Svelte

Theme: Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time Set: 7571 Fight for the Dagger Pieces: 258 Price: $US29.99; $CAD39.99 Resources: Shop @ Home, Bricklink, Brickset Introduction The mid-range set in the Prince of Persia line is a bustling market filled with danger and excitement! Will Dastan be able to capture the Dagger of Time from bling-magnet Asoka and his suppository-shaped hat? Will Tamina leap off the balcony of the tower onto a camel's back, or will it kick her while she's down? Will the Alamut merchant lower his already bargain prices on red cherries and green apples? Would anyone notice if you swapped Dastan and Tamina's hairpieces? Read on and find out! ** All pics link to high-res flickr versions for detail fans ** Box, Parts & Instructions Bold and brassy box art with some Arabic architectural inspiration in the background. The Hassansin in the small set was flying in mid-air, and now Dastan too! Platform game toy brick adaptations from film licenses - it's a crazy world! The side of the box gives us character names. The rear of the box shows the various set functions - camel labour, dagger-brandishing, and trapdoor-falling. I do love the dark red colour scheme they have with the box art pics in this theme. The instruction manuals are really badly printed. I buy sets from the US and the European market, and the US instruction manuals are by far worse in terms of print quality and colour differentiation. Random instruction pages showing most of the building. It does remind me of those early Harry Potter sets that were all based around 8 x 17 bricks with staircases and traps and suchlike. We get 2 bags of parts and 1 separately bagged dark tan camel. Wow! That's a lot of parts. The box art makes this set look kind of sparse but once you debag it you realise what treasure troves these Prince of Persia sets really are. There are *no* big BURPS or rock pieces or castle walls or large panels a la other themes. These are all pure bricky goodness, in useful colours, with some new and exciting parts! Gold, glorious gold! I adore the dome pieces. They just have a coppery, brassy gleam that is difficult to resist. Oddly, Asoka's pointed hat is a different shade of gold to the other pieces. The Dagger of Time is very detailed for such a small piece, especially with the difficult colour mix of having a splash of gold in the middle of the silver blade. A great piece. We get twenty of the new arch pieces in Medium Nougat (screw Bricklink and its 2pid 'Medium Dark Flesh! ). Parts bonanza! I like that these new pieces are in quite common quantities so their Bricklink value won't climb too high. Dark tan goodness. The parts just keep on giving! Here I've pulled out plants, fruits, fish, meat, telescopes, the pannier, saddle, new whip, flame piece, white plume, weapons... Brilliant! The rest of the parts - lots of tan corner pieces and round 2x2 bricks, and lots of the new 1x1 white brick modified with stud on one side. A great assortment! Tamina has a cape and the new market canopy piece is in dark red. The dark tan camel rocks! I love its sardonic, quizzical expression. I added my own dark tan 1x2 brick here - it isn't included in the set. Rear view of the camel. Nice hump! Minifigs! The Alamut merchant has a white keffiyeh exclusive to this set. Asoka has an exclusive white plume and a touch of the bling everywhere else. Asoka's torso under the armour is identical to the merchant's. Back view of the minifigs. I like the keffiyeh a lot more than the silly looking turban we've had for years. Grimacing Dastan and Tamina. Neither fig has back printing. I didn't realise Tamina had such a long ponytail until I saw the piece in person. Back view, showing the curly wurly pony tail. With the hairpieces swapped. They're actually gender interchangeable! I really like that Tamina has a 'cranky' expression rather than the usual 'terrified maiden' reverse face. Our full cast of characters for this set. The build The first part of the build is to enslave the camel. Poor camel! Boos! The boxes he carries contain jewels and cherries. It's Schrodinger's Camel - you are always uncertain which case contains the precious gems, and which container holds the stone fruit! The merchant and his cart of wares. His merchandise is all vegetarian but here he's gnawing on a chicken leg. Maybe he's just taunting the camel. The build starts off simply enough. The bley Technic bricks allow rods to be inserted which when removed will activate the trapdoor in the centre and collapsing balcony function. The trapdoor in place in the centre and the detachable balcony submodel. When a Technic axle is pulled, the balcony will swing down. The final model without all the accessories and minifigs. The early description posted on Amazon.com suggested this set could connect with the 7573 Battle of Alamut set but this doesn't seem to appear on the new S@H listing. I haven't built the big one yet so I am not sure if this still holds true. Extra pieces. Finished Model The finished model! It's a great little playset, nicely detailed with a few different play features. It certainly captures that 'exotic market' feel. Another, more top-down view of the set. A close-up of that shiny dome. Play-features activated! Asoka's spear and hat plume make him so bulky that it's actually kind of hard to fit him on top of the trapdoor, haha! One thing the box doesn't show is a back view of the model with all the nice arch detailing. A look back at the architecture - it is nicely detailed without being too fussy. Alternate shots Here, Princess Tamina makes the men in her life fight for her affections. 'Spilled blood will win my love!' she shouts from her balcony! Sadly, a race between Tamina on an oppressed camel and Asoka on a cart dragged by the Alamut merchant was never going to replace motorcar racing as an extreme sport. Conclusion Parts: 9/10 - Amazing selection of pieces - just look at the pics! Minifigs: 8/10 - Some repetition with the torsos, but some unique pieces too Build: 7/10 - Fun, if unchallenging. Further MOC'd expansions to the market will expand this set greatly Overall Rating: 8/10 - Great parts and a fun little build - a good mid-level set filled with enough exclusive pieces to make it a must-buy!

