Lego Dino 500

This is definitely going to be an unpopular take: the push for dual molding, more intricate printing, and improved detail in minifigures has ruined minifigs in recent years. Particularly stormtroopers, x-wing pilots (though Lego is finally moving away from the dual molded x-wing pilot helmet!), but it's especially painful for licensed themes and minifigures. At the time, the Simpsons sets and CMFs were pushing the line. But now the Muppet, Sesame Street, and Sonic head molds bear almost no resemblance to lego characters. It feels uncanny and awful, like if someone pulled the head off a statue or toy and stuck it on a minifigure. Designing for minifigures is always a challenge, as a very proportionally limited medium for character designs but Lego struck a really happy medium until dual molded helmets were a thing and required changes to allow for more intricate dual molded parts. As cool as the play feature is, the current Vader helmet mold doesn;'t feel like lego either. It's too realistically proportioned, and out of tune with the figures. I'm not a fan of how over-designed face prints are now as well. The licensed figures with special head molds don't even bother trying. My ideal Star Wars minifigs would be from 2005 to 2009, Clone Wars excluded.

The top of my list is probably 10179 UCS Millennium Falcon. I've been wanting it since I first saw it in LEGO Magazines as a kid. Aside from that? The remainder of the Mars Mission and Aqua Raiders I never got, some of the other UCS sets like the Imperial Shuttle (I'm a sucker for anything minifigure scaled), 8366 Supersonic RC, and 8275 Motorized Bulldozer. Not to mention LotR and Castle! I wish I had the Fantasy era and Knight's Kingdom sets. Especially the Vikings sets. For lack of space or money, I've focused mainly on collecting Bionicle the last few years though I really want all of those.

I'm not sure Ninjago has been mentioned here yet, but as much as I love it, maybe LEGO ought to retire Ninjago. It feels like it's kept LEGO from exploring other original theme ideas and different stories as part of LEGO's evergreen themes, among the countless licensed themes that are also around.

I feel that's more of a result of Bionicle and constraction fans generally being younger (I say that as one of them!) and moving to new and different platforms for discussion. Years of forum drama, losses like BZPower's database issue, plus Bionicle's two cancellations + Hero Factory kind of pushed the community away. So now you mostly see folks engaging in discussion and sharing builds on platforms like /r/bioniclelego, Discord servers, TTV's forum, etc. I'm probably far too late to the discussion but there's a surprising amount of connectivity between system and Bionicle parts. A lot of the piston details are capable of accepting clip pieces, all of the parts have technic connectivity, etc. It's a lot more closely linked than a lot of fans would think.

Yeah. I don't necessarily think that there's a golden age for LEGO either. LEGO's best sets and themes over time have all been tempered by the company's poor decisions, or lacking success, or limited parts availability, etc. If I could guess anything I'd probably say now with their current success and well managed set design is the closest we've gotten, but even that's offset by some of the criticisms of LEGO for some things today. Like an over-reliance on licensed themes that outcompete original themes and limit creativity, and the production of absolutely massive and expensive sets that only a limited number of fans can afford, let alone display. That said, those aren't universal criticisms and the specifics of them are more nuanced than "licensed theme bad" and "big sets bad". So we definitely are close in my opinion.

I like the idea of it, and the models are really cool. I want to see LEGO release more kinetic sculptures like this, and depending on the price, I might pick one up for myself. But to me this feels like LEGO is trying to market something that avoids the stigma of LEGO being "a kid's toy", which it has never been solely. Which is something that adult coloring books have had to do, but LEGO has never needed that. LEGO is for everyone, and they've done a pretty good job of communicating that, especially in the past few years. Forma stimulates creativity and helps people relax no more than other LEGO sets do. Maybe it's because I'm surrounded online by unabashed LEGO fans, (as I'm sure most of you are as well), not to mention our own biases as fans on a forum dedicated to that, but I'm not seeing these people who are too afraid or embarrassed to touch LEGO these days.

I love all the detail that you've been able to put into this! Especially stuff like Minas Tirith's throne room, and all the awesome rock work around the castle.

