danny316p

Bionicle fans build MOCs. I can't think of something equivalent in most "fandoms". Sure, "fan art" is a thing, but that's still fundamentally different from something being made out of pieces that are designed to be used to build a variety of things.

Ahem.

 

we can provide (exclusive to RLUGs)

 

...but then, this does seem like a good time to remind people how joining BioniLUG is easy ($5 a year!) and fun (exciting LEGO opportunities like this!)

Are we really just a "fandom"? I've figured that it's the creative aspect of building something new out of the stock elements that lends us more credibility and longevity. Not that there's anything wrong with pop culture fandom or toy collecting, but we do have a distinct advantage over those two categories...

I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of everything Lego has ever made and wouldn't expect anyone to be so.

We actually have multiple walking encyclopedias around here. My expectation, though, is that people would check against a database (such as Brickset or BrickLink) before posting something inaccurate about what LEGO has made so far. The Dimensions sets in particular are recent enough that even a quick skim through the LEGO Shop-at-Home website would cover it (most of those sets are currently in stores).

 

I want a Bionicle G3 to happen in my life time.

 

Same, anyone else?

 

That would be nice. I'd assume we'll get something else similar, but different instead. To set expectations, we'll probably get something soon that is to G2 what Hero Factory was to G1.

I wish LEGO would make a non-store version of their digital boxes. As long as they're trying out weird concepts, why can't they come up with an app that can identify sets and download animations based on them on-the-fly?

I'm probably in the minority in this thread, but I think the problem is that LEGO makes too much good stuff...most of what I'd wish for over the years has already happened. Short of giving us a value bucket full of currently rare parts, I'm not sure they could please me more.

...oh wait, we've already got keetorange bricks in Pick-A-Brick. So we're already seeing parts that sold for $30+ a few years ago become readily available in bulk.

This is the old Customer Service system - they modernized it with reasonable online ordering a few years back. The main appeal is the ability to get current parts that aren't available elsewhere in quantity. It's been kept semi-secret out of concern that resellers will ruin it for everybody (it's already explicitly mentioned when you order that you cannot resell parts bought through Bricks and Pieces).

Yep, I've grabbed most of the harder-to-find ones from there. There are other sites that have powers online, but Spyrius.org is the best I've found.

I have to wonder if the kids playing it have figured that out too...

Sonic the Hedgehog

Lord of the Rings

Seriously?

Here's the official Sonic the Hedgehog set: http://brickset.com/sets/71244-1/Sonic-the-Hedgehog-Level-Pack

They also did a multi-year Lord of the Rings series: http://brickset.com/sets/theme-The-Lord-of-the-Rings

...followed by a multi-year Hobbit series: http://brickset.com/sets/theme-The-Hobbit

Are you yanking our chains?

Stargate.

You mean something like this?

http://brickset.com/sets/8078-1/Portal-of-Atlantis

Combine that with Pharoah's Quest sets from that same year, and you're golden. I think they've pushed as far as they can in that direction without obtaining a license that wouldn't be kid-friendly.

I'm curious if anyone else has gotten hooked on the Merlok 2.0 game for Nexo Knights. It became my latest vice after I found several "exclusive" Nexo Powers at LEGOLAND Florida. I've since made the weekly leaderboards, hit level 88, and collected 104 of the 177 Nexo powers.

I can't tell if that's impressive, or if I'm just the only non-child playing the game. I'd be interested in talking strategy if we have other players here.

This might also be a possibility for a convention activity next year - I'd like to gauge interest on whether people would want to trade powers at events, or if we think there would be interest in setting up powers to be scanned at BioniLUG events. Or am I the only one getting into this?

I second that Code Lyoko would've been cool to see in Lego. Still, that goes back to the problem that, except for Harry Potter, Lego seems to never license non-American properties.

Ahem? Maersk is Danish. Hans Christian Anderson is Danish. Doctor Who is British. The car companies (Ferrari, Volkswagen, Volvo, Mercedes, BMW, etc) span a wide variety of countries. The "Soccer" sports theme never would have worked if football wasn't massively popular in non-American markets. The oil companies (Exxon, Shell) are all multinational conglomerates. I guess Disney's American, but otherwise, this seems completely wrong (and Disney brought us things like Winnie the Pooh, which brings us back across the pond).

