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I really dislike all the bizarre "lego ain't what they used to be!" comments - they honestly come from people who haven't spent time with modern legos. For refe

I really dislike all the bizarre "lego ain't what they used to be!" comments - they honestly come from people who haven't spent time with modern legos. For reference I was born in 1970 and played with legos probably from 1975-1985, and then seriously picked it up again in 2012 or so when my son was old enough to play with them. People paint this picture of these new legos that are made up of like 5 parts that you just click together and have a transformer or something. Reality is far from that - there are so many cool pieces that let you build things never before possible. I was going to make an analogy about it being like having 100 crayon colors instead of 1, but it is more like having a whole artist's toolbox at your disposal, including 100 crayons. People say, "but it is too complicated!" - well then just buy the classic bricks, they are easy to purchase in bulk, and you can find lots of instructions all over the place for fun ideas to learn with. And then there's this weird idea that it is so complicated that you have to build it once and then never take it apart. Please, taking it apart was a huge amount of the fun for my son. He'd repurpose parts into his never ending scene that sprawled a 10x10 area in our family room. He (and us) would play with them literally daily for at least an hour, if not more, adding sets as they came along. Much of it stayed in bins, just because he had so much (youngest child of a youngest child, means you have lots of generous Aunts, Uncles, and cousins!). Even now, at 13, he literally was putting a set together with is friend just yesterday. It's rarer now, since he likes the intense interactively of computer-based "legos" (People Playground, Minecraft, Garry's Mod, Teardown, and modding for other games, not to mention VR stuff). Modern legos are awesome.

