If Lego Designed Small Sets...

[Click]

I've been somewhat curious about this for a while now, particularly after seeing Bionicle: Nova Orbis. If Lego ever made a return to small figures (such as Bionicle's Matoran or Turaga) designed after all of these new Hero Factory pieces, what do you think they would look like? Would Lego use the smallest Hero Factory joints, which would leave plenty of posability but little armor connection, or would they design newer pieces to attempt to add on armor? Or (hopefully not), do you think they would revert back to one piece limbs like Av-Matoran, Agori, and HF 1.0?

 

Personally, I would hope that they would make new pieces similar to the basic small HF joints, but with more rod connection points that would allow for armor pieces to connect, but that seems unlikely as they would need new molds for everything. If that fails, it seems like they would take posability over design, using the small joints and compensating elsewhere.

 

It would be nice to see XT4's small body and some of the shorter HF pieces used as limbs. Seems like that would require new foot molds though, at least.

[Aanchir]

It's something I've thought about too. BIONICLE's small sets tended to be a mixed bag. On one hand, the original Matoran were great and expressive designs, but on the other hand they had incredibly limited articulation and were incredibly uniform and oversimplified in their build (something I'm sure McDonalds had a say in). Turaga were slightly more versatile articulated and even had an action feature, but their build was incredibly Technic-based and didn't look very naturalistic with the way their shoulders were constructed. As time went on, we saw articulation increase gradually, but sometimes at a cost — I think the Metru Nui Matoran might be my least favorite BIONICLE impulse sets, with awkward proportions, very little building, and incredibly empty-looking backs. The Rahaga and Voya Nui Matoran were better in terms of building, but were no longer as humanoid in their appearance.

 

I'd say the best BIONICLE small sets were easily the Mahri Nui Matoran, which, although uniform in their design, had great-looking proportions, intricate builds, and lots of articulation. But would this kind of model really work in Hero Factory? Certainly not as a hero or as a non-helpless civilian, I don't think (remember that BIONICLE civilian characters like Matoran and Agori, while weak, were never helpless — each and every one came with some kind of tool with which to defend themselves). Maybe as a villain, but in that case they'd probably need a larger companion or vehicle to be really intimidating.

 

After a while of thinking about this I decided that the best small models for Hero Factory actually would not be superdeformed humanoid characters of any persuasion, but animal companions like this dog, this monkey, or this hawk. Each is less than thirty pieces. Alternatively, you could have non-animal-inspired companions for the heroes and villains, such as non-humanoid assistant robots like Quadal. But how small and low-cost would these models really be? It's hard to say. I think $5 is the price point to aim for to keep things meaningfully different from the larger, $10 models.

 

The new Hero Factory minifigures, if the LEGO Group were to stick with them, could open up other opportunities for impulse-sized sets. But I am not too confident in that. You'd want to stick with the same building system as the larger sets, just as BIONICLE did. That way not only do the small sets enhance people's collections, but they provide a pretty accurate "taste" of that building system for people who have never owned a larger BIONICLE or Hero Factory set.

 

Even Evo Walker, a $10 set, has been criticized for looking rather pitiful compared to the larger models, as has the smaller beast from Splitter Beast. Making a vehicle, mech, or monster for heroes in a $5 set would be a tall order. And a couple heroes and jumpers, while great as accessories for larger models, would not give first-time Hero Factory buyers a very good taste of what Hero Factory building is actually like.

 

I do not think that new pieces like small HF joints with axle or rod connections would be too practical. I learned from Erland Nielsen, a part designer who goes by "Front" on Eurobricks, that this is probably not possible with parts that small that include a ball and a ball cup, or two ball cups, in such close proximity to each other, because the amount of compression on a connected axle or rod would increase or decrease significantly depending on whether joints were connected at both ends. This is part of why the 3M double ball cup element from Stormer XL doesn't have any additional connection points besides the two ball cups. Just another of these things that we fans can't possibly anticipate when we think about what parts might be cool or useful!

Edited January 8, 2014 by Aanchir: Rachira of Time