Star Wars Celebration: A "Casual Fan's" Perspective

The Force is strong in this one!

 This last weekend, I attended Star Wars Celebration 7 at the Anaheim Convention Center.  Like some conventions, this one moves around from city to city every year, and it even reminds me of another Hasbro Toys –centric convention, [Transformers] Botcon.  Since this IS a movie year, and I don’t have a chance to go to this convention every year, I jumped at the chance to go to Star Wars Celebration, despite its VERY HEAFTY $150 price tag for 4 days… that’s almost San Diego Comic Con pricey, and that’s NOT even the highest rate a paying convention-goer can choose.   

Your Wallets are Doomed: Lego Enters the Skylanders Game

"Wait," you ask, "Is that a picture of Marty McFly running from Golem and the Wicked Witch in Oz?"

Yes, yes it is.

First, Skylanders lured you in. Then Nintendo and Disney gave you the bug. And now, LEGO has decided to put the final spike in your addiction, by building a Skylanders style game of their own. On September 27th, they'll unleash the starter pack, allowing you to take Gandalf, Wildstyle and Batman (with his trust Batmobile) through a portal into a story of an evil villain ripping holes in different LEGO universes. The only way to save them is to team up the heroes from franchises like Lord of the Rings, Back to the Future, DC Comics, The Wizard of Oz and, we imagine, many many more in LEGO Dimensions.

The starter pack, pictured below, will cost $69.99. After that, they'll take the rest of your paycheck at, we imagine, $15 a figure.

The game is developed by TT Games, who've created all the incredible LEGO games of the past few years. This is exciting in itself - while the toys in Skylanders, Disney Infinity, and the Amiibo line have been cool, the games built around them don't have the kind of fun pedigree the LEGO games have.

The really cool thing about this is that it looks like many of the additional props, like the Batmobile and the portal itself, are actual LEGO toys you'll have to build. Here's hoping they find a way to incorporate giant playsets and other LEGO accessories. Hit the jump to see the reveal trailer, with a surprise guest.

LEGO Hobbit and the Dangerous Trend in Games

Getting a LEGO game based off your franchise is almost a requisite for certain big titles. So it came as no surprise that with the success of LEGO: The Lord Of The Rings, LEGO: The Hobbit was bound to follow.

The game released at an unusual time, right after the second film, and with no subtitles indicating it was based only on specific films (like LEGO: Harry Potter - Years 1-4). I even purchased it with concern it would spoil the last film for me, which was still many months away. I figured I could easily just stop playing after the battle with Smaug, and save the rest of the game for after the movie came out. It was a good plan, in theory.

The gameplay itself is quite similar to every other LEGO game. You explore the world, build sets, collect extra characters and quests. There’s the similar aspects as well how in order to gain 100% you have to go back through the game and play with the new characters you have unlocked. It was fantastic to go back into levels like Rivendell and Dale and fully explore them in depth. The typical LEGO humor was there, and it used the rare act of giving the LEGO characters voices with movie dialogue. The voices did feel rather awkward since, much like the Sims, their lack of regular conversation is rather endearing.

Then came the infamous “I am fire. I am death.” line. I figured I’d save after this and then I can- wait...

Lego to Release Female Scientist Sets

     Lego, one of the most imaginative and versatile toy lines in the history of ever, have a reputation for imaginative fun for all ages and genders. However, while the company produces female figurines, the roles these figurines have filled have always been limited, perhaps because they do not produce a representative percentage of female figurine. The scientist figures have always been men, for instance. Until now, and gloriously so.