Why doesn't Lego take some tips from MOCers?

[Custom333]

It seems to me some common MOC techniques (tons of greebles, more guns, studlessness) would make Lego sets more popular, even if it increased the prices slightly. Discuss.

[cas]

More guns? Who needs more guns? Star Wars has become pretty well stocked with guns. Alien Conquest is coming decently loaded. I think we're good on guns. Pricing is where I'm most concerned. Lego prices have already increased "slightly" in the past few years, any more increases and my buying will slow even further, and I bet many others as well, such as parents and grandparents etc, people who I doubt put much thought into studlessness and greebling. Plus, Lego has already been using more interesting, perhaps "MOC-like" techniques as of late in many themes and things are looking pretty awesome. So, I think we're good.

[majortom]

The problem with "tons of guns, more greebles, studlessness" is the 'incompatibility' with the target audience. The techniques MOCers use to create all these aesthetic effects are way over the heads of children, both in terms of the level of difficulty and in the sense that the majority of kids just dont care; kids will choose playability over aesthetics every day of the week (at least to a certain extent).
The majority of sets LEGO have released convey the overall design of the ships pretty well and I believe the techniques used in the construction of the official sets is of adequate standard to keep kids interested, represent the Star Wars franchise and maintain some functionality. If you look at past sets, I'd say the techniques and methods used in official LEGO models, across all system ranges has dramatically evolved and continues to do so.
To acheive the quality and level of build you seek, LEGO will have to increase the content (bricks) of their sets by a substantial amount and this equates to increasing the prices of sets by a substantial amount, and without getting into a debate about, I think we have all recognised the increase of prices over the last few years. Using more 'basic' techniques is also is a method of keeping costs down -a one piece studded wing versus an x amount of bricks to produce a studless one.
The purpose of the UCS sets is to provide a model that is challenging to build and also pretty on the eye, in terms of popularity, I'm not sure exactly how well these are accepted by the consumer, I understand that the AFoL community only makes up a very small percentage of LEGO's market.
Plus I think half of us would be at a loose end if LEGO did our job for us! haha

PS: LEGO tried 'more guns' -flick fire missiles anyone? -how well did those go down? :P

[Drock]

Most of the MOCs that we see are designed by AFOLs for the purpose of being detailed, accurate, and large models. LEGO does this models (for Star Wars anyway) and brands them as UCS. For the UCS sets, LEGO does seem to use the advanced building techniques, greebling, etc. I've seen a few MOC Super Star Destroyers, and the Official LEGO version looks similar.

But for marketing to the 7-12 year olds, LEGO needs to compromise between looking good and playing well. UCS sets look good but aren't always that stable (Death Star, anyone?) System scale sets often sacrifice accuracy to add play features (Venator). It's just two different worlds. In the AFOL community here, we rarely see a MOC which will include a lot of play functions, which is one criterion that LEGO uses when designing its system-scale sets.

[Crusader]

As a parent, I think Lego would sometimes be better off if they had less greebles and detail on many of their sets. For example, many of the bad guy structures from the Castle Fantasy line used a combination of a cone and a tooth/spike along the battlements. These certainly made the model look more sinister, but they are easily knocked off while playing with the set. Some kids don't care about these things, but others get upset when they can't keep their model looking like the picture on the box. Many parents look at a detailed Lego set in the store and only see hundreds of little pieces scattered over their homes.So greebles look great, but I think they can cut into a set's play value and even selling potential.

Some sets, like the 7658 Y-wing are have managed to combine greebles and complicated build designs to make a great sturdy set. That set is like a rock*. I wish all my kid's sets were like that.

On a similar theme, I think Lego does it itself a disservice by including so many play features. Many of them work poorly as we all know, they often eat up pieces in the set that could be used elsewhere to make the set better, and they often make a set structurally weaker than it would be otherwise. Sure we AFOLs hate flick missiles and even moreso their predecessors that just fell out of set (like in the 7658 Y-wing). But even more annoying are things like the device meant to remove Vader's helmet in the 6211 Star Destroyer. Did that thing work for anyone even once? The exception to this rant is of course the Death Star playset where I think practically everything worked perfectly and they all added to the set. Give the Lego designers a nice budget and they can work wonders.

So for me, the sturdiness of the set trumps all. I can add my own greebles. And as for play features, swooshability is a lot more fun than flick missiles.

*Except the swivel guns, I'm always putting them back on.

[Rook]

Ah clearly they do.

Look at the accessories, decals, and custom minifigures made by K.A.M., BrickArms, and BrickForge that now TLG products.

Also in 2004-8 I was building a sets from the SWU that TLG hadn't made. Since then TLG has made several of those. Prime example was myself and few other builders all built Freeco Bikes after Lucas films released images of it, within 12 months of us making and posting them on multiple forums TLG had the their version for sale.

And I noticed the comment about Greebles. To which I reply look at the top of UCS Super Star destroyer on the front page.

[Draykov]

Discuss.

In case it wasn't clear, that part kind of goes without saying.

[Padawan716]

As someone who has disappeared from the hobby and reappeared 5 years later, I can say there's a big difference between sets now and those when I left. There are already more guns (and unique ones, not just megaphones with a trans 1x1 plate), and more advanced building techniques. And the price has increased.

Looking at the difference between 2005 and 1999 is even more startling. Anakin's pod is so "traditional" lego it's weird. The first slave 1 (2000) looks so wimpy compared to the beautiful beast that was Jango's (2002, and one of my favorite sets in retrospect), and the latest slave 1 incarnation.

[mdilthey]

Sets like the X wing and Arc-170 with moving wings are more advanced than half the MOC models out there. it's easy to create a flat looking cockpit, but it's not as easy to create a ship that, quite literally, functions.

Sometimes, LEGO seems ahead of 90% of the MOC community these days.

[Daz Hoo]

My friend Pierre Normandin, who works as a designer for the LEGO City theme, explained to me that when a project is given to a designer, the targeted age is a major factor on how a set is designed.

For example, Pierre was the designer for both the 7938 Passenger Train and the 10219 Maersk Train, and he told us that he had much more elbow room with the design and techniques used in the Maersk Train because that set was intented for adults as opposed to the Passenger Train.

To take that point even further, Pierre also told me once that, in the process of creating LEGO sets, designers have to present their project to a panel of peers for evaluation.

He also told me that one Star Wars designer in particular is often reminded by this panel of peers that his proposed sets aren't juniorized enough, that the building techniques are too complicated for 7-10 year old boys.

So clearly, in the case of System sets, AFOLs are NOT the targeted audience, and the current trend isn't to make those sets more complicated than they already are. UCS sets might get more details and use more elaborate building techniques, but don't expect to see those same techniques and the same attention to detail on main production sets.

[walsh_Fever]

More guns? Who needs more guns? Star Wars has become pretty well stocked with guns. Alien Conquest is coming decently loaded. I think we're good on guns. Pricing is where I'm most concerned. Lego prices have already increased "slightly" in the past few years, any more increases and my buying will slow even further, and I bet many others as well, such as parents and grandparents etc, people who I doubt put much thought into studlessness and greebling. Plus, Lego has already been using more interesting, perhaps "MOC-like" techniques as of late in many themes and things are looking pretty awesome. So, I think we're good.

But at least you can get more value for your money. Would you rather just face inflation instead without getting a little something extra?

[hrdcrgamer]

This may be a branding issue. The Lego brand stands for family friendly. If all of a sudden it introduced guns and violence into the equation, it may not be such a good thing for its brand. But from your perspective, if you can't get it from Lego, you can always get it elsewhere.