On 3/15/2021 at 6:26 PM, Alexandrina said:

Why is Castle-Pirate inherently better than Castle-Space? One is combining two historical time periods which had limited overlap, while the other is taking a historical archetype and carrying it into an imagined future setting.

The problem with Nexo Knights, while it was a theme I enjoyed, it didn't work as a "castle" theme because so much of the focus was on vehicles and not on structures, like say, castles for instance.  A futuristic castle theme could work if it kept more of the medieval aspects (such as those beautiful horse molds introduced in 2012) and focused on actual castles/structures over vehicles.

That said, I would much rather see castle return in the form of medieval high fantasy.  Mixing castle with pirates would work great as the two time periods have some overlap and having knights fight pirates is fun.

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:38 PM, SerenityInFire said:

having knights fight pirates is fun.

That's subjective though. Lego are best off keeping Castle to itself and letting people mix it with other themes if they want to. Combining it with other things anachronistically will only alienate certain fans.

Ok, I get what you're saying now.  

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:43 PM, Alexandrina said:

That's subjective though. Lego are best off keeping Castle to itself and letting people mix it with other themes if they want to. Combining it with other things anachronistically will only alienate certain fans.

 

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:38 PM, SerenityInFire said:

The problem with Nexo Knights, while it was a theme I enjoyed, it didn't work as a "castle" theme because so much of the focus was on vehicles and not on structures, like say, castles for instance.  A futuristic castle theme could work if it kept more of the medieval aspects (such as those beautiful horse molds introduced in 2012) and focused on actual castles/structures over vehicles.

That said, I would much rather see castle return in the form of medieval high fantasy.  Mixing castle with pirates would work great as the two time periods have some overlap and having knights fight pirates is fun.

i like fantasy and historical, but proabbly fantasy would do better, i agree that castle and pirate should be diffrent, but if they have to do 2, castle and pirate are better then castle space

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:52 PM, valon said:

castle and pirate are better then castle space

Again, though, that's a subjective call. I would argue the other way - Castle and Pirates are too different to combine without one seeming like it was lazily tacked on to a different time period. At least with space you've got the automatic knowledge that it's not based on real world history. 

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:58 PM, Alexandrina said:

Again, though, that's a subjective call. I would argue the other way - Castle and Pirates are too different to combine without one seeming like it was lazily tacked on to a different time period. At least with space you've got the automatic knowledge that it's not based on real world history. 

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:58 PM, Alexandrina said:

Again, though, that's a subjective call. I would argue the other way - Castle and Pirates are too different to combine without one seeming like it was lazily tacked on to a different time period. At least with space you've got the automatic knowledge that it's not based on real world history. 

Castle with fantasy elements isnt based on real world history either yet it is accepted because its based on real world fiction (I guess).  But you are right, any attempt to mix the two themes would either result in something artificial (not necessarily nexo knights level) or, if it tries to be historically acurate, something underwhelming and boring as the overlapping period wasnt the high time for neither period/theme.

  On 3/15/2021 at 9:02 PM, valon said:

If you replied with an image of that set in an attempt to prove your point, you've also proven mine - that this is all subjective. That set looks better to me than any castle/pirate hybrid could realistically achieve.

I will say, and I don't mean to accuse you of anything by this, that it seems to be the done thing to assume that Nexo Knights was an unmitigated disaster and should never ever be repeated, and yet also assume that a theoretical fusion of Castle and Pirates would be a success. I don't see it. If one hybrid works, why not another? I wonder if it's down to a shared clamouring for Castle and Pirates sets and the desire to see them both, even if they come together.

this is very random, but on world builder, there are two very cool castle theme, they take place in the same area, one is a normal theme, factions fighting and castle but no story, the other has a story

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/41752046-34f4-4bf8-9c26-90228dfa1c62?page=1

 

https://worldbuilder.tongal.com/world/b552179f-590d-4e8a-a7c8-6673f40e489d?page=1&type=INCORPORATED

  On 3/15/2021 at 8:58 PM, Alexandrina said:

Again, though, that's a subjective call. I would argue the other way - Castle and Pirates are too different to combine without one seeming like it was lazily tacked on to a different time period. At least with space you've got the automatic knowledge that it's not based on real world history. 

