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BZPower or Eurobricks?


Waaja

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Eurobricks is okay, but the community is too large for me to handle. :/ I much prefer RRU (Rock Raiders United)

I didn't know anything about RRU but I did took a look at the sit and I don't think I'll be joining that sit anytime soon.

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Eurobricks is okay, but the community is too large for me to handle. :/ I much prefer RRU (Rock Raiders United)

Ooh, yet another community :ahhh:

 

what's eurobricks and does it affect the bzprpg

 

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It's another Lego-based forum...
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I joined Eurobricks in December 2009, when I was 18 years old. I've been active there ever since. For a while I even DID become inactive on BZPower, because in the wake of BIONICLE's cancellation the level of animosity between fellow fans, or between fans and the LEGO Group, became difficult for me to bear.

 

Don't get me wrong, the BZPower community had been incredibly divided for many years. Some people preferred newer BIONICLE sets, some people preferred older sets. Some people preferred the newer BIONICLE stories, some people preferred the older stories. But the cancellation of BIONICLE threw those divisions into sharp relief. Some people hated Hero Factory, and considered anyone who liked it a traitor to BIONICLE. Other people thought that Hero Factory was a great opportunity for a fresh start. Some people thought that BIONICLE had been going strong and was being cut down in the prime of its life. Other people thought that BIONICLE had brought about its own demise with declining quality of set design and storytelling. Some people thought the Stars were a loving tribute to classic BIONICLE, the sort that we should have gotten in previous waves that brought back classic characters. Other people thought the Stars were a cheap, lazy cop-out and an insult to the sets and characters that inspired them. Some people thought that showing our support for other LEGO themes would help us cope with BIONICLE's loss and show our support. Other people thought any LEGO theme without a storyline of BIONICLE's caliber was utter rubbish.

 

As an avid debater, I always enjoy being able to express my OWN opinions, which in this case were that BIONICLE had gotten a fantastic ten-year run, but Hero Factory had plenty of creative potential of its own and ought to be given a chance. But trying to be heard in the midst of all this argument began to feel exhausting. I also became bored of keeping up with the story serials, which were updated so infrequently that I would have completely forgotten the events of the chapter before by the time a new chapter was posted. And even buying constraction sets became fatiguing, now that I was in college and was fully aware of the cost these sets entailed. I didn't buy any Hero Factory sets in 2010, instead focusing on LEGO Atlantis and LEGO Space Police.

 

I got back into constraction when Hero Factory introduced its revolutionary new building system in 2011. And I came back after the Great Downtime, just to see how the community might have changed in my absence. Overall, I liked what I saw. The community had been restructured to give non-BIONICLE themes greater recognition. Tensions within the community had largely died down. But I remained incredibly active on Eurobricks, a community which had embraced me and helped me through the downtime.

 

On to the meat of the question. Eurobricks and BZPower are fundamentally different communities because of their origins. Eurobricks is an AFOL commmunity through and through, and the AFOL community has not traditionally been fond of themes like BIONICLE. The hatred and dismissiveness is not as strong as on Brickset, where I am also an active member of the community, but themes like this were historically thought of as "kiddie themes" with specialized parts, repetitive designs, and overwrought storylines that greatly reduced the potential for kids to create their own original models and stories. Obviously I'm generalizing — there's still a healthy community on Eurobricks surrounding non-traditional themes like BIONICLE, Hero Factory, and Ninjago, and that community has grown rapidly and become more accepted as kids of my generation have reached AFOLhood and added their voices to the discussion. But a lot of discussion there still focuses on more traditional themes like City, Castle, and Pirates.

 

BZPower, on the other hand, is a website that was born to celebrate themes that the AFOL community at large dismissed. Themes with detailed multimedia storylines, elaborate character and part designs, wild and diverse colors, and lots of "kid appeal" are what this community has always been about. And while at first there was a somewhat myopic focus on BIONICLE, that didn't stop fans from discussing other themes that shared these traits, like Knights' Kingdom II and Exo-Force. To many BZPower members, themes like LEGO Creator or LEGO City without any detailed story or specific characterization often seemed primitive and childish compared to BIONICLE's rich, epic storyline. Discussions and news articles regularly focus on new LEGO multimedia content, not just on new sets. Storyline discussions are plentiful, and they can span many pages even when discussing a theme like BIONICLE that has not had any new story content for four years.

