bonesiii

I'm not sure I understand your point here... Are you saaying you don't mind transformation, or hat you do, or what?

He said he's being misleading and cruel, remember?

Good to hear the update. Hope things go well from here.

Well as we all know now, the so-called "Kranohi" turned out to be the powerful Kanohi Nuva, powerful and mysterious artifacts and the transformation of the original Kanohi masks--but more than that, as was rather clear from looking at the new masks (Minus the Kaukau, but it was always kind of an odd duck out) they introduced something new to the BIONICLE mythos (Or at least the plastic) unlike the previous Kanohi they were organic.

They looked it, anyway... Only actual organic masks so far were Inika.

Try and imagine the joy that old fogies such as myself felt. Our heroes were not only taking back what we always felt was their rightful place--but additionally they were coming back in plastic! Of course many of us (including myself) were also rather hesitant at accepting this at face level--not only because people can say just about anything on the Internet (By the way, I'm really Bill Gates. Don't tell anyone) but also because we had seen how few similarities were shared by the Matoran > Inika > Mahri transformations.

 

but hey, a little hope couldn't hurt, right?

Hope is pretty much always deceptive. I make it a point never to hope, never to expect, nuttin. So I'm never really disappointed. Usually pleasantly surprised.

Though I personally thought the Mistika would have been better with armor and masks that resembled the Mata/Nuva forms as much as the Phantoka's.

*gets ready for chorus of HE'S A PURIST GET HIM*

How'd that happen?

Hm, a short story. Nah, that would turn this into an SS contest which is a headache to judge. I wish though -- that would be fun to read about, heh.

My thinking on weapon vs. character for the record is, character contests have been done before in Bionicle -- a weapon contest hasn't yet.

Also, there would be a text-only category and categories that allow images in addition to the basic explanation -- I'm thinking probably 3 categories total -- description, art, and MOC. Since lumping art and MOCs together is probably unfair.

Edit: Adv -- interesting idea... But seems too complex since it would be two in one...

Interesting point -- and vehicles do definately make a lot of sense as a "proper place" for a style that's all about machinery, after all.

Maybe only you and me, cuz I wouldn't mind it, but I'm pretty sure it would bore everybody else.

Maybe, Arpy, in an image category, though text based wouldbe the focus since it's not a BBC/Art contest.

Cap'n Bionicle -- The EU isn't dead; we just haven't had time yet to launch the first contest of the sort announced in an article last year. But I'm about to have that time, and a contest seems to be the way to get interest up.

Island is something I'd want to steer clear of because it's too large-scale to be official probably. An OoMN spy is an interesting idea. (Personally I love weapons -- maybe that's just me though. )

It's totally up to you, but lemme just say that there's no age limit. I'm in my twenties and still a fan, still enjoying it. And you don't have to buy many sets or follow it obsessively either.

I've had times where other demands have made me "lose interest" but it was more temporary, and usually all I have to do is read/buy new stuff when I'm bored to feel interested again.

Why...?

Why can't place names be just that, and nothing else?

 

 

~D

Has that ever been done, anywhere? I can't think of any examples... Pretty much everything is named after somebody or something else, innit? It wouldn't make sense otherwise, and it would lessen the meaning of the name. Instead of "Mountain named to honor a good friend who is no longer with us," it would be "random jumble of letters for this place cuz I couldn't think of anything else."

It loaded instantly for me. Yall's connections are slooooooooooow.

I didn't understand the image. I saw an improved Jaller -- because he had wings and a tail. I didn't see any signs of evil.

Maybe it's because the button to close a topic says "Close this topic" and the button for locking entries says "Lock entry"?

Technicfan here. If lego was so bent on eliminating technicism, then why are they releasing the vehicles, which feature gears, action features, and expensive design, which contributed to its removal in the first place?

I'm not totally sure I understood this -- are you disputing that Bionicle moved away from Technicism?

Since it's about what Aanchir and I were talking about, lemme for the record sum up the history that led to these vehicles:

First of all, you read the entry already so know about the original Technicism mistake, the poor Rahi, Bahrag, etc. sales, and the subsequent move away from that style.

Now, during all of this, there was a fairly vocal, seemingly sizeable minority that actually did like Technicism (one being MercenaryXero, also including much of our staff, and many prominent MOCers). Many of them see Technicism as Bionicle, unlike the majority. A lot of them have also seemingly been among the most loyal to the fanbase, at least in online participation.