There are some pirates in fantasy books and games so it's not a stretch at all.  Warhammer has it, Forgotten Realms has pirates in their high fantasy and it works really well.  You can have pirates in a castle setting.  Many realms in Forgotten realms have navies and there are pirates that attack trading vessels.  It really comes down to how you do it.  I think it would work quite well.  Now I'm saying it in a fantasy setting not historically accurate to humans on this earth.  Lego could easily make this work once again by making different types of ships like elven ships, viking type ships, etc.  

  On 3/16/2021 at 3:43 AM, zoth33 said:

There are some pirates in fantasy books and games so it's not a stretch at all.  Warhammer has it, Forgotten Realms has pirates in their high fantasy and it works really well.  You can have pirates in a castle setting.  Many realms in Forgotten realms have navies and there are pirates that attack trading vessels.  It really comes down to how you do it.  I think it would work quite well.  Now I'm saying it in a fantasy setting not historically accurate to humans on this earth.  Lego could easily make this work once again by making different types of ships like elven ships, viking type ships, etc.  

And Space-Castle can work well. My main point (other than personal preference) is that it's disingenuous to act like a Space-Castle hybrid is terrible but a Pirate-Castle hybrid is great. 

To be honest, I grew up near Portobelo Panama, you guys might not think Pirates and Castles don't go together but colonial spain had all these spanish "forts" with pirates attacking them and destroying/blowing up spanish castles.  With that said though it might not use accurate or historical sets but usually the "crown" be somewhere in europe is giving orders to the local villagers or be the ultimate chain of command for the good guys and the pirates being the ones who ransack and destroy everything IMHO they go hand in hand.  

I guess when you walk around destroyed cannons with moats and ammo houses surrounding a bay with a castle in the background, whenever i was introduced to the pirate sets in the mid 1990's i was mind blown, but in my mind if there's a king ruling over his castle i'm sure he had his imperial ships conquering the world or region around somewhere hehe

 

Edited March 16, 20213 yr by eldiano

  On 3/16/2021 at 4:39 AM, Alexandrina said:

My main point (other than personal preference) is that it's disingenuous to act like a Space-Castle hybrid is terrible but a Pirate-Castle hybrid is great. 

I agree. There is no absolute. Each of us would have a different appreciation of a "Something-Castle" hybrid theme, as it all boils down to personal taste.
I, for one, would remain equally indifferent to both a Space-Castle and a Pirate-Castle hybrid themes, because none of them would resonate with my interest in medieval history.

And it's not a matter of historical accuracy : fantasy elements such as dragons and wizards would be perfectly attuned with my perception of a "Castle" theme as inspired by the western european Middle-Ages. 
Because those fantasy elements already belonged to the collective imaginary in those days, and are an integral part of medieval heritage.
Bestiaries feature unicorns and wyverns, and sculpted gryphons can be found in cathedrals. The Matter of Britain (the well-known legendary stories of King Arthur and his knights) is rich with magical beings. Even the quite martial, down-to-earth Matter of France (the lesser-known legendary stories of Charlemagne and his paladins) occasionnaly features a cockatrice or a giant!

But that is only my personal, subjective vision, and I cannot draw conclusions regarding the probability, pertinence or success of LEGO themes that don't echo that vision.

Edited March 16, 20213 yr by Aurore
Typo!

  On 3/16/2021 at 8:55 AM, Aurore said:

I agree. There is no absolute. Each of us would have a different appreciation of a "Something-Castle" hybrid theme, as it all boils down to personal taste.
I, for one, would remain equally indifferent to both a Space-Castle and a Pirate-Castle hybrid themes, because none of them would resonate with my interest in medieval history.

And it's not a matter of historical accuracy : fantasy elements such as dragons and wizards would be perfectly attuned with my perception of a "Castle" theme as inspired by the western european Middle-Ages. 
Because those fantasy elements already belonged to the collective imaginary in those days, and are an integral part of medieval heritage.
Bestiaries feature unicorns and wyverns, and sculpted gryphons can be found in cathedrals. The Matter of Britain (the well-known legendary stories of King Arthur and his knights) is rich with magical beings. Even the quite martial, down-to-earth Matter of France (the lesser-known legendary stories of Charlemagne and his paladins) occasionnaly features a cockatrice or a giant!

100%. I'm not going to say I wouldn't buy well-designed sets that fused Castle and Pirates - because I have an interest in both periods, and it's easy enough to separate the parts out for my own use. But it wouldn't feel quite right.