FWIW, the US only recently surpassed Germany as the largest market for LEGO. It's only natural that LEGO would cater more to that market today, although that's still not that common.

According to BrickLink's inventory of the set ( http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItemInv.asp?S=8693-1 ), this set did not come with any extra parts. You can decide how much you want to trust BrickLink, but that's a recent enough kit that I wouldn't doubt it (plenty of people probably bought the set new after it was inventoried and could have corrected it, and that page already says someone else confirmed it with a new set).

Have they opened suit against other counterfeiting outfits from that area? I know it hasn't been done as well (or as quickly) by anyone else, but LEPIN is hardly the only problem.

...then again, this news came through the community team, and this is probably the first brand that AFOLs find "close enough" to take seriously.

The diehards will always be here. I see plenty of good in the future.

The money LEGO could spend on those fans would be better spent on themes that have more fans. But then, when their own favorite theme's time is up, it's as if no expense is too great to please even the smallest fanbase.

You're absolutely right. I'm not too surprised, though, to see that Bionicle fans aren't familiar with how much LEGO has tried to do things for FOLs in the past. About 10 years back, LEGO agreed (as part of their research on train sets) to do an adult fan-oriented set designed by train builders in the AFOL community, and marketed to train fans. The kit flopped and confirmed everything LEGO already knew about the size of the fan community - it doesn't matter how large we think we are, we are absolutely dwarfed by the general market for LEGO sets.

Oh, and after it was shown that AFOLs' clout was trivial in getting sets to succeed, LEGO went forward with existing plans to end 9V trains. You might remember how that part ended.

LEGO has done a few things since to measure how far their fans can really impact sales. People here probably remember the Ideas Exo-Suit, which was marketed almost exclusively through AFOL channels. The bizarre marketing there was intentionally designed to measure how well a set can be promoted just by the fans.

...and while we don't have the results of LEGO's research into that, I think the heavy clearance-pricing we enjoyed near the end of that kit's run speaks for itself. Similarly, we sort of knew the conclusion of Bionicle was coming - last year's sets are still getting clearanced out, and LEGO store employees haven't kept it a secret that most LBR locations aren't going to carry any of the 2016H2 sets.

I think most of the discussion so far misunderstands what goes into putting a set on the shelves. LEGO plans these things years in advance, and they need months of lead time just to get parts manufactured. These decisions certainly weren't made lightly or even that recently.

I figure there are two likely reasons for this:

1. The first few months of sales (or other indicators used for tracking the line's popularity) of the first 2015 Bionicle wave lagged far enough below expectations to immediately put the future of the line in question. It's likely that everything released so far was already designed and in the manufacturing pipeline at that point - this was probably the earliest the line could have been ended.

2. Some other license or product line that they couldn't tell us about now even if they wanted to interferes with further production of Bionicle. Think about, for example, the sudden end of new Space sets when the first Star Wars line came out, or the lack of other Castle sets during the first Lord of the Rings run, or the Pirates wave that ended around when the Pirates of the Caribbean sets came out. LEGO frequently makes decisions based on competing against itself, and license agreements frequently dictate those sorts of things.

A combination of the two reasons is also entirely possible - and if 2 is even remotely a factor, we won't get a complete answer as to what happened until after some new line is on store shelves.

So chill, everybody. The quality (comparative or otherwise) of the G2 line likely wasn't a factor. The lengthy lead time isn't comparable to a TV or movie series where manufacturing is fast and distribution is nearly instantaneous.

I'm 29, and usually the oldest person in the room when hanging out with BZPower peeps (I've occasionally met older BZPower members, but these elders tell me not to speak of them).

...and even if BZP skews older than it used to, it's still pretty darn young. Last time I went to an event BZP wasn't exhibiting at, the average age of AFOLs exhibiting was at least 20 years higher, with me being the youngest person in the room (perhaps by a ten year margin).

