Category Archives: Halo Mega Bloks/Construx

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New York Comicon, then HFFL experience. Part 3: The Thursday War.

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Comicon, finally!

At this point it was about 10am. Not many people there yet and the con doesn’t officially start until 3pm. So I sat here in the lobby for 5 more hours…

I did have one 343 sighting. I ran into Sotaro Tojima (Sound Editor Extraodinaire!). I introduce myself and thank him graciously for his work on Halo 4 and can’t wait to talk with him again at the after party.

I run into “Mister Chief.”

I’m lucky enough to get into the right line that I’m in the Halo booth immediately after the con opens!

They were giving away this awesome shirt to the first 100 players:

Hmm, I may or may not have an extra one of these…if so, you may want to stay tuned for a contest that could possibly happen to win this, possibly…

Oh, I should make note that I got to play Slayer on Ragnarok. And hells yeah, I played with the Mantis! In it I destroyed another Mantis, a Banshee, 2 ghosts, and about 15 spartans. Yeah, it just KICKS THAT MUCH ASS! I never even noticed that the Scorpion was missing. Believe me, you won’t either. The Mantis moves fast. Much faster than the Scorpion. It’s dexterous. You can turn in it much easier than the tank. It won’t topple over when hit with heavy firepower. It won’t trip up if it goes over a cliff. It just falls straight down. Something to think about while using during gameplay. Does this vehicle get my approval? Um, Does a bear sh…er nevermind. HELL YEAH it does. I’m excited to play with this again!!!!!!

I’m a HUGE Iron Man fan, so when I saw this display I had to take a pic. (It’s actually two pics merged together as I didn’t have room to get it all in one shot.) The pathways were freakin’ narrow.

It’s only Thursday and I wanted to take it easy since I still had two more days of Convention to enjoy. So I hit the only other booth I really wanted to see that day. Mega Bloks! (Sorry for the fuzzy pics on some, sigh…)

Now here’s the thing…the Forward Unto Dawn set was supposed to have a blue Storm Elite now it has a Gold Elite General? I think that was a mistaken figure put up. But I’ll ask.

Interior work stations.

Cryo Tube bay

Fully stocked armory!

The cryo bay in the FuD set can also be purchased separately, though not with a light up Cortana.

Grr, my only shot of the Mega Bloks Mantis didn’t take well, but here it is anyway:

Believe me folks, that set is AWESOME! Some very cool unique parts. I got to “play” with it for a little bit.

I got to build something on the Mega Bloks build wall, so I chose my logo (albeit in the wrong colors and the colors I needed weren’t available):

I decided to hit one more booth. The Square Enix booth and found these:

These look great. Much better than the Reach figures. Chief (Halo 4 version) is available next year. I’m not collecting this line, but I WILL get Master Chief.

After this I meet up with a friend for a bit then head off to the hotel on Long Island that I’ll be staying at and so ends the first day of Comicon for me.

 

New York Comicon, then HFFL experience. Part 2 ” And we’re off!”

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So part two picks up on the day before New York Comicon (NYCC). Excited, I’m packing my bags, checking the list of things to bring, MANY times and pumping myself up for what I expect to be a fun, though exhausting experience. I’m on a shoestring budget though. So I had to plan accordingly. Tickets were $85 for 4 days. So how to get there? Airfare was out of the question, just too expensive, plus then there would have been an expensive cab ride from there into Manhattan. Train? Hmm, maybe. Ultimately I decided on going “Greyhound.” I haven’t been on a travel bus in a LONG time. Let me say, chances are it will be a LONG time again before I do so.

My bus is to leave at 10:30 Wednesday night. It’s an express from Pittsburgh to New York and will get there approximate at 6am. My wife takes me to the bus station, we say our ” I love yous” and I’m off to catch my bus.

I’m the first to board, yippee! I get to pick anywhere to sit. So I promptly go to the back. I figure I’ll be next to the bathroom, you know, just in case. Plus I won’t have anyone kicking my seat behind me. Okay, not too bad. Everyone else boards and we get going. Almost immediately I realize my mistake. I’m sitting on top of the rear wheels. Jes..Chr..jiminy cricket, holy freakin’ sh*( can I feel every bump in the road. I’m getting tossed around like a salad on a cooking show. It does settle down a little though once we get on the highway.

Now I recalled from years ago that the back seats were the ones to take because they used to be three seats next to each other thereby making it possible to sleep on your side with cushions underneath. Hmm, someone decided in the two decades or so since I had ridden a travel bus to change that. Now the window seat sat higher by about 3 inches, the middle seat was normal, and the third seat…NON EXISTENT! Damn. there was just a flat hard surface there. Somehow though, I make due. I prop my head and upper body on the window seat, have the seat belt buckle pushing into my side with most of my lower body and legs on the second chair. My lower legs and feet get to rest on the hard surface. This last for oh about two minutes as someone has to use the bathroom and my feet were resting on the door.

