Toatapio Nuva

This is amazing! Thank you so much, it is certainly a valuable resource to all Bionicle fans.

I personally use this map of the MU. It's the most accurate/plausible map I have encountered so far. The Southern Continent and Karda Nui being underneath is probably the most problematic aspect, since it makes absolutely no sense, and wasn't even planned that way originally. My guess is that Greg's the one to come up with that particular aspect, but I have no proof of this.

If Karda Nui didn't have to be underneath the Southern Continent, it would solve the most glaring problem with the MU map.

As for the size of the MU, that was also originally planned differently. Mainly, it was planned to be significantly smaller. It's definitely that way in my headcanon, cause it makes much more sense. Even with that size, however, the prototype robot on Bara Magna would be impossible for the Agori to assemble, given that the pieces would still be the size of entire countries.

Every Matoran has the potential to become a Toa, but they will not all do so.

Besides, Greg confirmed that it continues to be possible to make new Matoran on Spherus Magna. So the species won't die out.

 

Kapura farting was the original sin tbh.

Nah. Greg deciding that that aspect of his character wasn't canon is where it all went downhill.

This, and the out-of-control Greg (de-)canonizations in general.

 

 

There's also The LEGO Movie, which rivals Bionicle G1 in depth if not length

 

In what way did The LEGO Movie have depth?

 

If you can't figure it out on your own then I have a feeling nothing I say will convince you, but it was a story with many different layers of meaning. It is packed with themes about teamwork, business, government, society, family, storytelling, childhood, creativity, self-confidence, and more. Just as Bionicle had the Matoran Universe which was at once both a fully populated world and an analogue for a single living organism, The LEGO Movie's world was both a fully realized society and an analogue to Finn's strained relationship with his father and childlike understanding of the world around him.

 

I guess you have a point. It's just that the execution of those layers you mentioned felt half-hearted to me in the movie, and didn't really make the impact I would've expected. Granted, the meaning may have been there, regardless of how they were executed.

Though I'll admit that my not-so-positive opinion on the movie overall may influence my thinking on this.

 

There's also The LEGO Movie, which rivals Bionicle G1 in depth if not length

In what way did The LEGO Movie have depth?

 

Bionicle [...] gave me quite a few moments in my childhood, and in a world that's always speeding up, attention spans being forced down by absurd competition, something that felt genuine and didn't act solely as a marketing ploy, well, it felt nice

I second this. The G1 story was more than just marketing the toys - instead, it went hand-in-hand with the sets. It was even written in the style guide how the sets, story and marketing were all on an equal level, and connected. The creators of G1 also made clear on numerous occasions that they were deliberately creating a rich story and lore, and that sales would follow from that naturally.

And don't ask questions about the Spirit Stars.  No one knows what those are!  Not Greg, and clearly not the filmmakers otherwise we wouldn't have all these plotholes about them.

Apparently, the stars outside the MU are created by the Red Star, which explains how they can exist (says so in Biosector). Still, I'm sure you're right about the film makers not understanding them.

Could someone point out where exactly these references take place? How many are there, just one or multiple?

For a long time, I've been thinking about making a Bionicle RPG game that would accurately depict the storyline, from the beginning. Recently, I finally began to work on the idea, using RPG Maker VX Ace and stuff I already had in place from my Voyage of Fear game to create a retelling of the 2001 story. I decided to pick Kopaka as a sort of main protagonist, so the game follows canon story events from his perspective.

The game is still under development, fully playable from start to finish. It contains about 3 hours of gameplay as of now, and goes through all the important story elements.

DOWNLOAD THE DEMO (VERSION 2) (updated 30.5.2017)

You can view screenshots below:

Now, this is still very much a work in progress, and if you feel like you can contribute somehow, please let me know. All help would be appreciated. If you have and know how to use VX Ace, even better, but it's not necessary. For example, I'm always in need of sprites and other graphical things, cause I'm not very good at them myself. So I will gladly accept help on those departments.

Play the demo, and let me know what you think. All feedback is appreciated, and possibly used to improve the next version of the demo.

