Yearly Archives: 2016

Age of LEGO – a build fit for kings

Considered to be one of the greatest strategy game franchises ever, as well as being an undisputed classic, the Age of Empires series has been entertaining players since its initial release back in 1997. While their gameplay is rightfully touted, the games’ graphics and architectural design style were equally memorable.

InnovaLug, a building group who describe themselves as “a bunch of friends who share the same fascination with the brick” brought together their love of LEGO and the Age of Empires to recreate in-game structures from Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings in spectacular fashion. Seven builders and seven buildings: nostalgia for the game has never been stronger.

Click here to see all seven buildings in detail

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German National Football Team Collectible Minifigures officially revealed [News]

In the run-up to the 2016 Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) European Championship, which is to be held in France this Summer, LEGO has officially revealed the new series of collectible minifigures: the German national football team.

Among 16 LEGO minifigures are the head coach Joachim Löw and the goalkeeper Manuel Neuer. The whole list is the following:

Manuel Neuer (1)
Shkodran Mustafi (2)
Mesut Özil (3)
Benedikt Höwedes (4)
Mats Hummels (5)
Sami Khedira (6)
Bastian Schweinsteiger (7)
André Schürrle (9)
Thomas Müller (13)
Jérôme Boateng (17)
Toni Kroos (18)
Mario Götze (19)
Christoph Kramer (20)
Marco Reus (21)
Max Kruse (23)
Joachim Löw (Trainer)

The series will be available beginning May 14 in Germany, Austria and Switzerland only, for the retail price of 2.99 Euro.

[Via Zusammengebaut.]

Titanosaurus Wrex wreaks havoc

Tremah has managed to create this menacing little robotic dinosaur from Bionicle figure parts. I particularly like the small details such as the cool blue eyes, the fangs, and raised vertebrae. The design even improves on the original dinosaur… See, mother nature? Longer arms!

An epic LEGO tale of death

This fantastic vingette by Thorsten Bonsch is a LEGO recreation of a scene from the Elder Scrolls Online (ESO). The ESO is an online multiplayer role playing game and this particular scene comes from the latest part of the saga, The Thieves Guild. The build is not an action scene but, as Thorsten calls it, a ‘still life’ that tells a story – can you imagine what happened by looking at the evidence left behind?

The builder uses a great building technique to curve the bricks and allow the ground to slope gently upwards to the right side. In addition, the rock formations are very nicely shaped and hints of colour are just enough to capture your attention. The more I look at this scene, the more intriguing I find it.

Personally, I think that a huge snake-like creature has eaten the first man and then reaches the second and kills him just as he mortally wounds the snake with a spear to the heart. All that remains are the bones and undigested evidence that tells the story of their deaths.

Previous ESO-based creations by Thorsten have been blogged by us and are worth a second look: the City of Orsinium, the Stonefalls in Morrowind, and an amazing 11,000 piece portal called The Dolmen.

Spooky cottage by the river

It’s not halloween season yet but Patrick Massey wants to scare us anyway. This spooky scene simply gives me the shivers! I love the eerie mushrooms, the thornbush, and those strange trees which seem to have grisly tentacles. Yikes! The lack of a friendly human, the abandoned boat and the partially collapsed roof add a lot to the ambience. Don’t let the fireplace welcome you into the shack! It’s just a trick of demons!

But we wouldn’t want to ruin your day with such darkness in lovely spring time so here’s a little bit of trivial info. Patrick utilized his fog machine to obtain this amazing mist effect but his neighbors thought his house was burning down. I really wonder how he explained the situation.

Alien kills Predator with a LEGO flipper

The 2004 movie Alien vs Predator was a clash of two eponymous sci-fi creatures to bring the comic action to the big screen. Grantmasters has captured the penultimate moment from the movie in LEGO, when the Alien Queen has mortally wounded Predator with a thrust of her tail to his torso and his green blood drips spills.

Grantmasters has cleverly utilised a host of parts to create this scene in ‘small scale’. Black minifigure hands form the feet of Alien, while lime green depict Predator’s dripping life-blood. The minifigure diver’s flipper also makes a fantastically unusual appearance as a wound!

The characters are cleverly built and a few subtle landscape details add to the scene without distracting from the main event. I hope Grantmasters continues with Alien vs Predator Requiem next…

The greatest gladiator match in the history of the world

God versus man. Day versus night. Son of Krypton versus Bat of Gotham! Despite terrible critic reviews, I enjoyed Batman v. Superman and thought there were some excellent scenes. And it seems builder Nathaniel shares my opinion. He must have appreciated the scene where Batman evades a heat vision blast using his trusty grappling hook because he has rendered it into LEGO beautifully.

Nathaniel’s harsh shadows and bold color choices masterfully evoke comic book art style. That heat vision explosion is fantastic! We’ve featured such “special effects” on The Brothers Brick before, but never one caused by a Kryptonian. Though this scene is not technically accurate (I’m not going to spoil the movie for those of you who haven’t seen it yet by pointing out the inaccuracy), it’s clear that Nathaniel decided to build what most people wanted (and expected) to see in the film. *Wink*

Microscale mech owns the lunar surface

Nick Della Mora has built a chunky microscale walking tank straddling an irregular section of lunar landscape. The tank itself is a good bit of building, with hefty firepower and a suggestion of mechanical details around the leg joints — not easy to accomplish at this scale. But what sets this model apart is the classy presentation. The landscaping and choice of black background really make the image pop.

Cyberpunk samurai suit looks sharp

SenSeiSei brings us a fabulous little Samurai-flavored exosuit. There’s an impressive sense of heft here, despite the model’s small scale, and some interesting parts usage — particularly good work on the “big fig fists” as shoulder armor.

The level of greebling creates a depth of detail and texture, and I really like the unusual “tip toe” design of the legs and feet. Now I want to see seven of these magnificent mecha, defending a village from marauding rogue AIs.

Corridor spaces are the best Space spaces

A beautifully-lit space corridor scene? Yes please. SweStar is the builder behind this great little model, and they’ve done an excellent job of creating a whole galaxy’s worth of atmosphere in a tight space. There’s a genuine sense of tension and impending trouble here. I want to know what’s going to happen next.

Laserbeak, Ravage, Frenzy...Eject!

Building a good-looking model mecha is no mean feat, but building one that can transform is a whole other ballgame; one in which Joe Perez (MortalSwordsman) just scored big with his excellent transforming rendition of Soundwave.

Megatron’s faithful Communications Officer doesn’t just transform from boombox to robot mode, but also comes with three of his own sidekicks: the transforming cassettes Laserbeak, Ravage and Frenzy.

Can you think of a cooler piece of Eighties nostalgia?

New LEGO Star Wars sets, official pictures spotted in the wild [News]

We covered the announcement of these sets earlier in the year in our extensive LEGO coverage from New York Toy Fair, but official pictures have recently been spotted on Amazon UK. The six sets are listed with a June 1st release date.

The highlight of the bunch is surely 75148 Encounter On Jakku, with its delightful blue Luggabeast…

However, if you’ve never built a LEGO X-Wing set, then the sleek lines and cool color-scheme of 75139 Resistance X-Wing Fighter are going to be hard to resist…

Click for more set images