Lego Dimensions cost analysis

Before we begin here, let's get a couple of things out of the way.  First, I'm postponing my usual scheduled post about one of my Lego city buildings, as I've been fairly busy lately with traveling and social commitments.

Second, if you are no planning to buy Lego Dimensions for a game console, then you can buy whatever Lego sets you want.  I'm just trying to help you save money if you ensure that you can access all the game content available.

First, let's start with the minimum purchase to get entry into all the worlds.  There are 14 areas of the game to explorer beyond the storyline set of levels.  You get access to DC Comics, Lord of the Rings, and the LEGO movie with the starter pack, so you only need 11 more sets.

Pro tip: keep an eye on the ads from your local newspaper or online.  Starter Packs with the game disc, base, Gandalf, Wyldstyle, Batman, and the Batmobile, will run you $80-90 at MSRP, but you can luck out to save a few bucks.  My wife and I lucked out and got the Wii U Starter Pack for less than $33 thanks to a Target sale and the reported price on their website.

After you have the Starter Pack, let's look at the worlds where you only have one set available to get access.  Jurassic World, Portal 2, Scooby-Doo, Midway Arcade, and The Wizard of Oz, Only give you one option, so let's pick those up:

• 71235 Midway Arcade Level Pack
• 71203 Portal 2 Level Pack
• 71205 Jurassic World Team Pack
• 71206 Scooby-Doo! Team Pack
• 71221 Wicked Witch Fun Pack

Level Packs are $29.99, Team Packs are $24.99, and Fun Packs are $11.99.  With these first five purchases, You're already on the hook for $121.95.  I'm not including the Starter Pack in the total financial commitment totals because, of course, if you don't have the Starter Pack and you're just buying Lego's, then you don't need this guide.

We now have access to eight worlds.  There are six more to go, so we'll start looking at minimum purchases.  We can do this with Fun Packs, so we'll calculate our new total now.  $121.95 + (6 * 11.99) = $193.89.

The next question we much ask ourselves is which fun packs to buy.  There are 43 unique character abilities, so we'll look at those characters with unique abilities or have multiple abilities.  I won't got into the details, but here's who I recommend:

• Back to the Future: 71230 Doc Brown Fun Pack (Drone, Fix-It, Hacking, Tech nology)
• The Simpsons: 71227 Krusty the Clown Fun Pack (Growth, Hazard Cleaner)
• Ninjago: 71234 Sensei Wu Fun Pack (Pole Vault, Spinjitzu)
• Legends of Chima: 71222 Laval Fun Pack (CHI, Laser Deflector, Sonar Smash)
• Doctor Who: 71238 Cyberman Fun Pack (X-Ray Vision)
• Ghostbusters: 71241 Slimer Fun Pack (Hazard Protection, Mini Access)

With these six additional Fun Packs, I get to use 37 abilities.  I'm still missing Atlantis, Big Transform, Drill, Freeze Breath, Rainbow LEGO Objects, and Suspend Ghost).  In these instances, I'd use the in-game Hire a Hero function to bring in someone to take care of these tasks.

Please note, I have not taken any vehicle abilities into account yet.  While I was compiling my numbers, I discovered the first Batmobile upgrade will give you the ability to Sonar Smash, which scratches out one reason to get Laval.  I don't know what other upgrades will take care of missing skillsets, but I'll keep you up to date as I progress down the line here.

If you wish to follow my path and you discover something I haven't, please leave a comment below and I'll verify that.  I've already bought the Wicked Witch and Doc Brown, so I can get into 5 of the 14 worlds now.  I'm keeping my eyes open for deals on additional game content packs.  Once I finish up my list, I'll let you know how much I ended up spending and what further abilities I gain with all the vehicles.

Start saving up, kiddos.  You're going to need about $300 to get everything in every Lego Dimension.

Seaside Cottage

The second piece in my series of Lake Shore posts cover the Seaside Cottage.  Lego calls it a Seaside House, but cottage sounds a little more intimate.

The Seaside Cottage

As I stated before, I was going to put some of these shoreline houses on the ocean before I decided to develop a lake shore area.  I'm tempted to take this set back to the ocean, as it is a SEAside house.

