Interesting to see that the Lego Atlantis Activity Book is now available in 7-11 for HKD 49 only, I got mine a few days ago for HKD 72 at a bookstore...

There are also news about the DK Lego Brickmaster Atlantis book being available in 7-11, but I don't see them in the 7-11 stores I passed by, perhaps only at selected stores along the MTR station line, I remember last year when the Brickmaster Pirates and Castle came out in the market, it was a super hot news and people searching around 7-11 stores to get them, but it seems that it is not the case this time for the Atlantis set, really wondering if it has something to do with the Atlantis theme's attractiveness, anyway, let's see what will happen when the Starwars Brickmaster comes out later this year.

Got a copy of this Lego Atlantis The menace from the deep Activity book from LadyBird, it is a nicely printed book, there is no bricks like the Lego Brickmaster Atlantis book, but it comes with a Squid Warrior, I got it for HKD 72 (USD 9.2), quite expensive, but for a single copy for collection, it is fine.

The book also provides some knowledge learning on sea creatures, so it can actually be used to let kids know more about things such as Squid size, and information on Sharks, turtles. The knowledge content is simple but there is a underwater quiz for fun.

With my past experiences on the Lego BrickMaster Castle and Pirate book from DK, I was having high expectations on the Atlantis version, this time the local supply is rather limited, and the pricing is not very nice either, and after getting it, I think it is not as good as I expected.

The parts list is nothing surprising, from the set you got Bobby Buoy and a Manta Warrior

One key thing I notice about this brickmaster theme is the emphasis on vehicle and rather limited focus on structure, and the book content is less appealing too. The so called models are also very monotone in design, perhaps partly due to the limitation of the theme itself.

Some of the models that I do not have strong motivation to build

But I need to say that some of the vehicles are quite interesting, especially the Explorer Submarine, it must be fun to be maneuvering a real underwater vehicle like this in the deep ocean.

DEEP-SEA DASH (scenario) represented by the Secret Chest and the Scorpion Submarine

Scorpion Submarine and the Hammerhead Shark

Ridiculously, some local book stores are charging customers HKD 296 (USD 37) for this book, I paid at around half of that price but still consider it a little overpriced, the pricing range of DK books is quite wide open and as a consumer, I would tend to think twice even if I see an interesting product from them.

Additional models available online: http://atlantis.lego.com/downloads , but I can only locate the PDF for Drum Sub and evil bug only, and the DK site seems require username/password for access.

I think this Brickmaster Atlantis book would still be worth getting, but there is less excitement and I wonder how the upcoming Brickmaster Starwars would be designed, it may not be an easy theme to come up with flexible designs.

I did not buy many Lego sets in the recent 2010 ani-com in Hong Kong, but there was one that I got without much hesitation, mainly because it is not official available locally yet, but after building it, I think that was really worth the money.

8128 Cad Bane's Speeder is a unique vehicle, although the color is a little dull, the design is quite interesting, I ususally would focus equally on the vehicle and minifigs, but I have to say that the bounty hunter is really a cool villain, as well as Shahan Alama, the Senate Commando Officers are nice but somehow I do not like the blue color much.

Come and get me, huh

Senate guards Duo on patrol

Parts list

Some interesting parts

Technic Brick Liftarms

The new 2010 2 x 4 tiles

When it comes to parts, there are quite a lot of new ones, including the new 2 x 4 tiles, and others, one observation is that there are more technic 2 x 6 plates used than actually needed, perhaps Lego designer just do not want to include one more part type when the technic counterpart can also fulfill.

The vehicle has some playability, the rear end compartment can be opened, but moving the propeller along with it seems to be a little wierd, missile launchers have not been my favorite, but the real nice thing is the six seaters, and the driver cabin is quite cool

8128 pricing is quite high, a little overpriced but tolerable, but since this is the only set to get Shahan Alama I believe, and you also get Cad Bane and the senate guards, as well as the cool vehicle, it is worth collecting.

Aside from the work of the finalists of the local Hong Kong Lego competition, there were actually other very impressive Lego arts being displayed in this year's Ani-Com.

I had actually tried on the Lego Mah-jong idea before but was not able to complete it, obviously this is an excellent work that I can learn from! I wonder if it is feasible to come up with a Lego mahjong set that can be played with.

To be fair to Lego Hong Kong, their booth in Ani-com does provide values to some Hong Kong Lego players, but as an ordinary person (not a VIP of any kind), you would need to set the right expectations, and IMHO, the management is not really impressive in handling this event, I am quite curious on what they wish to achieve in setting up a booth in ani-com:

1. For Product selling - the hot items would go anyway regardless of what they do (they have a stock supply shortage issue and not demand issue), for slow moving items, I don't think they can sell many anyway, in general, whatever they can achieve in sales in these few days, I think they can achieve the same easily in many other channels

2. For customer satisfaction - By providing hard to get products, and also selling parts, this should make local Lego fans happy, but somehow there are many complaints on alleged lack of fair play in distributing hot items, no matter whether the accusations are true or not, obviously there are many unhappy customers, it is definitely a failure in event logistics and managing customer expectation

 

3. For Lego promotion - Well, I have once worked in a very large global company before and I played major role in running events and evangelism, for me, promoting brands and products would be a top priority, and the exhibition of top local competition entries is a right thing to do, which Lego Hong Kong did a great job, however, the way the booth was setup definitely was not able to maximize this effect, the Lego booth is very much like a castle, I guess more people can be influenced if the booth has an open area




Perhaps this can be a good way to setup an open booth to draw more people to appreciate Lego? A separate area for product selling and an open dedicated area for exhibition?