 

Kids have always been welcomed and protected here on BZPower, and even as some older BZPower members talked disparagingly of the "seven-year-olds" who made up BIONICLE's target market and were blamed for every change to the sets and story that older fans disliked, those younger fans were still free to add their voices to the discussion from the beginning. Sometimes in the past, this has been a disadvantage, considering all the taboos that BZPower used to have on everything from gay pairings in fan fiction to criticism of staff decisions, and filters not just swear words but also mild insults that cropped up from time to time in the actual BIONICLE storyline! But today it is in many ways an advantage, as the staff work to encourage progressive, egalitarian social ideals rather than stodgy, prejudicial, or downright bigoted attitudes like you sometimes have the misfortune of running into on Eurobricks. Eurobricks still has a ban on members younger than 18, and while this can sometimes help keep the level of discourse a bit more professional, it also sometimes turns certain discussions whether LEGO-related or not LEGO-related into a bit of an echo chamber.

 

Eurobricks lacks the rich fan art and fan fiction communities of BZPower, and while those are less active today than they used to be, that still sets the two websites apart. Eurobricks still has just a single topic for all members to share art they create, whether LEGO-inspired or not, and while their "Mafia Games" are basically equivalent to BZPower's "RPGs", fan fiction topics are few and far between. When people do tell stories, they tell them through their MOCs: comics and animations are almost always based on MOC photos rather than sprites, drawings, or 3D renders. Eurobricks has no blogs where members can discuss how their lives are going or even simply ramble about their interests. What Eurobricks does have is a brilliant number of community-generated MOCs, LEGO set reviews, and fan-created digital resources, all painstakingly organized into indexes to aid in navigation. There is no topic revival rule on Eurobricks, meaning you are always welcome to share opinions and feedback in an older discussion topic instead of creating a redundant new one, though posting in a slew of old topics is still discouraged unless those posts are relevant and substantive.

 

All of these things are why I remain active on both sites. They are two different communities, and discussion within each community has its advantages and disadvantages.

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I'd actually compare the two for how they push other things in different directions - I see each forum's role in the larger LEGO/AFOL community as a huge factor in what's worth my time (and BZP wins there handily).

 

Take events, for example:

Try going to BrickWorld (Chicago) without first joining Eurobricks - you'll be shocked how many people come in from Europe to see other Eurobricks friends, and you'll see an enormous collaborative Eurobricks presence, parties you weren't invited to because you weren't on Eurobricks (last year they had an enormous pizza party on the convention floor just for EB members), etc. They also have a second private event every year - one of my friends who is in the cult of Eurobricks flew to Billund recently for an event limited to a few dozen people.

 

BZPower has a big role at BrickFair VA, but is much more open about it. At several events, there's a friendly guestbook out, the awesome convention-circuit MOC display, a LUG that anyone can join, and occasional "unofficial" events that non-BZPower members can enjoy (I was not asked about BZPower membership when buying my BZP shirt last year, and I enjoyed watching a BZP review video taping back in 2009). There are some "exclusive" activities that non-BZPower members aren't invited to (I don't know if a non-member would be allowed to join in for BZP-organized dinners or games - I suspect many AFOLs wouldn't ask), but the crowd here is polite/discrete enough to not rub people's faces in it - the dinner thing on Sunday night isn't right on the convention floor where everyone can see that they're missing out (interestingly, a few long-time AFOLs noticed the BZP group coming back last year - and I was the only person there who even knew that there was a Sunday night dinner thing). The most important thing here is probably the convention circuit MOCs - rather than take over one convention, try to win an award, and then go home, BZP actually enhances several conventions each year by making sure a niche theme is represented well.

 

Similarly, both forums run contests. The Bionicle Based Creation Contests are fantastic, and have shown the larger community ways to use Bionicle parts to make things besides action figures. Eurobricks regularly runs contests, but the entries don't inspire or break new ground in the same way.

