2023 Majisto GWP

[Breakspear]

I note the packaging design is different from the other retro releases (Forestmen's Hideout and the Blacktron Cruiser), but is consistent with other recent GWPs (e.g. Houses of the World, the Magic Maze).

Notably:

• No yellow banner in the upper left box corner with the name of the set plus "Lego Castle System" in blue font. 
• An age rating of 12+, rather than 18+ (which was the case for Forestmen and Blacktron) 
• The golden yellow ribbon along the bottom saying "Limited Edition"

These seem like odd design choices given the 'nostalgia' premise of the set.

Edited November 3, 2023 by Breakspear

[Classic_Spaceman]

7 hours ago, jodawill said:

The images dropped on Reddit. This is hilarious. I was just talking to a friend recently about how that one Dragon Masters torso is the goofiest one of all time, and here it is. It looks like they didn't even update the design. It's just a straight up reprinting that of the original.

It is an update - The original had rivets to suggest a breastplate on the front, while the new version does not; the old version had four alternating black/red sections, while the new version has only two; the old version had silver shoulder armour printed, while the new version has a blue undershirt printed in that same place and a silver armoured collar. 
 

[Follows Closely]

I also cling to the hope that this is a fake. 

[Classic_Spaceman]

6 hours ago, brimbolet said:

the silver helmet and this particular type just don't fit the Dragon Knights. A regular foot soldier with a black helmet would have worked (also on the box) much better.

Agreed; give her a black nasal helm and a halberd, and I could sort of overlook the lack of a new Dragon Masters shield. 
 

1 hour ago, jodawill said:

I'm still open to the idea that this "leak" is an elaborate hoax.

4 minutes ago, Follows Closely said:

I also cling to the hope that this is a fake. 

Be careful not to OD on that copium! 
 

1 hour ago, Breakspear said:

I note the packaging design is different from the other retro releases (Forestmen's Hideout and the Blacktron Cruiser), but is consistent with other recent GWPs (e.g. Houses of the World, the Magic Maze).

Notably:

• No yellow banner in the upper left box corner with the name of the set plus "Lego Castle System" in blue font. 
• An age rating of 12+, rather than 18+ (which was the case for Forestmen and Blacktron) 
• The golden yellow ribbon along the bottom saying "Limited Edition"

These seem like odd design choices given the 'nostalgia' premise of the set.

The yellow banner has only been on sets and GWPs that recreate sets form the Legoland era; the original Majisto’s Workshop did not have the Legoland banner, so it would be odd if one were included on the remake. 
 

This is irritating, because (aside from the disappointing Minifigs) it does look cute, but also too small. That brown door is too short for a normal Minifig to walk through, the shutters are stickers, the walls are made from BURPs, and overall I do not see where the 365 pieces are hiding! 
 

[Shroffy123]

4 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

The threshold is said to be ~250$.

Wow. Really makes it hard to justify getting this set.

[Black Feather]

1 hour ago, Classic_Spaceman said:

 This is irritating, because (aside from the disappointing Minifigs) it does look cute, but also too small. That brown door is too short for a normal Minifig to walk through, the shutters are stickers, the walls are made from BURPs, and overall I do not see where the 365 pieces are hiding! 
 

True.  Doesn’t look like 365 pieces.  Maybe loads of goodies inside the building.  That’s where they hid the printed shield and black helmet.  Maybe a goat.

[Roebuck]

6 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

The build and boxart may look like this  

I kind of like the boxart, is there a dragon flying on the sky? 

3 hours ago, Black Feather said:

True.  Doesn’t look like 365 pieces.  Maybe loads of goodies inside the building.  That’s where they hid the printed shield and black helmet.  Maybe a goat.

 wake up, you are dreaming

7 hours ago, Black Falcon said:

If they were to use that torso in the Village, they would also have shields, so we can be pretty sure it won´t show up there. However, since they didn´t make the shields, I am kinda wondering if we are even getting any new shields in that set. Seems likely to me they just use the existing ones.