enriquto 5y ago
> Modern legos are awesome. Indeed they are! But, as much as I also dislike, like you, these bizarre comments; there's one place where I drew a red line and lego has sadly crossed it recently: lego sets that become obsoleted because lego removes some software from the app store. Previously, sets were standalone and eternal. But today you can buy an awesome technic set that will become "bricked" in a few years when they remove the controller software from the play store. This is not a theoretical concern. It has already happened (even for sets that were still on sale!). It sucks big time and it is really sad. If at least the apps were free software, we would have something to hang on to defend lego. But their current stance is indefensible.
- ARandumGuy 5y ago
  I mean, that isn't really new either. I had the first generation Lego Mindstorms set (pre-NXT, with the old yellow control brick), which required a USB device and special software to edit programs on the control brick. After ditching Windows XP for Windows 7, I could never get the USB device, or the required software, to function properly. The software and drivers just weren't maintained and updated, and I could never figure out how to fix that.
  - xenomachina 5y ago
    I have a few RCX Mindstorms sets, and the software was always a problem. Thankfully, there were some open source alternatives, like http://brickos.sourceforge.net/ http://brickos.sourceforge.net/ As an aside I'm pretty sure my RCX IR towers use serial, not USB.
    - rhaps0dy 5y ago
      > As an aside I'm pretty sure my RCX IR towers use serial, not USB. Both versions exist. Mindstorms 1.0/1.5 had serial IR towers, 2.0 had USB.
    - slavik81 5y ago
      What a blast from the past. I remember the finicky IR tower for uploading programs. I failed abysmally at programming my Mindstorms robot. I could never figure out how to make two things happen at the same time, so I couldn't make both motors run at once. As a result, my treaded robot could only spin in circles. Sadly, that was pretty much the end of my experience with Mindstorms. Eventually, I gave up and put it away, because it was such a frustrating experience. I assume it would be easier for kids these days. It was a lot more difficult to find help on the internet in 1999.
      - xenomachina 5y ago
        Yeah, the bundled software for the RCX was pretty awful, and was Windows-only. That's why I used brickOS, which let me write C (or was it C++?) code to run on the RCX, and it also worked on Linux. The next generation, "NXT", was somewhat better (I believe it's based on LabView), but I remember it being ridiculously slow and unstable on Macs. One of my kids uses Lego's "SPIKE Prime" at their robotics club, and while I haven't used the software myself, it seems much better.
ballenf 5y ago
What I've seen is that kids get that dopamine rush from putting together everything exactly according to instructions. From opening the numbered bags and methodically working through thick instruction booklets. The problem now is that they have this expectation of gratification from making something kind of perfect and their own creations are less interesting and fulfilling. I don't know what the name is for the idea that offering an "extra" optional path can detrimentally affect the other path. (I'd posit the same theory softly applies to Minecraft's creative mode.) But might just be my experience.
- lovehashbrowns 5y ago
  There's nothing wrong with someone only liking the follow instructions aspect of Lego and not the fully creative DIY aspect. I think one of the weirder parenting things is a parent trying to get their kiddo to like something in exactly the way the parent wants and anything else is a failure. "I built my Legos without instructions and we had fun! Kids these days...!" But then parents don't realize they misunderstood the entire point from the beginning. Legos were never a magic device to make someone creative. They were always just a way to try and sneak creativity into people. It just doesn't always work. Some people pick up Legos and make castles and cars and all this stuff, while some people pick up Legos, make a box house, and give up. Maybe your kiddo is secretly part of the gives up camp, but it's satisfying for them to follow to build instructions. What matters as a parent is that you gave them an option to be creative. And that's super cool on its own, y'know?
  - jeremyjh 5y ago
    My son treats Lego sets like a model airplane: build it once exactly to spec, put it on your shelf in your room, never change it again. The one difference maybe is they will get played with more. Yet he's very creative with Magna-Tiles in exactly the same way we played with Legos when I was a kid (I was born in 1976). I do think part of the difference is the presentation and marketing of the set, and how specific some of the pieces obviously are. Yes, some kids can be very creative with these sets, but Lego the company would prefer you buy another set.
- 5y ago
ARandumGuy 5y ago
I feel like a lot of people look at the intricate sets that cost hundreds of dollars, and conclude that Lego has abandoned play and creativity. In reality, there's an abundance of kid-oriented sets that are meant to be built, played with, deconstructed, and modified. But those aren't the sets that get shared through social media. Lego has embraced the adult collector as a valuable customer. But that does not mean they have abandoned the children who just want to play with some Lego.
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  TBF the best advice for people who only want a bunch of "classic" bricks for their small child is to buy them used or of some generic conpatible brand. I totally understand Lego not putting any marketing power in that direction and pushing so hard for more branding and licensed sets. The other end of the spectrum is their educational sets, but then we're really into the multi hundreds of dollars sets.
  - The-Bus 5y ago
    Every major retailer that sells Lego sets will likely carry or stock some version of a "classic" set which is 1000+ bricks that are the same as the ones from 40 or even 50 years ago (just available in more colors & perhaps some bricks introduced in the 80s or 90s). There's no license, stickers, software, etc. Most of these sets are sub-$50, so relatively affordable.
    - mortenjorck 5y ago
      Indeed: https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-large-creative-brick-box-10698 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-large-creative-brick... The promotional photos even echo that long-ago Lego ad the author laments as a bygone era, with a little girl building a house with no instructions (albeit the modern version is perhaps unrealistically restrained for something a kindergartner supposedly came up with).
    - makeitdouble 5y ago
      > Most of these sets are sub-$50, so relatively affordable. Second hand buckets are around $10 if you buy from a store, and way less if you get them at a flee market or from families who don't use them anymore. Sounds hippy and extreme, but I anecdotely know around ~20 people who went that route to start or grow their collection, and that's the advice I'd give people if asked. Lego seems to be the only toy people don't mind just getting second hand, machine wash in a net and start playing. Bucket will stay in store as the anchoring price, and also to avoid having non Lego brand take that shell space, but I don't remember seing any marketing effort from Lego to push them in the last 10 or 20 years.
