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LEGO Pirates 2015 sets pictures!
just2good
Member Posts: 247
in Collecting
http://youtu.be/ZturyZzCVLw
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Comments
The builds I don't find very inspiring, and I'm not a fan of the ship. While it was never going to be an IF, it doesn't even look as good as BP or QAR.
I just think that LEGO could have done little things, like new sails color schemes instead of rehashing the red and white again. And no ship for the Imperial forces. I guess they did not have ships at all.. wonder how they took out the pirates?
I hope this is only the beginning and more sets are on the way for the second half of 2015, but if not this is a pretty sad effort by LEGO IMO.
Especially when the high point of these is the dark red Masonry brick being included.
I would certainly be willing to pay more for better sets. I don't know why Lego has dumbed down the pirate sets so drastically. Must be what the average buyer wants?
But again aside from prices, Just really sad looking line to me
If you consider inflation, this price point is similar to that of #6274 Caribbean Clipper in 1989. This ship looks more substantial than that.
I probably won't buy any, sure, but then I only tend to buy the occasional small exclusives anyway. But I am happy that the soldiers get a bit more focus, and that there is more than one 'fort' type set. Also, the new pirate torso and face prints are pretty neat, and feel quite Classic-inspired to me.
I'm pretty sure my brother will pick up a mid-sized one. I'm also pretty sure they'll prove popular with MOCers and army builders (but that depends on price).
Note they are using the new SW blaster for mini canons.
The builds look bland and disappointing, and that crocodile looks like he's snuck in from a Duplo set. Figs looks nice though, I like that they've used updated versions of the classic pirate torsos.
Yup. I see this not as juniorized, but basically some of the same sets from the 2009 wave, but revamped. I liked the 2009 wave better.
The subject matter has a very back-to-basics feel, which probably is part of why it feels so redundant to long-time Pirates fans. A pirate ship, an imperial fort, an imperial outpost, and a pirate hideout on a deserted island are all quintessential subject matter for any LEGO Pirates theme (and subject matter I remember fondly from my own childhood), and so after such a lengthy hiatus since the last true Pirates sets, they have to be its starting point.
I DO hope that there are other Pirates sets still to come, though, because if we keep having a lengthy hiatus after every LEGO Pirates wave and have to start fresh every time we will indeed miss out on some of the more diverse sorts of sets that could help broaden the theme's subject matter. #70413 The Brick Bounty is just fine, but it'd be a shame if there weren't a proper Imperial vessel for it to do battle with.
Look at LEGO City. Sure, we get a new police station every year or two, but because the theme continues nonstop, each one for the past several years has been considerably different than the one before it! We had a metropolitan police station in 2011, a forest police station in 2012, a metropolitan police station with very different architecture from the 2011 one in 2014, and now a swamp police station in 2015! By contrast, when you have a lengthy gap between new waves of a theme, it basically has to start from square one each time it gets relaunched.
Sadly we're unlikely to see an Islanders subtheme like the one I loved as a child (I was King Kahuka for Halloween in 1994!) due to it being rather politically incorrect.
Old croc/gator
Duplo croc/gator
I agree with above comments that the sets could be improved in places, although if we get more than one wave I will be very happy no matter what. A set like the old Imperial Trading Post would be an absolute dream!
The Islanders weren't quite so problematic, but they weren't immune to this kind of misrepresentation either. Whether they were meant to be Pacific islanders or Caribbean islanders (the massive statues point towards Pacific, I think), it's not clear why they would have drums patterned with zebra skins, zebras being endemic to Africa.
The Collectible Minifigures don't have this issue to nearly the same extent, because as individual characters it's much easier to keep them accurate to a particular culture. But start putting a lot of those sorts of minifigures and other cultural hallmarks together in one theme or setting and you might run into trouble.
Hoping these start hitting the shelves somewhere a little early....
LEGO could have created sets that would appeal to both AFOL and children. It's not like children would find *only* these particular sets appealing.
LEGO's strategy in this case and the most recent Castle series is a bit baffling. If kids were going to like Castle and Pirates in the first place they'd probably have liked almost anything LEGO did. AFOLs are always the harder sell. And all the AFOLs probably would have wanted is different set ideas, which just about anyone with an afternoon to kill could easily gin up.
Again, I like the sets and will buy them all save the boat(barring massive discount) but I think it's fair to take LEGO to task for their design decisions in this case.
Just as an example, look at the pier in the Treasure Island set, as well as the rocks under it. That rocky detailing and those uneven boards are beautiful! Rock foundations like this struck me as extraordinary when we first started to see them in sets like #9476, simply because that had previously been something you only saw in MOCs by AFOLs, not in sets! But now it's showing up not only in licensed sets aimed at ages eight and up, but also in non-licensed sets for ages five and up! That's pretty incredible, if you ask me. Likewise, the walls of the Soldier's Outpost are completely brick-built, not just printed or stickered panels like Imperial forts and outposts have so often used in previous sets (and again, we have an elegant brick-built rock foundation).
I felt the same way about the last Castle wave, though. The sets were few in number and some of them were not outstanding, but they demonstrated a level of detail and building complexity a cut above what I was used to from many previous Castle sets. They definitely measured up to the previous Kingdoms range or even many classic LEGO castles as far as complexity was concerned, and I could never quite figure why so many AFOLs considered them juniorized. #70401 and #70402 were particularly elegant and elaborate designs, and what #70403 lacked in size it made up for in detail. An evil tower built on the ruins of an older castle? Not only was that concept more or less unprecedented in LEGO, but I feel like it was realized remarkably well.
Even #70404 felt every bit as formidable and elaborate as #7946 — or for that matter, the fan favorite #6085. Yes, I said it. Black Monarch's Castle may have been elegant for its time, but it had no interior furnishings of any kind, fewer and smaller towers, and no ladders or stairs for getting up to the battlements. What's more, it had 294 fewer pieces than 70404, despite costing what would be over thirty dollars more today! And yet somehow, I'm supposed to believe that 70404 was "juniorized"? Balderdash.
The same goes for these Pirates sets. #70410 may be small, but it is packed with elaborate brick-built detail. I for one think that's admirable and shows a lot of talent and creativity from the designers.
1. The sets generally appear small and/or appear to have required little effort to design (I interpret this as Lego being cheap and/or lazy)
2. Although the sets might have some details desirable to some (such as rock formations), other more prominent attributes such as bright colors and half-finished appearances overshadow any positive attributes
3. The sets are unattractive and cheap-looking. That's the general impression I get when looking at these sets.
I'm fully aware that I'm probably not the target market for these sets, so my opinion obviously doesn't matter much. Nonetheless, it's my opinion of the sets and the reason I wont be buying them.
No for western / cowboys though.