Lego Castle's "Nostalgia Bait" Problem (ft. Goldfyre)

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[@SilverRiMiX]

I miss the fantasy era of Castle. Not because I grew up with it, but because it was the most creative due to its unique factions, crazy and interesting sets, a clear hero vs villain dichotomy that made play very fun, and a lot of unique play features and storylines included in even the small sets. I wish lego would release more Castle sets with fantasy factions and settings. I would love them to be at a reasonable price as well as a couple large display pieces. But, if I had to choose one, I'd choose reasonably priced playsets.

[@pinobluevogel6458]

I think you hit the nail on the head as for choosing the playsets. Ofcourse nobody minds great display sets, but we can certainly build our own castles, or we can buy them from great Moc builders. We cannot however, print minifigure parts or unique accessories to enrich the medieval setting. Also, we cannot get new younger castle fans, if they don't make exciting affordable playsets for kids.

[@hanzocloud]

I miss fantasy era too, as well as kingdoms that followed and last but not least I also miss black knights bcoz I grew up with that

[@thomasgolds4585]

It’s good to hear someone who isn’t biased say what I believe. I grew up with them so I always wonder if my love is rooted in nostalgia.

[@thomasgolds4585]

It’s good to hear someone who isn’t biased say what I believe. I grew up with them so I always wonder if my love is rooted in nostalgia!

[@matthewneuendorf5763]

To be fair to Lego, "loud" colors are historically authentic. Medieval people loved their colors. I've been advocating for a double-headed eagle faction since I started following Lego Castle KZbinrs (make it a gold eagle on a dark red background). It could be based on the medieval Romans for aesthetic, with lamellar, maces, dark red, and ideally modular fortifications. I'd love to see designs based on the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople, with sand stonework and dark red brick layers rather than light blay. Modular fortifications would drive the prices down for individual sections, while allowing people who want to do it to build extensive fortification sections. You could have ditch-and-rampart, low wall, medium wall, high wall, round towers, square towers, hex towers, gates, bridges, all kinds of civilian stuff that could all link together in a flexible way.

[@arbitrary2868]

I would sell my kidney for a faction based off of medieval Prussia, with the black eagle (be it with one head or two, crowned or not) on a knight with white as their primary color.

[@lukascermak4011]

Yeah... I think the Hollywood made most people think through a grey filter at the Middle Ages + other myths like education and cleanliness. Still waiting for a castle to include painted/colorful inner walls.

[@pixelfille3130]

​@@arbitrary2868i mean tecnically prussia wasnt the same thing as the one you think of. The prussia with an eagle began to first exist in the early 1700s iirc While the medieval prussians were a group of pagans in the baltic like the lithuanians and the estonians, while the group that conquered the area was the teutonic order who had white cloth with black crosses on their armour who later kind of evolved into the country of prussia in the 1700s

[@arbitrary2868]

​@@pixelfille3130 So a couple hundred years late to the medieval party. Dang. Well, it would still be cool to see a faction that utilizes that iconography.

[@klerengarcia6482]

We need a battle pack with 3 knights and 1 peasant

[@pinobluevogel6458]

Or a battlepack with 3 peasants and 1 knight :)

[@pinobluevogel6458]

@@simonmatrix That kinda value would get minifigures back to a reasonable price on the aftermarket.

[@jay.t495]

They need to make new castle themes along with battle packs to make them affordable like they do with the Star Wars lines. Castle aftermarket prices are ridiculous

[@pinobluevogel6458]

Yes they need to make smaller sets, possibly including battlepacks .. but the pricepoint that starwars goes at, is just too much. Keep in mind that they pay for the Star wars brand too, while Medieval lego can be produced without it, so they should be way cheaper.

[@medievalchameleon102]

It’s still ok, but slowly it’s turning into the Lego Star Wars situation.

