Fir his first major project of 2013, rongYIREN has created a mechanical version of the extinct “terror bird,” complete with a minifig pilot and an engine in the back.
Tag Archives: Mecha
Turn to Stone
My crony from Philadelphia Carter Baldwin returns to TBB with his latest mecha, the NATO ‘Gorgon’ Mobile Frame. Based on concept art by flyingdebris, Carter brings the futuristic war machine to life with some very inventive techniques. The only question remaining is which gorgon this respresents…Stheno, Euryale or their more famous sister Medusa?
Soren
Timothy Pendarvis ZephyrChaos has an interesting new mecha he calls “Soren”. Although the builder does not say as much, I suspect it is honor of reclusive Girondist Soren Roberts. It does have a striking resemblance to Roberts after one of his infamous paint-thinner binges. Perhaps I’m wrong though, Timothy could be referring to nineteenth century Danish philosopher Soren Kirkegaard or perhaps Søren Rasted – former member of Scandinavian band AQUA. Only ZerphyrChaos knows for sure, and he ain’t talkin’.
Ignore me, enjoy Soren.
And yes, paste-eater, it does fit a fig.
Garry_rocks absolutely rocks!
Flickr user Garry_rocks has been churning out an endless supply of stunning mecha and hardsuit designs ever since he joined in November. I tend to overlook strictly virtual creations more than I probably should, and Garry reinforces that I should pay closer to attention to LEGO Digitial Designer (LDD) models more often. The fact that he creates these models without being able to hold the bricks impresses me even further, when I build it is always by trial & error and just generally fiddling with the pieces. If you haven’t already, you must take some time to browse through Garry’s stream. It is guaranteed to inspire all the mecha and sci-fi builders out there.
Garry has a total knack for creating fantastic cockpit designs at a relatively small scale…trust me when I say that I have been making notes.
Apes shall rule the Earth
I’m loving This new scene by Zane Houston. Frankly, as soon as I spotted a mecha gorilla in a thumbnail, I was sold. Then, I saw a diorama of it ape-handling a truck, and I got excited. When I zoomed in and saw that the mecha was piloted by a chimp? Well, I for one, welcome our new ape masters.
Olive to see the day we liberate Europe from the Nazis
An Iron Castle Smashing Mountains
Devid VII brings to life one of Japans highest-rated anime series of all time with his outstanding micro-scale rendition of Mazinger Z (Tranzor Z in America). Mazin Go! Mazin Go! Mazingaa Z!
Zizy Madness
Anyone interested in mecha and unfamiliar with Zi zy‘s work should remedy that now by going carefully through his photostream. He is one of the original, and still best, masters of the small mecha. His latest offerings are no exception, ranging from ‘standard’ mecha like below, through to transformers in the same scale. Hot stuff.
Space Marines GO!
Perhaps I have missed them, but I am surprised that we have not seen more creations made for the Space Marine Collectible Minifigure.
But Peter Morris (peterlmorris) has done it in spades with his Rapid Reaction Force. The SM-41 Mauler mech is a more heavily armed variant of his previous Futuron Strategic Pursuer Mk II. Not only does the mech add some firepower to his squad, but he also outfitted the figs with some extra pew-pew. I also must give props to LEGO for giving us so many unique sci-fi heads over the years…as a result there is a lot of added personality in Peter’s squad, and that is very cool!
When You Need Some Heavy Weaponry...
…call in this guy. This mech by flickr user Bockaderunner sports some terrific heavy weapons, and looks great to boot. The posing of the mech is awesome, and gives it a much more dynamic presence than a simple at-attention pose.
Ninjago: 70500 Kai’s Fire Mech [Review]
Another of the sets I bought last week is the smallest of the 2013 Ninjago sets. This is the last wave of Ninjago sets before Legends of Chima takes its place as the go-to theme for battling minifig games, and I’ll be sad to see it go.