usefulcat 5y ago
For me, the biggest difference between Legos when you and I were kids and now is that the sheer number of different pieces makes it too often nearly impossible to find the piece you need when building something from "the pile". My kids also have a lot of Legos (by volume, more than I ever had). When engaging in free play (i.e. not building a new set from the instructions), I find that the things they make tend to be much smaller than many of the things I built when I was a kid. I think this makes sense. When I was a kid, for the most part I had a bunch of bricks, a bunch of girders, a bunch of plates, and a bunch of smaller, more specialized pieces, but the latter were used more for adding detail. So it was relatively easy for me to find the pieces I needed to make something decent sized and them embellish it. When I look at my kids pile of Legos, it looks like 90% small, specialized pieces. As a kid, I remember spending a lot of time looking for that one piece that I knew I had if I could just find it. But nowadays, that situation is far, far more common. The specialized pieces make for great looking creations on the outside of the box. In theory, they should also allow for great looking creations during free play, but in practice it ends up being too much trouble to find the pieces you need. And at that point, a new set looks even more enticing than spending all your time searching for pieces, so...
- kbouck 5y ago
  > "the pile" it's essential to organize them otherwise locating the piece of interest becomes too frustrating and time consuming. we use a stack of tool boxes from the hardware store to organize ours.
- brimble 5y ago
  A ~550-piece set from my childhood (90s): 10 minifigs and accessories, end result will fill about a 1-foot cube. Plenty of room for small hands to get in and actually play with it. Construction simple enough you can easily put it back together if it's messed up during play, without resorting to the directions. Exposed studs everywhere for easy adding-on. A modern ~550-piece set, also from a line aimed at kids, not one of the adult-aimed models: 3 minifigs, fills 1/3 cubic foot at best because 450 of the pieces are little 1x1 and 1x2 plates or similar. Finished set's too small for even kid hands to get in and play. If it gets messed up more than a very tiny bit, you'll probably have to re-build from scratch, because the construction is... very CAD, I guess. All surfaces clad in smooth bricks if at all possible, making adding on awkward. The modern ones do have more cool mechanisms and gadgets, though. Also they include extra pieces for the small ones now, and more sets come with a brick tool. Those are all nice changes. But the sets themselves seem to be tuned for inflating part counts and looking nice on a box, not for play.
MomoXenosaga 5y ago
Companies that don't change tend to go under. Lego has to innovate just like everyone else.
andrewgioia 5y ago
100% agreed. Our 5yo started getting into them about a year ago as we sunsetted the Duplo bricks and they're by far his and my favorite toys. We have a bunch of Star Wars sets and while the builds themselves are great, 90% of the fun has been breaking them down and building our own ships and designs. I watch him completely immersed in the world when he makes and flies these ships around, it's amazing. I hope we're still doing it when he's 13 too.
axbytg 5y ago
This rules
WheatM 5y ago
pnathan 5y ago
Yeah, I have been getting Legos for my kid, and man, I just don't see the complaints. I'm very happy with the modern sets, as happy as I was when I was a kid.
lhorie 5y ago
But you're literally admitting that legos aren't what they used to be. My exposure to legos was very similar to yours. Yes, there are more variety of pieces now, and it can be both a blessing and a curse, depending on what angle you squint at it from. In my experience, old legos had a far more rigid feeling: idiomatically, sets relied heavily on the verticality of system (i.e. usage of the traditional tall or short bricks). Nowadays, sets come with a huge variety of 1x1 and 1x2 pieces with sideways elements, and a good portion of pieces are of the beam variety (i.e. pieces that require connectors to be put together[0], commonly found in mindstorm sets) So with a modern mindstorms set, you can build some really elaborate things with high degrees of motion, in a way that is intended by Lego, but conversely, the traditional blocks look dull in comparison. I was building some random robots w/ my kids a while back, and the way we approached the bricks was fairly different. They largely build following the system as intended. My childhood techniques, by contrast, are distinctly "illegal" (according to what Lego considers valid/stable brick arrangements in official sets). For example, this[1] is a technique to achieve a movable joint that I used to chain together to create things like arms, animal tails, etc. The entertainment environment for kids has also changed, through no fault of Lego itself. Despite the availability of high range of motion components, there are so many other ways for kids to entertain themselves nowadays that it would just never occur to them to exploit Legos in unintended ways the way I did. [0] https://img.brickowl.com/files/image_cache/larger/lego-dark-stone-gray-beam-15-32278-64871-32-852929-50.jpg https://img.brickowl.com/files/image_cache/larger/lego-dark-... [1] http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102080 http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102080
- rightbyte 5y ago
  > For example, this[1] is a technique to achieve a movable joint that I used to chain together to create things like arms, animal tails, etc. It can only revolve a little before the next "button" hit the fork, right? EDIT: Nvm it should be able to bend alot. I am going to steal that technique. =)
  - lhorie 5y ago
    No, the second button is clear from the tip of the top piece, so that specific configuration has a range of motion of well over 270 degrees. It isn't considered kosher by Lego because obviously the second button does eventually hit the side of the top piece and if you force it, you can break your build or damage a piece. You can, of course, modify it to use a tall brick and some 1x1 flats to achieve a swiss-army knife setup[0] with a 360 degrees range of motion. I'd use this variation for things like retractable wings. [0] http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102082 http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102082
kingcharles 5y ago
I've played with Lego (never Legos) since 1980. I love the modern sets. The branded sets, to me, make it even more fun. You can mix a Batman mini-fig and use the branded parts to make an uber-Batmobile of your own design. The Star Wars kits are fantastic. I actually bought all the Friends sets for myself because the brick colors are great. Even today I opened my mail to find a teddy bear valentine's heart Lego set from my girlfriend that is constructed from clever use of generic bricks, none of which would have been out of place in 1970s sets. In fact, I think Lego has become 100X more creative since the advent of the Internet, where people are making the more insane and elaborate constructions from the simplest bricks. It's become competitive in the nicest way. Lego today is thriving and is better than it ever was.

