Aanchir

I have no idea what you mean by "round tiles at the facade" or "stupid new pieces". Are you talking about the curved timbers on the walls? Because those aren't new — they were introduced in 2017 and have already been in well over 120 sets (more than 40 of which came out just last year). If they've already been useful enough to show up in that many sets and themes, there's not much sense in calling them "stupid". I don't know if I've missed out on any new pictures besides the various box pictures that have shown up Instagram recently, but I see no reason to think that all the weapons, armor, and tools in the set would be visible in these pictures. Even the original project didn't include ANY pictures that really clearly showed the blacksmith's full "inventory" — the only interior pic showing the smithy itself was a top view pic in which a lot of the weapons/tools hanging from on the walls were scarcely visible, let alone identifiable. Would a Viking helmet even be historically/geographically accurate for the setting portrayed here? I thought they were more of an early medieval style and timber-frame houses like this were a later thing. That said, I know my knowledge about this stuff tends to be pretty limited! And while I get why you might've hoped for a new sword recolor, it doesn't feel very reasonable to have expected one. After all, silver is a pretty standard color for swords, and even in a theme like Ninjago that has had a whole bunch of recolored weapons, I can't say I've ever been bothered by a weapon not getting recolored immediately after its first appearance. I didn't vote for this set, and I can't remember why, but I suspect that due to the washed-out colors in the renders, it didn't really grab my attention enough to look closely at the alternate pics until after it had already gotten 10,000 supporters. Most of the other Castle projects I've supported are ones that either have eye-catching colors or high-quality photos, and particularly ones that have detailed interiors. The lack of interior detail has been a big frustration I've had with a lot of "official" Castle sets all the way back to the ones I owned as a kid, since a lot of the books I had about medieval history put just as much emphasis on the practical elements of castle life and the lifestyles of medieval people as they did on the exterior architecture. After all, you can hardly have King Arthur and his court without the Round Table! And most of my favorite Castle MOCs (as well as "Castle-adjacent" sets in themes like Elves, Ninjago, Nexo Knights, or Disney) are ones that have a lot of emphasis on these sorts of interior details that make a castle or medieval house feel "livable". All in all, Medieval Blacksmith Shop seems like the sort of project I probably would have supported if the main pic and thumbnail had excited me enough to dig a little further and see all the lovely interior details the builder had included. And thankfully, most of those seem to have been maintained or even expanded on in the final version, at least judging from the few angles shown in the box pics. But I think the first time I actually became aware of any of those details from the original project was when LEGO news blogs like The Brick Fan or The Brothers Brick published articles about the set reaching 10,000 supporters. I don't really follow. After all, the bladed portion of pole weapons like axes and halberds would be forged BEFORE attaching them to the shaft, I feel like depicting the blade and shaft as separate components makes MORE sense in a blacksmith shop than in other contexts, not less.

I suspect that part is likely long-retired, given how long it's been since any set used it (I mean, even without an active Castle theme, other Castle weapons still show up fairly frequently in themes like Ninjago, Legends of Chima, Nexo Knights, etc, whereas the old halberd hasn't). Plus, even if the details of the old halberd were more realistic, the scale was extremely excessive compared to minifigures — something that I've definitely seen criticized even by Castle fans in the past when compared to the sort of weapon pieces which preceded it. It was decent when used either as decoration (like, say, over an archway), as a swinging-axe trap in a building, or built onto some variety of siege engine, but for actual use as a polearm I think a smaller "custom" equivalent like this feels a lot more suitable. And in general, this set is already packed with so many complex building techniques that I doubt what would be "easier" was very high on the designers' priority lists. I mean, even some of the aspects they changed like the tree, rafters, archways, and roof timbers in the original project would have been way "easier" than the building techniques that ended up being used for those parts of thee build in the final set. The chicken (or at least, part of it) is still there, just look on the kitchen table in the interior pics. Maybe some of the other livestock/game animals are cooking in that pot on the stove… On a more serious level, I think that the designers probably had to make some tough choices about what details they could put their budget towards that would add the most value to the final product. After all, new prints and recolors for the minifigures, shields, and horse create more new and exciting possibilities for builders than putting that same budget towards animals like chickens and pigs which (as you've mentioned) have been a lot more common in recent sets and themes than horses or Castle-patterned minifigs and shields have.

I don't know about that. It's just as possible that they've decided that public transit related builds sell BETTER in Town sets like 60200, 60233, and 60271 where they serve as the connective tissue between miscellaneous "destinations", than as a stand-alone subtheme that's more focused on the transit network itself than the ways that people use it. Just as fire truck and police car sets are more fun and exciting for kids when they include fires to put out or criminals to catch, a bus, tram, or taxi set is almost certainly more fun and exciting for kids when it includes a variety of places for passengers to travel to and from — whether that be for work, shopping, or tourism/leisure. Each additional "point of interest" for passengers to travel to or from significantly expands the play potential of the transit vehicles themselves. Now, don't get me wrong — a set based around a bus station/terminal and a bus like 379 or 60154 can be a great set in its own right, and I don't think it'd be at all unrealistic to hope for more sets like that in the future (maybe even one as robust as some train station or airport sets have been in the past, with an integrated ticket window/service counter, waiting area, food vendor, etc). But I worry that creating an entire subtheme specifically around transit-related builds would run the risk of those builds offering less excitement and play value than they would as part of a more varied "Town" assortment. And for all we know, we could already be getting a greater number and variety of transit-related models through this current approach than we would from them being released as larger and more focused (but less frequent) waves like the City Trains and Airport subthemes. I mean, we've clearly gotten more buses, trams, and taxis in the past five years of City than in over two decades of LEGO Town!

Lovely article! I suspect that being able to understand the individual strengths of the official Modular Building sets on such a detailed level has had a big impact on how you've been able to create such amazingly distinctive and appealing Modular Building designs of your own! Regrettably, I have not yet been able to bring any modular building designs of my own to completion, and I think a big part of that is that even if I have a lot of separate ideas for architectural styles, compositions, or particular sorts of homes or businesses that I want to try designing modular buildings around, I often have a harder time synthesizing those design elements into one complete design that feels really unique and compelling on ALL of those levels. Hopefully after reading this article I'll be at least a little better equipped to overcome some of those stumbling blocks. But I also hope you consider writing more "building tip" articles like this in the future, because you clearly have a lot of insights to share, and also a great talent for communicating those insights! That said, I don't mean to take your time and effort for granted, so even if you don't plan on writing any other articles like this in the immediate future, I will try to set aside some time on my own to read some of the other articles you've written for sites and publications like Brickset and Hispabrick that I'd previously missed out on. I know I'll definitely have a lot to learn from them!

