>good set design>brick quality better than lego (coloration, only prints)>costs less>comes with a full lighting set why are alt-brick brands not more popular?
Because brand loyalty is a mental illness or a symptom of autism and many Lego fans have one or both.
>>11228307They are cheaper because they steal designs of the pieces and dont need to put costs into testing (which takes A LOT of money)
>>11228307>old cat mold with printssovl
>>11228307brand loyalty, but more importantly Lego gets the licensed franchises. I like the OP set though, nearly convinced me to buy
>>11228307Other than Mega, the others don't get anywhere near the shelf space that Lego gets.Lego still has the positive reputation it earned when they were a better product and the competition wasn't close. To normies (ie parents) Lego is THE brand, and also the name of the product. Other brands are "Fake Lego". Parents don't want to get their kids the imitation, they want to give them the real thing. And no kid wants to be the only one with the cheap knockoff product because his parents are poor. They're burning through the good faith they've built up now with their increasing prices, decreasing quality, and improving competition, so AFOLs at least are turning towards other brands gradually.
>>11228307Those minifigs are really fucking bad. Cute cat though
>>11228307Lego still leads with brand loyalty and momentum in various ways. There are other factors too like lego having more licenses, especially popular ones like Star Wars. Also Lego are still holding on to the trademark for minifigs which means that everyone else’s minifigs look pretty terrible by comparison because of how different they have to be from Lego’s design, really hope TLG loses that trademark, it’s bullshit that they do anyway.>>11229321Shut up TLG
>>11228307They should really work on their logo though, you can't know what it means without Google.
I've bought several cobi sets which all were very good. What are some other manifacturers that make quality alt-bricks?
>>11228307F.O?Really fits because it can FUCK OFF
>>11234956consooooom
>>11228307Area X Krusty Krab's looks grand too. And then I found out Lego did their own set from 2006. I won't compare a decade's difference but the Area X Minifigs look way better at least.
>>11235081
>>11235081>>11235083holy shit this looks great. how much?
>>11235113Depending on where you buy, it'll be between $80 to $200. Heard it comes with lighting too but I can't confirm if this is a set thing or a custom.
>>11228307Somehow this reminds me of the whole Warhammer debacle where the licensed brand is way too overpriced while they update the meta once every six months or a year, while every wargaming brand below it is cheap but the molds are just as good, minus the quality of the guide print.
>>11235120It does come. Webm of the interiors:
>>11235046Even if that's leafbux that's insane. This has "I don't know what to get my friend/relative's kid for the (((holiday)))s" written all over it.
>>11235135
>>11235140>>11235135>>11235120>>11235083>>11235081holy shit this is awesomeand you can actually play with it, its not statueshit
>>11235126Warhammer isn't just a brand though, it has lore and factions which people find interesting.While lego has minifigs and strong licenses, the actual building blocks are pretty much identical between lego and the better quality alt-brands.
>>11235150The weird thing is that this is a one-off thing. They don't do a lot of big sets and they mainly dabble in selling cube sets like pic related and creatures like YuGiOh monsters.
>>11235163True, but the price is just odd given the high bar to get into the tabletop proper. It's easier to get into the video games and books for the lore while it's harder to justify the tabletop set prices that require assembly AND painting. It's a hobby to customize sure, but it's easier to convince a guy to buy cheaper model kits of gundams and war vehicles.
>>11228307The big problem I have with alt-brands actually IS the brick quality.While I massively agree that Lego's quality went down the shitter over the past years they still put in "some" thought into what plastic to use in what situation.99% of the stuff the competition produces is simply just plain old ABS while Lego uses multiple different plastics here and there for certain parts.My sister recently built one of those Xingbao unicorns here (top left) and both the stem and petals of the flowers were made of hard plastic instead of Lego's more softer one. Trying to put that shit together was absolutely miserable and we ended up just shaving a bit of the stem piece off to make it actually fit.Same with Qman where I bought a mech from - yeah, unlike Lego, the Mixel sockets were in different colors... ...and almost all of them broke after just a few days - not just cracked but large chunks broke off.
>>11235688from what I gathered, only GoBricks (Mould King, Funwhole) brands are really supposedly on par with LEGO, though I have personally not tried them. Xingbao also uses new bricks since 2022, maybe these sets are from earlier batches?But I get what you mean, LEGO bricks are softer than COBI, for example, with the later also being harder to take apart. COBI gets a pass since they only make display models.
>>11235709Judging by the vids on Youtube they actually were released two years ago.I also wasn't talking about the plastic in general but certain stuff like classic leaf pieces, those specialized Ninjago/Bionicle weapon moulds, minifig-scale drill pieces, Exo-Force droid arms, etc. which are made of softer material in Lego sets like polyethylene and polypropylene.Lego uses like a dozen different plastic types for different purposes like POM for Technic axles or polycarbonate for balljoints but from my own experience they're almost all made of the same ABS as everything else in sets from other brands.
>>11235743Now I see what you mean. Yeah, having those be hard plastic sucks
>>11229321why should I care as a customer ?
I JUST bought one similar to this.I am NOT paying $350 for that same set but it's Lego(tm).I'd happily pay 1.5x for Lego, but when it's 3x, 4x, or 5x the price just because "LEGO!!!!", I'm not doing that.
>>11236447Post pics
>>11236464Coming tomorrow, anon.I'll post pics when I put it together.
