Sunday, January 2, 2011

New Year's News 2011

Time for our regular New Year's day business.

Once again, Peeron.com has updated their LEGO set instructions database to make all sets released in a given year available - you can now use their database to look up instructions for kits released in 2007. Speaking of databases: Brickset has done their year-end round of improvements. Nothing major this time, but all certainly good things.

LEGO has also unveiled some new items for 2010, most of which should be available through Shop at Home. Some highlights:

Maersk Container Ship:

(#10155, $119.99 USD, 990 pieces)

The Maersk Container Ship kit has been reissued again. Conveniently, they've risen the price on this one enough to make it about even with what you'd pay to buy the original off of BrickLink or eBay. Still - it's a great kit and the only way you can get your hands on LEGO pieces in the rare color of Maersk blue without breaking the bank.

Collectible Minifigures Series 3:

(#8803, $2.99 USD, 1 randomly packed minifigure per bag)
Collectible Minifigures Series 3
are now out. You know the drill by now: Randomly packed exclusive minifigures for a low price, but with some characters being quite hard to find. The price has gone up this time around, but is still quite reasonable for minifigures with exclusive molds and prints.

Diagon Alley:

(#10217, $149.99 USD, 2025 pieces, 11 minifigs)

For my money, the most exciting thing here is the new Diagon Alley set in the Harry Potter line. It's similar to other recent kits, like the 2008 Town Plan set or the Medieval Market Village. On top of that, it's got a bunch of great new Harry Potter parts in it! Although LEGO had previously released 4723 Diagon Alley Shops, this new version definitely takes it up a bit in the best way possible.

This year's big new playtheme is Ninjago, which is a game based system that involves colorful ninjas defeating "bad guys" through the use of "spinjitzu". This is definitely set up for kids to play with, but there are some new or rereleased elements in here as well.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I am looking forward to the Diagon Alley set the most as well. The buildings in this set are not only beautiful but they are built out of harder to find colors.

The Maersk set only has my interest for the maersk blue but I'm not sure the set is worth $120!

Finished Series 3 a few weeks ago thanks to TRU and my wife finding them for me.

Ninjago is being pushed by LEGO, TRU and the like so we'll see how this theme does. It might open up a solid line into the velcro wallets of young kids everywhere who might now spend allowances on Ninjago opposed to Yugi-Oh, Pokemon or DBZ cards.

Anonymous said...

I've seen the wonders of Ninjago's selling potential already. I was in the Lego isle of a well known big box mart when several male "tweens" walked in and started picking up sets to purchase and then they started talking about buying more! I'm convinced that this line, even though its price to part ratio is undesirable, will be a hit with kids and older kids and manchildren alike!