Hero Factory 2011

[Ceroknight]

For Doctor Who fans, has anyone noticed the if looked at in a certain way, the heroes kinda resemble Cybermen.

@Bricker what kind of torso armor did you have in mind for the female heroes?

...the 2.0s or the 3.0s?

[Jetrax99]

...the 2.0s or the 3.0s?

2.0s of course. BTW, if you were to buy doubles of Stormer, Evo, Nex, Surge, and Furno and you put their armor plates in uniform fashion so they all match(apart from the helmets, torso sizes, and armor plate sizes)you'd have the hero factory version of the New Dalek Paradigm.

[Bricker]

For Doctor Who fans, has anyone noticed the if looked at in a certain way, the heroes kinda resemble Cybermen.

@Bricker what kind of torso armor did you have in mind for the female heroes?

Not too dif. from the males torso armor, sort of like from agents, they had the female agent (forgot her name) to have more female qqualitys (not gonna say it) but also the armor to make the females seem less bulky and a bit skinnyer than the males making them seem more fragile. The females would have more accurate poses. Plus, if you liked Bionicle, and you buy sets from HeroFactory, but your not sucked into the stuff and dont really read bios and such, then you might not know Breez is a girl, her name might say something, but some people can be pretty stupid some times. Plus I would have liked to see some wires just above the hips, for some reason thats my vision. You would be able to strike more womanly poses too and better MOCing for female characters.

[Jetrax99]

Not too dif. from the males torso armor, sort of like from agents, they had the female agent (forgot her name) to have more female qqualitys (not gonna say it) but also the armor to make the females seem less bulky and a bit skinnyer than the males making them seem more fragile. The females would have more accurate poses. Plus, if you liked Bionicle, and you buy sets from HeroFactory, but your not sucked into the stuff and dont really read bios and such, then you might not know Breez is a girl, her name might say something, but some people can be pretty stupid some times. Plus I would have liked to see some wires just above the hips, for some reason thats my vision. You would be able to strike more womanly poses too and better MOCing for female characters.

I know breez is female.

[The Dor]

I know breez is female.

Yeah, you aren't a section of the fan base that Bricker was referring to. Unless you saw her 1.0 canister, or her bio online, there is no way to tell that she's "female". Considering that Hero Factory is supposed to be appealing to that exact audience (the quick, first time buyers), I would call that a "problem".

[VBBN]

Not too dif. from the males torso armor, sort of like from agents, they had the female agent (forgot her name) to have more female qqualitys (not gonna say it) but also the armor to make the females seem less bulky and a bit skinnyer than the males making them seem more fragile. The females would have more accurate poses. Plus, if you liked Bionicle, and you buy sets from HeroFactory, but your not sucked into the stuff and dont really read bios and such, then you might not know Breez is a girl, her name might say something, but some people can be pretty stupid some times. Plus I would have liked to see some wires just above the hips, for some reason thats my vision. You would be able to strike more womanly poses too and better MOCing for female characters.

Well, I'd love to have proper female torsos that are slimmer and have boobs, but it's unlikely to happen. They are robots, they dont have to follow humanlike qualities.

[CabooseBM]

I'd almost rather they pull a Strika and make a big armoured brute female character.

Although at least one successful attempt would be appreciated before we do that.

[The Crazy One]

Well, I'd love to have proper female torsos that are slimmer and have boobs, but it's unlikely to happen. They are robots, they dont have to follow humanlike qualities.

True, but that doesn't mean that it's not what we want.

Wasn't it Rodaka who was the only female robot and strangely the best set of the wave due to her female attributes?

[ZORK64]

True, but that doesn't mean that it's not what we want.

Wasn't it Rodaka who was the only female robot and strangely the best set of the wave due to her female attributes?

I don't know why, but Rodaka didn't look much feminine in my eyes. For some odd reason, I didn't notice the Rahkshi-Head-Boobs the first time I saw her. I think mostly because of her weird head which still confuses me.

[Bfahome]

I see Roodaka as a good set because she's well-constructed and has several good pieces, as well as a couple of exclusive pieces. Not because of the weird shoulder armor (the construction, not the piece).

Edited February 8, 2011 by Bfahome

[Aanchir]

Something to keep in mind is that Roodaka, despite being a really well-designed and shapely female set, did not sell particularly well, hence why BIONICLE (and now, Hero Factory) did not release similarly-designed female figures in later years. If any example is to be made of a feminine set, I'd say a better one would be Kiina: a female character on a canister-set budget, who managed to remain distinctly female without relying on unique "female" armor pieces or extremely obvious female physical attributes. Naturally, the Hero Factory theme, which is far less dependent on pre-existing parts, would have a little more difficulty with this. But in my opinion, Kiina still demonstrates how minimal the requirements for a female canister set should be. She wouldn't need to be a more realistic or gender-specific shape than the males, and she certainly wouldn't need to be a bikini-clad sex icon like Roodaka was (I have an enormous respect for Roodaka's design quality; I'm just calling it as I see it).