As WhiteFang says, the colour adjustment makes a big difference. Your new pics in the 7571 review are much better colour-wise

Thanks for the review! You've officially earned your special Prince of Persia Dagger of Time tag! You beat me to the post too, I'm just about to post my review! (But you have the extra Indy Ambush pics I didn't have time to assemble.) Thanks dabulls03!

Those of you who are fixated on some mythical perfect price-to-parts ratio are missing the bigger point, which I've tried to emphasise, that the sheer variety of what you do get here that is NEW and UNIQUE far outweighs some easy calculation that hasn't been really reliable for a few years anyway. You can keep your $10 Creator sets with 200 parts, none of them interesting or rare

Yeah, what a stupid decision. No colour should have 2 modifiers - 'Medium' and 'Dark' together - what does that even mean?

Theme: Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time Set: 7569 Desert Attack Pieces: 57 Price: $US10.99; CAD14.99 Resources: Shop @ Home; Brickset; Bricklink ** Please note that all images link to high-res flickr pics if you want detailed close-ups ** Introduction After 2010's more junior-oriented Toy Story and Ben 10 licensed sets, it's great to finally have a theme featuring the finer things in AFOL life - death-dealing assassins, new minifigure accessories, a printed horse, and smatterings of dark tan bricks and vegetation! So how does the latest addition to Licensed battlepacks and the intro set to 'Prince of Persia' measure up? Box, Parts, Instructions The front of the box tells you everything you need to know. Hassansins! Desert beasties! Old-skool skele! Dark bley bamboo! Dark tan bush! Dastan! Persian horsey! The rear of the box shows the application of the dual katana holder, the concealed gems in the desert scenery, and a fierce battle scene. I think that skele at the back is drunk. He's fallen right over! Parts contents - 2 small bags, and separate horse and bush. Short and sweet instruction booklet. The parts list. I like that they mixed up one each of a dark tan and ordinary tan 1x2 45 degree slope - nice touch when they could easily have used 2 of the same colour. All useful parts, even if most of them are figs or accessories! The 2 x 4 plate in dark tan is a previously rare part, and light bley cheese is always useful. The printed horse is a thing of delicate beauty - look at that finely printed goldwork and lovely dotted bridle! I was always annoyed by the horse bardings in the Fantasy line since they always seemed smudged or misprinted, so it is refreshing to see the crisp lines on this definite army-builder. The dark tan bush. Lovely! The colour thins as the leaf blades taper, but the effect is subtle and naturalistic. Must. Get. More! De-bagged parts, including the sand-blue saddle. Minifigs & Set Dastan from the front with dual katana holder in place. The leg printing is metallic, with red over-print on the left hand side. Is that orange mark a scar or a chin indentation? I'm not sure about the colour choice as a contrast to flesh And yet Jake Gyllenhaal's manly, bushy eyebrows are reproduced exactly here Reverse head is a grimace, look of determination or possibly even constipation! The Dastan torso has no rear printing so I haven't pictured it here. The hair could work for a female fig, too. The two Hassansins. A quick google search reveals 'Hassansin' is a term used exclusively in conjunction with the Disney movie, ie some marketing guru made it up, possibly to avoid the supposed association of the original Hashashin cult with cannabis. Again with the odd orange colouring on the eyebrows and cheeks. The claw Hassansin has a metallic silver scar on his cheek and the Hatchet Hassansin looks like a rejected model from 'The Fly' with