Khaled Yousef

Hopefully, the one they’ve been using for Snowspeeders is so completely wrong, a lot worse than using it for X-wings, so if X-wings got an updated windscreen then maybe the Snowspeeder should also get a much needed update, providing that the Snowspeeder in the new movie has similar design to the original of course.

I never thought web design (like in choice of colors not coding and functionality) to be such an important thing, or that it could affect the divisions of the users of a certain web service! BL has always been one of the most outdated looking websites I use, yet it’s been one of the most important and most frequently visited, it was and will always be the number one LEGO website because it provides the best service and value for my hobby, and I can’t imagine that it’s importance would suddenly decline because it changed the color of the background! That being said, I really like the fresh new look of the already awesome site, it made me smile to see how the new owners of the site keep trying to improve things.

I don’t like the black X-wing (not LEGO’s fault here), the color theme seems to be pretentious and overdone to give it a fake cool look, you see it’s black so its pilot must be badass. The LEGO representation is OK, and that windscreen is a nice update for the inaccurate one we had since 1999 (is it trans-clear or trans-black like the old one?). The Falcon is rather boring, roughly the same design as the decade old 2004 version with minor modifications. It could’ve been awesome if the designers seized the opportunity and came up with a revolutionized design, but they played it safe, which is boring. The minifigs however are all great, but I’ll keep the final judgment after watching them on screen.

I don’t think the problem was poor advertisement, Middle Earth toys sold poorly amongst the current toy buying generation because The Hobbit movies weren’t that successful to begin with, compared to the more recent Avengers or Jurassic World or any other movie targeted to the same demographic. Kids would rather buy Iron Man or a Hulk instead of a Dain on a goat figure I suppose, and I don’t blame them.

Luke is basically the main hero of he OT, no matter how much some fans like to believe it to be Han.

That would be really sad; I hope they show at least one system set, other toy manufacturers did show some new starships, I don't see why LEGO can't.

Hey, I absolutely LOVED that model when I saw it before, didn’t know it was yours, but I decided back then that this is how I’m going to build my Slave I. I actually prefer the “skirt” on your model than the official set, I think reddish brown works better, and the greebling on the bottom of your model is still unmatched by the official set, however, there’s a certain charm to the official one that I can’t deny. Perhaps a perfect ship would be a combination of the two. Great job man.

Anio: could you please provide a link to your model? I’m a big fan of your work and I’d like to see what you’re talking about here. Everyone here seems to have seen it but I’m not sure I remember which one was yours.

Sir von Lego: thanks so much for explaining, I’m sorry too if I misunderstood you. But I am still one of those expressing their dislike of that set, so I still get some share of your writing, don’t you think. The internet is full of weirdoes like me who keep complaining about stuff; pay us no attention and you’d realize by time that we’re harmless. People won’t stop buying the set just because a bunch of people said it sucked. I wasn’t criticizing a MOC you created; neither was anyone else, so I see no reason why you would be upset of our harsh criticism of a product that was supposed to please us as fans and failed. If I was criticizing a fellow member’s MOC I’d definitely provide more constructive criticism. But when I’m criticizing a set it would be futile to provide ideas for improvement because the set was already made and they won’t change it, it’s up to MOCers to use the parts to create something better, and that’s what we do much later, after we’re finished complaining a lot on the internet. And that iPhone of yours is stupid; there is no grammatical reason why that word should be capitalized, you should switch to Android.

What's your problem man? I made a comment on my opinion on how boring that design looked, and some people agreed, why you chose to direct your attack and sarcasm at me? (yeah, I can see how you wrote Designer with capital D)

I agree, for a set that size there could’ve been tons of interesting details and wow factors, all missing from this ordinary and uninteresting design.

Now that’s the spirit.

I prefer normal sets.