If they use all the budget and focus on animals and civilians that is fine with me 

[F1stzz]

9 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

With everything you buy from Lego you pay a little for the GWPs. A billion dollar company does not give you something for free. They want people to think it's free, yes. Every time a person buys something high priced directly from Lego and gets a "free" GWP the reward center in the brain is triggered heavily. Of course every big company knows how that works.

I've used the word "technically" twice purposefully 

[SpacePolice89]

I think this set is getting a lot of undeserved criticism. It's not perfect but for a GWP it's very cool. We have to bear in mind that many important pieces have been discontinued. It's biggest drawbacks are the minifigures, an original Majisto would've been better and the Dragon Master knight would look much better with an original Dragon Masters face and a black helmet but the torso looks very good and gives more options when building Dragon Masters MOCs. 

[Roebuck]

45 minutes ago, SpacePolice89 said:

I think this set is getting a lot of undeserved criticism. It's not perfect but for a GWP it's very cool. We have to bear in mind that many important pieces have been discontinued. It's biggest drawbacks are the minifigures, an original Majisto would've been better and the Dragon Master knight would look much better with an original Dragon Masters face and a black helmet but the torso looks very good and gives more options when building Dragon Masters MOCs. 

That do very easily happen when people have waiting for a thing very long and build up a lot of expectations for it
I hope the same do not happen for the MTS, but as long as it is as good as the prelim it should be OK (new record for "as" in a sentence)..

[Ruthin Road]

Oh dear! The concept and colour scheme of the original set was great. However even at the time it was let down by obvious flaws, namely the over reliance on large pieces such as BURPs and turret tops, the large gap under the roof space, and the lack of a door. The remake was such a good and straightforward opportunity to fix these faults and create a more coherent build, while remaining faithful to the spirit of the set. Instead we have been given a kind of a door but a similarly unsatisfactory build.

At least it has leaked early and gives people the option to get the Galileo set instead if they have been delaying purchases.

11 hours ago, jodawill said:

I'm still open to the idea that this "leak" is an elaborate hoax.

The thought crossed my mind as well. Surely a sign of an unimaginative set.

9 hours ago, Classic_Spaceman said:

11 hours ago, Breakspear said:

I note the packaging design is different from the other retro releases (Forestmen's Hideout and the Blacktron Cruiser), but is consistent with other recent GWPs (e.g. Houses of the World, the Magic Maze).

Notably:

• No yellow banner in the upper left box corner with the name of the set plus "Lego Castle System" in blue font. 
• An age rating of 12+, rather than 18+ (which was the case for Forestmen and Blacktron) 
• The golden yellow ribbon along the bottom saying "Limited Edition"

These seem like odd design choices given the 'nostalgia' premise of the set.

The yellow banner has only been on sets and GWPs that recreate sets form the Legoland era; the original Majisto’s Workshop did not have the Legoland banner, so it would be odd if one were included on the remake. 

It would have been fun to have some retro "Lego System"-style packaging instead although that is definitely nitpicking!

16 hours ago, jodawill said:

It looks like the shutters may be stickers.

Surely not! It would be hilariously bad if this was actually the case.

The interior is going to have to be great...

[Alexandrina]

Everyone here upset about the build and the minifigure, and I'm just happy that there are BURPs. They're the only surviving piece from my favourites (we've lost the cypress tree, the octagonal bricks and the 1 x 3 x 5 slopes that were used for the roofs of sets in the Majisto era) and I'm terrified they'll be the next to fall - so every time a new set includes BURPs, I'm happy.

Sadly I'm between jobs right now so can't afford to spend money to get the GWP but I'll probably buy a few BURPs off PAB around Christmas to celebrate! 

[MAB]

16 minutes ago, Ruthin Road said:

Oh dear! The concept and colour scheme of the original set was great. However even at the time it was let down by obvious flaws, namely the over reliance on large pieces such as BURPs and turret tops, the large gap under the roof space, and the lack of a door. The remake was such a good and straightforward opportunity to fix these faults and create a more coherent build, while remaining faithful to the spirit of the set. Instead we have been given a kind of a door but a similarly unsatisfactory build.