enriquto 5y ago

> Modern legos are awesome. Indeed they are! But, as much as I also dislike, like you, these bizarre comments; there's one place where I drew a red line and lego has sadly crossed it recently: lego sets that become obsoleted because lego removes some software from the app store. Previously, sets were standalone and eternal. But today you can buy an awesome technic set that will become "bricked" in a few years when they remove the controller software from the play store. This is not a theoretical concern. It has already happened (even for sets that were still on sale!). It sucks big time and it is really sad. If at least the apps were free software, we would have something to hang on to defend lego. But their current stance is indefensible.

ARandumGuy 5y ago
I mean, that isn't really new either. I had the first generation Lego Mindstorms set (pre-NXT, with the old yellow control brick), which required a USB device and special software to edit programs on the control brick. After ditching Windows XP for Windows 7, I could never get the USB device, or the required software, to function properly. The software and drivers just weren't maintained and updated, and I could never figure out how to fix that.
- xenomachina 5y ago
  I have a few RCX Mindstorms sets, and the software was always a problem. Thankfully, there were some open source alternatives, like http://brickos.sourceforge.net/ http://brickos.sourceforge.net/ As an aside I'm pretty sure my RCX IR towers use serial, not USB.
  - rhaps0dy 5y ago
    > As an aside I'm pretty sure my RCX IR towers use serial, not USB. Both versions exist. Mindstorms 1.0/1.5 had serial IR towers, 2.0 had USB.
  - slavik81 5y ago
    What a blast from the past. I remember the finicky IR tower for uploading programs. I failed abysmally at programming my Mindstorms robot. I could never figure out how to make two things happen at the same time, so I couldn't make both motors run at once. As a result, my treaded robot could only spin in circles. Sadly, that was pretty much the end of my experience with Mindstorms. Eventually, I gave up and put it away, because it was such a frustrating experience. I assume it would be easier for kids these days. It was a lot more difficult to find help on the internet in 1999.
    - xenomachina 5y ago
      Yeah, the bundled software for the RCX was pretty awful, and was Windows-only. That's why I used brickOS, which let me write C (or was it C++?) code to run on the RCX, and it also worked on Linux. The next generation, "NXT", was somewhat better (I believe it's based on LabView), but I remember it being ridiculously slow and unstable on Macs. One of my kids uses Lego's "SPIKE Prime" at their robotics club, and while I haven't used the software myself, it seems much better.

ballenf 5y ago

What I've seen is that kids get that dopamine rush from putting together everything exactly according to instructions. From opening the numbered bags and methodically working through thick instruction booklets. The problem now is that they have this expectation of gratification from making something kind of perfect and their own creations are less interesting and fulfilling. I don't know what the name is for the idea that offering an "extra" optional path can detrimentally affect the other path. (I'd posit the same theory softly applies to Minecraft's creative mode.) But might just be my experience.

lovehashbrowns 5y ago
There's nothing wrong with someone only liking the follow instructions aspect of Lego and not the fully creative DIY aspect. I think one of the weirder parenting things is a parent trying to get their kiddo to like something in exactly the way the parent wants and anything else is a failure. "I built my Legos without instructions and we had fun! Kids these days...!" But then parents don't realize they misunderstood the entire point from the beginning. Legos were never a magic device to make someone creative. They were always just a way to try and sneak creativity into people. It just doesn't always work. Some people pick up Legos and make castles and cars and all this stuff, while some people pick up Legos, make a box house, and give up. Maybe your kiddo is secretly part of the gives up camp, but it's satisfying for them to follow to build instructions. What matters as a parent is that you gave them an option to be creative. And that's super cool on its own, y'know?
- jeremyjh 5y ago
  My son treats Lego sets like a model airplane: build it once exactly to spec, put it on your shelf in your room, never change it again. The one difference maybe is they will get played with more. Yet he's very creative with Magna-Tiles in exactly the same way we played with Legos when I was a kid (I was born in 1976). I do think part of the difference is the presentation and marketing of the set, and how specific some of the pieces obviously are. Yes, some kids can be very creative with these sets, but Lego the company would prefer you buy another set.
5y ago