that manky eye. I have to say I much preferred the Indy approach of using dark flesh for variation in the Cairo battlepack. This is the only let down of the otherwise amazing Prince of Persia line for me. Back view of the Hassansin Brothers - possible evil ancestors of the Hanson Brothers? Yes, it's all beginning to make sense... The Claw Hassansin has a special pauldron and 2 of the attachable claw handpieces. Great new pieces in pearl silver! All tooled up! Yes, he looks like Wolverine's Persian cousin, but still very menacing. The black keffiyeh is a great piece, much better proportioned than that oversized turban we've had for a while. I guess with the dark shadowing, the orange face marks look much better Hatchet Hassansin! The horse comes with a detachable back. The sand blue saddle is nice. Good to see this colour isn't completely dead apart from actual minifig parts. The finished set is simple, but lovely for parts. Tan! Dark tan! Dark brown spears! The rare plant pieces! All very useful and easily recyclable for other scenes. Obviously these battlepack-style sets are all about the figs but I think the choices made for the small build are pretty good.\ A hinge opens revealing a secret stash of jewels. A black scorpion and crimson cobra add to the desert danger! They need to do that snake in a new colour, red is kind of old. Extras! Bley cheese, claw and old skool skele arm. The finished model! The final set, fully assembled. Yays for the old-skool skele! I am so glad they resisted the urge to put pupils on that thing and kept the original huge, dark sockets! This is a great little starter set for the Prince of Persia line and a fantastic army-builder. Who wouldn't want a whole camp of Hassansin Brothers, a herd of lovely horses, and a scattered landscape of burnt desert vegetation? A definite multiple must-have. Conclusion: Minifigs: 9/10 - Two Hassansins, Dastan, a skele and a printed horse - pretty good value! I am not really keen on the light flesh faces but maybe they'll grow on me. Parts: 10/10 - Lots of new minifig parts and accessories, a printed horse, useful bricks and a dark tan bush Build: 7/10 - Let's be honest, for these sets the build is minimal. Yes, the desert scene is sparser than other battlepacks but the useful nature of the parts and the great figs more than compensate. Actually assembling and playing with the various combinations of figs *is* more of a build than the scenery! Still, no complaints from me! Overall Rating: 9/10. A bold little set stuffed with unique pieces for its size. Definitely an army-building set in the best sense of the word!

Saturday, not Sunday Cute model!

Thanks for the lovely pics! I completely would have missed these otherwise. This looks like a sweet catalogue. I like that they're depicting minifigs in more graphical form rather than the computer-rendered stuff we've had for a while June looks to be an exciting month! Not too long now!

I vote for 'Schmelt'! A melted version of Svelte Or, since this colour is new and at the moment exclusive to Prince of Persia, I vote for 'Nipplehaal Orange' since it matches the shade of Jake Gyllenhaal's nipples in the trailer Seriously, since LEGO has now after some years gone to the trouble of giving us an official name and colour that, why not go with that and just call it 'Nougat'? Sand Orange is too easily confused with Earth Orange. Ricecracker, have you ever made Nougat from scratch? It often has that off-golden colour just like the bricks from the honey and eggs. Go and make a fresh batch and then report your findings Seriously, I will probably end up using whatever Bricklink goes for (even though they are still arguing about it themselves) since that's where I buy most of my parts from and theirs is the reference catalogue I use most.

