- seem larger than others. Splitface is the largest of the minor villains, while Breez, Furno, and Rocka are larger than Evo and Surge. Certainly a great change from tradition! I hope that, despite the old helmets on the Heroes, they get new heads underneath. Sadly this doesn't seem too likely considering that under their helmets their heads seem to all be Transparent Fluorescent Green and Transparent Fluorescent Reddish Orange... if there were a new head, I'd hope for at least a bit more color variety (even with this head piece I'm saddened by the lack of Transparent Fluorescent Blue). These sets raise so many questions, and I can't wait to get some answers.

Great review. Both informative, and fun to read! You certainly have a knack for incorporating humor in your reviews! One thing I feel obliged to point out, though, is the irony of you mentioning how you haven't seen the City trike used in City sets in a while. In fact, it was used just this year... and as soon as pics emerged of the set that contains it, people began complaining about the return of the "Town Jr." trike in the same way you complained about the flick-fire missile and catapult in this set. Clearly, people can be nostalgic about very different things... (I for one love the trike; it was a key feature of the Extreme Team theme which I enjoyed a great deal. I especially love its brilliant reuse in recent speeder bikes. But some people feel very differently.)

I actually liked Knights' Kingdom action figures and bought several. Although in retrospect I mostly bought them for click hinges in great colors and cool weapons I could use on BIONICLE figures.

Just to make sure you understand, extra parts are almost never included in sets for the purpose of helping people with their collections. The normal reason for extra parts is and has always been to ensure that the tiniest parts don't go missing without getting caught by the weight check. For instance, if a set is supposed to have one cheese slope in a certain color, and it is missing that cheese slope, the weight will be off by .21 grams (based on the weight listed at Bricklink). And so the weight check, an important stage in most quality control systems for mass production, might not register such a tiny discrepancy. How do you solve this? Instead of one cheese slope, include two cheese slopes in that color. If both are missing, then the weight will be off by a more significant .42 grams, something the weight check is more likely to notice. If only one is missing, then the set will still include just as many cheese slopes as are needed to build the set. This is why extra parts are almost always very small and lightweight parts of a set-- not because it's cheaper, but because these are the parts that need extras to ensure quality control. A lot of people complained when the collectible minifigures stopped including extra components, not realizing that the reason for this change was probably that the Chinese plant that makes the collectible minifigures got newer, more precise scales for performing the weight check, and so could now ensure the minifigures were complete without needing extras as a safeguard. Incidentally, what sets came before your "semi-dark age" that were so outstandingly different? Obviously Chinese production didn't begin until 2008 (though I personally think it's not as much of a problem as some people seem to feel it is), so that's a very recent development. So are cheese slopes, which did not exist until 2004 I think (although many AFOLs love them to pieces, pun intended). But the scarcity of minifigures is not entirely a recent development. Minifigures are, and have always been, expensive to produce, since they include pre-assembled components and usually have a lot of printed elements. So I think any older sets with lots and lots of minifigures probably are not evidence of a company that was less "cheap" but rather examples of a company that did not know how to please its fanbase, thinking that because they liked minifigures, more should be included at the expense of actual building elements. You're in an incredibly small minority thinking 4 Juniors figures are cute, by the way. But don't feel bad about it-- I'm glad to see that some people appreciate that theme rather than just considering it a complete and misdirected failure. I think some of the figs are kind of cute myself!

Could be a bad render, or (perhaps more likely) an obsolete version of the baseplate. Funny that Bricklink doesn't list the square edges kind (2748), while LDD doesn't list the one with rounded edges (3857). Perhaps 2748 never made it to production? It is an older part number, older even than most basic bricks...

As I mentioned in my post, Garmadon was apparently originally going to have four arms. I don't think that's Lloyd... According to the spinners page, Lloyd is the one in a Sith-type hood, also seen shooting lightning in the background of the same set Garmadon is pictured with. Also, I couldn't help but notice on the Spinners page that the contents of the Jay ZX booster pack happen to include a golden-bladed chainsaw... perfect...

Exactly-- past girls' themes haven't been too successful. And this is exactly the reason why they wouldn't invest extra in new figures if they thought the ones they had would work just fine. The fact that the results of TLG's market research haven't attracted enough girls to date is a stupid reason to assume that ignoring all their market research would attract more girls. I find your negative attitude extremely insulting. Do you honestly believe that you know more about what girls tend to like than people who have put time and money into researching that very subject? If not, then don't act as though the failure of all girls' themes or all non-minifigure themes is a foregone conclusion. Need I remind you that Belville lasted for a very long time despite consistent AFOL disapproval? A "failure" in the opinion of AFOLs rarely has anything to do with whether a new theme is profitable. Whether this theme lives or dies depends on whether kids like it, and I see no obvious reason why they wouldn't.

Batman and Green Lantern look the best here. Joker looks good, but I can't say for sure whether he is because we haven't seen him from all angles. The Marvel figs all disappoint, and I'm not sure whether that's because they're still prototypes (and thus, not likely to be "near-finalized" character art) or because they're just not attractive. Hulk is OK still, even if the Titanium Metallic armor is inexplicable and he feels incomplete without fingers. But Captain America seems to be going for a more complex build than other "human" heroes, and I haven't the foggiest idea why. I wonder if any of the "new" pieces here (for instance, the ones on Cap's knees, Hulk's chest, the various superhero torsos, or Joker and Iron Man's torsos) will show up in the Hero Factory theme. I think some of them would work great! I'm sure the price of these will be high, and I'm not a huge comic book fan, so I doubt I'll invest in these. I'm not the silly kid I once was who would buy any set that had BIONICLE-compatible weapons in new colors! But I'm not too badly disappointed. Batman and Green Lantern in particular look like this building system was made for them.