ARandumGuy 5y ago

I feel like a lot of people look at the intricate sets that cost hundreds of dollars, and conclude that Lego has abandoned play and creativity. In reality, there's an abundance of kid-oriented sets that are meant to be built, played with, deconstructed, and modified. But those aren't the sets that get shared through social media. Lego has embraced the adult collector as a valuable customer. But that does not mean they have abandoned the children who just want to play with some Lego.

makeitdouble 5y ago
TBF the best advice for people who only want a bunch of "classic" bricks for their small child is to buy them used or of some generic conpatible brand. I totally understand Lego not putting any marketing power in that direction and pushing so hard for more branding and licensed sets. The other end of the spectrum is their educational sets, but then we're really into the multi hundreds of dollars sets.
- The-Bus 5y ago
  Every major retailer that sells Lego sets will likely carry or stock some version of a "classic" set which is 1000+ bricks that are the same as the ones from 40 or even 50 years ago (just available in more colors & perhaps some bricks introduced in the 80s or 90s). There's no license, stickers, software, etc. Most of these sets are sub-$50, so relatively affordable.
  - mortenjorck 5y ago
    Indeed: https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-large-creative-brick-box-10698 https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-large-creative-brick... The promotional photos even echo that long-ago Lego ad the author laments as a bygone era, with a little girl building a house with no instructions (albeit the modern version is perhaps unrealistically restrained for something a kindergartner supposedly came up with).
  - makeitdouble 5y ago
    > Most of these sets are sub-$50, so relatively affordable. Second hand buckets are around $10 if you buy from a store, and way less if you get them at a flee market or from families who don't use them anymore. Sounds hippy and extreme, but I anecdotely know around ~20 people who went that route to start or grow their collection, and that's the advice I'd give people if asked. Lego seems to be the only toy people don't mind just getting second hand, machine wash in a net and start playing. Bucket will stay in store as the anchoring price, and also to avoid having non Lego brand take that shell space, but I don't remember seing any marketing effort from Lego to push them in the last 10 or 20 years.

usefulcat 5y ago

For me, the biggest difference between Legos when you and I were kids and now is that the sheer number of different pieces makes it too often nearly impossible to find the piece you need when building something from "the pile". My kids also have a lot of Legos (by volume, more than I ever had). When engaging in free play (i.e. not building a new set from the instructions), I find that the things they make tend to be much smaller than many of the things I built when I was a kid. I think this makes sense. When I was a kid, for the most part I had a bunch of bricks, a bunch of girders, a bunch of plates, and a bunch of smaller, more specialized pieces, but the latter were used more for adding detail. So it was relatively easy for me to find the pieces I needed to make something decent sized and them embellish it. When I look at my kids pile of Legos, it looks like 90% small, specialized pieces. As a kid, I remember spending a lot of time looking for that one piece that I knew I had if I could just find it. But nowadays, that situation is far, far more common. The specialized pieces make for great looking creations on the outside of the box. In theory, they should also allow for great looking creations during free play, but in practice it ends up being too much trouble to find the pieces you need. And at that point, a new set looks even more enticing than spending all your time searching for pieces, so...

kbouck 5y ago
> "the pile" it's essential to organize them otherwise locating the piece of interest becomes too frustrating and time consuming. we use a stack of tool boxes from the hardware store to organize ours.
brimble 5y ago
A ~550-piece set from my childhood (90s): 10 minifigs and accessories, end result will fill about a 1-foot cube. Plenty of room for small hands to get in and actually play with it. Construction simple enough you can easily put it back together if it's messed up during play, without resorting to the directions. Exposed studs everywhere for easy adding-on. A modern ~550-piece set, also from a line aimed at kids, not one of the adult-aimed models: 3 minifigs, fills 1/3 cubic foot at best because 450 of the pieces are little 1x1 and 1x2 plates or similar. Finished set's too small for even kid hands to get in and play. If it gets messed up more than a very tiny bit, you'll probably have to re-build from scratch, because the construction is... very CAD, I guess. All surfaces clad in smooth bricks if at all possible, making adding on awkward. The modern ones do have more cool mechanisms and gadgets, though. Also they include extra pieces for the small ones now, and more sets come with a brick tool. Those are all nice changes. But the sets themselves seem to be tuned for inflating part counts and looking nice on a box, not for play.