These fans, fairly I think, often ask LEGO to give them treats. I think it fair for the reasons I gave in my "Bring Back Gears" blog entry. The caution being -- they have to be careful not to demand too much and keep in mind that they are a minority.

One other factoid is that vehicles apparently have sold well when tried thus far, as long as they were cool -- Ussanui and the Sea Sled are examples. Ussanui I know sold very well, although Takanuva was a big reason for that.

So this year, Bionicle is doing more of a treat for these minority Technicism fans by including a lot of Technic-style elements in several vehicles, most of them pretty large compared to past vehicles. The danger here is that large sets tend to be seen as "too Technic" by the majority fans and sell poorly (the Rahi, for example, most of which were actually smaller than Axalara, although probably about the same considering there were two in each one). The advantage this time is that these vehicles (mostly anyways) are more stylized than the Rahi or Bahrag.

So the tests are going to be if 1) enough minority fans buy these to make up for the majority fans who won't, 2) enough majority fans like them enough for the "Bioniclism" in them to buy, and 3) if the smaller ones will do better than the larger ones (Axalara mainly). Jury's still out.

Technicfan here. If lego was so bent on eliminating technicism, then why are they releasing the vehicles, which feature gears, action features, and expensive design, which contributed to its removal in the first place?

As I commented above, these are able to feature action features without a loss to poseability. (In all honesty, how much poseability can a vehicle have? ) The same was evident in other inanimate objects in BIONICLE, such as Karzahni's trap, Lesovikk's sled, and of course some of the playsets.

 

I have better hopes for this than are expressed by Bonesiii, and not only wish for the success of this experiment for reasons of having fallen deeply in love with most aspects of Rockoh (ohhhhhh... the styliiiiistic consiiiiistency...), but also foresee its success for the same reasons listed above, as well as the compatibility of these sets which was absent from the playsets, which is a potential benefit to sales.

Good points there.

Articulation reaches a near-ideal state that's hard to improve on.

 

Exactly. I liked the move from the Nuva to the Metru, and I was expecting something equally awesome in the move from Metru to Inika. While there were improvements in that change , there have yet to be drastic changes in basic torso/limb styles since the Inika for the Toa, which is a slight disappointment to me. But, oh well.

 

Nice entry.

 

Well, there's rarely ever a significant change in set articulation except between story books. If next year we see no new innovation, I will be disappointed, but of course with all the changes in story (a feature to which we have been treated at the start of about every story book), it's hard to imagine not seeing changes in sets to accompany those.

 

Anyway, Bonesii, I daresay I have to agree on most of this stuff, with the possible exception of the 2006-2008 section, as I believe with Takanuva and the Mistika "ruthless elegance" may be making a comeback. Likewise, you may be counting your chickens about this section when it comes to the further elimination of Technicism, as most of the vehicle sets this year would appear to indicate a return to action feature, which is welcome by me-- after all, it's not like there's much to be gained by replacing vehicle functions with articulation. (I can see it now: Rockoh T3! Vehicle features ADJUSTIBLE MIRRORS! ) With luck, the vehicles will be just what we need to strike a balance and reestablish that lost aspect of play value which complexity is able to bring.

 

Nevertheless, good job for the most part.

Waist artic in canisters is the main thing I'm hoping to see in the future.

I'm very curious what you mean about the Mistika. I agree ruthless elegance is still present, but mainly in villains and some titans -- remember Takanuva is a titan this year. The Mistika are actually the ones I was talking about as going away from it, and more towards "Noble Heroism." Tahu's ninja mask being perhaps the biggest example. Although that shield spinny thing is pretty ruthlessly elegant. I didn't go into detail on this one though, 'cuz there's another planned entry coming soon related to the topic I started about this a while back.

Yes, the vehicles are experimenting with basically what I'm seeing as the fusion of Technicism and Bioniclism in a large set. I didn't mention that, you're right. Probably forgot it because the results are still very very up in the air about them, and I do suspect, unfortunately, that it might fail. But I'm cautiously hoping that it won't, at least for the sake of Technicism fans. But good point, regardless.

Also not sure what you meant about play value. I could guess, but I'd rather hear you say it.

A well written article, but in the 2002-2003 section, you say "LEGO strengthens the popular canister sets by extending it to villains. Also falls into a clonism trap.", but the Mata, Rahi and Turaga were still 90% clones of thier own groups.

