Svelte

It's kind of surreal, like they were walking through tarmac Actually, I think it's a clever idea and no less freakish than those home sets from the late 70s featuring the older large figures with normal-sized minifigs pretending to be babies! Great work, eti!

That's hilarious! Sorry, I didn't see the one that vanished! But this one is from the printed instructions, so I guess it's OK If the City sets have officially hit the UK I doubt Indy is too far away

It's good to see your Emerald Night up and running! I was too busy doing the Classic Town contest to build mine this weekend... priorities! The layout does look nice, although I think the newer Train Station would probably work a little better than the World City one

Indy fans, to tide you over here's a lovely piece of artwork for the forthcoming Temple of Doom railcar chase set: (This comes from the Venice Chase instructions )

For those interested in how this set looks with the Construction Site shopfront: The building is smaller, but more detailed than it's larger cousin. There have been some interesting responses to this review, with some people who I thought would love it not responding as favourably as I'd expected. Maybe Modular houses has ruined us all!

1620-1 - Charlie and the Chocomel Factory Fresh from their success with 1978's Chocomel Factory promotional set, and buoyed by the popularity of Roald Dahl's 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', in 1979 Lego's designers decided to combine the licences by producing a special, limited edition set that would expand the Chocomel factory with an exciting adventure for boys and girls (and consumers of chocolate products everywhere ). The set boasted a record number of new 'minifigures' which had recently been introduced and also experimented with new colours, some that would not be seen again for decades! Even though Lego changed the names of the central characters (Willy Wonka became Wally Wonky and so on), the threat of possible legal action from Roald Dahl scuppered the release, and the Lego group decided to focus their efforts on the three-pronged evergreen themes of Town, Space and Castle instead. For the first time, we are pleased to present confidential preliminary images of the mysterious 'Charlie and the Chocomel Factory'. Outside the Factory Welcome to the world of Wally Wonky! Young Charlie and his Aunt Josephine have been lucky enough to find a pair of Golden Tickets which grants them a tour of the Chocomel Factory! At the gate, they are greeted by Wally Wonka himself and an Umpa-Lumpa assistant! The factory is protected by a tall red fence, and there is a ticket booth at the front gate. A strange tree can be seen from the road next to the enormous factory itself. Two massive red storage tanks containing delicious liquid chocolate sit on top of the factory roof next to an ornate tower. (Alternate portrait view of the factory) Meet Wally Wonky! Here is a closeup of Charlie and Aunt Josephine meeting Wally Wonky and an Umpa-Lumpa, and handing over their golden tickets! Another lady is also queuing at the ticket gate! A special Umpa-Lumpa sized truck blocks the driveway and an Umpa-Lumpa in chef's attire unloads a delivery of dark chocolate from his little van. Inside the fence, a man is making a sundae from the liquid chocolate fountain which decorates the garden. Mr Wonky explains about the strange looking tree; at night, this is where the Umpa-Lumpas make their home! Inside the factory The Factory is bustling with activity! The delivery truck drops off raw material on the entrance to the left. Next, the chef Umpa Lumpa checks and selects ingredients of the highest quality. The two enormous storage tanks pipe chocolate direct to the factory floor. The Umpa Lumpa shapes the molten flow into delicious bars for all the family to enjoy. Waste products are deposited out the side door. The Chocomel tower contains Mr Wonky's office with a cash register (to measure the takings), a carrot juice and fruit - even Wally Wonky himself gets tired of chocolate sometimes! Thank you for visiting Wally Wonky's Chocomel Factory! We hope to see you soon again! THE END