Now, I didn’t follow the mythos of Ninjago, or watch the show, so I can’t tell you a lot of backstory about the theme beyond the very broad strokes, but it’s sure included some sweet sets, and 70500 Kai’s Fire Mech
The set contains a small mech and two minifigures, and feels like a bargain with 102 pieces and a USD $9.99 MSRP. The mech is basically the little sibling of the previous wave’s Samurai Mech, which is my favorite set of 2012. The mech is built with ball joints, which allow it quite a lot of pose-ability. Add to that the full-fingered left-hand, and this is probably Lego’s best mech of this size.
The gold highlights are terrific, especially since so many of them are weapons, which are always useful. This is also the cheapest set thus far to include the new inverted 2×2 tiles. All of the printed parts except for the minifigs are stickers, which I didn’t apply, even though they do look very nice. The only new piece here is the fire mech’s sword, which is transparent yellow infused with transparent neon orange, for quite a cool effect. Here are photos of the inventory pages, for those who are interested.
The minifigs look great. Kai has a snazzy black and red outfit, which is just generic enough to be useful for other themes.
The bad guy has a fantastic grimacing visage reminiscent of the masks samurai wore to look fearsome, and a red quiver and hat, both of which are new in that color to this wave of sets. Both minifigs have back printing.
My verdict: this set is a winner. If you’re a fan of Ninjago, mechs, or good Lego deals, you should pick this one up. I enjoyed it so much, I’ve already bought two.
Star Wars: 75002 AT-RT [Review]
My local toy store is stocking up on the first wave of 2013 sets, so I’ll be reviewing several in the near future as I get time. Today, though, I’ll start with one of the new Star Wars sets, the 75002 AT-RT.
With 222 pieces, it’s actually quite a steal with an MSRP of USD $19.99, and even more so for being a Star Wars set, which notoriously are more pricey than their non-licensed counterparts.
It includes an AT-RT walker, which 
is basically the Clone-Wars equivalent of the AT-ST “chicken walker,” for those who, like me, don’t follow the Clone Wars cartoon series. In order for it to have something to shoot at, a Droideka and battle droid are included. The box contains three bags, one each for the droideka and figs, the legs, and the cockpit. The construction was extremely straight-forward. If you’ve built a two legged LEGO walker before, you’ve basically built this set. The faceting around the cockpit is pretty cool though, and the blue color-scheme does look fantastic here. And a word about the blue pieces: in the past few years, LEGO has been having issues with their plastic, and some shades seeming more transparent and slightly off-color (blue being one), and thus looking cheaper. I happily noted, though, that the blue pieces in this set look terrific, even to someone as picky as I. There’s a small sticker sheet included, as the only printed pieces are the minifigs. I decided not to apply the stickers, especially since two of them
go on rough-surfaced slopes, which is a terrible idea. Those pieces should always be printed.
The Droideka is some huge version I’m not familiar with, though it is pretty awesome, having what basically amounts to an artillery piece in the middle. I’m not sure how big it’s supposed to be in scale, but it towers over the minifigs.
The minifigs in this set are pretty standard if you’re a Star Wars collector, consisting of Yoda, a 501st Legion clone trooper, and some variant 
battle droid. I believe the clone trooper is a new design, with yet another new helmet style. (I think. I lost track a long time ago.) The battle droid has a single red dot of printing on the torso, which to me seemed like a pretty insignificant result for LEGO to go through all the extra work of sending the piece through a printer.
I didn’t encounter any unfamiliar or new pieces while building it, though there are some useful pieces. It did have an unusually large amount of spare pieces. However, if you’ve got any of the previous iterations the Star Wars walkers, and you’re not a Star Wars collector, I’d recommend giving this set a pass. I’ve got nothing particularly negative to say about it, but it’s really not a terribly interesting set. It is one of the few Star Wars sets with a high piece-to-price ratio, though, so it would be a good one to nab on a sale when it’s even cheaper.