What that line refers to is that in 2001, the villains were titans (the Rahi), not canister sets, and not clones. It's true that each Rahi set came with two Rahi, with only slight differences, so they could be thought of as clones within the set, but that's not what "clonism" is -- clonism refers to different sets being clones. Meaning you would have to make two seperate purchases, like the blue Bohrok and the red Bohrok. With the Rahi, Tarakava were not clones of Nui-Rama, etc.

But in 2002, Bionicle introed the Bohrok, which were the first canister villains, and they were also clones.

The line about the clonism trap refers to clonism from 2001 being used again in 2002, rather than improving, and actually getting a little worse. It doesn't mean there was no clonism in 2001 -- there was. As you say, the Toa and Turaga were mostly clones (although neither were quite as clony as the Bohrok). Also, the Mctoran were clones.

Hope that helps.

First of all, where did you hear that he doesn't care what is happening in his universe? I can guarantee you that was a false rumor.

 

He actually has a character flaw which makes him not really care too much about the universe as long as it's working.

Really? Can you provide a quote for that one? I'm curious about the "too much" part. 'Cuz it's always sounded to me as if his will is a big part of why the OoMN, Toa, etc. exist as orgs. Which would imply caring, to me.

Is Mata Nui good.....or evil, then?

Mata Nui is good.

I think Mata Nui is SUPER selfish! He doesn't really care what is happening in his universe, he just keep it away from collapsing.

First of all, where did you hear that he doesn't care what is happening in his universe? I can guarantee you that was a false rumor.

Second, the last phrase in this part of what you said is what Mata Nui's job is, not what he "only cares" about. Look at it this way -- a police officer's job is to police the "homeland" -- like a city. Yet the policeman isn't overseas fighting a war. Why not? Because that's the job of soldiers. You can't expect one person to do everything.

Thirdly, keeping the universe from collapsing is pretty important, isn't it? Isn't it also something "happening"?

When there are Matoran Civil War, he did nothing.

Are you saying he should have? At the expense of the universe? Mata Nui should let the universe collapse so he could take over the job of Toa and others who are tasked with dealing with enemies, etc.? That wouldn't work.

I might as well argue that when there was a holdup at a bank near your area, you did nothing, so that makes you somehow selfish. That's a rather silly argument, don't you think?

So it later weakened him, and cost one Toa's life to healed him.

Because they don't want their universe to collapse! How is that selfish? Sorry, but you're not making any sense.

The organization that serves his will, Order of Mata Nui, prevented Makuta from killing 2007 main villains.

You state that as if to say "because they wanted them to be the 2007 villains." You didn't mention that the Barraki only escaped because Makuta caused the Great Cataclysm! That's Makuta's fault.

After he fell asleep, Toa Mata who is destined to awaken him, well.....awoke him

What? The Toa Mata have not yet awoken Mata Nui. That is what they're trying to do this year, in 2008.

, and brought him to his death, then cost another life to resurrected him.

Are you saying Greg should have told a story in which no sacrifice is required, nothing bad ever happens, etc? That would be unrealistic.

All you're doing is citing bad things that happened, ignoring the good things, and apparently implying that you have an alternative in which nothing bad ever happens and there's no conflict. That would be a really boring story, don't you think?

It's also a common tactic used by irrational critics of someone, or something, who don't understand that everything has both pros and cons. This is usually done by someone who simply hates the someone/something and wishes to discredit them for personal reasons. Dunno why you'd be doing that. But you need to understand that realistically, there are pros and cons to everything.

For example, say your boss asks you to work overtime. Con: you work more. Pro: you make more money. But by your logic, it would be selfish because you would look only at the con and complain about it. That makes no sense -- and the alternative suggestion would be what? To make extra money for no work at all? Not happening.

The way that his universe connects to him make him "invaluable". He can't die, the others can die (for him).

Nor can he ever stop working. He's basically a slave, is he not? What if he gets tired of that job, and wants to retire on some surface island, and just let the Matoran universe rot? Wouldn't that be selfish??

Instead, the guy slaves away for his entire existence trying to keep everybody alive, and you call him selfish for it?

So same question, is Mata Nui good or evil?

I hope I've been able to help. I'm not sure why you seem to have something against Mata Nui, so I'd ask you to calm down and think things through a little. He's only a fictional character, so it doesn't make sense to have a vendetta against him, man.

Dude.