Very good point! There's also the possibility of just focusing on obtaining the parts to recreate the "covered market/alleyway" area side of the set, since that's the part that really gives the billboard so much more visibility in your layout, and most of Market Street's rarer or more expensive parts are on the building side of the set. Lovely layout! IMO, these sort of flexible layout options are one of the biggest strengths of the "half-size" buildings in sets like Market Street, Pet Shop, and Bookshop. Even if they're designed with a specific side-by-side arrangement in mind, they can still be added to a layout separately if for some reason you decide that one of those two "halves" is especially well suited to different parts of your layout. I also love that you added palm trees to your layout! It really gives your town a very unique vibe/character that's distinct from the impression that the sets tend to evoke on an individual level. Next to the Downtown Diner in particular it feels slightly reminiscent of Miami's Art Deco historic district, though based on the barricades, Ferrari flag, and race track markings, I suspect you were more inspired by Mediterranean cities like Monaco. In any case, you've definitely succeeded at creating a very unique-looking layout!

I think what most people are observing is the difference in the height of the two models. For instance, the base of the attic in the original model is nine bricks higher than the top of the stone staircase, while in the final set it's only seven or eight bricks higher than the top of the stone staircase. But I definitely see this as an improvement, since the final set's proportions feel more consistent between floors, whereas the original model's ground floor seemed a lot more cramped than the upper floors. Yeah, professional product photos and renders in general tend to be very brightly and carefully lit compared to a typical MOC photo or render, which helps to create much higher contrast even before any sort of digital post-processing. After all, how many builders do you know who go out of their way to use separate spot, main, and fill lights for their MOC photos and renders? In a professional photo studio environment, that tends to be one of the more basic standards. And I suspect that even many builders who have both that sort of professional experience and professional-grade equipment/software probably wouldn't put the same level of time and effort into MOC photos or renders as they would for a paid assignment (unless it was a project of great personal significance, like a gift for a loved one). Also, neat analysis of the brightness of the white bricks! I can't help but observe that the color you sampled from the white bricks in the official image is very close to the RGB value that LEGO Digital Designer uses for white bricks (244/244/244). I know LEGO holds their illustrators and graphic designers to pretty strict standards for this sort of color matching, so I guess it's not surprising that they would try to maintain a similar level of consistency in official product renders and photos!

There's been enough "non-set" Ninjago minifigs over the years that later ended up getting physical minifigures that I wouldn't be quick to rule out a physical version of that updated Ice Planet torso EVER appearing. However, even a physical version does end up getting released, I would probably expect it to be just as a shout-out to a classic theme (sort of like Rench's re-imagined Blacktron torso from Space Police 3, or the re-imagined Dash Justice and Johnny Thunder minifigures from the blind bag series) and not as any sort of hint or foreshadowing of a full Ice Planet revival. Of course, like those earlier shout-outs, a torso like that would definitely be a great starting point for "Neo-Ice Planet" MOCs. Since Ice Planet was my first Space theme as a kid, I'll definitely be excited if a physical version of that torso ends up appearing, especially since there have been so many other parts in recent years that could be useful for that faction!

As a kid, while the similarity of their heraldry was immediately noticeable, I never really thought of them as the same faction. Even looking back at them today, the color schemes, types of build, and armor/helmets associated with them are different enough that even when they show up side by side like on the catalog pages in the first post, the differences stand out more to me than the similarities. I don't have any really vivid memories of what interpretations or headcanons I might've developed to explain those similarities, since the only Black Knights figures or parts I really had to use in MOCs or play scenarios back then were ones my parents got in yard sale lots (I would've been a little too young to collect those sets when they were "brand new"). But it's not as though different factions/subthemes using the same logo or variations on the same logo was all that unusual at the time. I remember that I typically thought of Classic Space and Futuron as earlier and later versions of the same faction, sort of like the relationship between "Star Trek: The Original Series" and "Star Trek: The Next Generation". Whereas I think I always tended to envision Imperial Soldiers and Imperial Guards as separate military divisions within the same faction, though I since learned that many other builders prefer to treat the "redcoats" and "bluecoats" as the navies of two different colonial powers. The Forestmen and Dark Forest subthemes also used the same heraldry on their shields, and in that case I HAVE generally interpreted both of those subthemes as one faction, even back when the Dark Forest sets first came out. In the case of Black Knights and Dragon Masters, I'm kind of drawn towards the idea those two factions being led by members of the same noble bloodline, and the dragon insignia representing their family's coat of arms. That not only feels plausible within the context of medieval societies, but also like the sort of story I would have enjoyed telling with my LEGO figures back then, even if I can't quite remember if I ever actually told that kind of story with these factions in particular. After all, "these two similar-looking figures are actually siblings/distant relatives/father and son!" is definitely a narrative element that I remember using more than once in my play sessions back then, such as with Majisto and a green-robed wizard I built from a Forestman minifig, a spare wizard beard, and a green wizard hat from a FreeStyle set. Also, since I don't think it's been mentioned yet: there ARE instances where LEGO did used the Black Knights' blue dragon heraldry and the Dragon Masters' green dragon heraldry for Dragon Masters minifigures, such as 6079 Dark Forest Fortress. But I wouldn't necessarily take that as evidence that the designers thought of those two subthemes as one single faction. It's quite possible that it was more of a "retcon" due to wanting to use two differently-shaped shields for the Dragon Masters minifigs in that set, despite only one shape being available with green dragon heraldry. Since that set came out in 1996, it's also possible that the designers felt the Black Knights were an old enough faction that reusing their prints on another faction would not create any confusion for the current generation of kids. Sort of like how a lot of minifig headgear or torso patterns that were originally designed for a specific character or category of sets (like the flame-patterned helmets from the Extreme Team sets) later ended up getting reused as "generic" patterns once the character or category they were originally created for was no longer current.

I definitely agree, and even for conventional stone castles, it's not like stones only come in gray and black. Brick Yellow/Tan, Sand Yellow/Dark Tan, Sand Blue, Sand Green, Nougat, Medium Nougat, Dark Orange, White, could all arguably be put to good use either as the main color or accent colors for a stone structure. For that matter, even pastel colors like Light Royal Blue/Bright Light Blue, Cool Yellow/Bright Light Yellow, Aqua/Light Aqua, or Spring Yellowish Green could be viable either as a main color or accents if you wanted to go for more "expressive" look that suggests some sort of ambient lighting, like the greenish colors of Castle Grayskull from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe or Minas Morgul from The Lord of the Rings. That said, I would definitely understand if LEGO might currently prefer to avoid using of some of those colors like Brick Yellow/Tan or the various pastels for their own castles, since they'd overlap considerably with castle color schemes in other current themes like Harry Potter and Disney.

