Over the last few days and weeks, LEGO and its partners have announced several new products and licensing deals. These include: Disney (Cars, Prince of Persia, Toy Story) LEGO Rock Band LEGO Harry Potter video games LEGO Ben 10 etc. I've been following threads here and on other online communities in response to these announcements, and I have some comments and reflections.
Most of the Disney announcement was greeting enthusiastically. LEGO Rock Band seemed to be half and half enthusiasm and de
OK, so I'm working on updating the text for BIONICLEstory.com (for release in July), and I've run across a question which I think my BZP compadres will be able to answer.
I need to include Agori villagers in the Heroes, Villains & More section. But I don't think it's substantially a different category from Matoran. Question: Should the "Matoran" section be changed to "Villagers" to include Agori? Or is it worth a new category?
Granted, there were Matoran in Metru Nui who weren't exactl
OK, so for all you asking about the song for 2009... it looks like my agitation is successful! The song will be available on BIONICLE.com as both a download and as a music video, starting in August. Not sure of the exact date, but shooting for early August.
This is as confirmed as I can get it. I watched the video, the song's good and the video is neat. And before you ask (because somebody will, even though I'm saying this), no, it won't go online any earlier, no, I can't give sneak previews.
Just finished writing the content for the BIONICLE.com update, and got Greg's blessing on it. That's always a good feeling. The story section of BIONICLE.com will be in 5 sections, like it was last year, and will be updated monthly. So you'll need to visit regularly to get the story updates.
For those of you asking about the song... I'm still working on trying to get the date for that. There were rumors that the licensing might be changed so we couldn't have the song for download on the site
Just a quick update. I'm working on getting the summer web update ready. I do plan on having BIONICLEstory updated with the latest story info at that time - I've been reaaaaaaal bad about updating that. But it'll happen.
Don't expect a major change in the web site. It'll be more evolutionary than revolutionary. There will be a fairly significant new section for the upcoming movie, and that should have some really fun content on it. Other than that, you'll see the usual downloads, story, etc.
After some discussions with people inside LEGO, I'd like to find out what you think BIONICLE is. This doesn't have anything to do with anything, just satisfying my own curiosity.
What is BIONICLE to you?
Answer the Poll
Thanks for your participation.
OK, the fest is now over, and I'm slowly getting back to whatever passes for "normal" for me. I haven't plugged in my camera yet to get the pictures, so I don't have anything to show. But you can troll Brickshelf if you want to find them, or Flickr.
Some highlights: Seeing the BIONICLE tables filled with MOCs, while the Space table had one - ONE - moonbase and a few spaceships. Roa McToa building the Emerald Night train - and getting it mostly right! Wacky Racers: one of the Legoland designer
For everyone waiting breathlesslessly for the new song to be released... sorry, I'm afraid your face will just have to get a little more blue. The song release has been postponed until later this year, to the second half of the year. Something about getting maximum impact for its release, which is understandable.
I haven't heard it yet, but I understand it's yet another good Cryoshell tune.
They say adversity builds character. Guess that means BZP is very... uh... characterful.
About once a year, it seems BZP gets hit by some server-level badness. This one was pretty annoying, granted, but not quite as bad as the one in 2007. I lost quite a few topics I was fond of, as did everyone, but basically, BZP came through mostly intact, and will grow once more.
I think Black Six and Dimensioneer deserve a huge "Thank You" from everyone for all their work on getting the server back. M
Just had another fun lunch with the BIONICLE designers. We ran through pretty much all the boiled-down questions I got from the massive thread from last November, and I'll be making sure it gets onto BZP soon. There are three or so more rounds of answers to put up.
At the end, they asked why they couldn't ask questions of you. Which is a really good question. So I'm going to put polls up, starting next week, with questions that the designers want to know from you, the core fans.
We have a
As most of you know by now, we released the web version of the Glatorian Arena game.
The game is on the US and UK versions of BIONICLE.com right now, and soon we'll have localized versions that you can download. And we'll put it on the local language web sites.
PLAY THE GAME NOW
I've been following the conversation in the talkback, and have some suggestions: To install the Unity plugin, make sure to run the .exe file (for PCs) or run the Mac program that downloads. The plugin site was d
The kind that has lots of sorting to do, that's what sort.