Left and right views of the Seaside Cottage

Right now, I have this set on a blue baseplate.  Now that Lego no longer sells blue baseplates, I'm thinking about moving this and all my other lake shore buildings onto sand baseplates, freeing up the blue ones for the ocean.  Of course, I'd have to pay $8 a piece for the new baseplates, but I'd only have to buy four or five of them, so it's not that bad.  But then I'd have to build upon the baseplate to put some water on it, maybe raise the buildings a bit...  I dunno.  I'd have to sit down and play with it to figure out what to do here.

Rear view of the Seaside Cottage

Sets used: 7346

Lego Haul - 5/14/16

Another day, another dollar...  To spend on Lego's of course.

My wife and I went to run some errands again this morning.  Groceries, Target, get myself a haircut.  You know, the usual.  And anytime we leave the house, we have to try to get some more Lego sets.

The Lego haul from 5/14/16

First, we visited Target to pick up some miscellaneous things.  We wandered over to the toy section, and again found Series 15 minifigures.  Since we were not in any rush, we started going through them to find Shark Suit Guy.  It's a good thing we did, as we found him on the second package we grabbed.  There were some debate if it was really him or not, but I felt the jagged teeth for the top part of his suit and his fin arms.  It might have taken us over three months, but we finally finished the set.

I then went to get a haircut, and afterwards, we headed into GameStop to find some Animal Crossing cards.  The sale associate told us that they were having a sale on all Lego Dimension products.  All Fun, Level, and Team Packs were 40% off, so we grabbed a 71230 Doc Brown Fun Pack.

71230 Doc Brown Fun Pack contents

We picked Doc Brown because he had four abilities that we'd need at some point, plus it'd allow us to go to the Back to the Future world.

I keep hoping Lego comes up with more Back to the Future sets.  I already have the DeLorean, but there is so much more they could do with it.  The clock tower, Cafe '80s, the train, any one of a number of Tannen minifigures...  They're sitting on a gold mine.

Shark Suit Guy, the time traveling train, and Doc Brown

I am planning to get more Lego Dimensions add-on sets in the coming weeks and months.  I'll be writing a cost analysis report for the entire series of Lego Dimensions products, in case you're interested in getting a few of them for yourself.  Yay MBA degree knowledge!!

Lego Haul - 5/8/15

This past weekend, my wife and I were on the clock with a number of appointments and time sensitive activities.  It was quite stressful running around town, but I'm glad we did it.

On Sunday, we went to the Minneapolis Wizard World Comic Con to meet the cast of Grimm.  My wife got me hooked on that show a few years ago, so we had to get our picture taken with the actors who play Captain Sean Renard, Juliette Silverton/Eve, and Nick Burkhardt.  It was pretty cool to see all of them in person.  We didn't get much of a chance to talk to them, and we would have like to see a few others, like the guys who play Monroe and Sgt. Wu.

But you're not here to read about meeting the actors from my favorite science fiction and fantasy television shows.  You wanna know what Lego sets I bought.  Fine, I'll tell you.

The Lego haul from 5/8/16

After Comic Con, we went to the downtown Target in Minneapolis to pick up some household items and a Lego Dimensions Fun Pack.  Through our first few days of playing Lego Dimensions, we learned that it was quite similar to Lego Marvel Super Heroes, but with a few key differences.  We needed to either hire characters in-game to address certain tasks or get the actual physical characters so we can play as them.  When you buy the physical minifigures, you can also unlock additional worlds.

We decided to open Pandora's box and get the 71221 Lego Dimensions Wicked Witch Fun Pack.  Even if you don't have Lego Dimensions, I recommend getting some fun packs.  You can play with the minifigures, use the extra pieces to build something, and maybe even finish out a collection of minifigures.  The Wicked Witch seemed like an obvious place to start, since there is no Wizard of Oz Lego sets, so I wouldn't be doubled up on Wicked Witches.  She also has the power to blow up silver items in-game, like some storage tanks we came across in the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant.

The Wicked Witch Fun Pack also has a Flying Monkey that can be used as a vehicle.  Not sure how that's going to help, especially since the instructions didn't tell me how to put it together.  You get those in-game.  I'd post a picture of the contents of this set, but for some reason Google wants to rotate it 90 degrees clockwise.

71221 Lego Dimensions Wicked Witch Fun Pack

As is always the case when we go to Target, we have to see what they have for Lego sets.  We finally found more Lego Series 15 minifigures.  I needed 7 more to finish the set, and we got six of them.  We found the Queen, the Astronaut, the Jewel Thief, the Janitor, the Flying Warrior, and the Faun (or as I like to call him, Goat Boy).  I just need a Shark Suit Guy to finish off the collection.