Maybe not, but I suspect that both sets were probably designed to be roughly comparable to other "minifig scale" builds of their time, and while the definition for that can vary a bit between different themes or different types of model (like, say, cars vs. trains), it's otherwise stayed pretty consistent for the past decade and a half. Which is a bit of a comfort, given how many fears there were in the early years of LEGO City that the recent increases in scale among stuff like trucks, cars, buses, and planes would become a "slippery slope", or that the exaggerated scale of vehicles in themes like Agents and Racers would end up spilling over to other, more "conventional" themes.

Interesting perspective! While I wouldn't ordinarily describe this and the original project as looking like "two different sets" due to the overwhelming similarities in the layout and color scheme, I do feel like there's a valid comparison to be made between the changes in this and some other Ideas sets and the updates or re-imaginings to stuff like, say, the recent "Legacy" versions of certain Ninjago sets from past years. As an example, compare this year's X-1 Ninja Charger to the 2014 version. Structurally, the core elements are all intact. Both represent a very sleek, futuristic red muscle car with a front scoop, an "escape bike" that can be deployed by opening up the hood/bonnet, an angular rear spoiler, a rear missile turret, and various gold blade-like accents which tend to be pretty much standard for that theme's ninja vehicles. But there are also some considerable changes in the newer version — replacing the skinny grille and tiny headlights with a much wider light strip across the front, adding lengthwise black "racing stripes" to the top and sides of the body, and changing the proportions of the bike fairing to give it a smaller tail fairing and a wider, curvier front cowling. The end result is a design that is clearly based on the original and retains most of its defining characteristics, but with enough differences that it can be more accurately described as a updated or re-imagined version of the original which brings a few new ideas to the table, rather than just an attempt to recreate/replicate the earlier design as closely as possible using an updated palette of parts or techniques. In hindsight, it's also possible that my background as a Bionicle fan has also led me to be pretty forgiving about changes between different versions of a particular subject! I mean, that was a theme where we were expected to recognize that 8584, 8730, and 8912 were the same character from different points on the same timeline. Needless to say, LEGO has gotten a LOT better since then at redesigning subject matter in a way that still clearly acknowledges previous versions of that subject, whether it's characters, buildings, or vehicles. I don't mean to imply that I or anybody else should just look past changes we don't like because "think of how much worse it could be!" But rather, having had to adjust to so many design changes that often felt downright arbitrary or inexplicable, and that had only the vaguest or subtlest "through-lines" between newer and older versions of the same subject, I think it's easier for me to appreciate even more extensive changes to a particular subject as long as I can generally follow along with what sort of thought process would have informed those changes.

Oh gosh, I can't believe that didn't occur to me! A lot of refinements he's made to the original model's architectural details (like the stonework on the ground floor or the timber framing on the upper floors) are totally in line with the sort of amazing medieval-inspired builds he's worked on for other themes like Elves and Harry Potter. Hopefully next time there's any sort of full medieval or medieval fantasy type theme he gets assigned to work on it, because I have no doubt he'd be able to bring all sorts of amazing new innovations to the table! I'd honestly never heard of polychrome roofs before reading this post, but I just did a Google search for "polychrome roofs 15th century" and… dang! Those are way more elaborate than anything I'd have ever imagined seeing on a building from back then. And that's especially embarrassing for me, since I've definitely seen fictional examples that I suppose completely escaped my notice, like the roofs in Rivendell from The Lord of the Rings. looking at images of some of the movie miniatures, the official LEGO rendition of those roofs in 79006 looks downright mundane by comparison! I guess this sort of goes to show that there are still plenty of pop-culture based cliches and stereotypes about historical architecture I have yet to "unlearn". It's definitely great to realize just how many different historical styles are out there to look to as MOC inspiration. Even if more ostentatious styles like this might be tricky to work into MOCs without it distracting from or clashing with other elements of the build, it'd definitely be a great accomplishment for any builder who manages to pull that off successfully! These are some fantastic comparison images! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. If it weren't for all the stuff I've been able to learn from these sorts of discussions I'd probably be even more hopeless at coming up with ideas for historic-inspired models or building techniques. I have a downright embarrassing number of "work-in-progress" LEGO Elves or Castle MOCs on Stud.io that I keep going back and forth on, with no idea of what my next steps should be to get them closer to completion. Haha, just earlier this morning the size of the comment thread on The Brothers Brick's Facebook page and nope'd right out of there before I was tempted to read even a single comment. I have a hard enough time resisting the temptation to waste hours on those sorts of heated discussions as it is! And if the past is any indication, a lot of people are probably just in that initial "shock" phase and are likely to warm up to the set in the long run regardless of anything comments I make (or don't make). While I don't mind the bright blue myself, I wonder how the set would look if you swapped those Bright Blue shingles with Sand Blue ones. The 2x3 pentagonal tile piece does come in Sand Blue (albeit only in one set, the Brick Bank), and it'd certainly be a very plausible color for slate shingles. My biggest worry with that is whether the transition between Sand Blue and Earth Blue would feel too stark or abrupt compared to the transition from Bright Blue to Earth Blue to Black. Plus, it'd reduce the contrast between the lichen/moss and the bare roof shingles, and it's a little hard to picture in my head whether that would enhance or detract from the overall look.

What parts of it look like a playset for children? It doesn't really have a lot of obvious play features or exciting functions, and it'd be impossible to accurately recreate Sesame Street without including bright colors. The biggest cosmetic difference between the original proposal and the final product (besides the addition of Hooper's store) was the open-backed design, and that has nothing to do with whether or not a set is "for kids" — after all, even the Stranger Things set has an open-backed "dollhouse style" design, and I don't think anybody would say that looks like "a playset intended for children". Most of the time that's just the most sensible way of creating interiors from TV and movies, since it lets people flip the set around to see the scene from the same sort of angle it would have been filmed from. And even from a display perspective, a lot of LEGO builders are either going to display the set like that on a shelf or against a wall (in which case a back wall would be an expensive waste of bricks that would hardly ever be seen) or by itself in a more central location like a coffee table (in which case a back wall would actually reduce the display value by covering up the detailed and exciting interior with a much plainer, less varied, and flatter back surface). The only builders who'd really benefit from paying extra to get a back wall are those AFOLs who are dedicated enough to have a larger layout/"tabletown" to incorporate those sets into.