Yikes, this is going to be a painful trip in to New York. So I reposition myself to be on my back. I’m a big guy, so between that and the fact of the seat belts/buckles gouging me in my back, I’m having to lay halfway on/off the seats. This isn’t working so I try my side again. and then….yep another bathroom visit by someone else. Am I ever going to get some sleep on the bus?

Well, as it turns out I get maybe an hour’s worth during the 8 or so hour trip. We arrive on time, in fact a little early. So I step out onto the streets of New York. It’s the third time I’ve been here. I LOVE the city. It’s full of life even at just before 6am on Thursday. AS I round a corner I see on some buildings this:

Yes, I’m a Halo fan for life, however, there is the occasional other game I’ll play. Borderlands is one of them and yes, I’ve played B2. So I had to take that picture. Larger than life, but that is New York!

I seek out a Starbucks to settle in for a little bit and get adjusted. A pumpkin spice latte and blueberry scone later and I’m feeling okay. Who, wait a second who is that? Ed Begley Jr. walks into Starbucks. Wait, really? Yes indeed. Okay cool, I’m in New York less than a half hour and already I see a celebrity. Yep, I am indeed in New York.

My cell phone needs charged so I plug in at the convenient outlet next to my table, tweet a little and just people watch for a bit. I’ve got nothing to do for a few hours, so this little bit of time at Starbucks helped to kill it. So I’m looking out the window and I see this:

What the hell is a “Vactor 2100?” Turns out it is some kind of industrial sized street cleaner. Damn, I’ll say.

Now it’s a little before 7am, so what to do? I saunter on over (yeah, it’s better than shuffling…LOL) to Good Morning America at Times Square. Along the way I see these sights.

This is not the PAX I was looking for. (That was a few weeks ago and I couldn’t make it, dang.)

Times Square from one side.

And from the other side.

 

I’m in the audience at street side.

I see Laura Spencer in the window:

That’s George Stephanopoulos seated next to her and yeah, he really is that short.

It’s apparently KISS day at GMA as people are getting their faces painted like the members of the band KISS. I was asked to do so but politely declined. (I think I made the wrong decision there now in hindsight, but eh, fugedaboudit!)

Right across the street is Toys R Us Times Square, THE flagship store for TRU.

Star Wars Angry Birds. Really? Okay, I love both franchise separately but together?

It should be mentioned here that I wanted for nearly 2 1/2 hours for the store to open. Really 10am? Come on TRU, get your crap together. Open this store earlier. THere was a line of people waiting to get in. So I head right for the Mega Bloks area.

NO freakin’ single minifigure packs for Halo. Wait seriously? This is the flagship store and there is a deal going on currently that is buy either $30 or $50 worth of Mega Bloks and you get a free figure. How can that be if there are no figures in the store. I ask the manager this. They say the run out of things all the time. Um, hello, flagship store…should NEVER run out of things. Yeah, it’s New York, and there are a lot of people to buy stuff, however you’d think that this store should practically have it’s own warehouse to replenish items, especially sale items as needed.

Oy vey! Well that’s the end of this part.

Next part I finally get into Comicon…Part 3: The Thursday War

 

New York Comicon, then HFFL experience. Part 1 “The Ramp UP”

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Okay, so what is Comicon? Most of you know that it’s a huge “festival” of people from around the world that gather to buy comics, cosplay, check out new TV shows and/or movies via panels usually with celebrities and so on. However, it’s so much more than that. The people…my gawd, the people.

I’ve only been to smaller “Cons” to this point, though I had an idea of what New York Comicon (NYCC) might be. Well let me tell you folks, I was floored. I had heard the weekend might draw 100,000 people. Um yeah…I think it did.

Let’s just say that when walking the convention floor it was practically “nut to butt” (a saying heard often in Navy Bootcamp). So many people you couldn’t help but bump into them. I made it worse by constantly having my backpack on and walking around with a large folding fabric mesh chair. I touched and was touched by more people this weekend then likely in the rest of my life combined! (Liberally use of sanitary gel was used repeatedly over the weekend due to this, LOL)

Hmm, so wait a minute, how did this all come about anyway? Glad you asked. I’m a huge fan of Halo Mega Bloks and knew they would have a booth at NYCC so I had something to look forward to besides the rest of the usual convention type stuff. I also figured on 343 being there with Halo 4 to try out and I was right. I follow several of the 343ers on Twitter and through their posts and/or conversations I had with them found out that indeed they were going to be there with the most anticipated game of the year, Halo 4.

