Hero Factory 2012

[Aanchir]

Oh, actually I didn't, mostly because I didn't start to pay more attention to the worldwide releases of LEGO sets until the release of the second HF-line. I was also not too fond of the Piraka, to be honest (though I got 3 Avaks after they went on sales, and in retrospect, they weren't that bad, actually).

Regarding the colours: I'd like to see more blue too. And azure. Lime is indeed blatantly overused, GL's medium green would be much appreciated. Gunmetal doesn't bother me that much yet, though.

Let's not call that color medium green. Medium green is already a color (a discontinued one, but still, no need to create confusion). TLG, Bricklink, and Peeron all call Green Lantern's primary color Bright Green.

I actually think Voltix has the potential to be epic if you replace the purple with black and took away the blue wires and the head lightning and then changed the orange whip to a blck one possibly with red spikes in it. And back on the gunmetal/silver debate bulk looks fine with gunmetal. Next year there better be a mata blue villain

I wouldn't want to remove the blue wires, although if TLG released solid blue ones without blending I'd use those in a heartbeat. Also, the whip is bright yellow-- it has never been orange; it just looks orange in some pictures compared to the lightning bolts on his head and back because those are blended with transparent blue and thus skew greenish.

A lot of people have all sorts of ideas about how to improve Voltix's color scheme, but I worry that some of them (like coloring the whip black or removing the blue wires) really make him lose the electrical motif that defines him.

[Gatanui]

Let's not call that color medium green. Medium green is already a color (a discontinued one, but still, no need to create confusion). TLG, Bricklink, and Peeron all call Green Lantern's primary color Bright Green.

You and your colours, Aanchir.

Oh, actually I didn't, mostly because I didn't start to pay more attention to the worldwide releases of LEGO sets until the release of the second HF-line. I was also not too fond of the Piraka, to be honest (though I got 3 Avaks after they went on sales, and in retrospect, they weren't that bad, actually).

Regarding the colours: I'd like to see more blue too. And azure. Lime is indeed blatantly overused, GL's medium green would be much appreciated. Gunmetal doesn't bother me that much yet, though.

Why worldwide? In case you don´t know yet, I live in Germany, too, so we had the same release date.

-Gata

Edited May 26, 2012 by Gatanui

[Shakar]

I say, Voltix's sole problems are not enough purple parts (easy to solve: replace the red 5M shells on his lower legs with the lilac 6M ones from Joker), the lack of hands and those pesky black feet.

Aside from that, his colour scheme is nowhere as cluttered as people make it to be- actually, it's better organized than many sets this year.

Whoops, wrong text colour.

Edited May 26, 2012 by Shakar

[MakutaDreadscythe]

It's surprising really. I'd think that I'd not like Voltix much, but I actually like his colour scheme for some reason, Core Hunter just looks boooooring. Snore.

[ZORK64]

Let's not call that color medium green. Medium green is already a color (a discontinued one, but still, no need to create confusion). TLG, Bricklink, and Peeron all call Green Lantern's primary color Bright Green.

Ah, my bad. I'll try to keep it in mind.

By the way, Bright Green was also the colour used in sets like the original Lewa, right?

Why worldwide? In case you don´t know yet, I live in Germany, too, so we had the same release date.

-Gata

I meant in comparison to the release in other countries so I wasn't aware that we got the Piraka far later.

[Kadabra]

Ah, my bad. I'll try to keep it in mind.

By the way, Bright Green was also the colour used in sets like the original Lewa, right?

I meant in comparison to the release in other countries so I wasn't aware that we got the Piraka far later.

No, 'Mata Green' is a little bit darker than Bright Green.

[vexorian]

So, this is very late (was very busy these two days). But I managed to extract the biggest quality shots from the incredibly lame and annoying amazon.fr interface.

For completeness. Here's the other sets' images I extracted from the other site a long time ago:

(Pictures are links)

(brickshelf gallery (not approved yet) )

. I am not liking Stormer's connection in the part behind his chest. It will surely look bad in some angles. Stormer also looks a bit chubby... Core hunter should have lost the gun metal. In fact, that color is becoming the new silver and needs to stop appearing that much.

Voltix should just replace all red with black and all black with purple.

Edited May 26, 2012 by vexorian

[Shakar]

Excellent work, vexorian.