Another thing I observed recently about Breez 2.0: not counting armor on the arms, she has shoulders nine modules wide and a height of about 21.5 modules. She uses the same torso structure as most of the male Heroes: her nine-module-wide shoulders are the wider of the two default shoulder widths in her canister set series. And notably, all of these descriptions apply just as much to Breez as to a much older canister-set female... evidently, not as much has changed over the years as some people seem to think.

(Yes, Gali did have design features which we can only assume were meant to make her more feminine. Her leg pieces were reversed so as to make her thighs thicker than her calves, although this was also done for Onua and did not immediately convey femininity. She had black friction pins on her hips, apparently to fill them out, although they made her hips no wider and were an awkward way of conveying femininity, to say the least. Most obviously, she had a y-joint on her chest rather than a ball-joint. But without a little imagination this did not make her look especially feminine, unless you're thinking of "male" and "female" hinges in some weird Freudian terms.)

[Bfahome]

(Yes, Gali did have design features which we can only assume were meant to make her more feminine. Her leg pieces were reversed so as to make her thighs thicker than her calves, although this was also done for Onua and did not immediately convey femininity. She had black friction pins on her hips, apparently to fill them out, although they made her hips no wider and were an awkward way of conveying femininity, to say the least. Most obviously, she had a y-joint on her chest rather than a ball-joint. But without a little imagination this did not make her look especially feminine, unless you're thinking of "male" and "female" hinges in some weird Freudian terms.)

People point to those and say "see?? she looks very feminine!" Of course, this is probably years after they found out she was female and had time to retroactively apply those interpretations to the design. I, for one, thought all six Toa were male at first, and was surprised when I read that Gali was female.

[toatali]

Um if you look on the recent Lego Cars 2 pics, you can see the side of a summer villan box...

[Mesonak]

You're right!

Looks like Witch Doctor's box; can't wait to see the actual thing.

-Mesonak

[Jouster]

I Can't Wait to see the actual thing too. It looks like it will be awesome.

[Bricker]

I must say LEGO may have not done "female qualitys" in Bionicle but I see absolutely no reason why Hero Factory cant be a new start. Lego created a WHOLE dif. connection system didnt they? If you watched the Hero Factory TV series, I recall in the end of the last episode, we saw the reporter which had both hair AND "female qualitys" as I recall. I can understand why LEGO doesnt want to do this but of course in my opinion, its for the best. In my opinion, LEGO needs a little bit of work on makingg female masks, helmets, etc. When Bionicle first came out, I wasnt interested in the theme at the least (eventually I came to love it) but when I saw Gali, I loved the mask. Unfortunately I never knew she was a girl. When Kiina came out, I thought she was a boy when I first saw the official catalog, but then I thought "Hey what the heck? Wheres the female character?" When I finally read her desc. (yeah I accually read that stuff ) I found out she was female and soon it grew on me and I saw her as female too (When I first found out she was female I was all- WHAT!?!? ). Rocka might be hard for fans to realize if she (if he/she is female)is female because to me I see almost no female qualitys what so ever, especially with that giant headdress. Breeze 1.0 was the only character that seemed to have a helmet that automaticly slapped me in the face and said "Hey look at me ima girl!!!". Breeze 2.0 sorta told me she was a girl with her face mask but it couldve been better. Im disappointed we arent getting Breeze for "Savage Planet" because she is the jungle/air type hero (just so everyone knows, Mark Surge [My favorite hero/first one I bougt *He has my first name *] is an electric type hero not water) and I read her core has a special connection to nature like talking to animals or watever.