I happen to be honored to know one of the high-up folks at Mega Brands (parent company of Mega Bloks) and he had something special planned, a LAN party. Woot, playing LAN at Comicon! I was excited. I happened to mention the LAN, but not the specifics to one of the 343ers and bam, things really started to change. Behind closed doors both Mega and 343 hatched a plan to have a shared Halo LAN/Afterparty. Yours truly was invited by both to come to the event. That by the way is an honor I do not and will NEVER take for granted (something I think any other Halo fan should keep in mind if they have been or ever will be invited to participate in). Much more about this later though.

So I started planning on going to Comicon. I got a 4-day pass figuring I wan’t sure what I wanted to do the whole time, so this would give me more time and options available. As the days got closer to NYCC excitement grew and I was heavy with anticipation…

Stay tuned for following parts of the story to see how the whole weekend unfolded. Believe me, you are going to enjoy, laugh, be appalled, and laugh again…

-Sal

Back from New York Comicon!

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Okay folks I have LOTS to discuss. I’ve got to write it all up. Here’s what you can expect over the course of the next two days:

• My “diary” of events of the trip. This will be a series of articles that will be more than just Halo related. It hopefully will read more like a story of my trip.
• Summary of New York Comicon. Think of this as the “Cliff Notes” version of above that pertains to the Con itself with more Halo highlights.
• Halo specific related convention news.
• A VERY Special Halo LAN/after party with pics and some great news about Halo 4 and Halo Mega Bloks.
• Thank you articles for those who helped me along the way during the con.
• Cosplay people! (Pics)

Beyond the convention stuff, I’m also going to squeeze in a multipart review of Forward Unto Dawn episode two, much like I did for the first episode. To follow in a day or two will be the unofficial Graphic Novel for episode two as well.

As I said, LOTS to do, so be patient please and I’ll get to blogging all this stuff momentarily.

-Sal

Cost of the MEGA Bloks UNSC Mantis?

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I been having a discussion with other Halo fans/collectors about the UNSC Mantis set from MEGA BLOKS since the story broke. The following are my thoughts on what pricing could/should be for this set.

I use the 10 cents per piece formula when considering price. Mega is still pretty close to that for the most part. In fact in some cases even less.

They are becoming more popular, not just with Halo, but with WoW (World of Warcraft) and then there are the upcoming licensed lines of Barbie and Skylanders. They haven’t quite hit the right supply vs. demand set, to raise prices a lot. That has a to do with retailers and their buying habits, as well as consumer buying habits.

Still, when in comparison to “that other building blocks” company, Mega is still less expensive and in my opinion are better. If anything I always point back to the minifigures. By far, Mega is the best in building blocks category.

As for the extra stuff in this set like the docking station it’s a way to help flesh out a set that might seem not as exciting otherwise.

Since the price hasn’t been announced I made a guess based on the piece count. The piece count for the set is 443. Hmm, so I guess we should ask the question of ourselves; What do you think the UNSC Mantis set is worth paying for (as shown)? and what is the most you’d be willing to pay for it?

Personally, I think it’s worth $35 due to the number of small pieces and not very many unique pieces (as far as I can tell). Since the joint system is new, Mega has to account for that. However, I suspect they will find a way to use those again in other sets. I’d pay another $5 for the set though because it’s just that cool. If it’s more than that, I’ll still get one, but multiple purchases will have to wait for sales.

Somehow though, I think this particular set will sell very well though.

Again, I’ll state, I think this set is amazing. I’d like to have at minimum 2 if not up to 4 of this set. Price will affect my decision to buy multiples immediately or wait for sales.

What do you folks think? How much do you think it’s worth? What would you be willing to pay for it? Will you consider multiple purchases of this set? Will you factor in retail price if considering multiple purchases?

-Sal

Toy Review: Halo Mega Bloks UNSC Desert Combat Unit Set #97027

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UNSC Desert Combat Unit: Set number 97027

Technical Specifications:
Build Time: 1 minute sorting, 1 minutes build. Total 2 minutes.

Set Piece count: 53
Minifigs: EVA Spartan, Marine (blue eye plate), Marine (full gold goggles); extra CBQ helmet, torso; Scout helmet, arms.
Weapons: Sniper rifle, SMG, Assault Rifle, Battle Rifle
Accessories: 2 Marine backpacks
Special Features: N/A

Price/Value: $12 US

This is a good set to complement previous desert themed sets like the Wal*Mart exclusive Covenant Strike Playset. Or the recently released UNSC Armory Pack (set 97023). Knowing that this set was coming out, I bought two extra of the Armory set to make the other Spartans from this Desert Combat Unit set (you’ll see in the pics below). The detailing on these figures is fantastic. It’s a good army building set if you’re building a desert theme.  I happen to have something special planned for my UNSC Desert forces. You’ll see that in a few weeks.