Look! Stormer has a dark bley torso!

[Bfahome]

I'd rather have the Fire Lord leg design on Stormer than the one he uses.

Edited May 27, 2012 by Bfahome

[MakutaDreadscythe]

I'd rather have the Fire Lord leg design on Stormer than the one he uses.

If it helps, when he's released I can show you how to mod his legs to look more like from the show.

And yes, he does have a dark bley torso.

[DraikNova]

Thanks for the pics Vexorian! They look great, although it seems Stormer has a black torso. I'm really looking forward to building the Stormer and SD combiner, with that purple, silver and trans-blue sawblade .

Edited May 27, 2012 by DraikNova

[MakutaDreadscythe]

Thanks for the pics Vexorian! They look great, although it seems Stormer has a black torso. I'm really looking forward to building the Stormer and SD combiner, with that purple, silver and trans-blue sawblade .

No, he does use a dark bley torso in his construction.

[Gatanui]

Thanks for the pictures! Why does Stormer have three drones on his left arm and only two on his right arm, though?

-Gata

Edited May 27, 2012 by Gatanui

[Kalhiki]

Once I get Stormer I'm going to hope and pray that he isn't top heavy. Those friction joints on his legs just look terrible. Otherwise, he isn't that bad.

Core Hunter looks great. Despite the generic build, the use of parts and colors really makes him pop. Speeda Demon I can wait on. He isn't a priority for me, but I must admit that he does look pretty good.

Kalhiki

[Aanchir]

Ah, my bad. I'll try to keep it in mind.

By the way, Bright Green was also the colour used in sets like the original Lewa, right?

As Kadabra says, "Mata Green" is one shade darker than Bright Green. In TLG's color naming system, "Mata Green" is called Dark Green. Bricklink and Peeron just call it Green. It is a bit confusing since normally the "default shade" of a color will officially be Bright Red, Bright Blue, etc., but green is the exception.

Incidentally, "Metru Green" (which Bricklink, Peeron, and most AFOLs call Dark Green) is officially called Earth Green, which is a shade darker than Dark Green in TLG's color naming system. Here's a chart I put together on LDD a long time ago showing the most systematic color names in TLG's palette. Some of the colors have somewhat surprising relationships with one another-- for instance, "Dark Tan" is officially Sand Yellow, one shade darker than "Tan", which is called Brick Yellow. "Mata Brown" (TLG's classic brown color) is officially Earth Orange, and thus has the same relationship with Bright Orange (classic orange) as "Metru Blue" (Earth Blue) has to "Mata Blue" (Bright Blue). The pre-2004 Pink and Dark Pink colors are Light Reddish Violet and Medium Reddish Violet, respectively, and thus they are both lighter versions of Bright Reddish Violet (Magenta).

[/colornerdery]

Anyway, I'm definitely fond of Stormer XL, though I'm curious what he would look like with a Breakout torso shell instead of a 2.0 torso shell for his abdomen. I don't mind that he uses stickers, and I think they help his design greatly, though I can't say for certain whether I prefer the stickered versions of his drones or the versions on the preliminary model shown in the Toy Fair press kit, which were blended much like his sword. In any event I like him much more than Rocka XL, whose design seemed much more cluttered to me.

Speeda Demon is a cool design, and I think his Bright Yellowish Green primary color goes well with his Medium Lilac bike. But in terms of MOCing potential he doesn't have that many Medium Lilac parts, and some of them are Technic parts that wouldn't necessarily work well on a non-vehicle MOC. Also, his bike just doesn't seem to have the same charm as the Furno Bike. That set was armored very well so it didn't feel very framework-like at all despite an extremely simple build. This one, on the other hand, has lots of bare Technic beams and gappy areas.

Core Hunter is cool-looking, and I actually quite like the use of Titanium Metallic for his claw and Plasma Gun. After all, it helps them stand out from his extremely simple color scheme. Of course, I might have greatly preferred his Plasma Gun if it had been Bright Red or Black on top and Titanium Metallic on the bottom.

