Do you think Exo-Force will last more than a year?

[vahkimetru]

I do. The merchandising and effort put into the sets is remiscant to the product plan for KK2 which has considerable feedback. So what's your opinion?

[Sir Dillon]

Well, we already know it will, there are more sets coming out this August. Or do you mean another year after this one?

[vahkimetru]

Another year after this one.

[natelite]

i dunno. it dropped out of the hot list from every country listed in lego.com. so far police, batman and star wars are going strong. exo-force, dino, harry potter are very weak.

for me, after the initial rush, i'm now lukewarm on exo-force. i'm on a star wars diet atm.

[Deinonychus]

I think so.

They've got a solid foundation for a continuing theme with all the robots and mechs and war-machines and such. It just begs for expansion.

Like vahki said, it sort of has a Knights Kingdom vibe to it that says to me that LEGO is really behind the concept and is actually planning on expanding into the future.

Then again, it could possibly go away for a year or two and resurface again in the future sort of like Alpha Team did recently.

Either way, I doubt 2006 will be the only year for Exoforce

[vahkimetru]

Plus, KK had speciaized boxes which should be the point where you say "Hey, why would Lego put this much effort if they were to discontinue it?"

As much as I love Dino Attack, they had few specialized parts, and so it means Lego didn't put in as much effort. With EXF, we have new hair, minifig robot, and light pieces.

[natelite]

i dunno. those large <insert that tiresome argument> dinosaurs look awfully specialized to me. without those dinos i am sure the vehicles are a lot more cheaper than the current cost.

[snefroe]

i'm kinda hoping they won't but considering the success of exo, it will

[xwingyoda]

I think at first it was cool to have nice figs, new hair pieces, mechas...

What can we do with a lot more mechas and robots and what have you !! To be successfull next year, they need to come up with something different !!

Sure the new sets coming out are great but they are huge !! I think i will drop the line now to save room/money !!

*yoda*

[vahkimetru]

There are so many possibilities. Think, mech carrier boats, tanks, small speeders and as xwingyoda said, "What have you".

Plus, there are a lot more mechs out there, just think for a little.

[natelite]

no doubt. totally agree with you. but whether they continue with the line or not depends ultimately on how well they sell. the 2004 alpha team had a great concept: transforming vehicles. but why did it discontinued? consumers were not buying it. i still see quite a few sets of the ogel's HQ on heavy DC in a kbtoys store.

there's so much more a mech line can do than just humanoid mechs. for eg, an APC full of mini exo-suits (ie power armors, those suits that are smaller than uplink), and it opens up to reveal a smaller recon tank/scout. just the other day i was browsing brickshelf.com and saw a most excellent model of a quad ped mech with a smaller exact replica of itself. the large mech has a hatch at the back which opens to reveal 4 power armored minifigs and the smaller recon mech. if you were wondering what i am talking about, i'm referring to something like the clone turbo tank but mechanized. and with lots of aerial suits or power armored ground suits.

i don't think lego designers are going to be as creative as a brickshelf moc'er. i don't mean any disrespect but i think creativity is best unbridled. if you are paid to be creative, the work is always going to be less than perfect.

so far for the exo-force line i can see TLG is going for the same concept as KK. 4 main chars (boring!). i wish they go back-to-basics with generic minifigs and give us super cool mechs and vehicles instead. what i like to see is something like the vikings. lots of generic vikings and maybe one captain (for those who like to role play the leader or the champion, etc).

[Mithrandir]

i dunno. it dropped out of the hot list from every country listed in lego.com. so far police, batman and star wars are going strong. exo-force, dino, harry potter are very weak.

for me, after the initial rush, i'm now lukewarm on exo-force. i'm on a star wars diet atm.

I think the reason the initial rush died out was because there wasn't enough variation in the original run of sets;

From the second run, it looks a lot more interesting than the first.

i dunno. those large <insert that tiresome argument> dinosaurs look awfully specialized to me. without those dinos i am sure the vehicles are a lot more cheaper than the current cost.

Yeah I *hated* that. I want to buy the sets without the dinosaurs. *sigh*

i don't think lego designers are going to be as creative as a brickshelf moc'er. i don't mean any disrespect but i think creativity is best unbridled. if you are paid to be creative, the work is always going to be less than perfect.

I disagree. I think people who are paid to be creative are probably better at it, because they don't have to go to work and waste all day doing stupid things; instead their work is creativity, and they get paid for it too.

I think the real reason lego sets aren't as good as some MOC's out there is because Lego is a business, and it cannot afford to make $300 sets or else they'd go out of business.

I feel that the Lego designers do their absolute best and their creativity shows through in spite of the restrictions TLC puts on the sets.

so far for the exo-force line i can see TLG is going for the same concept as KK. 4 main chars (boring!). i wish they go back-to-basics with generic minifigs and give us super cool mechs and vehicles instead. what i like to see is something like the vikings. lots of generic vikings and maybe one captain (for those who like to role play the leader or the champion, etc).

Hmm, I only see 2 (or 5) main characters. The two anime humans and the three non-copper robots (blue, green, red).

Personally, I don't like the anime humans at all. I've put Alpha-Team and Dino-Attack figs in my mechs, heh.

Regardless, I do agree with you that there are far too few human figs.

[natelite]

I think the reason the initial rush died out was because there wasn't enough variation in the original run of sets;

From the second run, it looks a lot more interesting than the first.

agreed. i am particularly thrilled with the white lightning and bridge walker set. that's definitely in my list along with hero tank. will have to read a review on striking venom to see if it is worth it. to me SV doesn't look impressive at all. and i hated the price tag for sentai fortress considering there's lots of useless parts such as the gate, turrets, barriers which no doubt added a lot to the cost.