Here are the pics.
Click on images to see a larger version.

And now for the variant Spartans. As you can see I left the original EVA Spartan intact and made the variants from the Armory base spartan.

Summary: These coupled with the Mk IV Spartan and the EOD Spartan from the Armory set make for a formidable squad of Desert Spartans. It’s a good set to get, especially if you want more marines. I really like that MEGA added backpacks to the set and love the 2×2 UNSC tile. That’s going to be used elsewhere.

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 medals!

-HFFL

Toy Review: Halo Mega Bloks Covenant Silver Combat Unit Set #97002

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Covenant Silver Combat Unit: Set number 97002

Technical Specifications:
Build Time: 1 minute sorting, 1 minutes build. Total 2 minutes.

Set Piece count: 42
Minifigs: Silver Combat Elite, 2 Silver Grunt Minors, extra Head and Arms of Silver Ascetic Elite.
Weapons: Plasma Rifle, Needler, Plasma Pistol, Focus Rifle, 2 Translucent blue sticky grenades.
Accessories: N/A
Special Features: N/A

Price/Value: $12 US

This is a good set for army building, though there really weren’t any silver grunts. Still, they look sharp! A nice assortment of weapons, though they are all purple with no extra detailing. The Ascetic Elite pieces are very well painted and have nice detailing.

Here are the pics.
Click on images to see a larger version.

 

Summary: I liked this set for a few reasons. Multiple Grunts, Ascetic Elite (my favorite Elite armor from Halo 3), and the Combat Elite can be used as Shipmaster R’tas Vadum. I bought two of this set so I could have both versions of the Elite and extra grunts.

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 medals!

-HFFL

Toy Review: Halo Mega Bloks Covenant Crimson Combat Unit Set #97028

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Covenant Crimson Combat Unit: Set number 97028

Technical Specifications:
Build Time: 1 minute sorting, 1 minutes build. Total 2 minutes.

Set Piece count: 47
Minifigs: Crimson Combat Elite, Crimson Grunt Minor, Crimson Grunt Major (Reach style), extra Crimson Flight Elite head; Crimson Honor Guard Arms, legs, head.
Weapons: Plasma Pistol, Needle Rifle, Energy Sword, 2 Sticky grenades (translucent blue), Honor Guard Pike
Accessories: N/A
Special Features: N/A

Price/Value: $12 US

This is one set where I think you most definitely get what you pay for. TWO grunts in the larger size and different styles. And the best absolutely is the Honor Guard pieces. I can’t see how anyone would display the Flight Elite or Combat Elite variants of this set when you have the awesome Honor Guard right there at your hands. Detailing is amazing. Weapons are plain in color, but the addition of trans-blue sticky nades is a welcome touch.

Here are the pics.
Click on images to see a larger version.

A good looking set about with a nice rich color. My favorite set of the recent Armory/Weapons packs.

We had a similar Elite to the Flight Elite above come in a Banshee set. This color is better, but I can’t bring myself to use this head when the Honor Guard is SO much better.

Just look at that minifigs. It’s a masterpiece!

Look at that detailing. By far one of the best MEGA has ever made in the Halo line. It’s my favorite Covenant minifig, hands down.

Summary: This set just screams to be a multiple purchase and indeed I did get two sets of it. The Grunts are great for army building, while having a set of Honor Guards just makes sense. The fact that these are so well painted needs to be stated again. I put this one in the category of MUST HAVE!

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 medals! SUPERB!!!!!

-HFFL

Toy Review: Halo Mega Bloks UNSC Cobalt Unit Set #97001

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UNSC Cobalt Combat Unit: Set number 97001

Technical Specifications:
Build Time: 1 minute sorting, 1 minutes build. Total 2 minutes.

Set Piece count: 48
Minifigs: Cobalt Spartan Mk V; Cobalt CQB Spartan; Cobalt Marine (Green eye display), extra Cobalt Scout Helmet and Arms.
Weapons: Shotgun, SMG, Silenced SMG, Rocket Launcher
Accessories: Trip Mine
Special Features: N/A

Price/Value: $12 US

This is a good set, though the color is a bit shiny for me. I like that we get a trip mine, though I’m a little perplexed that we didn’t get a backpack for the marine. The UNSC 2X2 tile is really nice and I’ll use that for other sets.

Here are the pics.
Click on images to see a larger version.

Summary: A good set, especially if you like the color. The figures are detailed nicely and you get a good little assortment of weapons. I’m not too keen on the color myself as I keep thinking it looks like a nail polish color.

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5 medals. (Only the color brought this down a little. Not bad, just not what I expected in “Cobalt” form.)

-HFFL