Records of Finished Work

There have been several Lego kits that I have made for the kids since they are too young to do on their own yet. Even with their tiny fingers, they don't have the dexterity to handle the tiniest Lego piece called a stud.

I am beginning to let them try to put together as much of the kits now, especially if the kit has less than 100 pieces. Bionicle is probably the toughest for them as the pieces with ball and socket joints require some extra strenght, even for me. I was surprised when my 8 year old put a small Lego Castle kit together without any help at all. The finished work is something for them to be proud of but what happens after?

THe kids do play with their finished Lego kits for a while. The Lego toy eventually becomes Lego scrap - especially if the youngest one gets a hold of her elder sibling's Legos.

There are some good kits I try to restore (I always keep the instructions). But usually there are too many pieces that are lost.

The best way to perserve the moment of your kids' Lego accomplishment is to take digital pictures of your kids with the finished Lego product. Just make sure you download them on the computer with the tons of vacation pictures you have stored on your 1 Gig memory card.

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Lego Universe

Somehow, I ran into a news article on the internet announcing the coming of the Lego Universe, a massively multiplayer online game or MMOG. If you have no idea what a MMOG is then any definition won't adequately explain MMOG. In its simplest form, a MMOG is when computer users interact with other computer users around the world in a computer network. A typical interaction may be to play games online with other people in the network. Other interactions may be very complex like socializing with other users with your character or "avatar" and do "stuff". You name the stuff and more often than not, you can do that "stuff".

There are kiddie MMOG too believe it or not. If you are a parent, you can be confident that the online MMOG for kids is safe for them. Otherwise, the problem will make world news and the MMOG company could be shut down.

I mentioned earlier that Lego Star Wars is for kids and adults. The Lego Universe MMOG is promised to be just like that - safe for kids and adults. The only difference is that the virtual universe will go beyond the Lego Star Wars World. Now users will be able to make just about any Lego character and world.

Unfortunately, it won't be available until 2008.

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Lego Indiana Jones?

I was surfing the net to get some of the latest news from Comicon 2007. I used www.g4tv.com which is G4 Tech's website. There was a list on one of the pages and the topic on George Lucas' announcement on Lego Indiana Jones video game caught my eye. In the article was a link to the trailer. It was so cool! Unfortunately, the release date of the video game is "Summer 2008". Oh how I wish I can fast forward into the future.

I saw some comments on the web article mocking the future game. There was a lot of whining how the game was too easy and for the kids. One was looking for some Lego gore as in the controversial scene in Temple of Doom that led to the creation of PG-13. Well maybe there should be an adult version for these 30 year old cry babies that are still living in mommy's house.

Games like Lego Star Wars was such a huge hit because it appealed to everyone. Lego Indiana Jones should continue this trend. Let the crybabies looking for Lego Dawn of the Dead stick to their bloody violent games.

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Lego Star Wars mini-figures

After playing both Lego Star Wars PC games (Lego Star Wars and Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy) and assisting my kid build Lego Star Wars kits, I began to notice the mini-figures. The PC game would allow you to play with a ton of characters from the movies. The Lego kits have some of these minifigures but not all. Unfortunately, you can not get individual Star Wars minifigures - you have to buy the kit. My kids kept breaking or losing the minifigures so now the minifigures are under my control. Now they are like gold to me. The Lego customer service didn't really have a satisfying answer for me. She mentioned the Lego magnet minis and that was it. I later discovered that there was a niche market for Lego mini figures, not just Star Wars. Some figures can be priced cheap while rare ones seemed to be priced unreasonable. I have started a collection and it is slowy growing.


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Bionicle

My kids love Lego and so do I. I have a few gripes about Lego and my criticism below is constructive and not meant to bash the entire Lego world.

Bionicle. My first impression is a binocular and monicle. Since the first time I saw the TV ads I was not impressed with the toyline and I hated the names of the Bionicle characters even more. I'll admit that the kids like them but they do have something to say about the names like Whenua, Hewkii, Toa Hordika Vakama, Pohatu Nuva, Toa Jaller, or Takadox. I asked one nine-year old what he thought about the Bionicle names and he just blurted out one word. Stupid. At least I know I'm not the only one to think this. The names themselves aren't stupid (hey, these names are based on Polynesian mythology) but for a Lego Bionicle toy they are.

One of my kids only got their first Bionicle as a present and it was a one of the cheapest Bionicles. Any kids' interests with most toys are short, especially if they have many. My kid's fascination with this particular Bionicle was shorter than the norm. The only reason why we have other Bionicles was that I didn't want to buy the more expensive Exo-Force or Lego Star Wars kits on the shelves. Most of the ones I buy are around $10 and the kids break them anyway. Many kinds of Bionicles are within the $10 price range.