 

There is a door in both the original and the remake. It may not be a regular opening door but that is something that I like about this set - both the original and the remake. Part of the fun of this set is that it is fairly unique in terms of how the insides of the build are accessed. It is not an open back set, or a lift off roof, it was a hinged set that splits right down the middle. Plus it is Majisto's Magical Workshop. Maybe the door is a decoy to make it look like a regular building, when the magical part is that it opens by splitting the building in half instead of using a boring old door like regular people. As to the BURPs, they were also in the original and to you it may be over reliance on these but to others they are an integral part of the original. They massively cut down on the number of parts necessary for the set, they mean the set can have a large interior space and be reasonably quick to build. To you they may be faults, but if they had changed these aspects, then it wouldn't really be a remake of the original set.

Of course, anyone can MOC a magical workshop where it does not have the splitting open feature, or make it split from the side, or have it open back or a lift off roof, and they could have an opening door if the front doesn't split and they could get rid of the BURPs and instead use a few hundred extra parts to recreate the interior space. But that wouldn't be a remake of the original. It would be something totally different. Given nothing important is exclusive to the set (aside from the torso that  so many people seem to hate already), if you don't like the GWP then MOC your own workshop.

[SpacePolice89]

57 minutes ago, Alexandrina said:

Everyone here upset about the build and the minifigure, and I'm just happy that there are BURPs. They're the only surviving piece from my favourites (we've lost the cypress tree, the octagonal bricks and the 1 x 3 x 5 slopes that were used for the roofs of sets in the Majisto era) and I'm terrified they'll be the next to fall - so every time a new set includes BURPs, I'm happy.

Sadly I'm between jobs right now so can't afford to spend money to get the GWP but I'll probably buy a few BURPs off PAB around Christmas to celebrate! 

I agree. I also like BURPs (and the set). BURPs still have that true Lego look while they are larger pieces. With BURPs it's possible to build hills and mountains quite easily.

[R0Sch]

Not sure how to feel about the GWP. Same plain Majisto without torso print or glow-in-the-dark wand is a big let down, considering we got a wizard with full printing, dual moulded hat etc. in the BaM tower. The female Dragon Knight will upset again a lot of people. A dragon shield would have been so cool and together with the one from the upcoming Bat Lord the perfect addition to the classic castle remake.
P.S. I see two Castle Turret Top 4 x 8 x 2 1/3 in dbg, which were last time seen in 2006 in that color.
P.P.S. This is how I imagined a remake would be done:

 

 

Edited November 3, 2023 by R0Sch

[Black Falcon]

15 hours ago, Classic_Spaceman said:

This is irritating, because (aside from the disappointing Minifigs) it does look cute, but also too small. That brown door is too short for a normal Minifig to walk through, the shutters are stickers, the walls are made from BURPs, and overall I do not see where the 365 pieces are hiding! 

Aside from the BURPs there are also a lot little pieces and given that it is very likely that you can open it, the use or BURPs has the advantage that there will be enough space for interior. 

[danth]

8 hours ago, SpacePolice89 said:

I think this set is getting a lot of undeserved criticism. It's not perfect but for a GWP it's very cool.

I think it's deserved because they could have done something else. Nobody was forcing them to do a Majisto Workshop throwback. If they don't have the parts to do it, they should have done something else.

I also don't think the set is very cool. What @R0Sch posted is way cooler. I think most people would prefer something original than a disappointing throwback.

[Aanchir]

19 hours ago, Breakspear said:

I note the packaging design is different from the other retro releases (Forestmen's Hideout and the Blacktron Cruiser), but is consistent with other recent GWPs (e.g. Houses of the World, the Magic Maze).

Notably:

• No yellow banner in the upper left box corner with the name of the set plus "Lego Castle System" in blue font. 
• An age rating of 12+, rather than 18+ (which was the case for Forestmen and Blacktron) 
• The golden yellow ribbon along the bottom saying "Limited Edition"

These seem like odd design choices given the 'nostalgia' premise of the set.