I'm not entirely sure. J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers have rebranded all the Harry Potter stuff to "The Wizarding World", especially with the new logo as of recently. We have Harry Potter sections at both of the Universal Studios parks. And there's going to be five Fantastic Beasts films, all covering the rise of Grindelwald's rise to power in magical Britain, and possibly WW2. Who knows what other future content is coming, but I wouldn't be surprised if we see a lot more of Hogwarts with Lego over the next few years at least. I can't foresee them releasing just a few token sets to whet our appetites and then moving 100% over to Fantastic Beasts. People want Harry Potter.

It should be okay, it has no watermarks or confidential markings. And I saw it an Entertainment Weekly article this morning on /r/Lego, so things are pretty chill. That being said, I'm extremely excited. Things are looking up for the train theme! I really hope that demand for this Hogwarts Express set will show Lego that people want more engines. I'm really hoping for that Creator Expert train now.

Trust me, I am. I spent six hours yesterday weaving chain maille, and I'm the kind of guy to sit down with a set and not leave until the whole thing is built in one go. I don't mind debugging or changing stuff around, and I know I'll love building with it. When I was younger I used to collect K'Nex coaster kits, although I never did get to build anything huge or fun with them because I didn't have the big coaster style track. I'd love to get back in that as well if I could find some reasonably priced sets. So I definitely have a bit of experience with the process and what goes into them. Plus I'd love to make a big model of a wooden style coaster, with all those trusses and trellises...

I know it's probably not entirely a popular opinion, but chances are I'll probably pick up a CDX coaster kit or two if I can. What Lego has is a really cool system, but they were kind of locked in to making the track system that they used for Joker's Manor, and now the coaster sets that are coming out. The owner of CDX bricks has talked to Lego employees and representatives at toy conventions, and from what I understand, Lego has said to him "We could never produce what you produce." The track system CoasterDynamix, and subsequently CDX Bricks uses is quite a bit more flexible, but also difficult for some to use. I'm sure had Lego not had to develop a track system usable for children, they wouldn't have been forced to use it for this set. As far as aesthetics, flexibility, and price goes, I'm loving the idea of CDX a lot more than this set, for those reasons. But they're two different systems, from two different companies, meant to fulfill different purposes with the same brick system. I can't wait to see what more cool stuff people will build with them, especially as CDX and Lego release more coaster kits in the future. Personally, I'm going with CDX though.

Yeah. One of my biggest barriers as a trains collector, since I was younger, is it's nearly impossible to find resources out of the store shelves for trains, unless you know of bricklink. And even then it can be a stressful venture, dealing with parts lists, excel sheets, shipping costs, and making sure you've gotten everything on time. As nice as Bricklink is, Lego really needs to lower the barrier of entry for Lego trains, as official sets are usually the most economical, simple solution to stuff. I'd like to see Lego offer maybe one or two brick built trains, with no wagons. Just an unpowered locomotive with the parts to build a few alternate models, and a single car set. 1-133-1 was a perfect example of a set like that. $40 for a cool locomotive, and two minifigs, and you could find a car to go along with it, 10170-1, right next to it on the store shelves. As nice as a comprehensive train theme would be, part of 9V's downfall was the large amount of sets. If we had just the two city trains, maybe a small set or two, and a separate locomotive and car you could purchase, that'd be more than enough.

I'm actually pretty hopeful for this year's trains that are releasing. The builds from what I've seen are more complex and interesting than previous ones like 60051 and 60052, despite being aimed at the same target audience. I know others aren't as satisfied with it as I am, but I can definitely commend the designers for what they've done so far. I still have a few gripes, like the small amount of cars, and the length of the cars, however, that's a result of the price point and constraints of the system.

I'm loving the looks of this model so far. Fast, clean build, and simple drivetrain and steering. Have you thought about uploading this to Rebrickable?