Hmm, I only see 2 (or 5) main characters. The two anime humans and the three non-copper robots (blue, green, red).

it's 4 humans MFs. blue, green, red and purple hair. same colors as the KK knights.

[Kahgarak]

I am sure of it.I hope that there will be battles all over Earth in 2007.Maybe they can do factions...?

[xenologer]

so far for the exo-force line i can see TLG is going for the same concept as KK. 4 main chars (boring!). i wish they go back-to-basics with generic minifigs and give us super cool mechs and vehicles instead. what i like to see is something like the vikings. lots of generic vikings and maybe one captain (for those who like to role play the leader or the champion, etc).

Yep, I totally agree with you on this point. But the way they're going with the dedicated online comics, It'll never happen.

This is a Major reason why I prefer the Robot mechs over the Human ones. The Robots fit more with the traditional structure of generic figs ( I regard the different colored silver robots as ranks, not characters). Plus there is less 'cheese' associated with them, since the silly comics don't focus on them as much.(not that I read those anyway)

I hope that there will be battles all over Earth in 2007.

For a moment I thought you were talking about real politics. lol, what a depressing world we live in.

[KimT]

I say Exo-Force is here to stay.. The local toy store says they have trouble getting enough of these sets. They're sold out almost the instant they hit the shelves *y* But who knows? LEGO also decided to seriously reduce the amount of Viking sets even though that theme sold buckets and was even released in the US, wich it wasn't initially supposed to be. We can only hope - TLC moves in mysterius ways.

KimT

[Mister Phes]

i dunno. it dropped out of the hot list from every country listed in lego.com. so far police, batman and star wars are going strong. exo-force, dino, harry potter are very weak.

You wouldn't happen to have a link to this page? How often does it get updated?

[natelite]

ah, then i guess online shop's numbers are misleading. i guess the only reason why none of the sets are in the top 30 is because you can get them from retail. hmm, but that still doesn't explain the popularity of the star wars and batman sets. there are tons of those in retail stores too. hmm...definitely something to think about.

You wouldn't happen to have a link to this page? How often does it get updated?

Sure. i think it is daily if not hourly.

http://shop.lego.com/Topsellers.asp

there's a dropdown box which you can use to pick the countries.

also you can try the toysrus.com (or com.au for australia, co.uk for uk, etc). they also have a top 10 selling list.

here's the toysrus.com's top 10 list for lego sets.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/brows...2906033-3498426

it's rated hourly. i think toysrus uk and other countries may have similar rating.

final edit: actually in the toysrus website, the three human large mechs (grand titan, stealth hunter and super nova) were featured in the top selling list. so i guess it is rather popular still. :)

[Mister Phes]

Thanx duuuuuuuuuuuude! I never realised that the LEGO Shop rated the sets these days. Must have been months since I looked at the website...

[Deinonychus]

i don't think lego designers are going to be as creative as a brickshelf moc'er. i don't mean any disrespect but i think creativity is best unbridled. if you are paid to be creative, the work is always going to be less than perfect.

I disagree. I think people who are paid to be creative are probably better at it, because they don't have to go to work and waste all day doing stupid things; instead their work is creativity, and they get paid for it too.

I think the real reason lego sets aren't as good as some MOC's out there is because Lego is a business, and it cannot afford to make $300 sets or else they'd go out of business.

I feel that the Lego designers do their absolute best and their creativity shows through in spite of the restrictions TLC puts on the sets.

That's a key point there and I'm glad someone else picked up on it.

The LEGO designers not only have to design cool and marketable sets, but they also have to fill out size and price-points and keep the piece counts to a level where the production costs won't outrun the price-point.

Supernova is a great example I think. My theory on that set is that it was an earlier basic mech design, but it just had too many pieces and would never fit into the $15 US price-point. So, instead of scrapping the design outright, it's given the TRU Exclusive treatment and sold for a little more.

Designing to a price-point is probably what hamstrings a lot of the LEGO designers in terms of creativity. However, when they're given a high price point to meet like say...the UCS Star Wars ships, the results are spectacular. I think it also works in our favor sometimes. Take the Gate Assault set. The gate, tank, and Robot Mech all look like they were designed to be the set. However the little white Mech almost looks like an afterthought. It's possible that it was tossed in near the end to up the piece count and give a little more value to a set meant to sell at the $30 US price-point.

So, MOCers have unlimited numbers of pieces they can toss into a creation and no limitations so far as actual construction goes, but the LEGO designers have any piece in any color they want...plus brand new pieces from time to time, so in the end i think the whole deal balances out

[SuvieD]

EXO will be around for at least a few years. I wouldn't mind seeing it every other year like the adventurer series. Of course it needs to get new characters and hair colors also. I am waiting for the pink mecha with female pilot.

[Deinonychus]

EXO will be around for at least a few years. I wouldn't mind seeing it every other year like the adventurer series. Of course it needs to get new characters and hair colors also. I am waiting for the pink mecha with female pilot.

Oh hell, that'd be worth it for mech/space shaped pink bricks alone! :-D

LEGO is packed full of weird and offbeat colors they don't use very often, the variety of mech colors we could see is very encouraging...I'm personally hoping for a teal one

[The Hordesman]

The first wave of imported sets were sold out in less than a week in all stores, only the airfighter was pretty untouched on the shelves.

Mega-success.

I agree, I want to see a pink mecha and female pilots!

Pink mecha pieces + black pieces = Emperor's Children from Warhammer 40k... >:-)

[Kahgarak]

I hope that there will be battles all over Earth in 2007.

For a moment I thought you were talking about real politics. lol, what a depressing world we live in.

No,i meant in the EXF universe. :-P