It doesn't really require any sort of complicated explanation. In a lot of cases, brighter colors make for a better model. On a basic level, it improves the amount of visual contrast between different parts of a model and helps them stand out. Also, since people rarely build or display sets under optimal studio lighting conditions, using brighter colors ensures that differntly won't be completely washed out or indistinguishable from one another under those less-than-ideal conditions. If you've ever had a hard time distinguishing between colors like Dark Stone Gray, Olive Green, and Sand Yellow/Dark Tan while building a set; or between Black, Dark Brown, and Earth Blue/Dark Blue, this should be fairly obvious! Also, with digitally-rendered proposals like this one, you have to account for the difference between transmissive color (the color of an object that emits its own light, like a lightbulb or computer screen) and reflective color (the color of an object that produces color by selectively reflecting the ambient light around it, like a LEGO brick or the printed page of an instruction manual). In general, white and other light colors look much brighter as transmissive colors like pixels on an LCD screen than as reflective colors like inks or dyes. By contrast, black and dark colors invariably look much darker as inks or dyes than they possibly could on a computer screen (since even if you turn a computer screen off entirely, it's often just a dark gray, and the light of surrounding pixels also keeps black images on a screen from looking as dark as the screen itself would be if it were turned off). So even if a model built with lots of dark colors might still show lots of detail andd strong contrast as a rendered image on a computer screen, that's no guarantee that a version built from physical bricks will look that good in real life. And similarly, even if a render or high-quality photograph of a set using lots of bright colors looks a little overwhelming on a computer screen, it might not be nearly as much so when built from real bricks or printed on a sheet of paper. Long story short, colors are weird and the context in which you see them can make a BIG difference to how they actual end up looking, even if the colors themselves remain the same between different contexts! It's entirely possible that if the creator of this set had designed it as a physical model in the first place, they would have found those initial colors too drab and chosen to use brighter ones in their original proposal to begin with — I've definitely ended up making changes to some of my own MOCs when I went from an initial digital design to building them in real life for the first time, and realized they didn't actually look like I wanted or expected them to. That said, I am not an expert on color theory myself by any means, nor can I claim to have all the answers! These are just some basics that I've picked up over the years from art classes or other sources, and there's probably a lot more nuances to this stuff that I wouldn't even begin to know how to explain. One final note: While some of us might disagree about whether the roof colors of this final set look better or worse than the ones in the original project, there are two facts that seem important to keep in mind about this: Monochrome Earth Blue roofs have showed up in plenty of other sets from themes like LEGO Creator and LEGO Friends without any issues, including brand-new 2021 asets like Heartlake City Park and Andrea's Family House. This set DOES include plenty of Earth Blue shingles, so there's no reason to assume there were any sort of limits on designers' access to those parts So it stands to reason that using Black and Bright Blue shingles in addition to Earth Blue ones in this specific set was a very deliberate aesthetic choice — not any sort of reluctant compromise or corporate mandate. In real life, older roofs often DO tend to develop darker streaks or stains towards the bottom, usually due to dirt, algae, mildew, and stuff making those shingles darker than they had been originally. So this seems to line up pretty neatly with that. Perhaps the moss and/or lichen growth near the top of the roof might have even helped to soak up moisture from those shingles near the top, preventing algae or mildew from developing up there? In any case, it definitely doesn't seem like the placement of the various colors was an arbitrary or random decision. Once the set is "officially" unveiled, it'd be neat to hear what sort of references the set designers might have turned to to inform some of those sorts of decisions. By the way, has there been any speculation yet about who the designer for this final version of the set might have been? It doesn't seem to have any obvious "calling cards" for the designers I'm most familiar with, so that's an aspect of the set which is still a complete mystery to me.

Are y'all really paying attention to the details of these images at all? The overall structure/layout of the two models is almost exactly the same, other than swapping the position of the dormer and chimney and adding an additional door to the left of the chimney and shop window. And besides the updated roof texture and curvature, nearly every cosmetic update I see is one that INCREASES the complexity and level of detail of the original. It's fine to prefer the older design if dark, desaturated color palettes and ramshackle-looking roofs are that important to you — but that's no reason to act like those tastes are inherently more "mature", "serious", or "realistic" than those of builders who recognize that there are more ways to make a color scheme effective and realistic than just making them as drab as possible, and that there's more to a model's complexity and detail than just how messy or chaotic you can make the patterns or textures. You realize that the Pirate Bay was ALWAYS supposed to represent a hideout built out of wrecked ships, right? Why did you think that the window of the captain's cabin was built at an angle similar to that on an actual ship, or that parts of the pier were in the shape of ship hulls? The only thing Barracuda Bay changed was making it clearer that all of those parts of the design were from one ship, and making the angles of walls more closely resemble the parts of the ship they'd been built from (to the point that you can re-assemble the ship by putting the different parts of the hideout back in their original positions). Obviously, you don't have to like those changes if the ramshackle nature of the build was what you cared about most. But the project creator and many fans of both the project and set have clearly had no trouble seeing the final set as a refined/"elevated" (I think that's the word the project creator used?) version of his original MOC, and the pics that were shared of the development process make the continuity between both the concept and layout of the two models fairly obvious. So I'm not sure why people are still acting like those changes between the original MOC and final set amount to some sort of wholesale rejection of everything the original MOC represented. How does the proposal look "actually medieval"? Do you somehow believe that bright colors didn't exist in medieval times — even on plants and trees? Or that the same medieval people who were able to bring both masonry and half-timbered construction to such a celebrated level of beauty and elegance were simultaneously some sort of uncouth barbarians who didn't know how to cut slate into shingles of consistent shapes or lay them out in straight lines? There's nothing "realistic" about looking at the dilapidated ruins of medieval buildings hundreds of years later that and assuming that such a dreary, drab-looking state of decay is exactly how those buildings would have looked when they were brand-new. That's just sloppy historical revisionism — the same sort which long convinced so many historians that Greek temples and statuary were all clad in spotless white marble.