[@glassesstapler]

they are not making it possible to create a real castle theme for this generation because they don't have the spectrum of price points for the castle sets. They should have battle packs below 20, small scenes for below 40, medium for 60 and so on. Lego are behaving like they have a bunch of accountants running the show without a clear understanding of branding!

[@marijn8057]

I really hope a new castle theme is coming to get kids interested in lego castle, otherwise the lego castle community will die at some point in the future, because the only people I know who are interested in lego castle grew up with lego castle sets when they were kids.

[@pinobluevogel6458]

This all starts with kids. Given the popularity of Star Wars, Marvel, Ninjago or Harry Potter slowly trending downward, Lego needs some themes to replace these with.

[@bbb462cid]

The thumbnail pic made me smile. The "old" image is in fact not the first iteration on the Castle minifigs.

[@NeoSephirothVal]

Also I am indeed a child of the 80s and love the lion and falcon knights, I would love to see crusaders with their silver chainmails, white clothing with a red cross on it.^^ And indeed we need castle back as a play theme, not only for collectors.

[@user-tn6pu1gf9o]

In a perfect world we have D&D for the fantasy side and castle (Kraken and Raven or Fox) for the more "LEGO realistic" side.

[@ClassicStudStudios]

I mean, lego castle has wizards and stuff, and they literally made Basil canonically a vampire now soooo…I don’t know if splitting it into “fantasy and realistic” is really needed, especially when a lot of people choose to simply keep or get rid of the fantasy elements

[@TheHumanfly3000]

It should be a blend of both with a twist. Smaller accessible sets with larger flagship Castles with the build quality they have now

[@Randuman908]

Loud and obnoxious colors were a staple during the medieval era lol

[@TX_Blake]

Nice collab. As an OG 80’s castle fan, I agree on all points. Let’s get some new, affordable stuff!

[@bbb462cid]

But OG would be 1978 Word

[@TX_Blake]

@@bbb462cid sort of. The classic Castle line was available until 1981 and that’s when I got into it with 6083. Nice try though homie.

[@bbb462cid]

@@TX_Blake coming late to the party never made anyone Original, you gangsta

[@TX_Blake]

@@bbb462cid so you’re trying to scoreboard me on 40+ year old Lego? Interesting. What are you getting out of this interaction? Genuinely curious.

[@bbb462cid]

@@TX_Blake All I did was tell you when it came out. You decided to bring it up a notch by calling me "homie". You could have said ":shit I forget that" But instead you're being an asshole. I'm not the first to observe this, I'd wager.

[@MNeuenswander]

I have no problem with a rehash here and there but really need alternative torsos. You look back at old factions (black knights, forestmen, dragon masters, etc.) with 4+ torsos. Now we get 1 per faction (ok 2 for Lion knights)

[@kunu1990]

I love the colorful factions! Brings life to the sets and MOC's. Mixing new retro factions with new factions I think is the best option. But overall we NEED affordable wave for castle fans young and old

[@BlueDragonBricks]

I truly believe that Lego will make the Griffins and Krakens into an official theme, I mean they obviously worked hard on making the graphic art for both factions. But also remakes are working fine for now as well, I mean for new fans of Lego Castle, the remakes are like new factions. But above all: LEGO PLEASE MAKE A CASTLE SET UNDER $50 THAT ISN'T A GWP.

[@fascinatingfaux811]

The only cheap army buildable factions are the Lion Knights, Black Falcons, and MAYBE Forestmen. We need more accessible factions.

[@QT5656]

Lots of good points. I'd like to see some new undead army sets but other knight or even orc factions would be great too.

[@SilverRiMiX]

Amen! All of the changes presented are necessary.

[@_fatalruin]

I couldn't disagree more. Lego drove the theme (and space) into the ground because they kept making new factions and sub-themes that were increasingly goofy. They should have just focused on better and more sets. 20 existing factions are plenty going forward. I agree that they need to expand Wolf Pack, and need to reintroduce the Black Knights (hell, even the Green Dragon Knights would be awesome). Personally, I would throw all the fantasy themes in the trash or at least keep them completely separate.