As for fantasy, I visited the Mappa Mundi in Hereford Cathedral a year or so ago (sidenote: is it just me who's hardly done any of the local tourist attractions, because there's no urgency to do something nearby when you can do it any time - and so it never gets done!). For what was intended to be a genuine map of the world as it was known, it's absolutely littered with mythology and fantastical beings. I'd be interested to see blemmyes or similar creatures in a Lego setting - a distinctive design that is so very medieval.

I wouldn't care for a castle/pirates fusion per se.  A more historically grounded way to incorporate maritime elements into a castle theme could be knights vs vikings - perhaps something in the style of G.A. Henty's The Dragon and the Raven. The book is set in the days of Alfred the Great when the Danes were raiding the British Isles.  Adding such distinctly Medieval ships as longboats and Mediterranean-style galleys would visually distinguish such a theme from pirates.

  On 3/16/2021 at 10:52 AM, Pdaitabird said:

I wouldn't care for a castle/pirates fusion per se.  A more historically grounded way to incorporate maritime elements into a castle theme could be knights vs vikings - perhaps something in the style of G.A. Henty's The Dragon and the Raven. The book is set in the days of Alfred the Great when the Danes were raiding the British Isles.  Adding such distinctly Medieval ships as longboats and Mediterranean-style galleys would visually distinguish such a theme from pirates.

 

  On 3/16/2021 at 10:27 AM, Alexandrina said:

100%. I'm not going to say I wouldn't buy well-designed sets that fused Castle and Pirates - because I have an interest in both periods, and it's easy enough to separate the parts out for my own use. But it wouldn't feel quite right.

As for fantasy, I visited the Mappa Mundi in Hereford Cathedral a year or so ago (sidenote: is it just me who's hardly done any of the local tourist attractions, because there's no urgency to do something nearby when you can do it any time - and so it never gets done!). For what was intended to be a genuine map of the world as it was known, it's absolutely littered with mythology and fantastical beings. I'd be interested to see blemmyes or similar creatures in a Lego setting - a distinctive design that is so very medieval.

i agree, knight and viking would be cool, i would rather there be 2 diffrent theme, but castle and pirate as one theme could mean castles that you could use in a castle setting and ships you could use in a pirate setting, but space knight you can not use for knight setting

  On 3/15/2021 at 7:06 PM, AmperZand said:

I also speculated that Castle would have an occasional bone thrown its way with the odd set, but not a full-blown line. Since saying that, LEGO Design Manager Sam Johnson seems to have confirmed it.

Why is anyone talking about anything except ^^^ this?  This interview has announced that Castle and Pirate themes as we know them may be dead FOREVER.  

We aren't going to get a castle pirate mashup.  We aren't getting either of them at all.  Am I supposed to be happy with the occasional bone thrown to us once every few years in a 3in1 creator set?  

LEGO design manager Sam Johnson is going to be getting some mail from me.  I am a castle collector.  It is my theme.  For the past 8 years I have been buying some sets that are useful to me in hopes that castle would return.  However, since I will no longer be getting fully fleshed out castle factions, figures, accessories, new molds, etc.  I am not sure I really need much in the way of new LEGO any more.  Without new castle products to MOC with I feel like my part of the hobby will become stale.  It has been hard to get excited about LEGO for me since Kingdoms left the shelves.  While I will buy multiple castle sets from this year in some vain attempt to make TLG change their minds about castle.  I will no longer collect any other LEGO products.  Sadly, I will now be going from a grey age to a dark age. 

I really feel bad for those who are new castle fans.  I have a ton of old castle sets, minifigs, accessories, etc. to MOC with.  Going forward it is going to be extremely difficult (expensive) for AFOLs to collect a good variety of medieval themed LEGO pieces.  

It doesn't sound like this is 100% a done deal from the interview, so I would suggest making an overwhelming amount of noise if you are not happy with 1 or 2 sets every few years and zero full castle themes for the foreseeable future.

And this announcement came on the Ides of March.  Et tu Brute...  

I kind of feel like I was stabbed in the back.  

  On 3/16/2021 at 1:33 PM, DaleDVM said:

Why is anyone talking about anything except ^^^ this?  This interview has announced that Castle and Pirate themes as we know them may be dead FOREVER.  

We aren't going to get a castle pirate mashup.  We aren't getting either of them at all.  Am I supposed to be happy with the occasional bone thrown to us once every few years in a 3in1 creator set?  