6. Building the set - The Pizza Restaurant Where I live, pizza joints don't usually occupy grand three-storey buildings, so obviously the pizza business is a lot more lucrative and renowned in Lego City than it is in real life. Here is the front view of the shop. The new smoke panels are thin so the colour is not as dark as many of the cockpits that also come in that colour. This is building '2': Inside: Closed pizza oven with door in down position: Turning the knob flips the door open so the pizza chef can use her enormous paddle to remove the freshly cooked treat. That sounds rude, but it's not, really! The restaurant on the second floor. Obviously no one in Lego City has hep B since everyone at the same table is forced to share a glass: The exterior: And the restaurant in position. All these floors are modular using the same arrangement of studs and tiles as the bus, so the creative builder could always add more floors! Notice the SNOT grille decorative detail: The top floor is well designed, and has lots of basic red bricks in 1xX format. All of these new modules do have the large panels as end-walls, but the additional normal bricks in the middle section compensate for this I think. I much prefer this style of modular building to the endless 1x2x5 long bricks which was the previous template for constructing buildings for, ooh, most of the last decade. You actually get a sense of making a building rather than assembling long lines of 1x2x5 bricks with some plates on the top and window pieces in between. The way the black roof pieces rest on the beams is clever and simple (as you will see when instructions are available) and considering the small area the designers had to work with here, they include an impressive amount of details with the windows, grille and contrasting angled roof tiles: Angled view: The empty back. No rodents, bats, owls or other animals in this restaurant! Even Green Grocer couldn't boast being vermin-free! Doesn't it look grand? I have to say, I like this building a lot better than the shopfront in the Construction Site set. It just seems to have more character somehow: The restaurant in action: And there we have it! City Corner comes to life as a bustling transport, retail and dining precinct! Pick up a prospectus today! 7. More views and alternate angles A bustling street scape teems with life! The reliable 244 drops off a commuter. The little shopping strip: The modular street can be arranged in different ways: And again: Open-backed charm: 8. Odds and ends! Spare parts (and there's another blue tile that fell on the floor that I didn't notice!). Yes, you do get an extra 1x2 double-cheese slope: Dr Inferno's workforce actually didn't stand out at all on public transport: Unsurprisingly, the Republic's insurance premiums went through the roof after this incident: 9. Overall Rating The overall direction of city sets in 2009, and of 7641 City Corner in particular, marks a definite turning point for Lego City. No longer an emergency-ridden badlands overpopulated with criminals, police, firefighters, and emergency rescue workers, in 2009 Lego City has returned to being a more soothing and peaceful environment. Down on the Farm, puzzled-eyed cows moo gently at their tan-fedora'd master, while a young girl takes riding lessons nearby; a young couple relax on holiday in their lime and white camper; a rich playboy calls for road assistance when his sports car breaks down; and you too can hop on a yellow bus, take a trip downtown, and wolf down a pizza in your very own local City Corner. Playability: 9/10 - a multitude of different scenes and actions, such as riding the bus, cooking a pizza, changing a tire etc. Design: 9/10 - colour palette is limited, but that adds to the charm. Excellent selection of window and door pieces, and varied figs Price: remains to be seen, but this feels bigger than 'just' a 483 piece set - I think it will be good value. To me it felt more satisfying than the 7637 Farm set, even though that was larger (in size and price). Overall: 9/10 - definitely a must-have for Lego City lovers!