Alright! Personally I disagree about the tree, though… I feel like a curvy design like this which requires using unusual parts and SNOT techniques feels more complex than the original model's more traditional "studs-up" design built from basic slopes, bricks, and arch pieces. I also feel like a distinctive design like the one in the final set helps the tree to measure up better to uniqueness of the building techniques and style of the rest of the set, if that makes any sense. That's not to say that more traditional way of building trees is bad, of course! I have loved seeing trees built similarly to the original project's in sets and MOCs over the years (including in recent themes like Ninjago and Elves), and that sort of build remains my "go-to" option when trying to design trees for MOCs, unless I need the tree to be a more specific type or a more specific size than that type of build would allow for. And it's great to have an option as simple and versatile as that when you need a tree design that's easy to build in larger quantities (like for a forest setting), rather than just a stand-alone tree like the one in this set. Also, the reason I feel that the green parts of the roof seem like they are intended represent moss or lichen is that they seem to have the same color and "bumpy" texture as some of the greenery around the model's foundation, but also roughly match the shape of the shingles themselves — as if they represent a rough-textured material applied on top of that more smoothly-textured surface, but not in a dense or thick enough layer to really alter the general "form factor" of that underlying surface. ----- By the way, I didn't mention it my earlier post (because it was running long and I needed to take a break to order dinner), and this isn't directed at any one person's comments… but in regard to the roof, I really get the feeling that the biggest changes were probably made due to structural necessity. I've seen some people compare to the Old Fishing Store and wonder why a similarly dilapidated roof wasn't an option here. But the original Old Fishing Store project's roof was made of fairly solid plates covered in large tiles representing wooden boards, and only a few of those tiles were attached by single studs so they could be left "askew" instead of in neat horizontal rows. If anything, the final set's roof ended up being a lot MORE uneven and dilapidated. The original Medieval Blacksmith Shop project's roof, on the other hand, had a much more chaotic roof design, with lots of individual shingles made up of smaller tiles (e.g. 1x2 instead of 1x4 or 1x6), and MANY of them attached "askew" by single studs. This sort of off-grid connection is inherently less secure than it would be using larger tiles, since instead of having individual tubes and anti-studs underneath which can function as a fixed "pivot point",1x2 tiles attached by a single stud can tilt or slide around much more freely. Also, the previous version of the blacksmith shop's roof was broken up into four hinged segments on each side, using various 1x2 hinge pieces. For an official set, these sort of hinge plates would typically need to be locked together both above and below, making the roof itself at least a full brick thick at many points even BEFORE adding the shingles. Otherwise, not only would the shingles themselves be prone to coming apart when you go to hinge the roof open or remove the entire attic to view the interior, but the connections between the structural elements of the roof would also break pretty easily when interacting with them. Because the original project only existed as a digital model, the project creator didn't really have to reckon with these sorts of structural concerns, but it's a dilemma that a set designer would have no choice but to confront — and it's quite possible that retaining more of these aspects of the roof design would've meant having to omit interior access entirely so that builders would not need to touch or interact with the roof at all after the model was completed (a sacrifice that I know many MOCists end up having to make to allow for that level of detail). For my part, I know I'd much prefer a simpler roof construction with fewer hinges if it meant that the interior space could be more fully utilized. And if we consider the roof design from a diifferent perspective than just authenticity to the original project, the original model's dilapidated-looking roof probably wouldn't be especially realistic anyhow. I mean, it's not as though people in medieval times were somehow too "barbaric" or "primitive" to build or repair evenly-shingled roofs. So a run-down, slipshod appearance like the roof of the original model feels more like something you'd find on an abandoned ruin or haunted house than something you would have actually seen on a beautiful medieval house of this sort back when it had been more recently constructed, and was still being actively used for a home and a place of business. In other words, if we'd describe the mottled colors and mossy peaks of the final set as unrealistically "fairy tale" styled, then we could just as accurately described the dark, run-down, patchwork look of the original project as unrealistically "gothic horror" styled. That's not a mark against either sort of stylization, but wanting something to be more realistic and less stylized is very different from wanting it to be just as unrealistic and stylized, but from a different direction!

I mean, we certainly could — the fact that a goat mold got introduced in the first place even without a firm commitment to include them in more than just one set is proof of that. But the likelihood of LEGO reintroducing a mold like that specifically for a product in a smaller and older-skewing theme like LEGO Ideas (without any other immediate uses in mind) is fairly low. Chances are, if they were to recreate the goat mold, it would probably be for the sort of "mainstream" KFOL-oriented sets that get a substantial budget for new molds by default — for instance, stuff like City sets or Minifigures blind-bags, which are produced and sold in batches of several hundred thousand copies each. And it would would also need to be for a set or theme that the designers feel would benefit more from a goat piece than from any other sort of new molds that the new molds budget for that set or theme could be spent on. The fact that they haven't reintroduced goats already isn't the fault of any sort of bizarre "anti-goat" bias — it's just that so far, designers for the themes where a goat mold COULD ostensibly appear have chosen to put their budget towards other sorts of new molds — including new or updated animal molds like the sea turtle, dolphin, big cat, chameleon, bulldog, husky, and baby velociraptor. I definitely think new goats would be great to see — and perhaps the original mold not being available anymore might actually provide an opportunity to make some design improvements like removable horns so that you could create goats with no horns, smaller horns, or differently-shaped horns. But there are also plenty of other new animal molds that would be exciting to see in the future (including in historical contexts), such as sheep, calves, foals, squirrels, or mustelids like weasels, ferrets, and stoats. By "grasses" do you mean the ones that were represented with the old spiky shrub pieces (the ones that were used as seaweed/coral back in LEGO Aquazone)? Those could have been nice I suppose, but at the same time, the variegated colors would not have been possible since only the upper of those two molds has remained in production. Plus, I personally feel like those two shrub pieces tend to be better suited for use as spiky plants like yucca which grow in arid or sandy environments, and grasses or shrubs in temperate European settings can be better represented with other parts that showed up in either the original project or the final set like the curled reed piece, the flower stem piece, or the "plate with three leaves" piece. The omission of some of those environmental details is definitely a bit of a shame, but I do feel like they're are balanced out nicely by other details which have been added in their place, such as the covered well, the more twisted and gnarled tree design, and the thick beds of moss on the roof and ground. And in the case of some of those features like the autumn leaves which were scattereed on the ground, roof, and the tree itself, there's still some hope that the set could include multiple foliage options for the tree like they did for the Tree House and Bonsai sets — particularly since this set seems to be aimed at a similar target age range to those two sets, and would require far fewer "extra" pieces to change out the leaves than either of those ones did! I also appreciate how compared to the original set's foundation (which was mostly a flat, solid-colored surface with only surface details like stones and greenery to break it up), this set's foundation is more mottled and uneven from the ground up. That definitely helps it feel more rustic/natural, and less like a carefully tended lawn or garden. That said, I do sort of miss how the foundation of the original terminated in a slope. Although that would've looked cleaner and more stylized than this "layered plates" approach, I have a lot of fondness for those sorts of uses of smooth, curvy pieces (sometimes to the detriment of my own MOCing efforts), and I was thrilled to see the Barracuda Bay set use that approach for its coastlines. So I guess either of those approaches is sort of a give and take. Other than the roof, what parts of this model seem less complex to you? Because honestly, as many unexpected changes as there are, I was pleasantly surprised to see how many of them ended up INCREASING the model's complexity. For instance, the half-timbered wall designs have added curved timbers in addition to the vertical and horizontal ones. This impressed me a lot, since I've been trying to play around with half-timbered wall designs on Stud.io for months now to figure out how to make more half-timbered walls like this SNOT techniques in place of either the printed panels that classic Castle sets often used or the more fiddly combinations of tiles and slopes that I've seen a lot of other AFOLs employ in MOCs. This design that LEGO managed to come up with far surpasses anything I was able to come up with — it's simple and versatile enough (and uses common enough pieces) that it would be useful in a wide range of other models, while still feeling detailed and authentic enough for a special AFOL-focused sort of set like this one. Similarly, the attic uses hinges really beautifully to construct the rafters at each end of the roof. While it definitely looks "cleaner" than the original model, which used the same SNOTted tiles for those roof timbers as for the ones on the other walls, it also gets rid of the unsightly, uneven gaps between tiles in the original model's rafters, and creates a really beautiful contrast between the wider and sturdier timbers used for the main support posts and rafters, and the thinner ones used for the intermediate wall studs and trusses. Even the stonework on the ground floor has been enhanced considerably — for example, the original set's arched doorways and windows used prefabricated half-arch pieces, while the new design uses Dark Stone Grey tiles and curved slopes to create much more detailed textures representing the individual stone blocks and keystones that form the arch. Again, this is something I've played around with in my own MOCing efforts quite a bit, with the specific aim of coming up with "brick-built" alternatives to the sorts of printed arches and window panels in older Castle and Pirates sets — but LEGO's designers were able with a solution that's much more satisfying than any of my own attempts. Similar SNOT techniques have been used to add detailed Dark Stone Grey quoins to the corners of this story in place of the simpler building techniques on that part of the original project. And on a more minor note, Olive Green and Earth Green bricks are now used for this story in addition to the two shades of grey, creating the impression that the same mosses or lichens which are growing on the roof shingles and ground are have also begun to take root on some of these lower walls. In general, there are just so many more details to take in the original project, which despite its really amazing textures and patterns, seems at some points to have used those textures and patterns in a much more "uniform" way. It feels like nearly every time I look at the set I spot a new, clever part use or technique which I hadn't noticed before, and I expect that will continue as pics of the set from more angles begin to show up. After all, even a lot of details from the original project that DID make it into the final set, like the stone staircase and the arched doorway beneath it, were ones that weren't visible in the project page's "main" photo, only from the pics showing alternate angles!