MomoXenosaga 5y ago

Companies that don't change tend to go under. Lego has to innovate just like everyone else.

andrewgioia 5y ago

100% agreed. Our 5yo started getting into them about a year ago as we sunsetted the Duplo bricks and they're by far his and my favorite toys. We have a bunch of Star Wars sets and while the builds themselves are great, 90% of the fun has been breaking them down and building our own ships and designs. I watch him completely immersed in the world when he makes and flies these ships around, it's amazing. I hope we're still doing it when he's 13 too.

axbytg 5y ago

This rules

WheatM 5y ago

pnathan 5y ago

Yeah, I have been getting Legos for my kid, and man, I just don't see the complaints. I'm very happy with the modern sets, as happy as I was when I was a kid.

lhorie 5y ago

But you're literally admitting that legos aren't what they used to be. My exposure to legos was very similar to yours. Yes, there are more variety of pieces now, and it can be both a blessing and a curse, depending on what angle you squint at it from. In my experience, old legos had a far more rigid feeling: idiomatically, sets relied heavily on the verticality of system (i.e. usage of the traditional tall or short bricks). Nowadays, sets come with a huge variety of 1x1 and 1x2 pieces with sideways elements, and a good portion of pieces are of the beam variety (i.e. pieces that require connectors to be put together[0], commonly found in mindstorm sets) So with a modern mindstorms set, you can build some really elaborate things with high degrees of motion, in a way that is intended by Lego, but conversely, the traditional blocks look dull in comparison. I was building some random robots w/ my kids a while back, and the way we approached the bricks was fairly different. They largely build following the system as intended. My childhood techniques, by contrast, are distinctly "illegal" (according to what Lego considers valid/stable brick arrangements in official sets). For example, this[1] is a technique to achieve a movable joint that I used to chain together to create things like arms, animal tails, etc. The entertainment environment for kids has also changed, through no fault of Lego itself. Despite the availability of high range of motion components, there are so many other ways for kids to entertain themselves nowadays that it would just never occur to them to exploit Legos in unintended ways the way I did. [0] https://img.brickowl.com/files/image_cache/larger/lego-dark-stone-gray-beam-15-32278-64871-32-852929-50.jpg https://img.brickowl.com/files/image_cache/larger/lego-dark-... [1] http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102080 http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102080

rightbyte 5y ago
> For example, this[1] is a technique to achieve a movable joint that I used to chain together to create things like arms, animal tails, etc. It can only revolve a little before the next "button" hit the fork, right? EDIT: Nvm it should be able to bend alot. I am going to steal that technique. =)
- lhorie 5y ago
  No, the second button is clear from the tip of the top piece, so that specific configuration has a range of motion of well over 270 degrees. It isn't considered kosher by Lego because obviously the second button does eventually hit the side of the top piece and if you force it, you can break your build or damage a piece. You can, of course, modify it to use a tall brick and some 1x1 flats to achieve a swiss-army knife setup[0] with a 360 degrees range of motion. I'd use this variation for things like retractable wings. [0] http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102082 http://www.publishyourdesign.com/design/102082

kingcharles 5y ago

I've played with Lego (never Legos) since 1980. I love the modern sets. The branded sets, to me, make it even more fun. You can mix a Batman mini-fig and use the branded parts to make an uber-Batmobile of your own design. The Star Wars kits are fantastic. I actually bought all the Friends sets for myself because the brick colors are great. Even today I opened my mail to find a teddy bear valentine's heart Lego set from my girlfriend that is constructed from clever use of generic bricks, none of which would have been out of place in 1970s sets. In fact, I think Lego has become 100X more creative since the advent of the Internet, where people are making the more insane and elaborate constructions from the simplest bricks. It's become competitive in the nicest way. Lego today is thriving and is better than it ever was.