[saturdaysaint]

I agree. It feels like most Lego sets on the market have several major/foundational pieces which are essentially useless outside of the model they're built for - some huge chunk of molded plastic. A big part of the joy of Lego sets in the past was that they showed you what was possible with these unassuming bricks. Sure, any big/intricate set would have some funny pieces, but they would mostly lend themselves to many forms of re-use that even a 10-year old could easily figure out. My 4 year-old has had a great time with Duplos, but I'm sort of leary about transitioning to Legos because to me, they've become more emblematic of consumerist collecting than creativity.

[tablespoon]

> It feels like most Lego sets on the market have several major/foundational pieces which are essentially useless outside of the model they're built for - some huge chunk of molded plastic.

Do you have an example of a one of those pieces?

I haven't had a Lego set in decades, but I do recall feeling that the ratio of fiddly pieces vs "foundational" pieces getting out of whack towards the end of my time with them. When my kids get old enough I suppose I'm going to have to get them one of those "classic" sets, because I'm not sure they'll be able to get enough by just collecting regular sets.

[saturdaysaint]

I feel like almost any new kit I look at is composed of big specially-molded bricks that would seem really odd and difficult to find a use for if they were deconstructed in a big box of bricks. Maybe I'm misremembering or am being too harsh on the newer kits, but I feel like the Lego sets I grew up with in the 80's and 90's were more reusable. I had the sense that every Lego kit I bought was also giving me cool new tools to build bigger/wilder spaceships and trucks, whereas these just look like a nice weekend project with no application thereafter.

https://www.amazon.com/LEGO-Legendary-Mountain-Awesome-Build...

https://www.amazon.com/LEGO-Creator-Adventure-Building-Creat...

https://www.amazon.com/LEGO-Champions-McLaren-Building-Piece...

[paavohtl]

All I'm seeing in these sets is mostly standard pieces, possibly with custom prints or stickers. The waterfall pieces might be entirely custom, but pretty much everything else is something you find in a lot of sets. Most things are made from small & reusable pieces like before, but there are just more kinds of bricks and they are assembled more creatively (especially in more expensive sets like the Creator Expert sets).

[tablespoon]

> The waterfall pieces might be entirely custom, but pretty much everything else is something you find in a lot of sets.

And stuff like that isn't new. I remember I had a "castle" set that had these wall-with-window pieces [1], which were kind of similar. You could still use them creatively. Also that waterfall set has a lot of pieces that would be good for building stuff like spaceships or planes.

[1] https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=4444...

[specialist]

The older pieces fell out of copyright. So Lego differentiated by making new peices, to stay ahead of the knockoffs.

At least that was my understanding in the mid-90s, when I worked in the toy industry.

I'm still conflicted about it. Though I can't deny the creativity on display at any LUG or brickcon, I greatly miss the simplicity. I own too much Lego and I've given up trying to rationally organize loose peices.

[tspike]

This article is due for a refresh, but it's still relevant on this topic: http://www.realityprose.com/what-happened-with-lego/

[shp0ngle]

They still sell the unassuming legos? And they are quite cheap (compared to the branded ones) and still quite popular

[andai]

Are you referring to the Chinese clones?

[mcphage]

Not the OP, but they're probably referring to the Classic sets: https://www.amazon.com/LEGO-Classic-Medium-Creative-Brick/dp... which exist in any possible size, full of bog standard bricks. There's also a large line of 3-in-1 sets, which have the instructions for 3 different models, all using the same set of bricks.