I mean, the yellow banner with blue text is specifically a reference to the "LEGOLAND" branded box art that LEGO used for minifig-scale "play themes" from 1978–1990. By comparison, the original Majisto's Magical Workshop, like all sets from 1991–1999 had "LEGO System" branded box art, in which the yellow border and banner were replaced with color-coded sides (yellow-orange for Castle, black for Space, purple for Pirates, blue for Town, etc). See this image for reference. So I wouldn't have really expected the LEGOLAND-style box art for this set any more than I would have expected it for 40581 Tahu and Takua.

Admittedly, this doesn't totally evoke that original 1993 box style quite so closely  — originally, the yellow-orange on the sides would have extended to form a border around the front, and unlike the LEGOLAND-style throwback set packaging, it doesn't use vintage fonts for the name, set number, target age, etc. But the other changes in the box art are more or less to be expected.

3 hours ago, R0Sch said:

P.P.S. This is how I imagined a remake would be done: [snip]

Honestly, as gorgeous as that MOC is, I would not have expected the set to introduce changes of this magnitude one way or another. Even before we had any specifics on this set, I was fully expecting it to stick fairly close to the original's proportions, layout, and color scheme, just as we saw with many other "throwback" sets like Barracuda Bay, Forest Hideout, and Eldorado Fortress. So stuff like making the roof two studs wider or

Anyhow, I've got to say, I'm a little bit disappointed, albeit for different reasons than some of the other folks here.

• I don't mind the lack of printing on Majisto any more than I did in 10305, but I don't think it was a good call to get rid of the sack on his back without adding another accessory in its place — perhaps a black fabric cape to echo the black plastic cape on the original figure.
• Even in lieu of a unique helmet, I wish the Dragon Knight's helmet and armor had been black instead of silver, both to echo the original Dragon Knight minifigures better and to better differentiate their color scheme from that of the Lion Knights.
• Since the wand is a new recolor anyhow, I would've preferred a color like White Glow (to echo his classic wand) or Warm Gold (to echo the staff he has in 10305, and take advantage of a sort of color that did not exist in 1993). I don't mind the Tr. Yellow that much, but it's not what I'd have chosen.
• The feather plumes on the workshop… I would've liked if they could have chosen a part with more of a dragon motif to use instead, or at least a part that would have still felt like an ornamental statue/grotesque/gargoyle instead of just an abstract ornamental shape.
• The roof design feels like it could have been a little bit more innovative. Like, obviously, the overall shape of the roof is important enough to the original set that I would not expect any huge changes to it. But I don't think the designers needed to stick so strictly to the original set's "thin black plates on big red plates" approach. For example, they could have added some curved slopes like in 71367 to create a narrower point at the top where the two wall surfaces meet. And the black plates could've perhaps been replaced with tiles, jumper plates, or even 1x4x2/3 curved plates to add more textural variety.

As for stuff I do like:

• Just as with the Forest Hideout, the designers did a good job keeping this model close to the same scale as its classic counterpart (despite Majisto's Magical Workshop being a slightly larger model to begin with than the Forestmen's Hideout was).
• A lot of the landscaping improvements from Forestmen's Hideout and Lion Knight's Castle (e.g. the curved base, scattered yellow flowers, and improved tree roots/branches using curved slopes, inverted arches, and dinosaur tails) are used just as effectively here. Not only does that help the set look nice in isolation, but it will help it fit in nicely in a shared display.
• Adding a more clearly defined brick-built door was a good call, IMO! The lack of a door on the original set was confusing to me as a kid, even though as an adult I understand the implication that Majisto would literally open up the entire workshop using magic in order to enter and exit. The brick-built detail here makes that implication a little clearer at a glance even when the structure is closed up. Using a jumper plate and lock tile for the actual lock was a particularly nice choice!
• The door and the Dark Grey bricks around it also help the mountain/cliff face feel more cohesive, instead of having a sharp separation between the  dark grey rock faces on the sides and the black bricks and panels surrounding them
• The railing on the balcony and the little wall sconces on either side of the door are simple additions, but ones that add a lot of visual appeal, IMO!
• Replacing the two layer of 4x8 parapet wall pieces with one layer with a brick-built wall above should hopefully allow the designers a little bit more usable  floor space to work with on the second story (whereas in the original, the second layer of parapet wall pieces created a protruding "shelf" that cut the usable floor space down to 2x4 studs on either side).