The Wicked Witch Fun Pack and Series 15 Minifigures

Although I felt pretty run down after everything we did this weekend, it was well worth it.  It always is when you get new Lego sets.

Lego Haul - 5/2/16

My wife and I took Monday off of work to run some errands.  We visited Paisley Park to check out the makeshift memorial to Prince.  We saw the movie Keanu, starting Key and Peele.  And we did some shopping at the Mall of America and Target.

The Lego haul from 5/2/16

Lego officially released the new Disney minifigures on the 1st, so we had to get them.  My wife is a huge Disney fan, so it's safe to say that she wanted the minifigures more than I did.  We were so excited to open them all up that I didn't even bother to take pictures of my haul before we started rifling through all the contents.

Our first purchase from the Lego store was fairly successful, as we got 15 of the 18 minifigures.  We had 2 extra Donald Ducks and 1 extra Genie of the Lamp, and we were missing Captain Hook, Aladdin, Daisy Duck.  I burned through most of my Lego gift card to get them, as I had been saving it for a special occasion like this.

The Lego Disney Minifigures

After the movie, we went back to the Lego store again and were able to find the three minifigures we needed to complete the set.  My wife decided to keep one Donald for herself and set it on her desk at work.  I'll probably give the other extra Donald and the extra Genie to my nephew at Christmas.

At Target, we bought a Lego Dimensions starter pack for Nintendo Wii U.  Target had them on sale for half off, so we had to get one.  My wife and I have had lots of fun playing Lego Marvel Super Heroes, and we nearly completed all the tasks in that game.  She's been itching to get a Lego Marvel Avengers, but since Dimensions was cheaper (especially after I was able to get it at only $32.49, plus a 5% discount as a Target Red Card holder), we got it.

Lego Dimensions launch pad, fully assembled.

Our day off was a massive success.  We should do that more often.  Just take a day off during the work week to go and have some fun.  I highly recommend that you do it as well.  You don't even have to buy Lego's, but if you don't, why even bother taking the day off to begin with?

Lego Haul - 4/26/16

I just got the other half of my Lego order in the mail Tuesday.  These are the pieces I selected from the online Pick-A-Brick.  I ordered just enough bricks to bring my order up to $75 bucks, but I got a nice assortment of bricks to help me finish off a few buildings.

The bricks I got from Lego's online Pick-A-Brick

As I did with my previous haul of bricks, I'll run down the list of the buildings I will be using them for.

• Grocery Store: The white 2x12 plates and 2x4 plates are for the final layer of bricks for the store's walls.  The white 1x3 and 2x3 plates are for the dairy case, where the milk and orange juice is stored.  The green 1x6 plates filled in a gap in the back wall where the meat department is.  The brown 3x4 boxes will hold fruits and vegetables in the produce section.  With these pieces, I'm done with the building itself and most of the interior.  I just need to organize the bakery area and put in a shelf for processed products, like cereal and chips and such.
• Hardware Store: The 2 red and 1 brown buckets are for inventory, but I'm not sure where I want to put them yet.  I'm on the fence between putting them inside or outside.  The white 1x6 and 1x8 plates are for assembling a backboard for a basketball hoop.
• Hospital: The blue 2x4 plates will go to finish building the walls.  I just need more 2x6 and 2x8 plates to finish it off.
• Islanders: The three white 1x4 bricks are for the picnic tables.  This building is now complete.
• Marina Office: The dark stone grey 8x8 plate is another piece for the dock outside the Marina Office.  I still need 5 more to finish it off, then people can start renting boats to take out on the ocean.
• Pyramid Nightclub: The yellow 1x8 plate and 1x2x2 corner plate are for the walls inside the nightclub.  I built the DJ booth into the wall, so I used these plates to level things out.  I still need a 1x3 plate to finish it off.
• Watch Tower: The dark stone grey 4x8 and 6x8 plates are for the floors in the Watch Tower.  With the former, I finished off the second floor.
• Winter Cottage: The white 4x8 plate was the last one I needed to finish covering the yard with snow, so the kids can play outside.

I need some more parts from Lego's online Pick-A-Brick.  I didn't order a door for the Grocery Store's dairy case, because I mistakenly thought I had one already.  I really need to verify what I need before I order parts online, but oh well.  I had fun regardless while putting my parts together.