LEGO design manager Sam Johnson is going to be getting some mail from me.  I am a castle collector.  It is my theme.  For the past 8 years I have been buying some sets that are useful to me in hopes that castle would return.  However, since I will no longer be getting fully fleshed out castle factions, figures, accessories, new molds, etc.  I am not sure I really need much in the way of new LEGO any more.  Without new castle products to MOC with I feel like my part of the hobby will become stale.  It has been hard to get excited about LEGO for me since Kingdoms left the shelves.  While I will buy multiple castle sets from this year in some vain attempt to make TLG change their minds about castle.  I will no longer collect any other LEGO products.  Sadly, I will now be going from a grey age to a dark age. 

I really feel bad for those who are new castle fans.  I have a ton of old castle sets, minifigs, accessories, etc. to MOC with.  Going forward it is going to be extremely difficult (expensive) for AFOLs to collect a good variety of medieval themed LEGO pieces.  

It doesn't sound like this is 100% a done deal from the interview, so I would suggest making an overwhelming amount of noise if you are not happy with 1 or 2 sets every few years and zero full castle themes for the foreseeable future.

And this announcement came on the Ides of March.  Et tu Brute...  

I kind of feel like I was stabbed in the back.  

 i hate brutus !!!!, i hope that lego does make a castle theme though and it is dumb if they do not, serously they make a music video theme that is dumb ad it encoruges people to use stupid apps like that

also a castle theme would be more popular then vidyo i think

  On 3/16/2021 at 2:09 PM, valon said:

 i hate brutus !!!!, i hope that lego does make a castle theme though and it is dumb if they do not, serously they make a music video theme that is dumb ad it encoruges people to use stupid apps like that

also a castle theme would be more popular then vidyo i think

 

  On 3/16/2021 at 1:33 PM, DaleDVM said:

Why is anyone talking about anything except ^^^ this?  This interview has announced that Castle and Pirate themes as we know them may be dead FOREVER.  

From reading the interview, I get the vibe that one of the main reasons they feel hesitant about bringing back Castle or Pirates as fully fledged themes is because usually a single set overshadows the entirety of the line (at least that seems to be the case with the Pirate Ships overshadowing the other Pirate sets in a wave, as stated by Samuel Johnson) so in their minds combing all the typical Pirate builds into a single Creator 3 in 1 set is a good idea. But, as we all know, those lines can't properly live on just through the occasional Creator set, unless they plan on significantly increasing the Creator's sets budget, which we all know they'll never do. 

Also in Samuel Johnson's interview words, they seem to believe that " LEGO has evolved a lot" and they consider a theme like Nexo Knights to be more "a modern play theme". You can interpret that however you want. 

  On 3/16/2021 at 4:44 PM, Lego David said:

Also in Samuel Johnson's interview words, they seem to believe that " LEGO has evolved a lot" and they consider a theme like Nexo Knights to be more "a modern play theme". 

so the can build a castle theme with normal knight and a story and it would be alot better, i think a modern play theme means dumb future space knight

  On 3/16/2021 at 1:33 PM, DaleDVM said:

Why is anyone talking about anything except ^^^ this?  This interview has announced that Castle and Pirate themes as we know them may be dead FOREVER.  

We aren't going to get a castle pirate mashup.  We aren't getting either of them at all.  Am I supposed to be happy with the occasional bone thrown to us once every few years in a 3in1 creator set?  

LEGO design manager Sam Johnson is going to be getting some mail from me.  I am a castle collector.  It is my theme.  For the past 8 years I have been buying some sets that are useful to me in hopes that castle would return.  However, since I will no longer be getting fully fleshed out castle factions, figures, accessories, new molds, etc.  I am not sure I really need much in the way of new LEGO any more.  Without new castle products to MOC with I feel like my part of the hobby will become stale.  It has been hard to get excited about LEGO for me since Kingdoms left the shelves.  While I will buy multiple castle sets from this year in some vain attempt to make TLG change their minds about castle.  I will no longer collect any other LEGO products.  Sadly, I will now be going from a grey age to a dark age. 

I really feel bad for those who are new castle fans.  I have a ton of old castle sets, minifigs, accessories, etc. to MOC with.  Going forward it is going to be extremely difficult (expensive) for AFOLs to collect a good variety of medieval themed LEGO pieces.  

It doesn't sound like this is 100% a done deal from the interview, so I would suggest making an overwhelming amount of noise if you are not happy with 1 or 2 sets every few years and zero full castle themes for the foreseeable future.

And this announcement came on the Ides of March.  Et tu Brute...  

I kind of feel like I was stabbed in the back.  