For some reason, it reminds me of ET. The movie, not the member.

They are baffled by your lack of sanity/intelligence/life.

Best explanation yet.

 

You post stuff we quote when we close topics.

But even my casual posts kill conversation.

People learn. Post by TtW = topic will soon close. Habit, see?

Got tired of maj being offline so put the craft pic on bshelf for now.

But if aliens were hostile, wouldn't they have destroyed us already?

 

Anyways, I agree with you that U.F.O's are most likely military planes. What better place to test them than in rural areas (isn't that where most sightings are ).

 

But Bones, if U.F.O's are actually classified planes, how would you explain people sighting them in public areas. Have you seen footage of U.F.O sightings in Mexico City, Mexico? What pilot would expose his "Top Secret" plane to the masses? He/She would have to be a total moron.

 

~SB~

1) Not if they're scouts, though I think you might have been joking.

2) Pretty sure that is where most sightings are, yes. But there have been exceptions.

3) Haven't seen footage no. But what kind of craft was it, and BTW, we can't assume all UFOs are from the US. There are other people in the world yanno, lol. But assuming for the sake of discussion that it was ours, I doubt the plan was to let it be seen. Missions of any kind, classified or not, can easily go wrong (and do).

I still think that some UFOs are real. I doubt the gov would cover up a bunch of stuff and presumably kill off some peoploe if there really hadn't been any alien crashes.

Well of course they're "real." Classified vehicles would be "real", no? And governments cover stuff up all the time. Part of their nature. CIA, yanno?

If you did reach light speed, the smallest speck of debris would literally make the ship explode.

And now it's possible to reach the speed of light, because scientists have discovered a means by which to slow down light, even stop it entirely.

What I find funny about that is this: if light was going at 0 mph, it couldn't reach your eyes.

 

"Watch now, as I stop light; entirely!" *click*

"Wow, that's amazing! It looked like you just turned the lights off!"

"Err, yeah..."

If you had deflector arrays like in Star Trek, though, or forcefields of some powerful kind, debris wouldn't be an issue.

And lol.

You post stuff we quote when we close topics.

I like it, except that I can't pronounce it even after reading the pronunciation guide.

Lol. Both maj and brickshelf go offline periodically all the time. I wouldn't worry about it, should be back in a few hours.

Well we know that new ones stealth mode is fully up to speed one then. A bunch of witnesses. Not enough, but there a bunch.

I'm not totally sure I understood what you're saying, but I think we can assume they weren't in "stealth mode" when they were sighted.

BTW, another reason for running lights I thought of is this -- the craft are usually reported to be pretty large. It's possible they can't maneuver deftly if another aircraft approached, so need the lights so aircraft would know to dodge. At least when not spying on targets but flying to landing pads, etc.

No, I'm just saying that it doesn't make sense to put lights on a craft that's not meant to be seen.

So you weren't just joking lol? As I said, the lights would presumably be so they can see when flying low, so as not to crash into trees and the like. They would switch them off when flying higher most of the time.

So it's a stealth aircraft that's for flying low?

Well, I don't think it can be a military thing in that case, because I think the military has night-vision technology...

 

If the aliens didn't want to be seen too, why would they put little lights on their ships?

I hope you're kidding there, because my response would involve a lot of typing.

I dunno why there'd be a distinction between military and anyone else -- night vision technology is very common (and it's pretty safe to assume any aliens smart enough to have hyperdrive would think of that too lol). Note that the above reason wouldn't be solved by night vision. Also, it's quite possible the government doesn't care if everyday citizens see the craft. We wouldn't be the ones they need to spy on with such a craft.

I'm curious what the typing would entail, so start typing.

Government planes are the most logical, likely, down to Earth theory. I personally hope it's totally wrong. When I just think about how just 100-ish years ago, people laughed at the idea of an airplane, and today people seem to think we know all there is about science and technology.... I'm just not ready to count out faster than light travel. Without it, of course, it really would not make any sense for aliens to come visiting us regularly.

I'm not ready to count it out either. Not sure I hope that these are aliens though, 'cuz if hi-tech aliens are keeping themselves secret from us, they'd probably be hostile.

No, I'm just saying that it doesn't make sense to put lights on a craft that's not meant to be seen.

So you weren't just joking lol? As I said, the lights would presumably be so they can see when flying low, so as not to crash into trees and the like. They would switch them off when flying higher most of the time.