LEGO® Minecraft: The Cave!

The following is a true toy story. I saw The Cave set on the LEGO® isle in the store for weeks, months, and years! OK, not years. They had probably 10 of these at any time. And then... I wanted it.

And of course, every store and online were SOLD OUT in the fall of 2015. This was likely due to the set being relatively inexpensive at $19.99, so more of these were being snatched up as gifts. As you know, when you can't find something you really, really, really want... you get a fanatical obsession with it.

So when it was finally back in stock (and may I add, $16.99 on a certain giant online seller. They can pay me for the link, you know who I'm talkin' bout), I asked my super cool 1x5 to order it for me.

"Gotta get me some coal for them torches!"

This being a small set, it didn't take long to put together, maybe about 45 minutes. It's 249 pieces and as I said, is currently US $19. Now let me say two things about this Minecraft set:

1: I LOVE the design, what is included, and the value of this set. It really looks great with the lava flow, water, ladder leading up to an upper level, and of course the brick-built spider!

2: I HATE how fragile this set is. All of the ore pieces are stacked up 3-4 high with those jumper pieces (the single, flat studded ones). This is OK to use for some builds, but what it does here is create chaos it you attempt to even move this set. I'm not even joking when I say I picked this set up to move it one day and half of it fell apart.

"Rrrrrrrrrggggh"

The Verdict: This is a great little set. It's inexpensive and easy to find, and would be great on its own or combined with the other Minecraft sets. 

It's my absolute favorite to look at and display... just don't try to play with it... or move it... or breathe too close to it.

LEGO® Minecraft - The Desert Outpost

Alex and the wolf guard the outpost while Steve goes fishing. Typical Steve.

The Desert Outpost was not a set that I was initially interested in. It just didn't seem to have many structures to build (or rebuild) and I wasn't crazy about the desert elements in the game either. But, one day that changed and as I looked at the cool box art (below) I started thinking that this might be a fun set to have. I even built a similar house and tower in Minecraft!

The bedroom area swings open to reveal
a bed... and nothing else.

The set was actually an enjoyable build (except for the "cobblestone" wall, which has... I don't know, 900 million 1x1 jumper pieces). There is the tower section that has the TNT launcher, the walls going around the compound, and then an odd sleeping area at the back.

I say that it's odd because:
1: It's a very small, small space. The bed fits exactly wall to wall.
2: Instead of glass windows (there's sand everywhere!), they opted for the fence style windows, and then strangely, the cobblestone wall in the window space.
3: Finally, Instead of a door there is a gate. Who builds a house with a gate entrance?

The TNT falls.. and boom! You
hopefully only blow up the sand
and not your fort.

Actually, I kind of understand the reasoning for the gate. It needs to be easy for the person playing with the set to access this area, and another door would just be in the way. But that doesn't mean I have to like it!

On the tower, there is one of the main action features, a TNT launcher, which is powered by a Redstone torch. You launch the TNT by pushing a rod of the back where the TNT falls to the sand below blowing up the skeletons.

The back/side view of the set. There are hinged pieces that will expand
the set out to have a larger play area.

Overall, this is a nice set, although a little high at US $59.99. You get 519 pieces, and the bulk of

Sweet and loving one minute, horrifically
scary when they stare down a sheep.

these are just common 4x and 6x bricks in gray, brown and tan colors. Not too bad if you want those pieces, but if you're looking to get specialty pieces this is not the set for that.

You get three minifigs and one brick-built wolf/dog (which as of 2015 is the only set that includes that mob). This is the first set to include the female character Alex also! She also appears in the Nether Fortress set, with more armor.

Verdict: Fun to build, cool to play with, a little pricey. I think $49 would be fair for this set, considering that the Crafting Box is $49, and has 518 pieces. Oh, one last thing: the official instructions give the iron armor to one of the skeletons, but I gave mine to Steve.  More photos below.