Looking at the clearer scans that Brickset uploaded seems to confirm that there will be more flowers and greenery on the opposite side from the view shown in the catalog. In particular, there are some flower bushes visible right behind Clutch Powers which I expect would continue around the back of that left-hand building. It's fitting that a lot of the gardens themselves would be on that side, since there is so much more open space on the inside of that corner than the outside — particularly on the "Old World" level, where the white and brown building is so close to the edge of the base that the pedestrian walkway has to wrap around the back of the building, rather than the front. The more open waterway around the back side would also provide more space for reeds and lilies. Also, some of the greenery in the canal towards the front of the "Old World" area is made up of the same Bright Green weapon assortment that was used for the Jadeblades in the Tournament of Elements set, so it stands to reason that the rest of the blade pieces from that assortment are being used on parts of the model which aren't as visible from this angle.

Corner Garage is also sort of an inverted corner in terms of the shape of the building, even though it sits on a regular corner. And one possible way you could compensate for the lack of frontage on an inverted corner building would be to have two more distinct buildings on either side of the corner, with a diagonal alleyway in between — sort of like the new Ninjago City Gardens set that was just unveiled. Potentially, the alleyway could even be turned into a sort of a "living street"/pedestrian thoroughfare, with entrances to shops on either side. But even besides these concerns, I can think of a few other reasons why an inverted corner might be less desirable than the other formats they've released so far. For instance, while some builders place their Modular Buildings on a central table that allows for more elaborate sorts of layouts, other builders place them on narrower shelves, bookcases, or display cases against a wall. And in any display like that which don't allow room for two full rows of buildings, an inverted corner layout would likely end up with at least one of the "blank" walls that's meant to connect to an adjacent building facing outwards, away from the display area's back wall. This is another interesting possibility in its own right. It's neat to see how even somewhat divisive ideas like this can bring out people's creative side.