INDEXED Name: City Corner Theme: CITY Year: 2009 Pieces: 483 Minifigs: 5 Price: USD$59.99 (according to Toy Fair info), probably $AUD90-100 when released, GBP44.99 at TRU (which may indicate a lower 'normal' RRP) Resources: Brickset 1. Introduction Having heard about Eurobricks' own Classic Town Building Contest, it seems as if the Lego designers rushed to production a new set they hoped could compete with the online community's own stellar MOCs. The result? The amazing new 7641 City Corner! With its classical primary colour scheme, smiling City civilians, and focus on the everyday life and activities of the humble minifig, this set almost catapults The Lego Group back twenty years in time! Grab your skateboard, hop on your bike or buy a bus ticket and take a one-way trip to your local City Corner. 2. Box, parts and paperwork Front of the box, showing all the parts of the set together: Back of the box, showing off all the play details. It reminds me very much of the similar art on the back of the 10184 Town Plan set: Close-up of some of the goings-on down at City Corner. It's like a mini-Ideas Book in itself! There are 5 minifigs in this set, including a female chef and a child: There are two instruction books - one for the bus-stop and bus, and one for the bike shop and restaurant: The DSS (dreaded sticker sheet) isn't too bad. Yes, there are a lot of stickers but they all apply to basic bricks and aren't tricky to apply - not like the hugely annoying sheets for sets like the 7682 Flying Wing (which were very confusing and difficult to judge for the big wing piece) or 7752 Count Dooku's Solar Sailer (which were applied over curved surfaces and appeared oblique in the instructions): The instructions feature an evocative piece of artwork featuring all of the new release sets: A page from the instructions showing how the pizza oven's opening door mechanism is constructed. This is the only bit of Technic in the whole set! The parts come in 5 numbered bags (with an extra bag of large plates and 3 8x16 base plates). These correspond to the order of the build: Regular readers of my reviews know that I fearlessly like to toss all the parts together - I am such a rebel! (This probably should be a question on the 'How Evil Are You?' quiz currently popular on the site ). As you can see, the colour scheme is (a) *very* primary (mainly yellow, black, red and white) and fantastically diverse for Town builders - look at all those great smoke (trans black) window and door pieces! This is practically a Creator building set in itself! I forgot to include these in the first pic, so here are the base plates and large plates: I have included the full parts list on my Brickshelf folder - Page 1 and Page 2. While the parts look very classical, there's some interesting new stuff in this set. First off, a 1x2 cheese slope piece! Who saw this coming? And, uh, why would you need it? The 10194 Emerald Night has about a zillion individual cheese slopes used as decorative details and they seem to work fine together. 1x3 tile lovers, start filling out your petitions now because if this can make it into production, any part can! (OK, OK, I am sure we will see more practical uses for this new piece in future ) The bicycle, which used to come assembled, is now three separate pieces (much like the old 2x2 turntable plate now comes as 2 pieces with assembly instructions in the manual). These parts are all listed separately in the inventory - see above. I never actually tried to disassemble the bike before, so I don't know how hard it previously was, but the box art of 7641 shows the bicycle repair dude even removing the rubber tires! Here is the new 1x2x3 window piece which was launched with the recently updated Pick a Brick selection: We get three of the fabulous new 1x6 window screens :wub: This is a great piece, and works seamlessly to produce elegant glass curvature, as we will see on the bus: Perhaps most excitingly of all, Lego's quality control department has actually listened to the widespread horror and revilement of the badly marked glass firstly produced for the 1x5x6 frames in 2007's Cafe Corner, and also for the 1x4x3 windows introduced in the Creator Beach House. The production marks which marred these pieces have now largely gone! :wub: Take a look at these comparison pics: Comparison of the old circular marked-pane with the new smooth 1x4x6 pane: Comparison of the new glass (top) and the pin-pricked 1x4x3 glass from last year and still present in the January 7633 Construction Site Set: It's funny as the 7641 box art is wrong and actually shows the old glass pieces in use! There are still some issues - the door isn't perfect, as below - but overall this is a vast improvement for MOCers! Thanks, TLG! There's also 2 of the new-style diagonally sloping windows with the tab (these are also available at PaB): 3. Building the set - Bus Stop This is a very simple little bus stop, using one of the new smoke curved windscreens. The red plate acts as a seat (although no minifig can actually sit that way). There's a trash can, signs, a flower in a pot and a simple but effective lamp-post design: I hope the designer of that fire hydrant copyrighted the design and is getting fat off the royalties, since it's been in the modular houses line, an Impulse set, the minifig collection, and it's now here: Overall, a simple little sub-build. You could easily make several of these and sprinkle them around your City layouts! 4. Building the set - The Bus! I have included detailed build shots of the bus only as it is what many AFOLs are particularly interested in. I mean, we get cars and trucks and small wheeled vehicles every year, and people are familiar with how Lego puts them roughly together, but the most recent official bus has been an orangey fish-shaped thing from the Spongebob line so this is something new! It was personally interesting to me to see how the bus was designed and the images we have seen also don't really show you what it looks like on the side facing away from the camera. Building up the base, the asymmetrical gaps for the front and mid-door and driver's area become apparent: The windows and chairs go into place: Spinning the frame around to have a glimpse of the other side: Doors and blank signage added: Another look at the other side: Access is provided through the top via a system of studs alternating with tiles: And voila! The completed bus! From the other side: Side elevation: From the rear: Close-up of the front: The use of the new double-cheese piece! As a panel behind the steering wheel? Bus rear: Overall thoughts on the bus: I love it! This new bus, the first proper City one in a decade, is completely true to Lego's design philosophy of simple techniques combining with a limited parts palette to produce something unique and effective. It seats several minifigs so scores on practicality; the new windshield piece combines seamlessly with the preexisting mold to produce a sleek, modern finish; the colour scheme and even the stickers are classic and effective. Unlike a lot of Lego vehicles, it neither feels too small or too large. I think this is an effect of having the bus as part of a composite set made up of different parts, rather than a bus set being sold individually where the temptation is to make the build super-large and super-impressive to shift more units. (Think of the difference between the modestly-sized crane in the 7633 Construction Site compared to the standalone City Construction vehicles). This keeps the civilian flavour of the set as well as preventing old-skool AFOLs from going into convulsions at the unbearable thought of a 12 wide bus (Yes, I'm looking at you Klaus-Dieter ). Here is a comparison shot with other current City vehicles (although this is not obvious from the pic, they are all aligned at the rear): The bus arrives at the stop. Feel that 80s vibe, man! 5. Building the set - Bike Shop Bicycle shops are one of the staple small buildings of Classic Town, appearing from almost the very inception of the theme. Many an AFOL has a nostalgic story about how the dog chewed up their prized yellow or blue bicycle. Thems were the days! This shop, while no classic, is simple and effective as an adjunct to the larger red restaurant building. Hopefully we see more of these small 8x16 buildings - they seem to be the 'kids' version of the more expansive modular houses system. (Unfortunately I didn't photograph the bike actually with the shop in this section so you will just have to use the power of your imaginations to pretend its there.) First off, the minifigs. Nothing exciting here, although it is nice to see a kid. Do Lego bike helmets have holes in the top so if the minifig has an accident, the brains have some way to vent from the skull? Wait a sec, minifigs don't have brains! This is probably one of those inhalation-choking-prevention things. Pepper McGreypants comes with a stickered skateboard (apologies for blurriness) with a cityscape design: The completed shop has a display with two caps, a skateboard, the (missing) red bike and a few tools for the repair guy to do his work. There's another street lamp here as well. A sticker reveals this to be shop number '1' (No imagination, I remember when houses were all randomly number 60 or 74 ): A slightly different angle, showing the surveillance camera. Actually, you totally know that the 2008 Police Mobile HQ is parked just down the street and a crack squad of twenty police officers is feverishly examining the live feed off this camera to storm the building and 'take down' Pepper McGreypants if he gets the slightest twinge of sticky fingers: Rear view revealing interior. The skateboard flips up and down:

Thanks for the fine review, Zuloo! This does look like a beauty and its evocative name is very appropriate. Murder on the Emerald Express! I was impressed by the 10173 Holiday Train when it was released, but this blows it out of the water. The colour scheme is brilliant. Mine arrived today (even though I did get charged twice for shipping... I'm not having much luck with S@H ) and I look forward to assembling it over the weekend. Green! Green! Beautiful dark green!

I want the tractor but I have no interest at anything at DJs at the moment so if anyone is planning a purchase anyway and wants to subsidise it by selling the little tractor to me (at a reasonable price), then PM me! Thanks for the news!

In the upcoming summer sets, the bicycle wheels are listed as separate parts from the frame in the inventory and the instructions ask you to assemble the complete bike - kind of like how the 2x2 turntable plate used to come assembled but now comes as 2 pieces. The back box art for 7641 City Corner shows the bicycle repair man with a wheel off and even peeling away the black rubber tire! Maybe TLG has 'adjusted' the mould to make the tires come off and on again more easily for increased playability.

Interestingly 7641 City Life introduces a new 1x2x2/3 cheese slope - not like the grill piece, but like 2 of the ordinary 1x1x2/3 cheese pieces placed side by side. I am not sure why this is necessary as sets like 10194 seem to look just fine with heaps of the little critters next to each other as a decorative feature.