After a while (5 years maybe), Bionicle the toy is starting to grow on me. They are unique and are becoming interesting. Lego keeps coming up with all different kinds and types. One thing is for sure is that they are different and stand out from the other Lego line.

Lego Star Wars PC Game

Rarely do I have time to play any video games that isn’t an online game. But there was one game not too long ago that caught my attention - Lego Star Wars II. Not sure how I missed Lego Star Wars I.

I played the Lego Star Wars II The Original Trilogy PC game last year and it was a blast! It was purchased for my kids only (yeah, right) but it turned out to be a great family game because of some *ahem* modifications. You see, the game was designed for kids and adults 10 and up. My kids are around half the minimum age. As I played it I realized that they won’t enjoy it too much because there were some areas that were downright difficult even for me.

There was this one room where you had to build a huge door and your characters must build it before the stormtroopers kill you. You can respawn after 4 lives but after that, you start the chapter over. There was a way to keep the stormtroopers at bay but only for a short amount of time. When they come back, the stormtroopers just overwhelm you and eventually shoot you, disrupting your Lego brick building work of the giant door. When they shoot your character, all the bricks that had been assembled will go back to the brick pile and you have to start building the door all over again. At the same time, you must keep holding the stormtroopers back.

Since Lego Star Wars II is a two player game, I did have my kid fend off the attackers while I build the door and when that didn’t work we switched places but that didn’t work either. So we stopped playing that chapter of the game and as a result we could not advance to the rest of Episode IV, A New Hope. Fortunately, we could play other chapters in the other two Episodes (V and VI, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi).

I could eventually figure it out like I have done in many games in the past (before kids) but now I had to find other ways of speeding things up and letting my kids finish the game on their own.

(Lego and Lucas Arts reps: Please cover your ears)
So in order to make the game playable for my kids, I needed to find a way to make the characters invincible. The game was relatively new when I purchased it so there weren’t any cheats that I could find. There was a gold brick in the game that would unlock the invincible option. The character would need to find it in the game first. However, even if you did find it, the invincible feature must still be purchased for 1 Million Lego money (or some large amount like that). Since the kids would practically have to finish the game to obtain that many Lego change (called studs in the game) and the kids were stuck on a puzzle at the same time, there was no way they could obtain invincibility right away.

Luckily, I did find hack instructions from someone on the net. The hack allowed the amount of Lego money to be altered. It required editing a binary file, a .com or .exe maybe -I filed the instructions under ‘black hole’. As a result, I had enough Lego money to purchase the invincibility feature, allowing the kids to have their way with the game. So thank you, whoever you are.

With this adjustment, I have allowed a family game even more fun. There are reasons why I think this game became one of the biggest hits last year:

1. Star Wars.
2. Lego.
3. You can have 2 players play side by side on the same keyboard. In most non-networked PC games, you can only have 1 player play at one time.
4. Fun for the whole family 10 and up. (Fun for 4 and up with the modifications).
5. Funny sigh gags in the game and cutscenes.
6. Interesting game play.
7. Ability to use any characters in freeplay once the story mode has been finished.
8. The are a number of interesing "quests" to fulfill even if you finish the story mode. So there is plenty of challenges and gameplay, even if you have to play the same chapters again.
9. Ability to play all kinds of neat characters in freeplay mode. Some of these can be useless, though.
10. Many neat options you can turn on after you find a particular brick and buy the feature with Lego money. For example, some features allow you to use the Force or build bricks faster. Others are silly like giving characters and vehicles glasses, fake nose and mustache disguise.

Not being satisfied with Lego Star Wars II, I tried Lego Star Wars I (Episodes I, II, and III). It isn't as great as II but it was still loads of fun. We've already finished that game too. Wish there was another new Lego Star Wars game available. *Sigh*

My Lego Site

Here is the first blog on my Lego toy interests. As a kid we were so poor that many times before I reached the age where I get clothing or cash as presents (from family, etc.) , the gifts would be coloring books or crayons. Once in a while I would be cool presents but that is very rare.

My kids would get the kiddie Legos and Megablocks as presents from family events like birthdays or holidays and I would think nothing of it.

Then there came the discovery of Lego Star Wars game for the personal computer. (More about this in another blog). Later, came the discovery of Lego Star Wars kits.

I brought my kid one of the cheaper kits (more about this in another blog) and my kid just wanted to have more. Every kid wants more of everything as a matter of fact. No surprises there. But the kid in me wants even more Lego Star Wars kits. After I get my kid all the cheap kits ($1-$9.99), it was time to buy the higher priced kits. ($10.99-29.99). At this time, I purchased a kit over $30 bucks for myself only because my kids still hasn't learn the lesson of keeping toys. The toys are taken apart to be built into something else so I think if his cheap kits get destroyed and turned into something else, it is okay. At least the kid is creative.

Lego Blog#1

This is a test to add another blog to an existing blog