[Aanchir]

I must say LEGO may have not done "female qualitys" in Bionicle but I see absolutely no reason why Hero Factory cant be a new start. Lego created a WHOLE dif. connection system didnt they? If you watched the Hero Factory TV series, I recall in the end of the last episode, we saw the reporter which had both hair AND "female qualitys" as I recall. I can understand why LEGO doesnt want to do this but of course in my opinion, its for the best. In my opinion, LEGO needs a little bit of work on makingg female masks, helmets, etc. When Bionicle first came out, I wasnt interested in the theme at the least (eventually I came to love it) but when I saw Gali, I loved the mask. Unfortunately I never knew she was a girl. When Kiina came out, I thought she was a boy when I first saw the official catalog, but then I thought "Hey what the heck? Wheres the female character?" When I finally read her desc. (yeah I accually read that stuff ) I found out she was female and soon it grew on me and I saw her as female too (When I first found out she was female I was all- WHAT!?!? ). Rocka might be hard for fans to realize if she (if he/she is female)is female because to me I see almost no female qualitys what so ever, especially with that giant headdress. Breeze 1.0 was the only character that seemed to have a helmet that automaticly slapped me in the face and said "Hey look at me ima girl!!!". Breeze 2.0 sorta told me she was a girl with her face mask but it couldve been better. Im disappointed we arent getting Breeze for "Savage Planet" because she is the jungle/air type hero (just so everyone knows, Mark Surge [My favorite hero/first one I bougt *He has my first name *] is an electric type hero not water) and I read her core has a special connection to nature like talking to animals or watever.

It's true, LEGO could make a more feminine-looking hero in this theme. They could have done so in BIONICLE, too. The reason they didn't, though, had nothing to do with tradition, and is just as valid with Hero Factory as it was with BIONICLE: namely, that young boys (the primary demographic for Hero Factory) don't especially like female action figures. Female action figures in general tend to sell more poorly than male ones-- and that's not just with LEGO.

By making the females somewhat gender-ambiguous LEGO can still manage to release female characters every now and then, but that includes both the physique and the mask/face designs. LEGO has done OK with marginally-feminine mask designs in the past-- Kiina strikes me as a good example, as does Toa Inika Hahli (I perceive her mask a lot differently than many fans, needless to say). But of course the cost is that most female characters don't really stand out as female at first glance.

It is a bit of a shame that Breez isn't showing up in summer sets, but I think a lot of people are happy to see Stringer and Bulk back. Since LEGO now has eight heroes (by summer, that'll be up to nine), they can't release all of them in one series. And anyway, I'm sure plenty of people will have fun MOCing their own designs for 3.0 versions of Breez, Surge, and Evo.

On a side note, it'd help if you broke your text up into short paragraphs. Your post was kind of difficult to read.

[ZORK64]

I, for one, thought all six Toa were male at first, and was surprised when I read that Gali was female.

Same here. In addition, I'm quite sure the first LEGO catalogues featuring Bionicle actually referred to Gali as a male character.

When I think back to that time when I realized Gali is a female character, I kinda know how all the video gamers must have felt when they finished the very first Metroid Game.

And as I already said in some other topic... I agree with Aanchir that Kiina is one of the best examples for a well-designed female character. Besides, some of the other masks also work quite well for female characters, like Vastus' (in fact, when I hold the mask in my own hands, my first thought was "It would work great for a female MOC!") or Berix/Ackar's mask.

Edited February 9, 2011 by ZORK64

[Bundalings]

When I got the first comic, I though Kopaka and Lewa were female and Gali was male.

So yeah.

I -do- wish we got more female characters, whether they looked it or no. Both in Hero Factory and Bionicle the female to male ratios were really bizarre, though they were helped some when Psionics and Lightning became female elements. With Hero Factory, though, I see no reason to connect colors to genders, so fingers crossed that Rocka is a female.

Also I'm still holding out for a purple Hero. Why? Because of the Hero Cores.

Stormer is white. Rocka has a white core.

Surge is blue. Stormer has a blue core.

Breez is lime. Surge has a lime core.

Furno is red. Breez has a red core.

Evo is yellow. Furno has a yellow core.

NO ONE IS PURPLE?!?!

So I'm hoping for amber, purple and mata green Heroes. =P

(Stringer has an amber core, Evo has a purple core, Nex has a mata green core.)

[Aanchir]

When I got the first comic, I though Kopaka and Lewa were female and Gali was male.

So yeah.

I -do- wish we got more female characters, whether they looked it or no. Both in Hero Factory and Bionicle the female to male ratios were really bizarre, though they were helped some when Psionics and Lightning became female elements. With Hero Factory, though, I see no reason to connect colors to genders, so fingers crossed that Rocka is a female.

Also I'm still holding out for a purple Hero. Why? Because of the Hero Cores.

Stormer is white. Rocka has a white core.

Surge is blue. Stormer has a blue core.

Breez is lime. Surge has a lime core.

Furno is red. Breez has a red core.

Evo is yellow. Furno has a yellow core.

NO ONE IS PURPLE?!?!

So I'm hoping for amber, purple and mata green Heroes. =P

(Stringer has an amber core, Evo has a purple core, Nex has a mata green core.)