Anyway, one of the biggest thing in this anicom Lego booth were the local lego competitions that highlight important Hong Kong land marks, and here are some of the photos that I have taken:

寶蓮寺與天壇大佛
Giant Buddha / Po Lin Monastery / The Wisdom Path
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/outlying-giant-buddha.html

黄大仙祠
Wong Tai Sin Temple
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/kln-wongtaisin-temple.html

鴨寮街
Apliu Street
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/kln-fashion-apliu-street.html

李小龍像
Avenue of Stars (Statue of Bruce Lee)
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/kln-stars-avenue.html

大埔林村
Lam Tsuen Wishing Trees and Tin Hau Temple
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/nt-lamtsuen-wishing-trees.html

屏山文物徑
Ping Shan Heritage Trail
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/nt-pingshan-heritage-trail.html

香港鐵路博物館
Hong Kong Railway Museum
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/museum-hongkong-railway.html

長洲太平清醮
Cheung Chau Bun Festival
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/events/festival-cheung-chau-bun.html

Interesting to see Buzz competing for the buns!

香港體育館 (紅館)
Hong Kong Coliseum
http://www.lcsd.gov.hk/hkc/

萬佛塔 - 萬佛寺
10 Thousands Buddhas Monastery
http://www.10kbuddhas.org

香港魅力之都
Hong Kong - A City of Charm
A mix of the best of Hong Kong

1881 Heritage
http://www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/attractions/kln-1881.html

Great work and although I have preference on a number of them, I admire the skills and dedications of all these lego artists!

One of the biggest event for Hong Kong Lego players would probably be the ani-com (香港動漫電玩節), as Lego would host a booth there to sell products and display the art work of local lego competition winners, usually they would sell hot products at "slightly" discounted price, and some items that are not available officially can be found there, and sold at prices lower than those parallel imported ones.

I had been there in the past years, and honestly it was a difficult experiences, so I did not plan to line up for the Lego store anymore this year, and when I did drop by to take a look this afternoon, it was as bad as I expected, long queue and same small booth that wants to be everything, I think the local lego management seems to be unable to learn from past experiences.

Reading what people posted in a local forum about their experiences, it is interesting that after all these years, the lego folks here in Hong Kong still do not know how to manage this event well, and I doubt if the Lego management in Denmark do realize how some local lego fans feel about Lego because of this.

If this happens in the old company that I worked for, ha......

Just returned from a New York trip, I was having big expectation to the Lego Store there at Rockerfeller Center, but I was quite disappointed.

Lego replica of the Rockerfeller Center

The store is conveniently located, not big but not very crowded even on a Saturday, but it is disappointing to see that many new sets available online are not found there, such as 10213 Shuttle Adventure, and they always run out of cups for purchasing bricks from the wall!

By the way, there is a Lego model at the Empire State Building, very nice work but the building itself may not be easily expressed magnificently as a lego replica, and I also notice that 21002 is abundantly available in many places, but the set is really too plain and small to be impressive, so I doubt if it is sold well.

It seems to me that perhaps Lego Stores in Europe would be better options.

How much would the White Boba Fett worth? This is an interesting question as I see people trying to sell it online for HKD 750 (around USD 95!) here in Hong Kong. Well, personally I won't pay this amount for getting the minifig, and I have no plan to sell it either.

I read news from Brickset (http://www.brickset.com/news/article/?ID=783) about how the White Boba Fett could be distributed, if only around 20,000 will be distributed world-wide, then this item should be really kind of "limited", but it is interesting to see how it will be distributed.

So I won't open the bag for the mean time, better keep it that way and see what would be happening to the product item.

How I got this set is blogged here.

Usually this kind of pre-launch activities would be a test of endurance, but for getting a White Boba Fett free (if you can go and fall in line for hours and purchase over HKD 1,000 worth of new Lego Star wars product), I guess the motivation is rather strong. In fact, despite the not so pleasant experiences before, I was tempted to do so, fortunately, this time there were not that many people around, so even that I arrived late, I was able to be among the first 150 people.

http://www.toysrus.com.hk/lego/PreLaunch-0710/eng-index.htm 

So is it worth it? In terms of monetary gain I guess there isn't much, and my plan to work on my laptop during the lining up did not work out so fine, but for Lego experience of another kind, it may be psychologically ok to do so. By the way, for HKD 300 purchase, you'll also get a small gift pack, this time there is no key chain, but a bunch of assorted bricks.

And the price of the new starwars set? See if this makes sense?

8093 Plo Koon's Jedi Starfighter - HKD269
8089 Hoth Wampa Cave - HKD 469
8095 General Grievous Starfighter - HKD 499
8096 Emperor Palpatine's Shuttle - HKD 699
8097 Slave I - HKD 899
8098 Clone Turbo Tank - HKD1299

* 1 USD = 7.8 HKD