>>11228307Good questionLego has a reputation for QUALITY which is rapidly declining, but still valideverybody who remembers building a Mega Bloks set, remembers that the thing was flimsy and sagging, where all Lego sets are consistently "tight" and solidthe gap is closing, you can buy a not-Lego set and it turns out it's not as terrible as you thought it would be. I recently impulse purchased a Spy Family Anya Forger set at Five Below, and it was amazing for only $5LMAO at Lego themselves ripping off Squishmallow (pic related)sure there are other egg-shaped pillow plush, but we all know those are Squishmallows and Lego made them anyway
>>11228307I'm still guilty of buying a lot of lego. If that was an official kit, at 1700+ pieces, 500 of them would be 1x1 dots. That's still a $90 toy where I live.
ALRIGHT, ANONS. IT IS HERE.I SHALL POST FOR YOU THE RESULTS!SUNDAY NIGHT, AND NO WORK TOMORROW, BECAUSE I QUIT MY JOB LAST WEEK!
>>11237217NOTE*MINE IS SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT, IT'S A BAKERY
>>11235163is this a set? or someone's build? because that's very much to mynliking.
>>11237472Brand's Bluebrixx and the set name's Blaustein Castle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20TVqWl5odQ
>>11237484thank you!
>>11237813probably worth mentioning they have an absurd number of expansions, over 26k pieces
>>11237484Wew lad.
The more I look through their catalog, the crazier it gets. Shitload of NOT-licensed sets, Blade Runner, Aliens, Akira, War of the Worlds, Fifth Element, Fast and Furious, King Kong, Terminator, Transformers, Mad Max, Duel, Taxi, 007, Ghostbusters, Starsky & Hutch, Back to the Future, Halo, god knows how many titles I missed or don't know.On top of that, shitload of train autism, absolutely CRAZY dioramas and medieval buildings with some insane detailing. What's the catch? How's the build quality?
>>11237850Afaik Bluebrixx sources their bricks from different manifacturers depending on the set, ranging from mediocre to great, which they are sadly not 100% transparent about on the store page. Probably worth looking for a german review and translating it if you are interested in specific sets.
>>11237863>>11237850Blaustein Castle and its expansions uses bricks from the manifacturer GoBricks, which is considered generally the best of the alt-brick manifacturers.Bluebrixx Pro sets usually use XingbaoBluebrixx Specials use Qunlongboth of the later ones should generally be decent
>>11237865>>11237863>>11237850And another thing, the bags the bricks come in are generally not neatly ordered like you might expect from lego, so its best to sort them well before you build.
>>11237863>>11237865>>11237867Thanks a lot. What about chinese brands, is there any place I can find any info on them?Like picrel is 2000pcs for $20, the quality SHOULD be shit, right?
>>11237850>What's the catch? How's the build quality?See>>11235688along with the fact that some builds can be rather... questionable.Built the Comet from Captain Future and the Viper from Galactica and well, even their own site flat out says that the radars on the sides of the Comet aren't particularly stable but it's good enough for a pure display model in their eyes.Worst part, however, was the tiny Professor Simon sidebuild.Having the handcuffs moulded in hard plastic just feels wrong and how the 1x1 studs with bar attached to the clips on the side made it through QC is beyond me because that shit is only connected by like a micrometer
one thing i really dont like about alt brick sets is that their designs are all over the place. the same company will shit out expert-done designs and a MOC made by a grade schooler at the same line. Sluban and Cobi are the worst offenders in this. also, most of their sets look more like display pieces than playsets. not that Lego is any better, but at least City, Friends, and Ninjago are playable.
goodamit china you can't do this to me
>>11238184CoC looking playset
>>11237869Nah. At worst, you'll get a few missing pieces which is common among these non-Lego brands.
>>11228307Because they don't make actual toys, this set (and presumably their others) is a model for manchildren who are a small demographic.
>>11237816that's really cool. but seems kinda pricey. Need to think about it.
>>11228318fpbp. Could apply this to so many more things.
>>11238624This is also a problem with Lego, and complaining about man children on this board it absurd, in fact I would argue that the displayfag AFOLs are different and worse to true man children, but I agree, the biggest problem with alt brands is that essentially none of them do actual sets designed around play, which should mostly be on the smaller side. Tragically Lego only does these for licenseslop like Star Wars and pseudolicenseslop like Ninjago and Dreamzzz. As an example of the alt brand problem we have >>11237816. This things looks like it would be huge even compared to the massive lion knight castle, completely impractical.However there are large and modular-type sets that are still fun sets like the Kristy krab one ITT or the OP>b-but modular buildings are for AFOLs only!This isn’t true and if you think it’s true you must never have had any rich friends as a kid, kids often really like the huge sets, I never had any then because my family couldn’t afford them and now I’ve got no place that I would keep them but my friends had and played with the early modular buildings.There needs to be competitors for Lego that produce small-medium classic style sets
>>11238206Affirmative!
>>11228307location, location, locationThey aren't available on the same store shelves as lego, so of course they're going to be less popular.
>>11239569And also natural bias. I saw a couple of not-Lego sets at a local store that sells to off-brand stuff a couple years ago. Seeing them as off-brand knock-offs made me turn away, thinking they're probably not as secure. Funny enough, rewatching the first Lego movie actually made me curious enough to waltz into the store because actually buying Lego sets to turn into OC builds feels like wasting a good chunk of money.