I would definitely also like to see more pictures, but even from thee limited angles we can see here, the impression I get is that the "gardens" are decidedly NOT separate from the rest of the structure. Rather, parts of the gardens like the cherry blossom tree on top of the museum and the massive memorial tree in the corner (with a peaceful park bench at its base) grow over, around, and through other parts of the structure. In fact, a lot of the comments that seem to assume the gardens are exclusively tucked away in the parts of the model that aren't as clearly show in this pic like the "Temple Island" leads me to think that people expected the set name to refer to some sort of independent park or arboretum-like structure which would be clearly separated from other parts of the city like homes and businesses. The actual "gardens" more closely resemble urban landscaping technniques like hanging gardens and roof gardens which are more directly integrated with man-made structures, providing a touch of natural beauty in environments where undeveloped land is scarce and space is at a premium. And honestly, I feel like this is a much more thoughtful and accurate expression of what sort of "gardens" might realistically be found in the sort of densely populated urban setting which the Ninjago City sets have sought to portray from the very beginning. In general, I'm super impressed with all that we can see of this set's design so far! Architecturally, it maintains a lot of the common threads from the previous two installments in the series, particularly the tiered design shifting gradually from traditional architectural and lifestyle elements on the lower "Old World" level to more modern or even futuristic elements as you approach the uppermost "High Rise" level. It also does a great job at continuing other trends we've seen throughout the series — for instance, the many cleverly constructed signs and stickered billboards along the railings of the walkways, the inflatable koi on the high rise level, wildly varying colors and textures to differentiate between the various homes and businesses, and the many clever and unique part uses and builds for architectural features like awnings or windows. However, it still stands out considerably from all of the other installments in many ways, including the three-story-tall tree in the corner which serves as the garden's centerpiece and grows all the way through the first level of elevated walkways, the angled bridge-like placement of the Ninjago Museum of History which joins the towering buildings on either side, and the extremely angular and geometric design of the tower that serves as the Ninja's latest hangout spot. And it includes some features which are big departure from anything we saw in the earlier sets from this series, like Cece's futuristic hover-scooter. Master Chen's Noodle Shop and the Ninjago Museum of History are both great choices for businesses from the show to incorporate into the Ninjago City collection. And the designers did a great job recreating the look of the noodle shop's gaudy signage and the museum's domed skylight. Much like the signage and contents of Dareth's dojo in the Ninjago City Docks set, touches like this really help these elements that are based on or inspired by the TV show feel recognizable, despite being transplanted from the more mundane street scenes of the show's early seasons to this elaborate, futuristic re-imagining of Ninjago City which featured in the movie and subsequent seasons of the show. Other small details I love — the ninja-patterned bedspread and microscale versions of Ninjago sets in Christina's apartment, the microscale Destiny's Bounty and cleverly constructed display case in the museum, and the angled construction of the ninja's TV stand/entertainment center. All in all, I'm really excited to see more pictures that show more of these elaborate detail, as well aswhat the overall structure looks like from other angles! Truth be told, I don't feel particularly disappointed by the minifigure selection. Not only does this set include the first new Misako and Ronin minifigs in years, but also minifigures of the Mechanic and one of his henchpeople! It also has the first young Lloyd Garmadon minifig with a hairstyle resembling his hair in the show (and the first time this hairstyle has officially appeared in this color). All in all, I think one of the big strengths of these bigger and more AFOL-oriented Ninjago sets like the Ninjago City collection or Temple of Airjitzu is that they are able to focus so much on the "everyday" elements of the world of Ninjago. Compared to smaller or more KFOL-oriented sets, these sets focus on slice-of-life scenarios rather than intense action scenes, and ordinary people in ordinary clothes rather than elaborately armed and costumed heroes and villains. As such, these sets provide a unique opportunity to introduce minifigs representing the sort of ordinary/mundane citizens who you might expect to see in crowd scenes, as well as various noteworthy characters like the Postman, Mother Doomsday, Mystake, Dareth, Lil' Nelson, and Misako who tend to dress casually and support the ninja from the sidelines. So I'm glad that the designers continue to embrace that opportunity instead of neglecting those characters in favor of other super-powered action hero characters like Pixal, Skylor, or the Elemental Masters who often join the ninja in battle, and thus are much easier to work into smaller and more typical Ninjago sets. I've long hoped to see a physical minifigure of the Mechanic, but there haven't been a whole lot of great opportunities to introduce one, since unlike other Ninjago villains he usually tends to specialize in petty crimes except when he gets roped into another villain's schemes like in "Prime Empire", and visually he doesn't tend to fit in clearly witht the sorts of "themed" villains who tend to be the focus of each new story arc. In a set like this, though, he not only fits in nicely, but performs a role that buyers would be able to understand fairly well even without any familiarity with him from the show (i.e. a stereotypical crook/robber sort of like the ones that show up in City sets, but with a "cyberpunk" twist in accordance with the Ninjago City setting). On a similar sci-fi note, it doesn't seem that anybody here has mentioned it (though it was noticed by a few commenters on Brickset), but the construction robot "Scoop" seems to resemble the robot minifigures from the Exo-Force theme in a lot of ways, like its rectangular red eyes and angular muzzle which sticks forward from the rest of the body. Whether or not this was an intentional reference, it's undoubtedly a great new robot build that fits in beautifully with other high-tech elements of the setting, particularly the cleaning robot Sweep from the original Ninjago City set. The use of a recolored minifig baby carrier for its face/muzzle is a remarkably clever part choice! And even if it's not really "new", I can't help but smile at the inclusion of Sensei Wu's dog, which has not been canon to any Ninjago media at this point as far as I'm aware, but was a cute and quirky feature of 2015's Master Wu Dragon. Between that and various other details like multi-colored frogs, I get a strong feeling that the designer of that set, Nick Vas, probably worked on this one as well. There are defiinitely other characters who could have been neat to see in a set like this one (like casual Harumi, as some folks have mentioned previously), but I'm not especially bothered by their absence, particularly since knowing that we're still getting new sets like this one makes it much easier to keep looking forward to the possibility of seeing minifigs of those characters in the future.

Daisy-chaining motors could have been a nifty feature, but I would assume that LEGO omitted that functionality from Powered Up for the same reason as they did with LEGO Mindstorms EV3 or NXT — most likely, because all of these systems are intended to use motors as either an output device OR an input device. Back in the early days of LEGO Mindstorms, when all the motors, sensors, and connectors adhered to the 9V standard, you COULD daisy chain motors, and this was just fine as long as you were using them all as outputs, but if you tried to use one as an input, it would effectively function as a generator rather than a motor, supplying power to all the other devices it was chained with. This was a weird and surprising phenomenon to me as a kid, even if it was a simple one in hindsight. And since they WERE analog rather than digital, it probably wouldn't have been too hard for me to write an RCX program that would interpret the cumulative strength of the electrical signals from a daisy chain of motors in a useful way, if it had occurred to me. By comparison, Mindstorms control bricks from the NXT onward (as well as Powered Up control bricks like the Boost Hub, Technic Hub, or Smart Hub) WERE designed to be able to receive and process rotation input from motors. And for this purpose, having multiple motors connected to the control brick through a single port could interfere with that function — for instance, how are motors in the middle of a chain supposed to differentiate between a signal from a motor at the end of the chain and a signal from the control brick? For that matter, how well can a control brick be expected to accurately "read" input signals of different strengths that it receives from a chain of motors connected to the same port? That would be like "daisy chaining" several force sensors to one port and expecting the control brick to identify how much force each one is recording. I know the use of digital signals rather than analog signals like back in the 9V days allows the control brick to differentiate between different TYPES of input and output devices (so, for instance, you no longer need to manually tell it whether inputs it receives via Port A should be understood as readings from a light sensor, a touch sensor, or a linear motor). But unless you encode every single Powered Up motor with a unique serial number, then I'd still expect that having multiple input devices of the same type sending signals through a daisy chain to the same port on a control brick might result in some weird issues. And since this is a toy for kids, you can't always count on "common sense" being enough for users who get perplexing readings off of a daisy chain of input/output devices to understand what went wrong or why. I mean, I was probably 9 or 10 years old when I first realized that 9V motors could be used to generate electrical signals that could then power other 9V components, and yet my understanding of it was fairly hazy at the time, even if it was such a simple phenomenon in hindsight.