[@richardbrown5057]

Love the idea of a medieval theme. Combine pirates, castle, vikings etc. I would love if they did an Icons remake of a Black Knights castle, then do a new Medieval cast for the Gryphons with a Kraken ship. Give me the nostalgia and get the new juices flowing.

[@pinobluevogel6458]

To be entirely fair, even as someone that grew up with the older factions, you can still want new ones to be made. In fact I'm interested in (almost) every faction I do not yet own, including the more isolated one-off minifigure factions like Bear Knights and Raven Knights. Not to army build, but to have at least a moderate amount so I can build something and populate it with figs. Having more diversity, even in the non-faction civilian population, is essential. I don't want any more Lion Knights, nor do I really need any more Black Falcons, I have more than I can use anyways and the only new ones I would add are custom ones that I've designed myself or completely new figures that offer somewhat of a unique take, like the Falconer CMF for example. I don't think the majority of Castle fans want much more of these factions, as if they did, they've had plenty of time to build a massive PAB army, potentially customized with some older specialized minifigure parts and accessories from Bricklink or elsewhere.

[@MrSaturn012]

If anything I find the new Lion Knight designs to be too toned DOWN. Once you get used to obnoxious color schemes, anything less becomes quite drab. Woodsmen still look goofy regardless though.

[@fritz5940]

I wish i could have more specific filters on pick a brick so that i can more easily narrow it all down

[@kylethisismylastname6737]

The Lion Knight color scheme seems jarring because we've become accustomed to dark gritty color schemes for medieval armors and flags based on things like Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings. The jarring color scheme of the Lion knights would be far more accurate historically to what medieval knights would have looked like. That being said, I'm totally with you guys on wanting new factions. A seafaring themed Kraken kingdom would be so cool

[@zenonx1]

I would love to see a new wave of castle instead of big expensive sets

[@OaktownBricks]

Great Video! I’m an AFOL who would love to buy LEGO Castle Sets but can’t because the barrier of entry is too high!

[@docnecrotic]

A few things. I don't mind garish colors too much... at least within reason. Even the dorky Royal Knights remake of the Crusaders, fine enough by me. Making castle muddy just doesn't feel authentic to either history or lego's roots. If you want Warhammer Fantasy, that's fine, but there's room for different pallets. Also, I'm here for accessibility. Adding Raven Knights alone to PaB would be huge! I've wanted to make a MOC out of them, but I don't want to drop 150 - 200 dollars to get a satisfying amount of them to populate a keep or tower. For the question, I'd prefer a cheaper castle theme. Maybe have some crossover instructions on the web or an app, so you can make a massive castle by combining them. That's the best of both worlds!

[@beyondlego97]

This was a pretty good video. I'm just got into Castle again which used to be my favorite theme when I was growing up, and I missed out on a lot of things for having star wars tunnel vision lol I wish we had the fantasy era back... I have been making videos about army building and such and I'm loving every second.

[@pnwmtb7332]

im a 15 year old and im obsessed with lego castle ive bought all of the sets excluding the gwp's and the viking village, i love all of the sets and the nostalgia factor doesnt bother me because i simply dont have nostalgia for it but still think they're cool. i would love to see some fantasy era castle like trolls, maybe they could make an elves faction, that would be super cool. also viking village is coming soon i ordered it yayyy.