I'm finally trying to get my LEGO collection organized. I've taken apart a bunch of old, stored sets that have been jostled into oblivion, and gotten all my bricks together from my various travels. Now it's time to sort them so I can create something for BrickFest.
The only problem is, I have about 250 pounds of brick to sort through and put in the right spot. It's gonna take a while.
(Excuse the grainy cell phone camera pictu
Sometimes a coincidence just strikes you so out of the blue, you have to blog it...
I was in the middle of replying to an email from Mikkel Maltha when "Face Me' came on the ol' iPod.
That's it. The whole coincidence. Well, I thought it was funny.
It's really gratifying to see the My LEGO Network campaign taking off so well. I see a lot of interest in this game, and there are some fun tidbits in there. We had a creative roundtable last year with me, the MLN producer, Greg, and Leah to work through the story, and I think Peter (the MLN producer) and Eric (the graphic artist) did a great job.
Now, on to the real reason for the blog entry...
I've been receiving lots of PMs about MLN issues. Unfortunately, I'm not really able to help.
I had another lunch meeting with the BIONICLE design team today (or at least 5 members of the team), and as usual, we had a great time. I've been negligent - nay, delinquent - in updating the Designer questions and answers, but I hope to have the next set ready for BZP by the end of the weekend. I'm traveling on Friday so that'll take some time to get back to normal.
We answered another 20 questions today, on top of the 30 or so we'd gotten through before. It's turning into a regular thing, a
Just because it got a bit chopped off in the BIONICLE.com version, here's a better look at the teaser trailer for Glatorian Arena. Make sure the sound is cranked...
View it here
That's in-game footage, although the camera angles are different than what you'll play, of course. And that's only part of what the game includes.
As for the platform... it's not Flash. We followed one of the Three Virtues.
I've played a solid beta of the game, and with the exception of a couple of things tha
I should know by now that I'd start getting spammed at 12:01 January 1st about when the site will be updated. So, to answer the literally dozens of PMs I've gotten, here is what I can tell you.
I don't work on weekends and holidays, so don't expect updates of the site during those times. I've already said "early January" so you'll need to be patient until the site is updated. Although I do have a target date and time to release the site, I refuse to publish that date, because if the site doesn
Now that the cans are in people's hands, I should let you know what the real B.I.O. Code for Gresh is.
» Click to show Spoiler - click again to hide... «GR35H1
All the cans for Gresh had a misprint, they included Malum's code rather than Gresh's. You won't be able to do anything with the codes until sometime in January.
I've talked with the rest of the marketing team, and I'll be reviewing and approving BIO Codes on packaging from here on out, to make sure there's not another copy/paste
Time for a few tidbits from the Bink. Just stomping the final bugs on the updated web site. It will launch a few days into January. We're working on a game, I just got a beta yesterday, and it's looking good. The game will launch in February. Just had a second lunch with the design team, and we got through some more answers. We'll do more in January. Working on 2009 and 2010 communications stuff. I'll be offline for a good part of the time between Christmas and New Year's, so after this Friday a
Here's an update on the "Ask a Designer" project...
Of the several thousand questions, I spent many hours finding and removing duplicates. Then I divided them into categories, like "Designer," "Sets," "Colors and Elements," and so on. All told, the boiled-down questions numbered more than 250.
I presented them to the designers, and I could feel the vibration as several jaws hit the floor. I don't think they quite anticipated that many questions.
So we're going to break it down even furt
After being without my main computer for a week so it could have Vista inflicted on it, I'm finally starting to catch up. But it's taking 12-hour days...
Anyway, I'm starting to see the results of my labors come together. I just saw the design for the new BIONICLE.com, and it's actually my favorite design from the last 8 years of BIONICLE. It's extremely cool. I'll be putting content into the site hopefully next week, or the week after. It will launch in early January.
I'm also starting to
Well, it's been a little over a week, so now the "Ask a Designer" question period has been closed.
Since there are so many duplicate questions, I'm going to collate the questions into groups so the designers don't have the answer the same questions over and over. The repeat questions will be rephrased, but the more unique ones will be just as they were posed in the thread. Then I'll give them to the designers and they will answer them this week. Next week, we'll send the finished answers to t