 

From a corporate level, it's also worth mentioning the EB had a reputation (somewhat faded now, but not completely gone) for being the site that angers TLG by posting leaks of pictures and other product information. I know people who STILL avoid EB for the sake of not being "one of those leakers". BZP has a much better track record of staying on TLG's good side - I can't remember ever seeing/hearing any complaints from TLG about BZP. A few years back, the leak issue was big enough that I avoided linking to EB on my blog more than necessary.

 

...which somewhat invalidates my next point. BZPower has resulted in more excellent blog fodder at LMOTD over the years. Compare: http://lmotd.blogspot.com/search?q=BZPower and http://lmotd.blogspot.com/search?q=Eurobricks - I count 2 MOCs built for/described on EB and 5 built specifically for BZP contests/events. Interestingly, trying to get the same data from Brothers Brick shows BZP mainly getting mentioned in Ambassador-related news and Eurobricks mainly getting mentioned when they're first announcing a contest (as compared to when something particularly awesome has won a contest).

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From a corporate level, it's also worth mentioning the EB had a reputation (somewhat faded now, but not completely gone) for being the site that angers TLG by posting leaks of pictures and other product information. I know people who STILL avoid EB for the sake of not being "one of those leakers". BZP has a much better track record of staying on TLG's good side - I can't remember ever seeing/hearing any complaints from TLG about BZP. A few years back, the leak issue was big enough that I avoided linking to EB on my blog more than necessary.

BZPower used to be pretty bad about posting leaked information. Some 2002–2005 news articles even featured preliminary images of sets from retailer catalogs if I'm not mistaken. BZP started properly cracking down on leaked pics and info around 2006, though, and since then they've been on much better terms with the LEGO Group.

 

The same is true of Eurobricks, to a lesser extent. Discussion of leaked material is permitted there, and even linking to sites that host leaked material, but as long as I've been there there's been a rule against embedding any image with "preliminary image" watermarks in order to stay in the LEGO Group's good favor.

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A while back, I took a brief look at Eurobricks, but didn't join (partially because I don't live in Europe lol but that probably doesn't matter), partially because I got a sense that, as other people have said, some of the users [usters lol typo alert] there can be somewhat...nasty to others.

For the question of "which is more well-known", I'd actually probably say Eurobricks. I know most of us would say BZP, but, hey, what site are we talking about this on, anyway.

 

And RRU is awesome.

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Eurobricks has always seemed to have a collective dislike for constraction figures which are one of my favorite aspects of Lego. I've never felt too attached to it anyway but in the later days of Bionicle I'd spend some time there when BZP apparently wasn't enough.

 

Also I don't know how relevant creative works other than MOC's are anymore but Bionicle/HF-based works like fan fiction, art, and RPG are practically nonexistent at EB. Gotta get my fix of trashy fics about Toa OC's on made-up islands SOMEWHERE.

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Eurobricks has always seemed to have a collective dislike for constraction figures which are one of my favorite aspects of Lego. I've never felt too attached to it anyway but in the later days of Bionicle I'd spend some time there when BZP apparently wasn't enough.

 

Also I don't know how relevant creative works other than MOC's are anymore but Bionicle/HF-based works like fan fiction, art, and RPG are practically nonexistent at EB. Gotta get my fix of trashy fics about Toa OC's on made-up islands SOMEWHERE.

That "collective dislike" is not nearly as bad as it used to be. Granted, some people still probably don't like constraction sets, but they're not nearly as utterly dismissive of the entire category as they used to be (or as people still are on some sites like Brickset).

 

I think part of the reason for this is that we're at the point that constraction has been around long enough for many BIONICLE fans to be AFOLs, and thus, old enough to participate on Eurobricks. It's amazing how people's attitudes can change when they share a community with people who they might have once looked down on and have a chance to realize they aren't all that bad. Brickset still doesn't have much of a constraction community, so it's not quite at that stage where constraction is respectfully tolerated even by those who dislike it. Of course, Brickset users are often rather dismissive of a lot of themes, not just constraction themes.

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