Beware of geeks bearing gifts

I got Pat a bunch of LEGO sets for her birthday. Decided to start her off with relatively small stuff. You know how usually you think of LEGO as coming in ginormous boxes that cost a ton? Well okay, actually that's still true. However, I made the amazing discovery that LEGO is actually pretty fairly priced when you look at the medium sets. I was able to get Pat two decently sized boxes, when I thought that I would only be able to afford one.

The first set I bought was 4939: Cool Cars. It has a lot of parts, 206 in all. Since this is Creator, the parts are very generic; you can use all of the parts in entirely different designs, not just the 3 given on the box. The parts are pretty small, there are a lot of 1x1 and 1x2 tiles. There are very few actual bricks; it's mostly planks, with slopes, smoothers, some grilles, hinges and a windshield for effect.

The finished models are all pretty cool, if you don't mind the fact that they're proud to have studs visible all over the body. I really appreciate the instructions for three builds; I wouldn't say the desgins are amazing, but they're still a lot more creative then I would be able to come up with myself. The only drawback is really that it can't fit minifigs; this won't matter if this is your only set, but if you have a lot of minifigs you might feel that the given designs are out of place. All in all, it's a lot of product for just under 1k Php, so it's a pretty good starter for a grown-up.

The other set I got for Pat was 7040: Dwarven Mine Defender. This is from the Castle line, which means minifigs ahoy! Included are two Orc and one Dwarf minifig; they look pretty neat, with printed torsos and textured helmets. Also included is one orcish sword and a bulky orc banner. The minifigs are great fun, but you do pay for them; the siege machine is kinda small and straightforward to build.

There's only 86 parts, and that counts the minifig components. On the other hand, the parts are a lot bigger, so there's more mass per brick (when compared to Creator sets). Some of the parts are also kinda specialized; there's a one-piece catapult and scoop, and the spinning circular siege blades are pretty much always going to be circular blades. Overall, this set is fun, but at the same price as 4939, it's not so great on value. In hindsight, I would have saved up for a bigger Castle set.

LEGO - a wide angle view

Pat had been talking about how much she would enjoy playing with Lego since we got Tesla a Baby Zoo Duplo set. I'm not entirely sure if it's something she would have gone through with on her own, but I took it as a cue to do some research into the scene.

There aren't any local hobby shops that specialize in importing Lego; I'd have to look at the regular mall toy stores, like Rustan's, Hobbes and Landes, or Toys R Us. Sad to say, local SRP seems to convert the official prices at around 1 USD = 100 PHP. But hey, shipping and shopkeeping costs money, and it's still better than importing it myself.

Taking a look at what's available, I noticed that Lego seems to be divided into several different lines. The most classic line would be Creator: it uses very generic parts, has instructions for 3 different builds per set, but it doesn't worry about scale or minifigs. I'd say it's aimed at adult builders who want to make their own creations. Probably best for Pat.

On the other extreme is Bionicle; it's still built from small parts, but it has almost no brick pieces. Instead it uses mostly specialized parts, joints, bars and axles from Technic. Put together, they look like action figures, not like Lego at all. I expect that the target audience here would be young boys interested in posable fighters.

In the middle are a huge number of minifig-scale lines. Castle, Space, City, and also similar licensed lines like Batman and Starwars. These lines are all heavily themed; there are many pieces that are specialized for use in a specific setting. The downside to this is that there's less versatility for customization, and the building experience is a little duller. The upside to all of this is that the finished products look pretty good, with detailed sculpting and prints. These themes are aimed at collectors (like me!) that want to have something that's not too hard to build, while being fun to play with and display. As a bonus, there are minifigs everywhere, and let me tell you: collectors love to army-build minifigs.

Scalped Robots

Yay, I got new toys yesterday!

I didn't buy any TFTM movies last year, primarily because it was ridiculously hard to find Bumbleebee or Barricade at a reasonable price. Neither did I want to buy random unknowns just because they were available. I ended up skipping the movie line for a while.

I could launch into a long rant about how Hasbro should have just made MORE of the famous characters to start with. Perhaps Hasbro has a perverse incentive to screw over the casual guy who just wants a Bumblebee. Perhaps they're simply that bad at estimating relative demand. Ultimately, though, it's the collector who is responsible for shooting himself in the foot when he decides to buy at an irrational price; he is saying, yes, this thing is really worth twice the SRP.

Fortunately, supply was able to catch up with demand, and I was able to find the toys at close to "retail" price.. and from someone who would be willing to bring the toys to Megamall, too. So, yay me! Now I have something neat to remember the movie by.