Krana Ja

Just have Morgan Freeman as the narrator & have him do slightly different voices for everyone. That way it's as close to the animations as possible.

1. Kopaka- Big fan of his colors, and he's the most solid build out of all of the Toa. Only issue with him is that his function seems a bit loose, but that may just be my set only.

2. Onua- Don't actually own him yet, but I like his unique design. His colors are a bit cluttered though, and his hammer looks really awkward.

3. Gali- Not much to say about Gali. There's not anything wrong with her aside from maybe her colors feeling a bit cluttered, but she's nothing special either.

4. Lewa- Unique build, but I don't like the use of Keetorange and his axes look strange. Also, he can't move his head because of his gearbox.

5. Pohatu- Used to be my least favorite, but then I got him and hes a bit better than i expected. He's got a decent build and color scheme, but his random silver arm and flimsy boomerangs kind of kill him for me.

6. Tahu- I'm probably not a "true Bionicle fan" for saying this, but Tahu is probably the weakest set out of all the Toa this year. His design is very awkward, with incredibly long legs on a torso thats proportionally too short, a gearbox that sticks out too far fron his sides and gives him a boxy look, and what I feel is an uninteresting color scheme. That being said, I don't think he's actually a bad set, I just personally don't like him a lot.

Not sure if this is Bone-Heads or not, but I want to see sets of the prototype Matoran on Christian Faber's blog that have names like "Woo" and "Doo-Chuck" (seen here).

Large: All of them seem pretty good. They have a few problems here and there but not enough that I can pick out a least favorite.

Medium: Pohatu. I don't like his color scheme that much, and the asymmetrical silver arm looks very poorly built without any sort of detail added on.

Small: Tie between PoF and PoI, but i chose PoF. Red and silver isn't a very interesting color scheme, and he has no elbows.

The art style here reminds me a lot of G1 Transformers for some reason. I like the look of it overall, but a few things seemed a bit odd to me.

1. The size of the Protectors. Even though the Protectors are supposed to be much smaller than the Toa, here they're about the same size.

2. Tahu's design, particularly because it changes to a more set accurate design for one panel only.

3. Statues of human faces. This is probably just supposed to be generic background decoration, but I thought it was sort of odd onsidering that the animations have kept this sort of thing out despite the Mayan/Aztec sort of style.

4. The Mask of Jungle's design. It seems like whoever was doing the illustrations mistook Lewa's shoulders for ears or something. I like the more tribal look it has, but it's not consistent with the set.

Are there any pictures for those of us who haven't played the game?

Anyways, it sounds like it could be hinting towards a future upgrade to Onua and the others, which jugding by your description sounds like a cross between the Nuva and the Hordika. It may also just be something the developers added in, in which case it probably doesn't have any meaning and is just an easter egg.

I'm sure there'll be Bionicle 2015 bootlegs eventually, but I think that we won't be seeing any anytime soon since it usually take bootleggers a few years to get their hands on all of the molds and packaging and whatnot.

Why does it need storyline significance? It's a promotional give-away mask. The trans green Miru never had a place in the story either.

 

-NotS

But the copper Huna did. You're probably right though, the trans Hau probably won't be important to the story in any way.

Got Gali, PoS, PoW, and LoSS yesterday. PoS is probably my favorite so far, I like how the spikes on his feet and arm give him kind of a biomechanical look. LoSS reminds me a lot of the old 2001 Rahi. He looks cool and he's got a cool function, but he's a bit of a brick when it comes to articulation. Also, it feels really wierd to go back to the same section of the same Toys R Us that I went to in 2001 to buy Bionicle again.

rip in pies bohrok, nevar 5get

But seriously, I'm fine with Tahu being the winner. Maybe not my favorite set overall, but I did vote for him in the 2001 poll; and considering how iconic he is, I'm not surprised he won.

Two questions: Is the Vahi considered a legendary mask or 'mask of great power' such as the mask of creation?

And question umber 2: How did they get the Vahi?