That's… still a little confusing to me. Generally, I'm used to people asking questions because they're interested in knowing the answer, unless it's obvious from the phrasing or context that they already know the answer and are only asking rhetorically. Going forward, I'll try to remember to just ignore any questions you ask, if that makes you more comfortable. But I apologize in advance if I forget and reply to your questions thinking that you want to know the answers to them. If that happens, please just go ahead and remind me that you aren't interested in knowing the answers to your questions. One advantage of Powered Up that I remember standing out to me early on (and that I've since learned that it shares with the BuWizz components — they hadn't really been on my radar before that, unlike Sbrick components which I'd seen demos of at conventions) is that a basic Powered Up hub like the ones used in train sets only takes up the same amount of space as a simple Power Functions battery box. By comparison, either a Power Functions IR receiver or an SBrick would require at least four 2x4 bricks' worth of additional space, without even counting the space taken up by the cords that connect the power supply to the receiver. For many larger sorts of models like large-scale Technic vehicles or robots, I realize the scale tends to be flexible enough for this advantage not to matter a whole lot. But for remote-controlled or programmable vehicles at minifig scale (like RC cars or trains), not needing to make room for a separate receiver piece besides the hub itself is very liberating. Also, from a cost standpoint, Powered Up WAY more affordable for basic sorts of models with just one or two outputs (like LEGO City trains) than Power Functions + Sbrick or Power Functions + BuWizz. Even with a Powered Up hub, motor, and remote included, 60197 cost almost exactly the same as 60051 after adjusting for inflation. Whereas an Sbrick would cost $60 on top of the base price of any Power Functions set you intend to use it with. Even a stand-alone Powered Up hub (88009) costs $10 less than a stand-alone Sbrick (without even accounting for the additional cost of the Power Functions battery box and cables you'd need for it to turn on or receive commands), and over $70 less than a BuWizz control brick. Even if we imagine a hypothetical Sbrick version of 60051 which adds an Sbrick in place of the Power Functions IR receiver and IR speed remote and adjusts the price accordingly, the resulting price of $182 ($150 + $60 - $28) would still be higher than 60197's RRP, even BEFORE adjusting for inflation. Similarly, a hypothetical BuWizz version of 60051 which includes a single BuWizz 2.0 control brick in place of the Power Functions battery box, IR receiver, and IR speed remote would carry a price of around $245 ($150 + $126 - $41). And that's in spite of 60197 also including a physical remote control. No equivalent remote exists for either Sbrick or BuWizz, and even if one did, it would likely increase the cost of a train set like this even further. I realize that Sbrick and BuWizz can separately control up to four outputs from a single receiver (and of course, that the Power Functions connectors themselves are stackable, while their Power Functions equivalents are not). So for a lot of highly advanced sorts of Technic builds with four or more outputs, I can definitely understand how Power Functions with Sbrick or BuWizz could be a more cost- and space-efficient option for MOCists than Powered Up. But to keep things in perspective, very few Powered Up sets — and NO Power Functions sets — have ever required this many individual outputs per receiver. All in all, I find it pretty impressive that LEGO was able to come up with a system that uses same input/output connectors and wireless protocols for everything from simple train sets and RC cars to Mindstorms-esque programmable robots, but still keeps simple motorized models like train sets and RC cars around the same price as their Power Functions equivalents. By comparison, even their most basic level, accessories like Sbrick and BuWizz add much more to a model's cost than Power Functions IR controllers and receivers. And even at their most complex, SBrick and BuWizz's use of Power Functions style input/output connections puts a much tighter limit on the complexity of the signals that they can send or receive compared to Mindstorms NXT and EV3 control bricks, motors, and sensors. Both SBrick and BuWizz are utterly brilliant devices in their own right, but they were very clearly created to occupy a neglected "middle ground" between the costs and capabilities of "official" Power Functions and Mindstorms components — not to measure up to either the low costs of official Power Functions components or the advanced capabilities of official Mindstorms ones.

There have been a few other sets like that in the Creator theme and the Designer sets which preceded it… namely Power Mech from 2013 and Mech Lab from 2003. But I realize this differs from those by having a clear canopy in which you'd expect the pilot to be visible if it were piloted. Similarly, last year's Drone Explorer included a cockpit and controls for a minifigure, despite not including one in the set itself. I think we can file "Space Mining Mech" and "Cyber Drone" in with the long tradition of sci-fi set names that use technobabble and/or alliteration to sound cool, even at the expense of more clearly and accurately describing their contents. That said, these names at least gives a slightly better idea of what sort of set they're describing (a mechanical humanoid and a futuristic flying machine, respectively) than many older examples like "Allied Avenger" or "Spectral Starguider". LEGO has also used "drone" to describe robots before, like the Nindroid Drones from LEGO Ninjago, the Magma Drones from LEGO Agents, and the Iron Drones from LEGO Exo-Force. In these cases, though, it's clear that they're using it in more of the same sense as Ogel's mind-controlled "Skeleton Drones" from LEGO Alpha Team… in other words, unfeeling footsoldiers/underlings that are only intelligent enough to follow orders from a commander, rather than to think or act independently. It's unlikely that "Cyber Drone" was meant to be interpreted this way, though, because the set description on LEGO.com consistently uses "Cyber Drone" to refer to the set's main model, while referring to the pilot as a "new-for-January 2021 robot minifigure… which can ride each of the 3 models". As I mentioned in the sci-fi topic, I think the colors were probably picked because they're colors that people tend to associate with near-future space exploration in general. While the cartoonish green aliens in the Space Rover Explorer and Space Mining Mech sets aren't realistic, the sets still seem to be framed around "first contact" scenarios in which Earthlings are exploring a mysterious and largely uncharted extraterrestrial frontier in a near-future setting. By contrast, more fanciful spaceships with shapes and colors that vary wildly from real-world space vessels tend to show up in much more futuristic or technologically advanced settings in which travel between different planets or interactions between different species are already "taken for granted" — particularly those that can be broadly categorized as "space opera" like Star Wars, Guardians of the Galaxy, Metroid, Futurama, Cowboy Bebop, etc. Even in many series that ARE much more highly futuristic, like Star Trek, it's not uncommon for "human" or "Earthling" spaceships to use spaceships with similar color schemes to real-world space agencies, both to establish that they are the creations of a society that traces its history back to our own, and to help contrast them with more fanciful vehicle designs used by alien societies which developed independently from us.

I'm confused. Did you not actually WANT to know why the BrickLink prices on those two listings were different? Why did you bother asking, then?

Wow, I guess I struck a nerve there… at no point did I imply that you weren't welcome to share your opinions, no matter how big your layout is or how much of a cost burden is reasonable/unreasonable for you. But that doesn't mean anybody's obligated to take those opinions seriously. And the more you humblebrag about the massive size of your layout, the more ridiculous it is to act like the much smaller costs of this road system are suddenly a deal-breaker. Also, did you miss the part where I mentioned that with a MILS layout like yours, you can use the new road baseplates just fine without raising up anything at all in your layout, or even swapping out any of your existing roads? After all, if all your baseplates are already raised up, all you need to do to line up the newer road elements with the height of the roads you already have is to raise them up by one plate FEWER than the rest of the parts in your layout. There's literally no reason you can't use multiple road systems together in the same layout, especially a MILS layout which is designed to cancel out the height difference between baseplates and standard plates/tiles. Finally, your calculation of the number of plates you'd need to buy if you DID need to raise up your entire layout is WAY off, and seems to be based on the bizarre notion that to raise up a layout by one plate in height, you need to buy enough plates to for their total area to equal the area of your entire layout . You know that it's okay to have gaps in a layout's substructure as long as you keep the weight evenly distributed, right? I hope you haven't actually been building all of your MILS bases solid this entire time, because if you have, I shudder to think how much money you've already wasted on bricks that your layout didn't actually need…