Please don't create separate threads just about set availability. Thanks!

Dark gem? Ut-oh. I suggest we tie up William whilst we still can and then tickle a confession out of him once he awakes. If that doesn't work, we can set the rapist on him until he confesses, as is the way in my country

Academy Teacher & Fellow Clone O'Patra brings us a beautifully photographed review of the flagship Prince of Persia set 7573 Battle of Alamut, featuring golden domes! Lots of lovely new pieces and figs! A tan camel! Click on the pic to view this review and join the discussion! Do you want to learn how to make impressive LEGO set reviews and share your work with the community? Join our reviewers academy!

What is this? 'The Shining'? If all the jewels are gone from the temple, then why bother to go through this elaborate masquerade? Either their really is something supernatural at work, or there is a more pragmatic reason for these convoluted games. Perhaps the cultists are using our collective intelligence to go through all these myriad unsolved puzzles in the hope we will uncover even MORE treasures! In which case, we should sit here and do nothing at all to not give them the satisfaction. I still say we shoot any relatives first.

An OK fig, but this is one that they should have left the white dot pupils off the eye print... it looks too creepy

Why would they bother writing elaborate letters hidden behind elaborate traps just to confuse us, when they can pick us off one by one without any trouble? I'm with the others, any descendants or relatives by blood or marriage of cultists should be corralled up and shot Tranquillisers or real bullets - either works for moi.

I think you're overstating the case. There are plenty of SNOT connection pieces via the use of half-Technic pins to make them very useful in terms of attaching a whole lot of things to the panels. Larger flat wing pieces *are* still found in these sets (like the Galactic Enforcer) if you do prefer just studded plates.

How weird. Wait, you got 5 other copies of this set? Why not just get a different one?

Yes, great review Svelte! Oh wait... I can't wait to get my hands on these sets! Personally I doubt that it's the same plastic as Kit Fisto - it looks a lot sturdier, whereas Kit's head-tentacles are pretty flexible.

They haven't been especially anything, considering the limited info on the movie. We have 2 months between the release of the sets and the film itself to worry about how the movie is going to end up. Let's just enjoy the great sets for now

Ooh, review! :wub: I am glad you went over your usual limit for this one

It's SNOT sand blue 1-wide 45 degree slopes alternated on either side. Very nice technique!

Some factors at play: - Most S@H Exclusives have an intended run of 2-3 years (eg in last year's issue of TheBrick, they stated that they expected the Taj Mahal to be available for 3 years) - However S@H Exclusives that nobody is buying can have a drastically reduced shelf life - eg the Space Factory sets or 10186 General Grevious, which barely lasted 6 months - Backorders accepted is generally a positive sign as it means the set is going through another production run at the factory, ie a whole new batch of sets is being produced. However there is no way of telling in quantities they are produced or which production run is the last - There are only so many 'Exclusive' slots available in LEGO's product range, so as the year goes on and more are released, there is pressure not to renew the older sets It's only been 18 months since 10188 is released, so I would expect it to be around for at least another 6, maybe more if it continues to be a strong seller via S@H or brand stores and LEGO thinks it is viable to do another production run. On the other hand, if sales have flattened out, maybe they will decide to make room for the next big thing.

I was thinking of this independently of this topic in the context of those large white Technic panels that most people seem to hate in the SP3 sets. To me they don't seem any different in intent than using flat wing wedge plates back in Classic Space, but the aesthetic is definitely more smoother and rounded. This feels like a natural evolution to me. I actually like the mix of parts in SP3 - yes, there's some Technic, but there's a lot of great different types of slopes in white and much blocky goodness in the big Enforcer set.

Whilst the US Toy Fair said 'August' on all the sets, in Europe/ rest of the world most of the second year sets are available on S@H in June. So I expect we will start to seeing these show up in June Some retail stores may get them earlier depending what distribution deals LEGO strikes with individual countries.