Obviously, I'm still very eager to see what the interior looks like — after all, one of the strengths of the original set was that it had a slightly more furnished interior than many Castle models of the time (though of course a hearth, barrel, trunk, and 2x4 brick workbench make for a rather austere interior by modern standards). And the interior details were a big part of what drew me to other recent medieval models like the Medieval Blacksmith and Lion Knight's Castle. Using 4x10 BURPs like the original set means that the designers of this set will have just as much space to work with, but if other modern sets are any indication, I am hopeful that they will have made much better use of that space.

Hopefully now that high-quality pics have started to surface it won't be long before images show up on LEGO.com! Even with a number of part choices that feel iffy to me, my overall impression remains positive, and I'm enthusiastic to pick up this set (and take care not to miss out like I did with the Forest Hideout).

Edited November 3, 2023 by Aanchir

[RichardGoring]

4 minutes ago, danth said:

I think it's deserved because they could have done something else. Nobody was forcing them to do a Majisto Workshop throwback. If they don't have the parts to do it, they should have done something else.

I also don't think the set is very cool. What @R0Sch posted is way cooler. I think most people would prefer something original than a disappointing throwback.

Agreed. It's not really a question of whether this is good or not, it's whether, for a retro set, they chose the right subject matter.

I like the build they've done well enough. But it's not nearly as exciting as something else could have been, given the restrictions on parts availability.

[SpacePolice89]

38 minutes ago, danth said:

I think it's deserved because they could have done something else. Nobody was forcing them to do a Majisto Workshop throwback. If they don't have the parts to do it, they should have done something else.

I also don't think the set is very cool. What @R0Sch posted is way cooler. I think most people would prefer something original than a disappointing throwback.

I understand your point of view and agree that the parts usage is far from ideal but somehow when I see it I just like the set, I know I'm in the minority regarding opinions about this set but somehow it speaks to me. 

[Sir Dano]

BURPs are awful and should be retired permanently outside of Juniors sets.

Edited November 3, 2023 by Sir Dano

[Aanchir]

10 minutes ago, Sir Dano said:

BURPs are awful and should be retired permanently outside of Juniors sets.

I get where you're coming from but I wholeheartedly disagree. I think they're just as valuable to have as other large structural frames and panels. If a rough cliff face or mountainside entirely built up from basic bricks were suitable for KFOL playsets, then I imagine we already would've seen LEGO doing more of that in the years prior to BURPs being introduced.
 

On a separate note, I just noticed that the roof plates leave a two-stud-wide gap towards the base of the roof. I think the designer might have added some windows to the sides there!

[The Reader]

I did a close comparison of the outer shape between 6048 and 40601. Actually I think the GWP an almost perfect remake of the original set (given that there are parts which are out of production). I like it!

P.S.: And i like BURPs. They have a classic vibe ...

[Black Falcon]

2 hours ago, danth said:

I also don't think the set is very cool. What @R0Sch posted is way cooler. I think most people would prefer something original than a disappointing throwback.

I prefer the GWP over that one. It looks nothing like the original and is just to far away from it. It also shares some of the main things people mentioned to dislike on the gwp. And well, also I think it is to big.

1 hour ago, Sir Dano said:

BURPs are awful and should be retired permanently outside of Juniors sets.

Without BURPs that gwp wouldn´t actually exist. You would have to use several other bricks instead and then would be missing the space to do much inside. Taking the BURPs for this GWP was the right choice IMO.

44 minutes ago, Aanchir said:

On a separate note, I just noticed that the roof plates leave a two-stud-wide gap towards the base of the roof. I think the designer might have added some windows to the sides there!

I don´t think, there will be windows, but would actually guess that the gap is the window.

[Sir Dano]

1 minute ago, Black Falcon said:

Without BURPs that gwp wouldn´t actually exist.

Sounds great, this gwp is awful too.