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Last weekend, Kris Abel from CTV News visited the Canadian Toy & Hobby Fair and got a good look at upcoming LEGO sets from the LEGO Canada display. He posted a lot of pictures (would have loved more from some of the Atlantis sets) and a lot of them I was surprised at. They were some of the first good photos I’ve seen of some of the unreleased sets scheduled for later in the year.

A few highlights:

8077 Atlantis Exploration HQ

8078 Portal Of Atlantis

My observation on the Atlantis sets:
* The 8077 Atlantis Exploration HQ looks to be shaping up well. The first blurry shots I saw a while back made it look closer to the 7775 Aqua Raiders Aquabase Invasion. It looks to be a square-ish/self-contained structure which makes sense. I’m assuming the vehicles will dock on top.
* The 8078 Portal of Atlantis (the infamous Shark Temple or Shark Castle) is bigger than I thought and looks to have a lot of really cool and unique parts. It’s hard to get a sense of the minifigs since they were mixed together with other sets. There looks to be some parts in colors that we haven’t seen before. The box shows 898 pieces but that’s obviously subject to change since it’s a prototype. I’m not sure on new minifigs – there is a skeleton with some diving gear on that has a trident symbol on their head. You can barely make out what looks to be the “turtle warrior” on top of the Portal, that’s been discussed in the past.
* Kris mentioned when discussing the Space Police sets that Atlantis was the focus this year, hence the lack of a lot of new Space Police sets.

As Kris notes, a lot of the upcoming sets are prototypes/mock-ups and details are not yet finalized. Nothing from Harry Potter and nothing new from the Toy Story line that’s not already out. I’m not quite as interested in the World Racers line or the Hero Factory line, but it looks like both could give us some new parts or older parts in new colors. Looking at the boxes for the World Racers, I think they’ll probably sell very well to the target audience.

Some of the other sets shown (besides 8077/8078) include quite a few sets that are currently available and some that are limited right now or unavailable (depending on area), such as:
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Having heard that quite a few new 2010 LEGO sets are popping up at Toys R Us and LEGOlands, I paid a visit to the Toys R Us in South Austin earlier today to have a look, and it was surprising.

We bought and are going to review in the next few days:
7592 Construct-a-Buzz (Toy Story)
7594 Woody’s Roundup (Toy Story)
8057 Wreck Raider (Atlantis)
8072 Sea Jet (Atlantis)
8073 Manta Warrior (Atlantis)
8083 Rebel Trooper Battle Pack (Star Wars)
8084 Snowtrooper Battle Pack (Star Wars)

First impressions: The Star Wars battle packs seem a bit high for the price, but the minifigs are awesome. The 8072 and 8073 were impulse kits priced at under $4. The Sea Jet in particular is great. The Wreck Raider is very neat for being under $12 – it comes with a Sharkman minifig and is the cheapest way to get one at this point. The Toy Story sets are also pretty nice, we were not after sets to review, but sets we wanted to keep around.

We also saw:
3187 Seaplane (City)
5891 Apple Tree House (Creator)
5898 Cars Building Set (Bricks and More)
5899 House Building Set (Bricks and More)
7206 Fire Helicopter (City)
7567 Traveler (City)
7595 Army Men on Patrol (Toy Story)
8059 Seabed Scavenger
8061 Gateway of the Squid (Atlantis)
8075 Neptune Carrier (Atlantis)
8085 Freeco Speeder (Star Wars)
8086 Droid Tri-Fighter (Star Wars)
8087 Tie Defender (Star Wars)
8088 Arc 170 Starfighter (Star Wars)
8519 Big Chill (Ben 10 from Cartoon Network)

There were probably Racers and some other sets we missed, but it was an impressive amount of new sets coming out all at once. It makes a lot more sense about Toys R Us trying to clear the shelves with a lot of good sales recently (Buy 1/Get 1 50% off, etc.).

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After seeing the comparison between the Creator 5867 Super Speedster and 8156 Ferrari, somebody worked out the actual size and asked me if the 5867 is minifig-scale. Luckily I caught the email right before I was about to tear down the speedster and work on the armored car build of it.

The answer is yes, sort of.

Simple answer: If you are willing to remove a tile from the seats, and remove the legs from the minifigs, you can fit them in there (click for larger image):

Shark man from the Atlantis sets doesn’t fit too well, as you can see, thanks to his shark half.

Complex (and proper) answer: If you were to change the seats, as well as change how the roof plate is supported, they would fit comfortably (minus any mini figures with large heads). The speedster is scaled to fit them if you make those changes. Changing it into a convertible might just be the easiest way to deal with the roof, and would allow you to work the seat tile back into the mix, raising the minifig so he can see over the steering wheel, but then you start getting into working on the dashboard…I would build it, look at what doesn’t work, then back up and tear it down to where you can work with them.