Now we know why your wife is questioning why you need so many new minifigs... Athos, you will be pleased to learn that last year's large Police Station also has sanitary facilities in the individual cells, so prisoners can keep themselves clean. Presumably civilians go wash their filth off in the river....

That's how it starts One bug today... tomorrow, the world!

62% So, not as evil as VBBN but more evil than the rest of you babies. What's the matter with you apes? You wanna live forever? Mr Veeb, I bow before your high evilness!

Maybe if you leave the minifigs alone in a darkened room together in close proximity, they will spontaneously triple in numbers. Just like the rabbit colony living under the Sydney Harbour Bridge

That is what I was intending - I only wanted to use a few as I have a very limited supply of the old-style female hair with the side plaits. Thanks!

Another few questions: Are we allowed to use the short legs produced since Yoda/ Harry Potter for kids as the new Town sets do? Can we use newer hairpieces/ hats as well or should we stick to using the early 80s ones? This is a great competition, by the way! I am coming to an end of my first phase of building - I received a lot of new and exciting sets this week but I have been too focussed on my BSCT contest entry to start building them!

I wouldn't mind an entirely new elephant; the old one kind of sucks. It's those horrible legs However the head and ears were nicely detailed. I don't think we need new birds, as the brick-built ones produced in sets such as 10193 are already amazing. I agree we need more farm animals, such as sheep. We also need pigs. And to go with the pigs - a brand new moulded bacon piece!

I don't know if I'd want to live in a Lego set - I tend to bump into things so within a week my flesh would be shredded by all the sharp plastic corners - but clearly it would have to be something classy and detailed like 10185 Green Grocer At least it has a working fire escape so when the inevitable Lego rescue team was sent out I could make a quick evacuation. It also has food so I wouldn't starve, and a radiator so I could keep warm (which is probably what sets off the inevitable fire!).

Yay! Round 3! Prateek beat me to it by like 1 minute, but what he said svelte 'Kinda on the right track but needed help guy... thing...' corps

As Ricecracker has pointed out, the bricklink Catalog list is a great start. Go into 'Catalog' then Browse Items 'Parts'. The different varieties of animals are all found at the top, sorted alphabetically.

I don't really know what people mean by 'European' charm? Probably the only two sets that I see as distinctly European are 1592 Town Square (with the half-timber shop and the yellow Castle facade) or maybe the 1620 Chocomel promo set. Other sets from around the same time such as 6390 Main Street to me seem more American, with their wide boulevards, spacious streets and broadly spaced shop facades. Most sets from this era, however, are suitably generic - houses, bike shops, garages, mail vans, post offices. Perhaps that is the appeal - of reality, not fantasy - that a child could create (or recreate) the things familiar to them in brick form. Kind of like the ABS version of painting a picture of a house with family and pets around them. The nostalgia then comes from returning to a place of familiarity, pleasure, where you had absolute control over your surroundings. However, as shown in the Idea Books, the horizon of Classic Town is always limitless, always beyond reach - so the pleasure also comes from the creative act of expanding that childish empire. I think that's why the road baseplates were so important back then - as they were the primary avenue of expanding your Town - like a grid or the next piece of a jigsaw puzzle that made the overall pattern larger. It seems a shame that the sense of this has largely been lost. I can see why these decisions are made, but I do think it's a shame that things like the treads on the new City Dozer don't function on a smooth road plate surface, only on something like carpet which provides more friction. I do however think the spirit of Classic Town lives on. The City Farm set 7635 4WD with Horse Trailer is beautifully designed, a simple concept executed wonderfully with nice figs, a fun and detailed build, and great colour scheme and parts. To me, it definitely has the feel of a Classic Town build, even if it is a little larger than vehicles from that era. Similarly, the 4999 Vestas windmill is the kind of modern classic that not even the Idea Books would dare to imagine! The windmill is huge and impressive, but the very simple and neatly built house (albeit updated with Power functions) and the cleverly landscape mountain area really integrate this to make it an exemplar of Classic Town.

Congrats to the winners, especially I Scream Clone, underwater lord of all he surveys!

Happy birthday, Mz Iz! Hope you had a great day!