For what it's worth, I wouldn't blame Samuel Johnson for the lack of a full Castle or Pirates revival. After all, being the one to announce this in an interview doesn't mean he's the one who chose not to bring back those themes in full — in fact, for all we know, he might have been the one who pushed for more stand-alone sets from these themes to fill the void. After all, keep in mind that he was the designer for the Pirates of Barracuda Bay set. From my perspective, his love for these traditional themes seems to be as strong as any of ours.

Moreover, lines in this article like "looking for alternative solutions to resurrecting entire product lines" and "maybe there’s new homes for those themes that don’t necessarily mean that they have to have their own product line" suggest to me that migrating these themes to Creator 3-in-1 rather than dedicating a full wave to them is an approach that LEGO is currently exploring, not an approach they're committed to in perpetuity.

Certainly this article does make it sound unlikely that we'd get a new version of these themes within the next couple years, which is a genuine bummer. But what it most clearly confirms is what a lot of people had already speculated — that the recent Castle- and Pirates-inspired Creator 3-in-1 sets are intended as a way of introducing those sorts of products even though they don't currently have full themes of their own.

  On 3/16/2021 at 4:44 PM, Lego David said:

From reading the interview, I get the vibe that one of the main reasons they feel hesitant about bringing back Castle or Pirates as fully fledged themes is because usually a single set overshadows the entirety of the line (at least that seems to be the case with the Pirate Ships overshadowing the other Pirate sets in a wave, as stated by Samuel Johnson) so in their minds combing all the typical Pirate builds into a single Creator 3 in 1 set is a good idea. But, as we all know, those lines can't properly live on just through the occasional Creator set, unless they plan on significantly increasing the Creator's sets budget, which we all know they'll never do.

I wouldn't make that sort of generalization. I mean, Creator 3-in-1 sets never introduced any brand-new minifig parts or printed elements until the Daredevil Stunt Plane set in 2018, and it never had any sets at a $100 price point until the Pirate Ship last year. Needless to say, the theme's scope could easily expand in even more ways in the years to come.

Edited March 16, 20213 yr by Aanchir

  On 3/16/2021 at 1:33 PM, DaleDVM said:

Why is anyone talking about anything except ^^^ this?  This interview has announced that Castle and Pirate themes as we know them may be dead FOREVER. 

If you read his quotes, that's not what's being said. First off, it doesn't seem as though he has final say on what themes Lego produce, nor does he seem to want Castle gone for good. "Castle is definitely not gone, and I’m hoping that in the near future you will be extremely happy. I don’t know if there’s anything coming, but I’m hoping!"

He also seems to be suggesting that - in his capacity as a senior member of the Lego Ideas team - he hopes the sets his department produces inspire a revamp of the classic themes. "Something we always hope when we do these one-off things in LEGO Ideas is that it will revive something and bring some kind of new opportunity for the LEGO Group. So what we were really hoping with 21322 Pirates of Barracuda Bay is that the real LEGO Pirates will come back and be where they should be in their prominent place."

On top of that, he specifically seems optimistic about Castle based on the Blacksmith set. "Now we have these cool Black Falcon knights [in 21325 Medieval Blacksmith], and that’s just a peek into an endless world of castle, so who knows what could happen?"

The headline is very sensationalised, intended to elicit strong reactions - and that's exactly what it's done. But the truth is probably something different. Besides which, if one of the designers had confirmed in a round-table meeting that Castle and Pirates were ended as themes, why would only one outlet be reporting that?

i hope lego will make a creator castle for the dragon and lion knight and a imperial fortress, i hope they make a knight theme and a pirate fighting naploenic soldier theme, but creator sets are still good

Edited March 16, 20213 yr by valon

Castle/Space can be done right, it's just that Nexo Knights didn't do it. I was a fan of the original He-Man as a kid, which took the classic pulp barbarian aesthetic as a base, and added science fiction elements on top of it. Nexo Knights went nearly the opposite route by creating the castle shapes out of the base of sci-fi parts. Add to that the app based game which didn't really encourage building, just collecting the shields, most of which are difficult to use for Castle builds.

Sailing vessels in a Castle theme can done nicely too, but unless you're going full high fantasy (D&D, Dragonlance, or Forgotten Realms), then the ships themselves are less likely to appeal to traditional Pirates fans. Magic: the Gathering actually does this really well, and also weaves in some fictional science (more steampunk than Space), but that is a license that's never going to happen. All four of the above properties are produced by Wizards of the Coast, which is owned by Hasbro.