4 ms·

What timeframe do you refer to as "what it used to be"? I owned lego castles and spaceships sets even 30+ years ago.

ggm 6y ago
I stopped playing with lego as a child around 1975. I've played with lego as a parent and inveterate fiddler ever since. I freely admit by the time I stopped, Lego was well beyond blocks: fences, animals, plants, roofing elements, train elements, turntables, windows, car elements...
- agumonkey 6y ago
  I think you're going too radical. I get that LEGO gradually shifted from pure blocks to more and more specific things for aesthetics (and sales), but even up to the 90s the main focus was functional blocks. It was still geometric in spirit and very free.
  - darkwater 6y ago
    I had a spaceship in the late '80s which was full of custom pieces (like V shaped blue windows with yellow glass). Anecdotal I know, but still..
    - agumonkey 6y ago
      those were my gear (6685 :) The weirdest and less reusable were hollow corners (for the V shaped windows) the oval feets. The rest was very generic.
kungtotte 6y ago
I was a kid in the 90s so that's when I bought my Lego. One specific example I can give is with the chassis for small cars. In the 90s they were fairly generic. They were obviously intended to make cars with but you could build any kind of car or boat or plane or spaceship using it as a base. Now I'm buying Lego for my kid and the car chassis have integrated tyre pins and mudguards, so it's hard to put on e.g. monster truck wheels (won't fit) or build it into a boat/plane. So while specialized pieces aren't new, they're so very single purpose now. Not every piece, but enough of them that it's problematic.
- riffraff 6y ago
  Got it, thanks for taking time to explain.
- CDSlice 6y ago
  Lego sets intended for younger children tend to have more large, single purpose pieces. For example, [0] is a set intended for children as young as 4 and it has the single purpose car chassis pieces you mentioned. However, in the same City theme this set intended for 5+ year olds [1] has the same sort of generic chassis you remember. The city theme as a whole though does tend to have more single purpose pieces such as plane cockpits or boat hulls, but even then you can use the pieces to build new boats or planes. Furthermore, the Creator theme has no single purpose pieces for at all, those models are made completely out of generic pieces (not just bricks mind you, there are lots of slopes and other kinds of really useful pieces used). For example, [2] is a pirate ship made completely out of generic pieces that even has instructions to rebuild it into a Pirate inn or a skull island. If pirates aren't your fancy, how about a monster burger truck [3] or a twin rotor helicopter [4]? Again, no single purpose pieces in sight. Even the modern Star Wars sets tend to have mostly generic pieces and even the custom pieces made for the set tend to be things like windscreens that can be used for custom spaceships. [0] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/garage-center-60232 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/garage-center-60232 [1] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/service-station-60257 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/service-station-60257 [2] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/pirate-ship-31109 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/pirate-ship-31109 [3] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/monster-burger-truck-31104 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/monster-burger-truck-3110... [4] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/twin-rotor-helicopter-31096 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/twin-rotor-helicopter-310...
  - kungtotte 6y ago
    Maybe that's what I've been experiencing. He's four and a half so mostly we've been buying slightly "younger" Lego I guess. Those 3-in-1 sets really impressed me though! We've got two of them and as you say they come with instructions for several different ways of using the same pieces, and they're generic enough that you can build mostly anything. We're definitely picking up more of those as both me, my dad, and my kid all like to just free-form build things most of the time. The creator pieces are actually really great because of the slopes and curved pieces that complement your ideas and help put the finishing touches on things.

ggm 6y ago

I stopped playing with lego as a child around 1975. I've played with lego as a parent and inveterate fiddler ever since. I freely admit by the time I stopped, Lego was well beyond blocks: fences, animals, plants, roofing elements, train elements, turntables, windows, car elements...

agumonkey 6y ago
I think you're going too radical. I get that LEGO gradually shifted from pure blocks to more and more specific things for aesthetics (and sales), but even up to the 90s the main focus was functional blocks. It was still geometric in spirit and very free.
- darkwater 6y ago
  I had a spaceship in the late '80s which was full of custom pieces (like V shaped blue windows with yellow glass). Anecdotal I know, but still..
  - agumonkey 6y ago
    those were my gear (6685 :) The weirdest and less reusable were hollow corners (for the V shaped windows) the oval feets. The rest was very generic.

kungtotte 6y ago

I was a kid in the 90s so that's when I bought my Lego. One specific example I can give is with the chassis for small cars. In the 90s they were fairly generic. They were obviously intended to make cars with but you could build any kind of car or boat or plane or spaceship using it as a base. Now I'm buying Lego for my kid and the car chassis have integrated tyre pins and mudguards, so it's hard to put on e.g. monster truck wheels (won't fit) or build it into a boat/plane. So while specialized pieces aren't new, they're so very single purpose now. Not every piece, but enough of them that it's problematic.

riffraff 6y ago
Got it, thanks for taking time to explain.
CDSlice 6y ago
Lego sets intended for younger children tend to have more large, single purpose pieces. For example, [0] is a set intended for children as young as 4 and it has the single purpose car chassis pieces you mentioned. However, in the same City theme this set intended for 5+ year olds [1] has the same sort of generic chassis you remember. The city theme as a whole though does tend to have more single purpose pieces such as plane cockpits or boat hulls, but even then you can use the pieces to build new boats or planes. Furthermore, the Creator theme has no single purpose pieces for at all, those models are made completely out of generic pieces (not just bricks mind you, there are lots of slopes and other kinds of really useful pieces used). For example, [2] is a pirate ship made completely out of generic pieces that even has instructions to rebuild it into a Pirate inn or a skull island. If pirates aren't your fancy, how about a monster burger truck [3] or a twin rotor helicopter [4]? Again, no single purpose pieces in sight. Even the modern Star Wars sets tend to have mostly generic pieces and even the custom pieces made for the set tend to be things like windscreens that can be used for custom spaceships. [0] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/garage-center-60232 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/garage-center-60232 [1] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/service-station-60257 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/service-station-60257 [2] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/pirate-ship-31109 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/pirate-ship-31109 [3] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/monster-burger-truck-31104 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/monster-burger-truck-3110... [4] https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/twin-rotor-helicopter-31096 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/twin-rotor-helicopter-310...
- kungtotte 6y ago
  Maybe that's what I've been experiencing. He's four and a half so mostly we've been buying slightly "younger" Lego I guess. Those 3-in-1 sets really impressed me though! We've got two of them and as you say they come with instructions for several different ways of using the same pieces, and they're generic enough that you can build mostly anything. We're definitely picking up more of those as both me, my dad, and my kid all like to just free-form build things most of the time. The creator pieces are actually really great because of the slopes and curved pieces that complement your ideas and help put the finishing touches on things.