LEGO® Minecraft "The Dungeon" Review

You have mined down a few levels and are starting to find some great deposits of iron and coal. Everything is going great until you hear that unmistakable groan of a zombie. You decide to punch through a few more walls before heading to the surface and... you wind up at a monster spawning cave/dungeon.

That seems to be the premise of this LEGO® Minecraft set. It's not a very large set (I think it may in fact be the smallest at 219 pieces), but it's still a lot of fun. It's also an inexpensive way to try out the Minecraft sets as these can be found for $20 or less (as of 2015).

Build

This set took me about 30 minutes to build. The base construction is wider than it seems, which gives the whole set a nice footprint. There isn't much height to it; it only goes up to six blocks high in the main dungeon area. There are two doorway openings for the mini-figs to go through. Above and on the outside, there are sand blocks and a small lava pool with a cactus. This is kind of an odd choice but I suppose there was a reason behind it, although I've never seen that in the game.

The set includes a "Steve", two zombies, and... bricks.

This set has two movable play features. The first is the monster spawner, which has a representation of a zombie being made inside the spawner. You can spin a drum built into the base to make this spin around, but that's all it does. I feel like all the pieces and gears involved in this could have been put to better use.

One of the cool movable features let's the zombie
"spawn" into the dungeon. This is activated by flipping a brick
on the backside.

The second moving feature is also related to the monster spawner. Basically, it's a way to have the zombie hidden from view, then you flip the assembly forward to make the zombie "spawn" into the dungeon. This is a much cooler looking, and functioning, feature on this set.

Value

I think the value on this set is about right for the bricks and figures included.. For $20, you get 219 pieces and that includes three mini-figures. You also get one iron pickaxe.

It's an easy guess that you get a Steve with this set, but I was more excited about getting a couple of zombies, since I had none.

The only negative I have with this set is the rebuild options. On the box (as is with all the Minecraft sets) it's prominently displayed that you can "Build your own creations!", but I just do not see any rebuild options here. The only official changes they give you are to take some of the sand pieces and make a stair step down to the dungeon. 

Overall, this is a nice set that is fun to build and has some fun play value. It also makes a nice display piece that's great to look at. 

LEGO® Minecraft: "Crafting Box" Review

The LEGO® Minecraft Crafting Box was my very first set of the series. I was drawn to the interesting packaging and the encouragement to build anything you want! Plus, as I said in the First Night Review, I really love the unique colors you get and the transparent bricks.

To me, the Crafting Box reminded me more of the basic (basic being a positive here) sets I had when I was a kid. It includes a lot of basic 2x and 4x bricks and very few specific ones that have limited use. The official piece count is 518, but it really feels like you get more than that once you start building.

And, that's what this set is really about: building, taking apart, and building again. There's not really a "correct" model to make, or even a best one. Much like the game, I have built something and then went back and modified it over and over until I was happy. Then I took it apart and started all over!

What I really dislike about this set are the instructions. There are eight official builds included in the two booklets. However, the instructions are split between the two books.

So, for example, to build a waterfall piece in a desert biome, you would refer to one book. For the larger part of the set, you would refer to the second book. It wasn't hard, but it certainly wasn't fun.

After we built several of the official builds, I decided to dismantle it all and start fresh. This was much more satisfying than anything the instructions provided, and I think that's the real value of the set.


For my own creations (MOC), I opted to build as vertical as I could, while still having a large "land" base. That's just what I enjoyed making.

You get two mini figures with the set: a Steve with diamond pickaxe, and a skeleton with bow and arrow. You get one exclusive (so far) with this set, a Mooshroom. One odd thing to me though is why they decided to make the weapons and tools jagged and pixelated looking. I understand this is to match the game, but it just doesn't look right.


Value

The US price of this set is currently $49.99, which is not bad considering what you get. There are lots of great bricks here, 518 to be exact, and lots of rebuild value. I would have liked to have another mini-figure included at this price point; perhaps a zombie.

The instructions can be a little messy, so I say just look at the inspiration pages and pick some elements you like. Then build! That's why you would buy this anyway!