Some creative part use on Joker. In particular, he's got a tie made from the blended lightning piece in orange and purple! Anyway, Batman and Green Lantern look especially nice there. Marvel figs don't look as nice, probably since they're still prototypes and so this isn't true "character art" like the others. Can't properly judge Joker without seeing how he looks from all angles. These are all stylized portrayals, like many action figures, so accuracy is the least of my concerns-- what I want to know is whether the models look cohesive. I look forward to pictures of the regular building sets!

Yes, I fully expect it. I can't imagine they'd put a tile there if there wouldn't be a sticker for it. Nice to see some color variety in Geonosians! All the minifigs look good to me, but then I'm not a huge Star Wars fan so I only have faint memories of what they should look like (in the case of some, like the Commando Droids, I've never seen them before at all). Still no sign of the "Planets" sets we've heard about... wonder when pics of those will show up.

Look at the SNOT engines on that plane! The "fire truck" is a bit weird and chunky, but other than that I'm not the least bit disappointed. I wonder why there are no police pics yet, but I'm happy just seeing these. LEGO City isn't a theme that I collect, but still I think recent years have really done it justice! Good point about the 1x1 round tiles-- pretty cool! Not sure if they'll have any defects that make them impractical (for instance, hard to remove), though. Also, new wheel wells on the jeep in the fire plane set! The old ones might have worked OK, but I appreciate variety. That tree in the Fire Plane set is also excellent.

I think the role of the minifigure in determining the classic LEGO style is overrated. Many people were perfectly happy with Technic figures when they were around, after all. People keep thinking about what this could have been, but they're not considering what was likely. The most realistic thing to have expected would have been Belville-like dolls at god-knows-what scale! But instead, we get four-piece minifigures at almost the exact same scale as traditional figs. If they had reason to expect regular minifigures to be successful, they'd have no excuse not to use them, so I think we should be grateful that we got the next best thing. The sets themselves are amazing. The colors are pastel, but not as though someone vomited pink paint all over them. They're still plenty realistic. Everything about this theme is scores better than Belville. All the vehicles, buildings, etc. look like they'd work perfectly for minifigures, and the compatible hairpieces make even the figures a safe enough investment for AFOLs. The colors are beautiful, and the content of the sets (such as a treehouse, a veterinary office, and a cafe/diner) manages far better than any girls' theme in the past to avoid female stereotypes. Only the beauty shop and arguably the stage are explicitly "girly". As soon as I saw these, my first impression was that "people are going to love these". And as soon as people start to look at them realistically, rather than thinking about the misleading first impressions we had suggesting we might have traditional minifigures, I'm confident that any AFOL, male or female, will be able to find something appealing in this theme.

The snakemen remind me heavily of Dragonball Z or Power Rangers villains, while the vehicles have a definite Power Rangers vibe. I was never interested in either of these things growing up, but I can appreciate why everyone else my age was! The kendo gear is cool, as is the helmet on the Cole spinner, and I love Nya's design in her spinner set, especially the creative use of the bucket handle! The new arena looks pretty boring, but there's not much that can be done with an arena. Sadly, it doesn't excite me nearly as much as Skeleton Bowling's arena, but it probably has a much lower price point. The new spinner design is just slightly different, and the fact that it has Technic pin receptacles on the bottom is promising. The "crowns" are cool additions, and remind me slightly of Knights' Kingdom shields only much more versatile. As for the larger sets, the Ninja's boat is most excellent. It has a very traditional look, yet is stylized enough to feel as exciting as everything else in the theme. And it flies! Magnificent! The "tailed" snakemen are very interesting, as are the snake staffs. The other vehicles are all kind of odd. While the world of Ninjago has been established as an anachronism stew, it's hard to tell whether these will fit in very well, and they certainly upset the "technology versus tradition" pattern that the first wave had. At the same time, they are quite stylish, especially Kai's bike! If that same sort of sweeping stylization were present in Cole's and Jay's vehicles, I'd like them all a lot more. The snake ATV is weird beyond belief, but the brickbuilt snake face is sexy, arguably more so than any of the skeleton vehicles' brickbuilt skulls! I can see Zane has a stylish little bike in the snake ATV set. Why does Zane always get stuck with the tiniest vehicles/steeds? I can just imagine that if the Ninjas were to get horses, he'd get the Fat Pony. Also, interestingly, Garmadon now seems to have four arms in the boat set. This is actually consistent with his initial concept, as seen in this video. But the way they're actually doing it looks really weird... The new snakes are kind of weird. They seem to be ammo in some things? That's absolutely crazy, and I love it! I can't wait to learn the story behind these things in more depth-- the roles of all the characters, all the new armor, and the vehicles! But I can tell already that in this theme alone 2012 could be an expensive year for me!

Excellent. The dinos have plenty of poseability, but still have the smooth, crisp edges that gave Adventurers Dino Island and the 2001 Dinosaurs theme such an authentic LEGO feel. The vehicles all feel fun and cohesive, much like Dino Attack/Dino 2010 or other more recent action themes. Don't know if I'll invest in this, but it certainly meets my expectations of a good dinosaur theme.