I'm building a car, though my lack of parts is a bit of a pain. I don't have small balljoint components for small scale suspension or steering mechanisms, I might have to get another Technic set. 13 wide axles, 4 42mm wheels, and 2 PF m motors, one for steering and another for drive. I think it'd be a good idea to provide updated technic building resources for steering and drive mechanisms, and provide a standardized chassis for less experienced builders to build around and base their designs. How are tracks going to be built? I'm thinking you could use double sided tape and foam pipe insulation, similar to how scale RC tracks are constructed.

What's the minimum sized wheel we can use? I only have M motors. Unless I do some crazy stuff like direct hub powered wheels, which kinda ruins the fun of designing and building the chassis, I wouldn't have the resources to build and compete. If there was a micro class, using 43.2mm rims, I think that'd be rather helpful.

True. We're not going to be getting good pirates sets for a few years, in the gap between Pirates of the Caribbean films, similar to LotR and Fantasy, or Star Wars and Space. I imagine they're going to be using Dead Men Tell No Tales and all of these sets to build up a new fanbase for Pirates, and gauge interest in it for after the film's popularity dies down after a few set waves.

This looks amazing! If I were you, I'd take some SNOT bricks so you can add some greebles to the body and mandibles. You could use that to get the rest of the piping detail done, as well as everything else. The mandibles could be thickened up a tiny bit, they seem a bit too thin to me. Any chance we could see this with a brick built cockpit?

I love the design of this set. It's a good sign to me that they're starting to branch out in set design, instead of the boring typical stuff they do with the ship plates. Making it like that using ribs allows them to make it even more accurate to the film, and have a more realistic shape. Hopefully we receive a new Black Pearl as well, I don't like the design of the original BP and QAV.

DnD may be out of the future because Hasbro owns WotC, but there are other decent ideas for fantasy. The final How To Train Your Dragon film comes out next year, they could easily snap that up for a late series of sets like with Lord of the Rings. There's a Elfstones of Shannara series on MTV that looks okay. Or Lego could reboot the Lego Heroica series into a larger, deeper, fleshed out series with better game mechanics and actual sets. DnD would be awesome though.

This looks awesome! I don't think there's much criticism to be had about it, the shaping and detail is pretty accurate. My only gripe is the shaping of the back end, it could stand to stick out a bit farther. You could fix that with an extra 3x3 45 degree slope plates underlapping the back ones by two studs. Or maybe by replacing those slope plates with some 2x3 ones, which would match the larger angle on the back wings. Here's what I assume is your current plating over it. And here are my two solutions - keep in mind I'm not that advanced a builder. Everything I do is in LDD for lack of job and physical parts. You could extend it with an extra of the same plate, though this would require you to lay a skin two plates thick, or mount the entire section a plate higher on your hinge assembly. Or you could rebuild that section of plating with 2x3 slopes, which is what I would do. This is rather rudimentary as I don't know your build, and I just quickly mocked this up, but it could work. Especially in comparison to the pic of an actual Venator.

I'm certainly hoping for it. But I wouldn't mind if it takes a bit longer, that should give me time to get a job at Lego for that sweet discount. I wouldn't mind even a rerelease of the 10179, though whatever they stew up should have a fair bit more accurate detailing with some structural room for an interior.

@Jeffinslaw Any words about potential locos and cars? I can't wait for that, they've had the section on their website for a couple of years now. I'm waiting to get a job before I start purchasing track.

Thanks for posting this! I'll have to try this method, I just eyeball stuff right now, which has a somewhat detrimental effect on the design of my models. It looks like Sariel's scaling program could work for this.

If it's going to be possible to support multiple trains on a single layout, then there's a slight issue: While the 9V remains the same, the amperage/draw should increase (double) with every additional motor or pickup. To support this, we'd have to increase the the voltage being supplied to the track, and apply some sort of resistor or mechanism to limit the current draw to 9 volts. I'm pretty sure at least, I'm not the best with electricity. Much like the current draw safety mechanism in Power Functions receivers and motors. To limit costs, it could be possible to limit support to a single motor, and give the option and advice on applying resistors to the pickups to limit power draw and damage to components.