LEGO® Minecraft: "The First Night" review

When I first saw the LEGO® Minecraft sets at a big box store, I didn't really know what to make of them. I hadn't played Minecraft (I only vaguely knew what the game was), and I didn't own any LEGO® sets. Actually, I hadn't even put together a set since I was 12 years old.

My initial thought was that it was kind of silly. I knew Minecraft was a game about nearly unlimited building, and here was a building set by the most popular brick company in the world.

But soon after our LEGO® collection began to grow by almost a set a week, and I was playing the Minecraft game any moment I could. I knew it wouldn't be long before I had to have a set!

What I really love about these sets, and why I wanted them so badly, was the type of bricks included. I especially love all of the transparent bricks, both colored and clear.  It was those cool transparent blocks (and the bright orange lava) that made want these sets.

Before I get into what I like and dislike about the set, let me state (along with everyone else who reviewed this set) that this is NO ONE's first night in the Minecraft game. No one. Perhaps an experienced player, but not a first-timer. 

The first shelter I ever made wasn't a hole in the dirt, or in a cave, but I didn't make anything close to this elaborate! Does anyone really have time to gather resources for a full house, including cobblestone, planks, a bed, AND sand for windows in 10 minutes? (For the two people out there who haven't played Minecraft, you only have 10 minutes of daylight before monsters attack)

Construction

The First Night has your standard LEGO® instructions. Other than the door and hinge on the house, there are no other moving parts (like trap doors). Overall it took me about 40 minutes to complete, but I'm kind of slow.

As I said before, I really love the bricks included in these sets. They give you great colors and lots basic 4x4, 4x6, and so on. I do love the transparent bricks, and how they are used on the tree builds. 

The pickaxe is included with the set, but if you want
you can still "craft" one.

What's cool (or annoying) about the Minecraft sets is that some of the sections are designed to be moved around to create different landscapes. The roof of this house is made of two separately built pieces that can be taken off and placed to the side of the house, the front, the side (you get the idea). You can simply sit these pieces somewhere or attach them to the build.

It doesn't actually look like anything in the game, but that's OK. This is the LEGO® interpretation of Minecraft; it's not going to be a one to one ratio (can you imagine how expensive that would be?).

The two sections of the roof are removable and
can be placed around the model any way that you want.

What is disappointing with the Minecraft sets is that most of the build is based on single blocks placed one on top of the other.

For example, the wall sections were three to four blocks high without any interlocking with the next block. Trees are built with the square four stud blocks five or six high. With no real structure, these tend to break off easily from the model. I have knocked trees over just casually trying to adjust something or place a mini figure somewhere.

It isn't so bad once you have the roof section pieces in-place, as these are long and do solve the fragile structure problem. But it doesn't help the trees.

Play Value

I'm a little older than target age that would play with a set like this. But if I were a kid, I think I would be really happy playing with this.

 

As for the mini-figures, you get a Steve (also included with every set), a Creeper, and a pig mob. Steve comes with wooden tools: a pickaxe, an ax, and sword. A wooden sword? The wooden pickaxe I understand, and maybe even the ax, but I doubt anyone makes wooden swords.

The house has two ways to play/display. Closed, you get the cool looking structure, but it isn't very big. But if you open the back up, the interior is accessible and the whole set seems a little larger.


Value

Overall this is a nice set if you like Minecraft and LEGO®. I bought mine for $39.99 US dollars (plus tax). For that price you get 408 pieces and the mini-figures. There were a few extra pieces leftover from the build, but nothing special. There isn't much included in the way of rebuilds, but there are certainly enough bricks included to make some great models.

There are some full printed pieces, such as the crafting table and the furnace, but nothing really unique. I think that's what is most appealing about this and the other Minecraft sets: it focuses more on building and creating and not specific pieces that have little other use (other than the Creeper).

Overall, if you are a fan of building, Minecraft, and LEGO®, this is a great set to get. It's a great start to a collection.