 

 

Whoa this is still around? I remember trying to make sprites for the ship thing a long time ago but they were really bad lol.

 

I remember the struggle to get some sprites for the transport... unfortunately, it still uses the basic ship sprite to this day.

 

Yeah, I didn't know the size of the spritesheet for RMVXA back then. I've used it quite a bit since then, and looking back on it I'm actually disappointed in myself.

 

No need to be disappointed, it did work out pretty well in any case.

Whoa this is still around? I remember trying to make sprites for the ship thing a long time ago but they were really bad lol.

I remember the struggle to get some sprites for the transport... unfortunately, it still uses the basic ship sprite to this day.

Hi, could you please update the Voyage of Fear section with this link (http://www.bzpower.com/board/topic/20452-voyage-of-fear-the-game-version-2/) instead of the old one, and change the status to completed?

The game uses the arrow keys and space bar/enter, plus shift for running while out of the ship. For battles there are combos you can make using letters on the keyboard.

Seeing a Let's Play of this would be interesting, so I'm all for it if you do.

Update: I've updated the game slightly, and uploaded a playthrough video here. If you run into problems with progressing in the game, the video should help you out.

Well-written review, I especially liked the character-music analysis part. I love the soundtrack and agree with your points, the music deserves praise indeed. As for the few points of criticism you offered, I didn't even notice those particular aspects while listening to the music, but next time I'll have to listen carefully to understand what you meant.

This looks great, thank you so much for sharing!

Ah, the eternal debate of Bionicle vs. Hero Factory.

I personally don't think Bionicle G2 was any better than Hero Factory. G1, however, was vastly better. It's not that I really hate Hero Factory, it's just that I can't get behind the execution of its story, much like with Bionicle G2.

The flaw you mentioned about the disconnected story each year is perhaps one of the most glaring points to me, and one that Bionicle G2 also suffered from. I have a hard time appreciating a story that is full of inconsistencies and doesn't take itself seriously enough to at least maintain consistent characterization and important plot points. The same happened with Journey to One, which changed some personalities from last year and made the characters generally bland and uninteresting. This was Hero Factory's flaw too, and I didn't feel anything for the characters or their motivations. The premise of Hero Factory's story was also far less interesting than that of Bionicle, basically being about a factory that builds action figures. That was it. Locations were constantly changing, meaning that it was near impossible to properly establish a proper atmosphere in any of them. Constantly changing characters also meant lack of connection to any of them. Also, the lore was minimal - this was the total opposite in Bionicle G1, which had a rich lore and plenty of worldbuilding.

As for the sets, I cannot really say much about that since I don't own any Hero Factory sets. They look ok, but seem to have a lot of specialized and over-designed pieces. The Bionicle aesthetic appeals much more to me, though that's merely my opinion, and nothing else.

It's hard to choose my favorite, but I think I would go with The Fall of Ta-Koro if I had to. In the movie, I always found that scene one of the best, and the music reflects it. There's something dark and epic about the destruction of an entire Koro, and the most well-guarded one of them, no less.

Ah, I got technicalities mixed up then I guess I was just referring to high quality in general.

Yes, on Ghost's own website.

Aw shucks, I guess I was being too optimistic about finding a HD version then.    I remembered the videos being better quality back on bionicle.com, but I suppose the comparison was different at the time.

Well, at least the Final Battle animation is available in HD. It's already something.

I don't actually play with my Bionicle sets, but that's only cause I don't have enough time for it, or company who would also enjoy it. If I had those two, I wouldn't even hesitate to resume playing with them though.

I mostly stick around with the Bionicle story though, rather than the toys. There's just something remarkable about it that keeps you hooked.

Oh, and I'm 24.

Quick question, does anyone know where one could download the highest quality possible version of the Mata Nui Rising video? I know that the Final Battle animation as a whole can be found like that on Ghost's website, but that version doesn't have the part with the Hau and Kini-Nui collapsing, which is what I'm looking for. I didn't find the video on Biomedia project, and youtube doesn't have a high quality version.