Tardisblue’s Edgy Solar Strafer

Nick Trotta’s (aka Tardisblue) newest ship combines a superb color-scheme with incredible angles and a Vic Viper flourish to help finish out Novvember. The integration of the stripes into the wings and tail is wonderfully done, and the sawtooth edges on the forward struts give this ship a particularly aggressive look. Be sure to check out some of his other sweet ships, too.

LEGO Liberty Inn, London

I’m finding it difficult to pick my favorite shot for this blog, because the Liberty Inn by ZCerberus is just lovely. Every angle has something visually captivating. I picked one to put here, but I whole-heartedly recommend perusing the flickr gallery.

Minifig Scale Supercar: It Curves Nicely

Looking like it’s straight off the track at Nürburgring, this elegant supercar by flickr user L@go is a wonderful example of the beauty that can be achieved in minifig scale.

Amazing Lego Sidewalk Art

Ok, it’s the street, but it’s still some amazing chalk work.

There’s some speculation that this may be related to the giant Lego minifig that recently washed up in Florida.

Thanks to Tom Hohman for the heads up.

UPDATE (Nov 9): Artist Leon Keer has posted complete photos of his chalk art effort on Flickr (I’ve replaced the unsourced photo above with one of his). And here’s the finished artwork, evocative of Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s terracotta army:

LEGO Universe to close operations, lay off 115 employees [News]

Breaking news from LEGO. It appears that LEGO Universe will be shutting down at the start of the new year. My heart goes out to all those who will be losing their jobs. Here’s the press release:

LEGO Universe to close in 2012

Online game will close on January 31, 2012. The LEGO Group’s digital offerings will continue to develop over the coming years.

November 4, 2011 – The LEGO Group today announced that it will close LEGO® Universe, an MMOG (massively-multiplayer online game) that has been in operation since the autumn of 2010.

In spite of very positive player feedback and a large number of players in the free play zone, it has not been possible to convert a satisfactory number of players to paying subscribers. It has therefore been decided to close the game as of January 31, 2012.

“The LEGO Universe team can take pride in having developed and launched a great LEGO experience that many players will miss,” said Jesper Vilstrup, Vice President, LEGO Universe. “Right now, we have almost 2 million players in LEGO Universe, and we get extremely positive feedback from players. Unfortunately, we have not been able to build a satisfactory revenue model in our target group, and therefore, have decided to close the game.”

Despite the change, the ambition to develop and run a digital business remains. In future, it is the intention to further pursue cooperation with partners. The LEGO Group has a strong and continuing partnership with TT Games Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment to create digital LEGO experiences within video games. A further expansion in the digital area will mainly be based on similar partnerships.

“The development of our digital offerings continues to be a very important element in our strategy,” said Mads Nipper, Executive Vice President, LEGO Group. “We have more than 20 million visitors on www.LEGO.com every month, and LEGO video games are among the bestselling children’s video games with sales of more than 60 million units in the last five years. Through our experience developing and running LEGO Universe, we have gained a lot of valuable insights, and we have a very strong foundation for future development in the digital area.”

As a consequence of the closure, the LEGO Universe staff has today been informed that the ‘Play Well Studios’ in Louisville, Colorado and the game’s marketing function in Billund, Denmark will be closed. This will affect 115 employees. All affected employees will be offered assistance in finding new jobs inside or outside the LEGO Group.

The Red Lieutenant takes to the skies

With fewer wings than the Red Baron but no less awesome, this little plane by Bartosz Kacprzyk (the oneman) has lots of lovely details, from the raggedy trailing edges of the wings to a spike atop the cockpit.

Via YSAB.

Le-Go Yo-Yo

Lino Martins (Lino M) claims this Yo-Yo is 100% LEGO and who are we to argue? I’m also wondering if this model doesn’t have the fewest pieces of any we’ve blogged here.

And to let you all in on a personal shame: if you give me a yo-yo I will be ‘that annoying yo-yo guy’ until it breaks. Not the one who can do tricks, the one who just makes it go up and down constantly. I get so mesmerised.

New CubeStormer II solves Rubik’s Cube in 5.3 seconds

Mike Dobson has came out with Rubik’s-solving CubeStormer last year. Now, Mike has teamed up with David Gilday to create an updated version that scans the cube, creates a solution, and then manipulates the cube to solve the puzzle.

Can you solve it any faster?

Back on the Rails

Courtesy Train Station by valgarise