My guess is that it's either A. The protectors didn't have the Vahi and the magazine is inconsistent with the story or B. The protectors did have the Mask of Time, and we either didn't see it (not counting the easter eggs) or the animations are inconsistent with the story.

I'd like to see them bring back Vezon. Considering he already has dimension travelling powers, having him end up in Okoto's timeline wouldn't be out of the question. I don't think he'd necessarily be evil though. My idea is that he'd be trapped in the Okoto timeline, so he'd work with both the Toa and Makuta/whatever other villain we have at that point to get back to the G1 timeline. He wouldn't stay completely loyal to either side though, and he'd leave whatever side he's on as soon as it's no longer convenient. For the sake of advertising, they could leave his connections with G1 pretty vague, and just advertise him as "a warrior from another dimension" or something like that.

My collection consists of...

2001:

Toa: Tahu, Onua, Pohatu, Lewa, Gali

Turaga: Nokama, Matau

Tohunga: Maku, Jala

Rahi: Nui-Jaga

2002:

Bohrok: Levahk, Tahnok, Nuhvok

Bohrok Va: Levahk Va, Tahnok Va

Toa Nuva: Gali Nuva

2003:

Rahkshi: Lerahk, Guurahk

Matoran: Macku, Hahli, Hewkii, Hafu, Kopeke, Matoro

Titans: Takanuva

2004:

Toa Metru: Matau

Matoran: Vhisola

Vahki: Vorzakh, Nuurakh, Zadakh

Titans: Nidhiki, Lhikan and Kikanalo

2005:

Toa Hordika: Whenua

Visorak: Keelerak, Vohtarak, Oohnorak

Rahaga: Norik

Toa Hagah: Iruini

2006:

Matoran: Balta, Garan, Velika, Piruk, Dalu, Kazi

Piraka: Zaktan, Avak, Hakann

Toa Inika: Nuparu

Titans: Axonn x2

2007:

Barraki: Pridak, Mantax, Carapar

Matoran: Dekar, Defilak

Hydruka: Morak, Thulox

Titans: Nocturn

2008:

Toa Phantoka: Lewa

Makuta Phantoka: Chirox

Matoran: Tanma

Makuta Mistika: Krika

Titans: Toa Ignika

2009:

Glatorian: Strakk

Agori: Metus, Zesk, Tarduk

Titans: Toa Mata-Nui

2010:

Stars: Tahu, Gresh, Piraka, Skrall, Rahkshi, Takanuva

All of these are currently dissassembled in my parts bin, and some of them have broken or missing pieces. I've also got a couple of the System playsets, and a few collectables like masks, Krana, and the ammo packs for some reason.

Maybe he's hoarding masks so he can create the Vahi like in 2004.

Sort of dissappointed that the Bohrok didn't win, but Iruini is probably my second favorite set, so he gets my vote.

Gonna go ahead and jump on the Piraka bandwagon. To me, the Piraka were some of the best villains we got because they were the first villains who truly felt like equals to the Toa. Before the Piraka, all of the canister-sized villains were more or less just mindless, faceless drones. The Piraka, on the other hand, were a group of characters with invidual personalities and actual dialogue. The dynamic of the Piraka always fighting amongst themselves was also interesting because it created a contrast with the Toa. Whereas the Toa were usually all about teamwork and cooperation, the Piraka were always trying to backstab each other so that one of them could take the Mask of Life and leave the others behind. Although they didn't ultimately have a huge effect on the plot, they were still pretty groundbreaking at the time.

2009 is kind of a wierd year for me. I think there are some things it did really well, and some things it did horribly. I think that, overall, the pros would be the return of the brighter colors from '01, less of a reliance on silver and grey, a new setting and story that could have done really well, and a few good set designs that either don't use a traditional Inika build (Kiina, Strakk) or look good enough to make it work (Ackar, Stronius). The cons for 2009 include the return of the 2008 socket design (which is odd because Lego probably knew about its problems by this point), some awful small sets that fix none of the issues with the '08 Matoran, canister sets that don't feel particularly inspired or nice to look at despite the improvements over '08 (with some exceptions), and finally, the handling of the new story.

