The Crowdfunding phase is gonna require at least 3000 people to spend 100$+ for a set that might not even end up being made. Getting people to just press the “support” button is easy, but getting them to pay for it almost 6 mouths in advance of getting it isn’t gonna be exactly easy. Especially considering how this program doesn’t even have World Wide shipping to most countries.
I feel like realistically speaking, this Bricklink design program isn’t the right place for Sokoda’s set. One of the biggest appeals of it was the minifigures, but now we’re reduced to just a simple diorama with no exclusive parts. That’s a big minus for me personally.
Hm… I do love the new brickbuilt matoro, sure the printed minifigure was nice, but this has much more of an authentic bionicle feel to me. That ignika definitely stings though. Sure, it works, it just doesn’t feel anywhere near as special without that printed iron man helmet, it was just perfect for the figure. Would it be at all possible to do a printed golden minifig head instead? That might produce a similar effect. Maybe not as great as the original, but a good substitute.
The set would have been quite expensive anyways, Ideas or no. And I highly doubt people who place a pre-order for a set that doesn’t get funded wouldn’t get a refund. I don’t see it as much of a risk.
This is a very good point, and admittedly something I overlooked. I’m not a user of Bricklink in the slightest, but I know they aren’t international friendly. Who knows how that will work with the Designer Program.
I understand this sentiment, but…
I feel like if you were drawn to Sokoda’s set because of exclusive parts and not because it’s a really well-built, well-thought out, and heartfelt representation of what Bionicle means to fans, then you missed the point of supporting it.
By itself it’s already much more than a simple diorama.
Usually on Bricklink, most sellers actually do offer World Wide shipping, but this AFOL Design Program specifically does not. For whatever reason, they have a specific list of only 30 countries or so that can pre-order those sets.
It is well-built and well-thought out, nobody is gonna disagree on that e̶x̶c̶e̶p̶t̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ ̶p̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶M̶a̶s̶t̶e̶r̶p̶i̶e̶c̶e̶ ̶D̶i̶s̶c̶o̶r̶d̶ ̶s̶e̶r̶v̶e̶r̶ ̶, but for me personally the exclusive parts are a big factor that draws me into buying a LEGO set. Otherwise, I could just order the parts individually and build the set on my own., for much cheaper than the price that will be required for the “official” set.
Now that I’ve had a chance to see the updated images, I’m horrifically saddened at the lack of balljoint Bohrok. It makes me cry in sorrow.
And IMO the helmet doesn’t really capture the Ignika. I don’t know how restrictive LEGO is on outside elements being added into the model at this point; would it be acceptable for the community to put its collective room temperature IQ together and come up with a design?
That’s terribly strange, considering they should have a lot more resources than individual market sellers. I wonder what the restrictions or the limitations are for them.
Well, the way I see it with my comfortably room temperature thinking box, there’s really only 4 options.
Option 1: Use an Iron Man helmet to get the overall shape of the Ignika. Gets the outside mask shape right better than anything else, but no detail whatsoever without a sticker or print.
Option 2: The Vladek helmet we have now, which is the closest LEGO helmet piece that can approximate the very distinctive design on the Ignika. It has the T shape in the middle that approximates the GSR on the mask and it has the three prongs at the top and stiped details on the sides.
Option 3: Printed minifighead/other helmet piece. This would be the best option, but no one here knows if there are going to be custom printed pieces.
Option 4: An entirely brick-built micro mask. I’m sure it can be done, but I’m not certain you could get much detail at all into that small a size. It will either be cartoonishly big or too small to even know what it’s supposed to be.
So, for now, the best option is any of the existing minifig helmets. And personally, looking at them (and I’m sure Sokoda already did this), the Vladek mask is one of the best options.
I don’t quite follow as to why people are saying this. I think the helmet he chose does an incredible job of estimating an Ignika in System. It’s got the same general face pattern and the spikier top. What about it doesn’t work?
Yeah, with the limitations in place it does a great job, given no print limitations, of capturing the details of the Ignika. While the outer shape isn’t ideal, it’s still pretty clear as to what it is meant to be in context of the scene and character.
Nice! Looks great, looking forward to trying to build other Bionicle characters at this scale, since at least for Toa it looks great.
Honestly, yeah. It fits the bill better than any other preexisting helmet, without a doubt.
There’s no middle portion.
The addition of a middle portion matching the color of the helmet would pretty much perfect the design, but as it is, it’s really hard to see it as anything other than a gold knight helmet. The issue with simply slapping something on is it can’t be longer than the helmet itself, it has to have a way to attach, and it’d have a significantly easier time getting approved if it already came in gold.
Ticking all the boxes there is going to be a nightmare.
Unfortunately, you won’t be able to tick all of those boxes.
There might not be a middle portion, but at the end of the day there doesn’t really need to be. In a perfect world, we’d be able to enjoy custom prints or moulds. But as it stands, this Matoro is an excellent approximation of the one from the comics in that style.
I’m actually kind of impressed these pieces exist in these colors, honestly.
I’m extremely excited to see that is project is (somewhat) back! I’ll be supporting it all the way just like the original IDEAS project. Congrats, Sokoda!
I actually really, really like the brick built Matoro. I have a feeling that Sokoda may have inadvertently created a whole new genera of microscale BIONICLE MOCs with Matoro here
I think that while it approximates the general shape of the Ignika quite well, if you were to look at that in isolation (that is, apart from the scene) there’s no way you’d say “oh look, the Ignika!”. You’d think it’s a gold medieval helmet - the fact that it’s a piece already with other associations adds to this.
Matoro, on the other hand, is recognizable even apart from the scene. If you look at him all on his own (like @TheCobaltCorsair posted) he’d still be identifiable as Matoro, and he’s still really cool. Ideally (though perhaps not feasibly, I admit) the Mask of Life should achieve the same effect.
My criticism is not saying that I think Sokoda did a poor job, or that there’s an obvious better solution - I think he’s done very well. Nor is BrickLink or TLG at fault, for that matter. But the solution doesn’t have the same impact on me that the original printed piece did (and though one could argue that you’d need a printed piece to do that, I feel the brickbuilt Matoro achieves what the mask alone doesn’t quite manage to).
Or, for a more meta answer to the question, I’m saying this because Sokoda specifically asked for honest feedback on the adaptations he’s made, and it’s probably the only one that I’m iffy on.
He’s been doing this for a while, his Matoro actually scales really nicely with some of the Bionicle builds from his Weekly Builds.
I wonder whether a black head piece would give the mask center a bit more… “texture”. But the minifig itself looks great.