[@Jax_4499]

I might be wrong but I feel as if castle especially rn has a larger fan base than space, but they are really putting out a lot of space stuff rn. If we got anything even close to what space got I would be happy for a couple of years tbh

[@crisisOstrich]

The only thing i dont like about the new Lion Knights is the color match fail on the leg printing

[@Nightlordbuilds]

I need more Fright Knights

[@octav1600]

While I do agree that lego could (and should) do new factions, I find it imperative that they remake all the old ones. And I'd rather them remake the old factions first (we know they work, they have a thematic tie in and are generic enough to do fantasy or non fantasy things with them). Reasons: - vintage sets are expensive as sin - vintage minifigs are simple (they looked great back then, but would look out of place now with the newer style) - they started this string of remakes, and I for one really like a good thing that has a start and end to it (not just some random sets that have no cohesion - even with the remakes they are failing at cohesion, so they would need to work on that a bit ... from the no stickers Lions Knights Castle with so many special pieces, flags, bardings, etc to the Medieval Town square that has all of the stickers, little innovative pieces, modern looking colors, and so on, and the Creator Castle that is just too simplistic when set next to these 2 sets - good parts pack though) This being said, tehre is not much they need to remake. They would need to remake the Black Knights Castle (the one on the raised baseplate) - and they could even have a creator 3 in 1 tie in black castle remaking the other black knights Castle - and make it modular to fit itself around the raised baseplate remake castle. They need to do some black forest remake (not even a big set to be honest - mostly for the minifigs and some fancy shield that is slightly off from the forestmen), the bulls - a siege engine / camp set, the dragon knights - and for the love of lego, they need to remake the dragon piece as well. The Frightknights would warrant a remake as well, maybe a ruined castle / manor with a graveyard and remake of the normal soldiers. They could extend these releases with 1 every year or one every 2 years, and this will keep the pieces for the Bricklink program fresh as well and add some new elements to each if needed / wanted - like a necromancy element to the Frightknights and Willa the Witch. What they really need to do now is make variations on the torsos, shields and flags for these factions. While having all soldiers look the same sounds fun, I'd rather have some variation. They did it so well with the falcon knights - the CMF, the normal falcon knight and the red cape silver falcon. They did some of this with the lion knights as well, with a separate torso for the queen - easily made a special knight torso, if you dress the queen in something less battle focused, and the shield variations. They have at the moment 2 original remake shields, one that combines them both and the new shield painter shield (that seems to me more like a royal knights remake). This would also be a good place tro bring up the Royal knights. While I love them, LEGO needs to keep designs consistent, and their shield looked like a disney lion ... The new royal knights must be something similar enough to the lion knights or even a subfaction of them so they are usable. These minifigs could be peppered in battlepacks and even the larger sets (like the medieval town square having 1 lion knight), and once these are done - or even while re-doing them, they can start the real work of implementing a MEDIEVAL series , just like what they did with SPACE this year. One can only hope there is someone at LEGO continuing the good work.

[@MichaeldeSousaCruz]

Good video. Thought provoking! This is how I see it: (1) I think Lego should only release new Castle CMFs, old and new factions, maybe a new faction each year. We just need the minifigs. (2) All parts for castle minifigs should be made available on pick a brick, and easy to find the whole collection for a faction with one click. (3) it sounds nice to have a starter set at say $10/$15 dollars, but it always falls short in satisfaction. In the end you’ll want a larger, more detailed build, which costs more in the end. Lego should concentrate on minifigs for Castle. (4) we have to be honest, Sar Warts, Bored of the Rings and Hairy Pothead are the main drivers of Lego now, not Castle, and we should appreciate that, because without those themes Lego would have gone bust. I don’t like any of those themes myself, BUT I love their parts!! I get one of those sets, rip it open and immediately begin to sort out the pieces to use for my own builds. Kingdoms is what got me back into Lego in 2012. Good design and colors, nice minifigs. Every iteration of Lion knight has been a villain in my world 😂 can’t stand them, any of them! I’m a Black Eagle (they’re not Falcons), Forestmen, Wolfpack, Vikings, Snow Guardian, and Bat Lord (just the bat lord, not the rest of the fright knights) fan.