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I’m not going to get the review of the new 2010 LEGO Creator 5867 Super Speedster, which is a 3-in-1 (also makes for an armored car and a go-cart) posted tonight, but I figured I would post some photos showing a comparison to the 8156 Ferrari FXX 1:17.

I did so since it seemed like a natural comparison – both are sports cars and both have nearly an identical color scheme. The Super Speedster is a new model for 2010 and comes with 278 pieces sells for $19.99 (available now at the LEGO Online Shop), while the Ferrari had over 600 pieces and retailed for around $60.

Obviously it’s quite a bit smaller than the Ferrari, but there’s quite a few influences present from the Ferrari. My general impression so far (I have yet to build the go-cart and armored car) is that it’s a great value for $19.99 and comes with a lot of useful plates and smaller pieces (if you prefer red/black).

Remember, click on the photos for larger versions at flickr.

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This is a short and sweet review of the LEGO Creator 5865 Mini Dumper. It’s basically an impulse Creator set, consisting of 60 pieces and while it’s called “Mini Dumper” and resembles (and functions like) a dump truck, it includes alternative instructions for two other vehicles: An SUV resembling a Land Rover or Range Rover, and an open wheel race car.

By the Numbers:
Set: Creator 5865 Mini Dumper
Year of Release: 2010 (available 2009)
Type: 3-in-1 Mini Vehicle in Creator line.
# of Pieces: 60
# of Extra pieces: Not really – as far as I can tell, all were used in at least one of the 3 vehicles you can make.
# of Minifigs and what kind: N/A
Stickers? No
Ages: 6-12
Time to Complete: 15 minutes or less
Price: $5.99 at the LEGO Online Shop

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This is a quick preview of the 60-piece LEGO Creator 5865 set from the new 2010 sets. It’s $5.99 and it’s a decent amount of standard pieces you’ll be able to use in your own MOCs.

The most important pieces of the newer 2010 Creator sets:

I’m just kidding, although I’m noticing them popping up in the 2010 sets quite a bit. Apologies for the crummy photo – didn’t realize it was slightly out of focus until after I finished the third part of the 3-in-1.

As for the 3-in-1 aspect, you get a dump truck (aka the “Mini Dumper”), the SUV that looks similar to some kind of Range Rover or Land Rover, and the racecar. The dump truck’s bed actually raises and lowers:

View: Creator 5865 Gallery (more will be uploaded later today)

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Update: Reviews coming Tuesday (Dec 1)

Last week I did a quick report on what I saw at a nearby Toys R US. This week I swung by the one to the south of me (South Austin, Texas) and picked up a few of the new sets and tried to get decent pictures of the others.

I forgot to get a few prices on the some of the sets, and I may have missed a few Bionicle sets, but here’s a run down of 2010 LEGO sets I saw tonight that I didn’t see last week, along with prices. Keep in mind that this is the day after “Black Friday” – there could have been plenty more sets that were sold through. I did see all of the previous sets mentioned in the link above. I do believe some of those prices will drop or change when other retailers start carrying them.

Creator 5867 Super Speedster – 278 pieces ($19.99)
Creator 5865 Mini Dumper – 60 pieces ($5.99)

Bionicle Stars 7117 Gresh – 19 pieces ($7.99 or $8.99)
Bionicle Stars 7135 Takanuva – 21 pieces ($7.99 or $8.99)
Bionicle Stars 7136 Skrall – 21 pieces ($7.99 or $8.99)
Bionicle Stars 7137 Piraka – 15 pieces ($7.99 or $8.99)

Racers 8192 Lime Racer 1:55 – 44 pieces ($5.99)
Racers 8195 Turbo Tow 1:55 – 43 pieces ($5.99)
Racers 8197 Highway Chaos – 142 pieces (forgot to lookup price)
Racers 8199 Security Smash – 135 pieces (forgot to lookup price)

I’ve uploaded photos of all of the above to the 2010 LEGO sets at Toys R Us flickr page I created last week.

I am working on reviews for the following sets I picked up and will have them up this weekend:
Creator 5867 Super Speedster – 3-in-1 – also builds armored car or go-kart
Creator 5865 Mini Dumper – 3-in-1 – race car, dump truck, heavy truck
Racers 8192 Lime Racer
Racers 8195 Turbo Tow

In addition to my reviews of the above, Jason will be posting a review of Power Miners 8191 Magma Mech ($19.99) on Sunday (Nov 29), and I saw this one tonight as well. I’ll also be working on an update to the Creator 5866 Review of the Rotor Rescue, building out the other two models of the 3-in-1 kit.