LEGO Designers want our input on future play themes

FINAL UPDATE: Thanks for all the suggestions, readers! We’ve passed on your ideas to LEGO. Look for other opportunities to submit ideas to The LEGO Group through The Brothers Brick’s LEGO Ambassadors in the future.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: LEGO tells us that they didn’t intend for this discussion to take place in public, since that enables their competitors to watch the discussion and steal all your great ideas! So, we’re locking comments, removing the ones posted so far (85!) and asking all of you to use the Contact Form at the end of this post to submit your comments instead.

You don’t need to re-submit your suggestions if you had already left them as a comment; we’ve saved all the comments so far.

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LEGO Designers have asked the LEGO Ambassadors to help brainstorm ideas on future play themes. Here is the original message:

My name is Phil McCormick; I am a Senior Designer at the LEGO Group working within a small concept group specializing in new theme generation.

We are looking for new LEGO set opportunities within the Play Themes line-up. Play Themes are sets involving characters and stories, where the minifigure always plays a key role. The big theme this year is Power Miners. Some sets from the past include: Agents, Aqua Raiders, Exoforce, and Mars Mission. Usually the stories are conflict-based (good vs. bad) and revolve around treasures or missions. The stories that accompany Play Theme sets help spark the imaginations of our target group: boys aged 7-9.

Currently we are in an “insight phase,” gathering inspiration for the next big Play Themes opportunity and we would really like your input. We hope to involve you as much as possible for the next few months as we take in the ideas. Please submit ideas for themes as detailed below. Limit your words to a few sentences; we encourage you to submit pictures, drawings, MOCs, to accompany each story. Feel free to involve your greater fan community at this point–the more ideas the better.

Things we do look for:
-Simple, well understood themes (Usually, placing a “twist” on a known universe works well).
-Unique Model expression, or play experience to accompany the set.

Things we do not look for:
-Castle, or IP (Star Wars/ Indiana Jones/ Sponge Bob/ etc…). They each have devoted project teams which are separate from us.

The deadline for submissions is Jan 12, 2009; but we do encourage you to post earlier. Thanks and we look forward to your input!

Create a new, never-before-seen, LEGO Play Theme! (Place words and images under the following categories)

Theme Name (something short and catchy):

Characters (who is good and bad guys?):

Conflict (why do they fight, and what do they fight over?):

Setting (where does the story take place?):

Background Info (if relevant):

Please use the Contact Form below to submit your suggestions, using the format requested above:

Before you click Submit!

  • We won’t be able to pass on your suggestions if they don’t follow the format described above.
  • LEGO cannot use suggestions based on IP (intellectual property) owned by other companies, such as Halo, Lord of the Rings, or Pirates of the Caribbean.