The story gets its own paragraph because I have a lot more to say about it. I think that the idea behind the story is fairly solid, and it really could have gone somewhere interesting had it been properly handled. I think giving the story a reboot was a great idea. At this point in G1's lifespan, Bionicle had seen a drop in sales, in part due to its position as a story-based toyline whose story had become too complex for most newcomers to follow. Given this, it makes sense to create a new story in a new world to attract a new audience. However, I think there were a few mistakes made when it came to designing and marketing this new story that ultimately lead to Bionicle's early cancellation. First of all, the setting. I think that, out of all of the themes that could have been chosen for the new setting, a barren desert was definitely one of the worst. If they had included some more interesting settings, like ruins for example (the prototype robot doesn't count), or even just given more attention to the parts of Bara Magna that aren't just desert, maybe it could have worked. But, overall, there wasn't enough focus on anything aside from the desert to give the story an interesting setting. Also, world building was severely lacking. All we get is "desert planet, gladiators, evil nomadic tribes, also theres a giant robot out of nowhere". We don't get a good look into how the world works, we just get a few basic plot points, and then a bunch of random fighting until suddenly there's a giant robot. Something MNOG-like would have been great here, and I think that's what the MLN canpaign was trying to do, but it evidently didn't do it well enough. Also, a lack of mystery hurts the story in my opinion. If we had gotten a story that had gradually given vague hints at something bigger going on behind the scenes, and then at the end linked those hints to a big reveal, in this case the prototype robot, it would have been great. This sort of thing is what I really loved about 2001's story, it always felt like something big was going on that no one knew about, and the MNOG in particular did a good job of dropping hints without making the big twist too obvious until it had already happened. To me, 2009 doesn't feel like it really wants to tell a story, it just wants to rush through to sell more toys. And although it's understandable why it would be that way (Lego is a toy company after all), I feel like Bionicle's focus should always be using a well written story as a way to make people want to buy sets. Yes, it's harder, but if you get people invested in a story and it's characters, they'll buy the merchandise.

>malum

i don't think that's malum guys

My guess is that it's a similar case to the Matoran in G1: regular villager masks have some elemental power, but it's only enough to give the mask an affiliation with the element. The masks worn by the Protectors have more elemental energy in them, which is why they have a second transparent color mixed in. This extra energy gives the Protectors some control over their element, but it doesn't really compare to the Toa/Masters' masks.

Army ants are pretty small and weak compared to a lot of other creatures. That doesn't stop them from posing a threat to adult humans who wander into their territory.

Also, the Skull Spiders do have the ability to strategize. That's why LoSS has the Golden Mask. He comes up with strategies, and the mask lets him tell the weaker Skull Spiders what to do.

 

I didn't wanna spam another topic with this, but does anyone else think the Skull Spider's will transfer their special traits onto their controlee? (i.e. Hardiness, X-ray vision, increased speed, etc.)

I think it could be possible. The Krana that Lewa wore gave them its power, and though they are two completely different creatures in two different storylines, I still think the Skull Spiders could transfer their power to their host if they took over someone. (If they can even do that to begin with.) I don't have any proof for it though. 

 

Speaking of Lewa and the Krana, I will be very dissappointed if we don't get a scene this year where Lewa gets possessed by a Skull Spider and Onua has to save him.

As far as music goes, what we really need is stuff like Hura Mafa Flow and Kumo Rocks from the Power Pack in 2001.

2004 is kind of an odd year for me in terms of sets. I think most of them have good builds, but their colors, which are usually a dark color, grey, and silver, make them very uninteresting to look at. Lhikan breaks this trend, however, by having a very good color scheme of dark red, gold, and a bit of black. He also gets some extra points for his role in the story as Metru Nui's legendary hero before the Toa Metru. Kikanalo is also pretty good, since he also has a fairly solid build, but I think Lhikan is definitely the main selling point of the set. Nidhiki is probably my second favorite from this year, since his design is pretty unique and his functions are interesting.