It's also been my experience that the youthfulness of BZPower can intimidate older builders, even if they are already interested in Bionicle or constraction at some level.

Funny, that link doesn't seem to work anymore.

I'm disappointed by the lack of connection points, as well as the choice to run Windows. I've been looking for a "purist" computer for some time, though...

I'd also kind of like to find a way to use my hobbies to bring joy to other people.

That may be the best justification as to why so many of us do FOL shows and conventions. Especially with something like Bionicle, with a multi-year storyline, I've been surprised by how excited some younger kids get at even just seeing sets from years that they weren't able to enjoy the first time around. I know I've changed the way I build based on the thought of doing more exciting things at events where we get to share the hobby. Interestingly, one of the more memorable discussions I've had over a Technic MOC was with a homeless man who was reminded of happier times when he used to tinker with similar things. It's impossible to predict how you can connect with people by doing LEGO displays, but it's been surprisingly positive for me overall.

For what it's worth, The LEGO Group is an enormous corporate bureaucracy - it's more than just a large company, it's a group of companies and the name is licensed out even further than that. For the scope of what they do, I'm impressed that they don't mess up more often - there are so many people across so many countries, that it's a given things will go wrong. As it is, you see different policies in different places (compare LEGO stores operated by LEGO Brand Retail with LEGOLAND stores operated by Merlin Entertainment) and in different countries (consider monobrand stores in countries where Brand Retail doesn't operate or charity partnerships that only happen in certain places).

Then again, you can probably expect a biased response when you ask a question like this on a LEGO fan site. We've obviously already decided that we like LEGO at some level...

Did you change some dark green to regular green (or "earth green" to "dark green" in official color-speak) on Euripedes?

I'm impressed - these are surprisingly easy to recognize as the old sets. How far do you plan on taking this? As a rare color collector, I tend to think of Galidor in terms of how many rare colors show up in seemingly "useless" parts - there will probably never be CCBS elements in some of the weirder shades of purple there. Gorm looks close enough here, but I can't imagine how Nick Bluetooth or the TDN module might be possible.

I love the interior. I kind of wish that the Island theme carried out to the exterior, too, but I don't see how that would be possible to do in the modular standard.

Wow, the dramatic reveal there really threw me! The "studio" wasn't the "after party room" at all - it was the hotel lobby the whole time! The behind-the-scenes reel features not just the studio audience, but blink-and-you'll-miss-them cameo appearances from non-BZP BrickFair celebs!

You shouldn't take my opinions seriously, I get too excited over these things. I also seem to forget the details I've already watched in these - you might be making them too fun. I enjoyed the behind the scenes look, though.

I'm not sure who I'd like to see next...I'm a little strange in that I probably spend more time talking to BZP staff in person than on BZP. I kind of want next month's video to be another surprise-twist behind-the-scenes video from a different angle. Maybe the next reveal could be that you were actually at a different hotel, in a different year, all a dream, or in an alternate universe. Or maybe you were never there at all, and you're really different BZP staffers wearing masks!

Ah, I see - 11:30 PM is waaay too early for me. It's pretty hard to get me out of the expo center before it actually closes for the night at 2 AM. The trick is to start the party around 2:30.

At least the other 11 months of Meet the Staff videos will be like a little bit of BZPower at BrickFair party all year 'round.

I just started with Sumiki's. This is awesome, although the hoarseness makes it hard to hear. I'm bummed that I wasn't there in the studio audience.

When was this taped?

How do we get to be in the studio audience?

What else was going on in there?

Did I miss all the fun?

Why can't we do it again next year?

What are everyone's alter egos based on the Avengers? I get that we all assemble at these events, but without super powers, aren't we all Hawkeye?

Is it possible to pick up our parts at BFVA for this? Or is this going to happen much later?

I'm not sure I'll ever get the hang of thread revival rules. It's noobish of me, but I still have a hard time with it. I think it's been a few months since I've actually messed that up, though.

I'm going to try to make it there this weekend. We'll see how it goes.