There we go again, with all the theories about what’s happening inside the LEGO office and the legal and marketing details of things we’ve never been officially informed about. All I know for fact is that the LEGO and LOTR partnership is alive one way or another since we’re getting more construction sets with LOTR logo on them. Elaborating on the details of such partnership, making up explanations about official responses and uninformed discussion of legal matters would lead to nothing. As a fan, I prefer to discuss things related to the theme I like from a positive perspective. Not the trend here I see. I see people trying so hard to see the case from the worst angle possible to the extent of creating entire theories out of nothing, and I don’t understand why. Why can’t you guys just be happy we’re getting LOTR related stuff from LEGO and hope for more?

How come the statement doesn’t mean they have the license when we already know for fact they do since we’re getting LOTR themed sets? So they used a generic statement that doesn’t mean they have the license, but at the same time we know for fact they still do? Are you saying LEGO official responses are just generic statements that don’t mean anything; even when those statements are sustained by facts we already know to be true?

You say MAB is right that the official comment doesn’t mean LEGO have the license, but then you say we know LEGO does have the license (since we already got new LOTR Dimensions sets this year)? Which one is your opinion now, does or doesn’t have the license?

Is that an official explanation to that particular wording or is it just a popular internet guess? There is no doubt that the license is still on, there are small construction sets that carries the trade mark coming up this year, the details of the license are completely unknown to us, but IT IS still on. And if the license was off for bigger system sets then wouldn’t that be an “issue”? Why would they say there are no issues if they can’t release normal sets anymore? And hey, you said it yourself: “current licenses.” I should’ve said: that clearly means the license “might” still be on not just for video game related stuff but also for normal sets. (you know, or else there’d be an issue)

That project has almost reached 5000 supporters, Edoras by Nuju is also approaching the 5000 mark and Lothlorien has already passed 8000, I’d say the interest is definitely high, and LEGO can see it clearly.

Check out the official LEGO comments on this project, it was submitted on Feb 4th, and it says “we’ve done a preliminary check with licensing regarding your project and see no known conflicts or issues.” Which clearly means the license is still on not just for video game related stuff but also for normal sets.

A couple of pages back someone said April; can we get a confirmation on the correct release date anyone?

In Star Wars we usually get information on summer wave around February, and since Castle 2016 is rumored to be an April release I guess we’ll not be hearing anything useful before winter.

Vorkosigan: LOL, and the only evidence you have that it did poorly is what exactly? A couple of internet posts? A casual observation of an empty shelf in your local store? Again, I’m glad LEGO don’t use this funky method in their market studies. Seriously man, I really don’t get what you say here, perhaps you misunderstood us, Sir Basil said LOTR theme did poorly, I commented it didn’t and my evidence is that LEGO still uses it (be it on polybag-like sets or whatever) and they can’t be so stupid as to keep releasing stuff related to a theme that failed. Neither of us mentioned Hobbit sets, which was established in other thread (future LOTR) that it actually didn’t do well and we all agree on that one way or another. Now back to Castle, so BrickJagger do you only have confirmation for the theme or also some more details about the sets too? Maybe some little information that would get this conversation going in the right direction?

Awesome solution lowlead, the curves look much smoother this way. Now maybe you could find inspiration to fix the nose in Baronsat’s MOC; I think it has more accurate tapering which doesn’t end up so narrow like the official set.

It’s not about LOTR fans’ opinions, it’s a fact that these are LEGO sets, they have LOTR brand on them alongside Dimensions logo and they have LOTR minifigs and construction elements. Choosing to neglect all those facts just because one isn’t a LOTR fan and want so bad to believe LOTR failed is something else entirely. And I agree Deathleech; those are some interesting points you brought up here, there could possibly be many reasons why LEGO decided to include LOTR to the Dimensions world, none of which could possibly be “hey, people didn’t like LOTR, so let’s force some new LOTR based sets on them so they’d fail as well.”

The Tyderium is indeed awesome, and I think the UCS version wasn’t that perfect, it was a little too big for minifigs and the nose looked wrong, they could’ve done so much to make it look more accurate for that large scale but they went lazy and just used slopes. The new set looks better proportioned. I think a combination between the snot techniques used in the UCS wings and the proportions of the new set would make the perfect shuttle.