[@pinobluevogel6458]

1. While it would certainly help to have more minifigures introduced through CMF's, I'm not a huge fan of the concept or even the execution of these. These last 'space' CMF's I found to be horrible. All but maybe one or two just don't look great. If that is the quality they intend to produce Castle CMF's at, I would be against this method. Another problem is the insanely short time of availability. You have a few months and then if you miss it, you need to pay 2, 3 or even 5 times the price on the aftermarket for just 1 figure. That is just crazy. Even for someone like me that only uses small quantities of certain factions for a build or a moc, that is just way too much to spend on one small aspect of the build. Imagine if you want to do some serious armybuilding, then paying 20 dollars for a single figure is completely unaffordable. 2. The issue with PAB is that it is a rotating system. As much as I want permanent availability to be a thing for anything castle related and even for regular parts, that is just not feasible. The main way to circumvent this is quantity. If more than enough is out there to saturate the market, you should be able to get anything from the aftermarket at a reasonable price. If lego then sees that certain individual parts or figures are getting too expensive, they can decide to do a reprint at some point. But the main way to get enough parts out there is sets, the PAB wall in the stores and the PAB online service, not just any one of them, but all of them. 3. As someone that almost never kept anything intact that I bought, I can understand the reasoning behind this. But without the set to begin with, you usually are not going to go for your own version of it. Your collection of parts has to start somewhere, even the idea for a larger build has to start from somewhere. For most people, it is extremely hard to envision something and just ordering parts alone. 4. I highly dislike Star wars, don't care about Harry Potter and would collect LOTR only if it was affordable, but you are overestimating the current popularity of these in comparison to other themes and just regular Lego builds. The vast majority of people that own lego just have a few Lego flowers and a brickbuilt animal, or some modular buildings or christmas themed snow sets.

[@MichaeldeSousaCruz]

@@pinobluevogel6458 thanks for the reply and adding more thought to my plate 🍽️ 🍻 1. With the CMFs we could get variety quickly of different factions. I agree not all CMFs are good, but that’s just my opinion. Army building always saddens me. Seeing 100s or a 1000 minifigs in someone’s MOC all lined up in formation just makes me sad. I build smaller sets, just looking for 4 or 5 to live in the set. 2. PAB should have all castle factions available, no discontinuation, no retiring. 3. You can use Hairy Pothead and Bored of the Rings sets for collecting a base of parts to start building or modifying. Then add castle minifigs from CMF or PAB.

[@pinobluevogel6458]

@@MichaeldeSousaCruz Thanks for provoking the thought. I was actually only planning answering to your CMF point, but it spiraled into the whole list. 1. Exactly! Having CMF figures adds more different parts out there. We are kind of the same in that I do no armybuilding either. As an example, I made a viking ship to go with the viking village set. Since my ship has both sails and oars for rowing, I needed at least enough vikings to crew the boat so each of the 8 spots were filled, with a viking at the helm and at the front. Throw in a Husky dog for good measure and that's all the minifigures needed. Now this is quite a lot for a mid-sized boat, but now I also have more than enough to use in the village and whatever I am going to add to it. 2. I would love this, really. I just don't see lego doing this. It would greatly help castle builders though. (even armybuilders) 3. Precisely. I had quite a bunch of Harry Potter lego from old collections that I took over, a lot of the basic pieces are now somehwere in my mocs. Lots of sand colored (tan) and brown. Could you give an example of what you have built, since you say you build smaller mocs?

[@medievalchameleon102]

@@pinobluevogel6458 bro wrote a whole 4 paragraph essay about plastic toys

[@williamharris1890]

I like the crusader knights a lot, I don’t care much for any of the other Lion crests much though and I do think they’ve well over used it. My biggest issue with Lego is no small medieval sets for kids and I think it is harming lego in the long run, as y’all have stated. For myself growing up without the 50 dollar and under sets, I would have never started buying Lego as an adult later on

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

2:47 No because the lion kight's castle is the halo set of the theme always has been. So haveing a new kingdom be the new halo would come off to casle fans the same as Rey did for star wars fans.

[@Dreadwolf3155]

would so love to see 6086 get the el dorado fortress treatment along with some sets for new factions to battle them

[@Jax_4499]

Yall think the torso and legs from the prize machine make it to PaB?