I like Bulk's color scheme until you get to his black feet, but those are easy to replace with either Titanium Metallic or Silver Metallic through Pick-A-Brick. I'd prefer Silver Metallic because it would help organize his color scheme-- Titanium Metallic for his torso and limbs, Silver Metallic for his head and extremities. Incidentally, I really don't think the silver Hero foot on Rocka's back makes much sense in the context of that set, but at the same time I'm grateful for it because if not for that, the Silver Metallic foot piece would probably no longer be on Pick-A-Brick!

Nex and Stringer are still amazing, and I feel their color schemes are organized very well despite not having torso shells in their primary colors. Both also firmly adhere to their thematic origins (Stringer's sonic theme and Nex's "tech" theme). They're the kind of sets that make it abundantly clear that these Hero Factory sets were designed with these specific characters in mind. Stringer might have been better if his amplifier shell detail had been Black instead of Titanium Metallic, but he still looks awesome.

Voltix looks cool to me. Unlike some people, I don't think he desperately needs more purple. While including more purple parts might have been OK for MOCing, I think his color scheme makes a lot of sense with his Titanium Metallic primary color, Bright Red secondary color, and Medium Lilac "auxiliary color", which ends up feeling like one solid suit of armor. The black feet again interfere with this slightly, but it's nothing a Pick-A-Brick order can't fix. As I've mentioned before, the main improvements I can imagine would be making his blue wires solid blue rather than blended with transparent, and possibly removing the transparent blue blending from his lightning pieces. While the lightning pieces do look awesome in their revolutionary three-color blend, it keeps them from matching the sphere and tentacle as well as they should.

I still find XT-4 a masterpiece with his non-humanoid proportions and his well-balanced asymmetry. The only change I could see myself making would be matching the color of his laser to the color of his eye.

[turtleman2020]

I want Nex sooooooo badly. I think him and Evo 4.0 are the best heroes lego has made. Also is his weapon new?

Edited May 27, 2012 by turtleman2020

[Aanchir]

I want Nex sooooooo badly. I think him and Evo 4.0 are the best heroes lego has made. Also is his weapon new?

His weapon is built using existing pieces-- in this case, one of the 8M "engine block" shells introduced in 2011's Fire Villains (92215), along with some classic System pieces (a loudhailer/megaphone and an antenna).

[ZORK64]

I want Nex sooooooo badly. I think him and Evo 4.0 are the best heroes lego has made. Also is his weapon new?

As far as parts goes, his weapon tool is actually recycled from a bunch of various pieces. The core is one of those shell pieces introduced with Fire Lord and his buddies, the speaker/cannon (was also used often as a blaster in the Star Wars sets prior to the rifles) and the antenna are pretty old LEGO pieces and the antenna on his right shoulder is actually a Mini-Fig Spear Gun (on a side note, one of the first LEGO action figures, the Sub Slizer, also used one of these).

EDIT: Oh, I got outposted. Well, it happens.

Edited May 27, 2012 by ZORK64

[Bfahome]

Thanks for the pictures! Why does Stormer have three drones on his left arm and only two on his right arm, though?

-Gata

Huh, didn't notice.

Probably to make room for the launcher.

also @ MD: I don't plan on buying him right now, and if I do I have the pieces to give him FL legs if I want to.

Edited May 27, 2012 by Bfahome

[vexorian]

Alternatively, the designers just like asymmetry (Explains other things like Stormer 2.0's legs, Nex's shoulder armor, etc...

[turtleman2020]

Alternatively, the designers just like asymmetry (Explains other things like Stormer 2.0's legs, Nex's shoulder armor, etc...

Yeah, some assymetry can make a moc look really unique.

[Dorek]

Lol, you guys didn't notice that he only had two scout drones on the one arm? XP.

Who knows why. They do love their asymmetry, so let's just go with that =P. Just buy another one off of PAB if it seems annoying; I know I probably will. (Hopefully it's actually included on PAB)

[Bfahome]

Lol, you guys didn't notice that he only had two scout drones on the one arm? XP.

Too distracted by his twig knees.

[Jetrax99]

Stormer has only 2 drones on 1 arm because he launched the 3rd one. Remember when he launched 2 while chasing after speeda demon in Breakout?

Only had 4 out of his initial 6 during the fight against BP.

Edited May 28, 2012 by Jetrax99

[DraikNova]

I hope we will be able to get purple scout drones from PAB.

Edited May 28, 2012 by DraikNova