Gotham City police headquarters

Jbuttles has made a great rendition of Gotham City police headquarters, completely furnished with details like a crime lab and Commissioner Gordon on the roof with the Batsignal (hmm, sounds like a game of Clue).

Dark Knight

DARKspawn is back from a LEGO hiatus, and he shares this medieval version of Batman. I hope he continues on with this idea, as I'd love to see the medieval take on the Batmobile, or the Batcave.

Wolverine

Mike Napolitan reproduces X-Men 133.

Superman - The Televised Adventures

Too Much Caffeine just posted this wonderful rendition of Superman - The Televised Adventures. Now if that by itself wasn't cool enough, you've got to check out the video to see Superman flying over Metropolis.

LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes video game

We knew this was coming, but LEGO has finally announced the upcoming LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes. I cannot find the official announcement anywhere on their site (rant to follow), so I'll grab the text from FBTB:

Batman is back to save Gotham City and the action will only build from here! Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, TT Games and The LEGO Group are teaming up once again to announce that LEGO® Batman™ 2: DC Super Heroes will be available beginning Summer 2012 for the Xbox 360® videogame and entertainment system from Microsoft, PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, the Wii™ system, and Windows PC, as well as the Nintendo DS™ hand-held system, Nintendo 3DS™ hand-held system, and PlayStation®Vita handheld entertainment system. The game is the sequel to the best-selling LEGO® Batman™: The Videogame, which to date has sold more than 11 million units worldwide.

LEGO Batman™ 2: DC Super Heroes complements the brand new, recently released LEGO® Super Heroes: DC Universe toy collection. The line includes five construction sets, such as The Batcave and three buildable, detailed action figures.

In LEGO Batman™ 2: DC Super Heroes, the Dynamic Duo of Batman and Robin join other famous super heroes from the DC Universe including Superman, Wonder Woman and Green Lantern to save Gotham City from destruction at the hands of the notorious villains Lex Luthor and the Joker. Batman fans of all ages will enjoy a new and original story filled with classic LEGO videogame action and humor as players fight to put the villains back behind bars.

“LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes builds upon the action and cooperative gameplay experience established in our best-selling LEGO videogame to date, LEGO Batman: The Videogame,” said Tom Stone, Managing Director, TT Games. “We’re offering fans a rich and expansive Gotham City environment filled with cool characters, great customization options and plenty of surprises that families, young gamers and DC Universe fans can enjoy together.”

“LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes further extends and combines both the Batman and LEGO videogame experiences to create very fun gameplay,” said Samantha Ryan, Senior Vice President, Development and Production, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. “Fans of all ages are going to enjoy the action and light hearted humor that TT Games and LEGO provide.”

LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes allows players to explore all new areas of Gotham City utilizing a variety of vehicles including the Batmobile and Batwing. In addition, they’ll be able to fight for justice by mastering new gadgets and suits, such as Batman’s Power Suit and Robins’’Hazard Cannon, and using all-new abilities including flight, super-breath and heat vision.

LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes is being developed by TT Games and will be published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. For more information, please visit www.videogames.LEGO.com.

Okay, now the rant. LEGO's pressroom is absolutely horrible. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong place, but whenever I go to Lego.com, and go to the 'about us' section and look under 'press releases', 'product news' or 'corporate news', there's nothing up to date. They write these press releases and send them out, but I have to get them from various other websites. I guess Ace at FBTB is probably a LEGO Ambassador, and so gets them through that channel, but why the heck does LEGO make it so hard for their true fans to find out the same information that they are giving out to other gaming or comic sites? Google News is a heck of a lot better at informing me of recent LEGO happenings than the official LEGO site ever was.

Okay, also an admission. Perhaps this will get me to play the LEGO Batman 1 game that's been sitting on my Wii for so long. In my defense, I have very small children. I only ever really play the Wii with them, and they spend the entirety of the time running Batman and Robin into the big pool of acid on the first screen. No joke. Eventually I'll persuade them to give me the control and get them past this, but then we just get stuck in the next hurdle. Oh well, they have lots of fun running Batman and Robin around the screen, and aren't really all that concerned about completing levels. BTW, it's exactly the same with our Wii Dora the Explorer game. My daughter plays it for a while, then gets stuck, and Daddy ends up playing it to get Dora through the next area. Oh well, I guess I should be happy that my kids aren't addicted to video games (yet - they've got a lot of years in front of them for that I suppose).

Holy giant penny, Batman

Check out this great Batcave by Jbuttles. I love all the details, like the memorial to Jason Todd's Robin costume, the hidden exit for the Batmobile, and the trophy display (especially the famous giant penny).

Avengers, assemble!

Mike Napolitan is back to his old tricks, with a great rendition of Avengers #4.

Batwing

This has already been featured on Brick Heroes and FBTB, but it's way too cool to pass over, so I'll jump on the bandwagon and feature Hans Dendauw's amazing Batwing. He incorporated lights, so be sure to follow the link and check out the low-light photos as well for a great effect.