I had sort of been doubtful of a purple (268 Medium Lilac) hero because it's so much darker than all the other 2.0 Hero colors, rather than being bright and vibrant. But now, seeing that there's a gold hero in the 3.0 series, there's really no reason to assume LEGO's going to adhere to a strict formula of any kind. True, brighter colors will still probably be favored, but that doesn't mean darker colors aren't an option.

In other color-related news, people have observed in other themes that some of the unreleased colors we've seen on LDD are beginning to make their debut this summer. At least three will be in summer sets: the bluish-green 321 or 322 in Alien Conquest (hard to tell which it is from photographs-- 321 is darker than 322), 323 Aqua in Cars, and the light-lavender 325 in Collectible Minifigures Series 5. Other unreleased colors we know about from LDD include 324, a darker lavender color, and 326 Spring Yellowish-Green (basically a very light lime, nearly identical to the long-discontinued 120 Light Yellowish-Green). Another color we didn't even know about, an olive/army green (!) is also visible in one of the Cars sets.

I wonder if any of these will make their way to Hero Factory, or whether the theme will tend to stick with tried-and-tested colors. Certainly a lot of these colors would look "girly" to most preteen boys, but the olive green and the bluish-green used in Alien Conquest could both have potential in this theme.

I, too, would love a Mata Green (28 Dark Green) hero or villain. And for that matter, maybe LEGO could do something they never did for BIONICLE and use 38 Bright Green. It's a color that's rarely used for anything other than plants and baseplates, but it's still on the current palette, and makes a notable appearance in one of the Heroica board games.

-----

Talking about color variety makes me wonder: Do you think the DbM-based "Hero Recon Team" function might be used to design a playable hero in "Mission 2: Ordeal of Fire"? The design function for "Mission 1: Von Nebula" was OK, but it included several unidentifiable colors. I'd much prefer a design function that sticks to existing LEGO colors. But perhaps that's just my nerdiness speaking.

[Bfahome]

A purple-colored hero could work well, depending on the design and secondary color. Given the right shape, helmet, and Hero core/head color, it wouldn't look very "girly" at all.

For example, I don't think the Zurg set turned many people away simply because it was purple. THough it was licensed, so the scenario is sort of different.

[Sulfurix]

On the purple hero topic, Lego could make Von Nebula return as Ness 4.0 or something. Von would look amazing in purple.

(Fingers Crossed)

[Aanchir]

A purple-colored hero could work well, depending on the design and secondary color. Given the right shape, helmet, and Hero core/head color, it wouldn't look very "girly" at all.

For example, I don't think the Zurg set turned many people away simply because it was purple. THough it was licensed, so the scenario is sort of different.

Never said it was girly (assuming you're still talking about Evo's purple). I was concerned that it was too dark relative to the bright red, bright blue, bright yellowish-green, etc. of the 2.0 heroes.

The lavender almost certainly would look too girly, at least as a primary color. You can see it towards the end of my Complete LDD Color Chart.

[Jetrax99]

If they do a purple hero I want him to be part of a dinosaur themed wave.

I also hope we get some stylized armor plates that correspond to a hero's specific motif.

Also.....I WANT A PINK HERO!!!

Edited February 9, 2011 by Jetrax99

[Aanchir]

If they do a purple hero I want him to be part of a dinosaur themed wave.

I also hope we get some stylized armor plates that correspond to a hero's specific motif.

Also.....I WANT A PINK HERO!!!

That'd be OK as long as the stylized armor plates are only distinguished from one another by printing. Having a separate mold for each of the six sets would just just cut into the budget for new parts, meaning more unique and versatile pieces wouldn't show up nearly as often. In other words, basically the "name badges" we have currently, but with more character-specific printing. If LEGO had done that with the 1.0 wave, then Furno might have had a flame pattern, Surge might have had a lightning pattern, and so forth.

Hard to tell whether that would happen since the 2.0 wave eliminated the main character-specific trait we had gotten used to in BIONICLE, that being unique elemental affiliations. As far as armor and tools are concerned, the 2.0 heroes have much more uniform styles. But of course, that may just be a consequence of the huge number of new parts that had to be made just to establish the new building system, so maybe the 3.0 heroes (or whatever series comes afterwards in 2012) will have more unique "motifs", so to speak.

A pink hero probably won't ever happen. The preteen boys who make up a great portion of the fanbase are as likely to consider pink a "girly color" as they are to avoid anything they consider "girly". Honestly, BIONICLE never had pink in it for a reason-- a reason that applies as much to Hero Factory one year in as it did to BIONICLE for ten full years.