[@kingpunis3492]

Great video!

[@BB2O2]

Thanks for watching!

[@legoman2313]

Unfortunately it’s just a money issue, it’s just like you said, why can’t Lego make new factions and new battle packs to get castle or medieval theme rolling in strong. I think Lego nowadays is just too corporate and committee that they are too calculated in how they produce new stuff. It’s so difficult to get Lego to take a risk nowadays like how they used too in the early 2000s to mid 2010s

[@Dreadwolf3155]

regardin gyour question, if i have to pick.....new theme

[@BobJedi]

I think the hard part of this is drawing in the kids and younger folk. You have the older of the young people (people that are in their early 20s right now) that were like 5-10 years old when they saw LOTR and Harry potter stuff. Obviously with the flood of harry potter, and now LOTR coming back you are going to have some stiff competition to get Lego to put out battle packs and smaller sets for castle. Star wars also competes in this area for the $ but is a different theme for sure. That said I think castle themed things is more niche these days and hard to get the attention of those younger folks. There just isn't any social media, movies, or entertainment right now to draw them in. 80s castle had the Excalibur movie. I don't really see what the younger folk would be watching to get into castle lego.

[@Overlordbb8]

Fantasy sells, I mean the issue for LOTR is that there is nothing for younger people to want from it. Fantasy/Medieval is popular with kids, I mean most kids play with that type of thing. I think it will do well but we have to see if Lego will actually do it. Which I’m half half on.

[@isaacschiel2112]

Kingdoms is the goat for me too.

[@criminalmind27]

people have to start puting their opinions out like youre doing.. i also have something in the back of my mind telling me that theres is something wrong with what lego is doing.. it doesnt cut it for me

[@KNIGHT_And_BEEZY]

Oooooooooh!

[@bruceismyhero]

The reason Lego has leaned so hard into the castle nostalgia market is because the 2013 castle line failed. And it was an awful theme and deserved to fail, but it has made Lego afraid to market smaller, more affordable castle sets to kids (ostensibly the intended audience) in fact, they know their audience are fans from the 80s and 90s who grew up with the classic factions. I think the lesson here, though, is that just like everything else, the nostalgia market evolves over time. We're already seeing an increased interest in the Viking theme; how long until nostalgia for the fantasy era comes into vogue? That theme turns 20 in 3 short years and the CMF orc was huge among fans. So I think you're right about needing new factions and smaller sets, but maybe for different reasons.

[@barbarian3946]

Stop hating on the lion knights, they're cool

[@gregleuze6657]

Lego is not catching on. All of you thoughts make sense to me. Why not take battle packs for Castle? Battle packs seem like a no brainer for this theme. I wouldn’t mind a rerelease of the original factions but I am just showing my age with that request. New factions seem like a great idea and sets at different price points seem logical as well. I could buy some of the less expensive sets for my children which will create future fans of the theme. My children like the minifigures and the animals and they create their own dwellings to fit the stories they create. I enjoy watching this play as it is really creative and I enjoy watching them play together.

[@RalphPL]

Lion Knights haters! :P

[@justinmsc5]

We have to accept that Castle/Medieval is now a very niche theme. Lego has no confidence or reason to roll the dice on a theme that's been repeatedly unprofitable, when they make consistent easy money with their other kid-focused themes like Ninjago and City. At least for now. Maybe one day this stuff will be popular with kids again, but until then you're just asking a profit driven company to make less profit. Theres absolutely no reason to make a whole wave of sets for collectors. You can package an entire wave into one box to save costs and force collectors to buy it all. Ever notice these big sets are roughly the price of an entire wave of kids sets?

[@filippoargonauti1488]

Lego is just lazy and greedy they must stop realising huge expensive set! Castle theme has to come back and to stay to change new factions every year or 2! Damn lazy Lego!!! Instead we get stupid dreamz; minecraft super heros and many other garbage theme!!! 🤬