New polybag sets

Over on lego.com they post instructions for sets (so, for instance, when my son tore up the instructions to his new Cars set, we can still build it). Anyway, yesterday they added a bunch of new instructions, including for the upcoming polybag sets 30160, a Bat-jet-ski, and 30161, a micro-Batmobile. No release date on these yet, or even official names, but you can already download the instructions for 30160 and 30162. There's nothing too rare there, except of course the minifig, so you could probably build these today with your existing collection.




BTW, given the value on Bricklink for some of the original Batman run, and just the general collectible nature of Batman stuff, these polybag sets might be a great value to store a few copies away for resale in a few years. Personally I've never been a collector/investor in LEGO, I've pretty much only bought things I wanted for my own building. The one small SW promo set that I stashed away thinking I might resell later was found by my kids, who opened it up to play with. Oh well, it's not like that one set would have ensured their college fund.

Braniac attack

There are a number of great MOCs posted in the past couple of months that I didn't get blogged, so I'll try to get through them. Mr Xenomurphy's Superman & Young Justice vs. Brainiac is surely one of the best comic-themed LEGO creations I've seen recently. I particularly like his reinterpretation of the Daily Planet headquarters.

Merry Christmas

Nathan Proudlove's family wishes us all a merry Christmas, and, yes, his son is wearing Spider-Man jammies.

And the winner is ...

A few days ago the winners were announced in the Eurobricks Batman contest, and Skrytsson won both categories with his Dark Knight and Croc's sewer entries.

Batman before and after

GV357 made great versions of Batman's origin and mourning.

In brightest day ...

V&A Steamworks has an ongoing Cabinet of Curiosities project, where he invites other AFOLs to contribute small MOCs to a group display. NorbyZero made this great version of the Green Lantern's power ring.

Cyclops

Mike Napolitan, who is normally known for his great virtual customs, found a 3-D printing service that allowed him to produce Cyclops' visor.

Sets spotted

Yesterday I stopped by my local Toys R Us (in Cherry Hill, NJ, near Philadelphia) and saw that they have some of the DC sets (specifically they had the Catwoman set, the Superman/WonderWoman/LexLuthor set, and the Batman and Joker Hero Factory sets). Sets have also been found at Toys R Us stores in Georgia and California, so this seems a pretty general thing in the US. I'm not sure yet how widely spread they are in other countries. They've also now appeared on LEGO.com (including the just-announced Joker's Funhouse, but not including the first set that was revealed, the Batcave). Just in time to buy that special Christmas gift for your favorite blogger. ;)

6862 Superman vs Power Armor Lex

It looks like one of the fine folks over at FBTB got ahold of set 6862. I'm still waiting to hear what stores this is showing up in. Anyway, check out their extensive pictures. I so want this set.
-Edit- Okay, when I posted this last night Ace had just got the pictures up on the FBTB Flickr stream, but now he's posted an extensive (and very positive) review. He also responded to me that he found this at a Toys R Us store in California. I'll swing buy a TRU here in New Jersey sometime in the next few days and will report on if these are more widely available.

Holy awesome set, Batman

Here's a huge surprise (at least to me - maybe this rumor has been out there already?) - LEGO has another Batman set up their sleeves, and it's coming out in just a few days: 6857 - Dynamic Duo Funhouse Escape. For me at least the image is not currently showing up on the lego.com link, but LEGO Toy Story News had sharp eyes and grabbed a copy. At US$40, this seems like an amazing deal, with figs you would have to spend quite a bit to get otherwise. I'd say that this and the Superman set are my two "must get" sets from the initial run. I take back my previous complaint about LEGO simply repeating old Batman set designs.



Here's the official description:

Help Batman™ save Robin from the villainous trio!
Rescue Robin from 3 notorious villains in a funhouse with trap-doors and moving floors in this suspenseful scene with 5 new minifigures!
Price $39.99
Help Batman™ save Robin from the villainous trio!
"The Riddler™, The Joker and his sidekick Harley Quinn are holding Robin hostage at their evil funhouse! As our hero Batman™ jumps off his cool Batcycle, can he avoid the trap door, big hammer and moving floor and rescue his crime-fighting partner? Includes 5 minifigures: Batman™, Robin, The Joker ™, The Riddler ™ and Harley Quinn.
* Includes 5 minifigures: Batman, Robin, The Joker, The Riddler and Harley Quinn
* Features Batcycle and funhouse
* Funhouse features wagon rails, crane, hammer, opening trap door and moving floor
* Lift the crane!
* Move the floor!
* Includes comic book!
* Funhouse measures over 8” (21 cm) tall and 11” (29cm) wide
* Batcycle measures over 4” (10 cm) long

Wheels of Justice

During my near-month-hiatus from blogging, I totally missed the Wheels of Justice contest over at FBTB, that challenged people to build cars for the Green Lantern and Batman. Entries are now closed, and it doesn't look like voting has started, but two of my favorites include Cole Blaq's Emerald Thunder and SPARKART's Electric BATWInG Batmobile.

And Lois is in trouble ... again

Okayaraman made a great Superman vs Braniac battle. I particularly love how he did the classic Daily Planet icon.