The Lego videogame thread got me inspired. Growing up, Legos were a very fun yet expensive hobby.

I collected from 1991-1998, and started out with those little $3.50 sets, which sucked since you couldn't really do much with them, but the majority of sets I had were usually in that range, and hardly went over.

I collected basically anything besides Technic and such. My favorites were always the Pirates, since those ships kicked ass. I had the French ship with the blue sails, the Imperial Brittish, and my personal favorite; The Skull's Eye Schooner. Sadly in 1997, the Pirates went downhill and were shortly canceled soon after. I remember one time, I was missing a certain piece from a set, and knew damn well I wasn't just NOT seeing it, so I basically looked around the entire house, not to find it, then checked the vaccuum bag, which was new, so I dug around in the 3 day old trash in my garage in order to find the old bag, and sure enough, my dad had swept it up by accident. Since then, I lost countless pieces.

The Space sets were hit or miss, some years they were great, other times they weren't. Overall, 1993 had a kickass group called Ice Planet. I made sure to get almost all of these sets and my personal favorite was the Deep Freeze Defender. There were other series that were pretty interesting like Blacktron, Spyrius and Explorers, but once they did UFOs and such, it became pretty lame.

Forest/Castle was good, but I never owned any big sets. My favorite was the 1995 Castle, the name of which escapes me, but they always did a pretty good job on these, although they did the Witch series in 1997, which sucked.

Wild West was a shortlived series that had some interesting sets like Fort Legoredo, which I got for Christmas one year. I think they were only done for 2 years, including some Indians, which were fine but the sets themselves weren't all that interesting. There was so much that could've been done with this series. I think this was the first time they also didn't use smiles on people.

Finally, there was Town. Of all the areas, I probably like this the least. Any time I would get a Lego set for my Birthday from a friend, it was some racing Town set. And what irritated me the most, was the overuse of the same racing people over and over, which made you collection look weird by having the same 3 people. I got tons and tons of these and they really saw little enjoyment. There were a few good Town sets, but they were few and far between. And one other thing that did bother me, was how crappy the cars were. Anytime they had a Lego car, it only seated one person, which always bugged me when I played, since doing "scenes" required dialogue and most people can't talk to their car unless they're David Hasslehoff. This continued for years, never improving and it always bothered me. They finally upgrades a piece that had 2 seats in 1998, but I was done collecting by then.

The reason I basically quit in 1998 was based on several factors. First, they started offing my favorite franchises and putting other new stuff that never took off in there. Then, they stopped doing the smiling faces, I know that's a weird thing to be bothered by, but these smug looks they painted on there looked terrible, I grew up with dot eyes and a basic smile, and sometimes they had characteristic based around those things such as facial hair or glasses, but it always stayed the same. Then, it seemed like they were creating new pieces based towards one or two sets, which made the reuse factor almost useless if you used them for anything else. Lastly, I was 13...and the magazine had age limits printed on their sets and it made me feel a little silly buying a set that said "ages 6-11". I'm pretty sure they've done away with that now.

Lego has done very well for itself since then, the Star Wars sets sold BIG TIME and a lot of those have been pretty interesting. I recently checked out some stuff for the hell of it and found these;









Now, even though I didn't collect Town growing up. THIS is what Town should've been. All these buildings come with a back side, so it isn't cheaply done. Every buliding is highly articulated and has an amazing amount of detail, and most importantly...it's classic made, meaning basic smiles on everyone. Only drawback is that each set is well over $100. Each set is designed specifically for older collectors. So I might tap into my savings sooner or later, you're never too old for Legos.

Anyone else have any interesting Lego stories?

SoldierHawk wrote:

Not interesting per se I guess, but I LOVED legos as a kid. I could never afford the big sets, but I had almost every little set in the (classic) Lego Knights collection. Had quite a few of the Space ones, and even one Ninja set. And the best part was mixing them all and having the spacemen come in and break up a fight between the knights and ninjas...good times. I loved those old sets. I'm not a fan of all the licenses lego has now. Less opportunity for imagination when you have the worlds and characters pre-built for you.

Yeah, that's my feelings on the way Lego is now...I also just despise the facial expressions these people have.

And it's funny, I also started out with a couple of pirates and about 15 Town people, so I'd always pretend the pirates traveled through time and started killing the Town people one by one, that was the good thing about having a lot of Lego people...plenty of casualties.

Pandajuice wrote:

Check out the Medieval Market Village if you haven't seen this one yet. It's got a tavern, blacksmith shop, and a butcher shop I think.

Yeah, that definately is cool. My only criticism, is the lack of back walls on the buildings which Lego does all the time, it's funny since they have wall pieces...so there's no excuse. It's a cool set nonetheless, but I think it's a stand alone set, which would work great if you had one of the old castles. I really like the cows though. And if there was a gullitione and plague rats, it would be like looking into a window into the past.

I also got the magazines, and was always intrigued by some of the creations in there. There was a magazine that came out in 1996 or 1997, that had a kid who built a white castle with a red top, and had an entire village that went with it, tile floors, everything you could think of...I think it was the first time I knew what love was. On the flipside, I'm amazed at some of the shittier sets that got placed in there, probably because they felt sorry for them. I mean come on kid, you're 12 years old and you built something with maybe 60 pieces, all of which are mulitcolored and looks like you built it in the dark. Unless you're blind, don't send in shit like that, especially with your stupid ass grinning in it, it makes us real builders think you're a douchebag.

SoldierHawk wrote:

I disagree with the complaint about lack of back walls. After all, how else were the knights/ninjas/pirates/etc supposed to actually man and defend their fort if you couldn't get them in it?

VERY easily. Lego made a hinged piece that allowed you to move at a 180 degree angle. Kind of like how the cabins in all the ships were made. There's no excuses other than trying to save money.

Cameron wrote:

My dad got me a subscription to Lego Magazine as a kid, and I'd always hate how I could never get the big sets as a kid. I remember for my eighth birthday though, I almost exploded with ecstacy when my dad got me a huge tub of legos; I'd been used to only getting the cheap $3.50 sets from Wal-mart, so I was overjoyed when I could actually build something worthwhile. I remember wanting the Flying Ninja's Fortress the most, the ninja sets were always my favorites. Never got it, though. SoldierHawk wrote: I disagree with the complaint about lack of back walls. After all, how else were the knights/ninjas/pirates/etc supposed to actually man and defend their fort if you couldn't get them in it? Seconded. I always thought it was dumb when people put four walls around their buildings and you couldn't see inside them.

I remember the ninjas...those came out in 1998. They were ok, but I hated how they reused the wizard's beard and didn't give the elder guy a proper coolie.

I used to buy the in catelog exclusives all the time, thinking I was cool because I had a mini-figure who had a green hat.

Yeah, I know it's not much nowadays...but you can get a free catelog from Lego, which sometimes has the old sets in there.

What always struck me as funny in those comics, was how sometimes they'd fuck up somehow and put the wrong head on someone. I mean how do you "fake Shemp" with Lego people?

There were definately a few in the 1996 issues.