X-tropia Lego Blog

As you can see here I have a big bright yellow bag with a big bright red Lego brick on it. That can mean only one thing…I stopped by the Chicago Lego Store! Of course riding the L-train home you can’t help but get a lot of attention carrying a bright yellow bag like this. Maybe that’s just me being self conscious. hehe. I found a lot of great stuff and I didn’t even get everything I was very close to buying. Oh course I spent way to much money. But the sting of that was lightened a bit because they gave me all kinds of neato freebies and bonus materials just for spending way too much.

Chicago Lego Store

First off if you are ever in the Chicago area you’ll have to stop by the Lego store. The Chicago Lego store is located at 520 North Michigan Avenue 3rd Floor Chicago, IL 60611. It’s pretty tight, yo. I plan on doing a more detailed review of this store for you all soon. I’ll give you a tour with some more pictures. But until then, here above are a few pics of it just to whet your appetite.

My Lego Store Haul!

Now here’s my latest Lego haul! You’ll notice right away that I was after Pirates this trip. ARRRrrrrrr! Sadly this Lego theme isn’t going to be around much longer they say. So I wanted to pick up some while I can. Sadly they were sold out through the holiday period, though a few sets were available for back order on Lego Shop At Home shipping in February. I just waited it out this time. And this month they were stocked back up again.

Lego Pirates sets 6242, 6241, 6239, 8397

I got 6242 Soldier’s Fort which is a very nice looking set. You get a lot of great pieces with this set including six minifigs, a monkey and an alligator! For under $50, I highly recommend it. I also picked up 6241 Loot Island. This one I feel is a bit overpriced at $20 but it does come with a lot. I especially like the skull brick that I haven’t had before now. I’ll probably be using it in some MOCs I plan to build for my Tales of Blockview Castle Comic. So keep an eye out for it in a future chapter. The other two sets are 8397 and 6239. Not much to say about these. They are some nice small range sets and you get a couple more pirates. Double AAAARRRrrrrr!

Shop for Lego Pirate sets here!

Lego Atlantis freebies from the Lego Store

So that’s what I bought but the rest was all free! So let’s take a closer look at some of the cool promotional items Lego is using to promote this year’s line of sets.

Lego Atlantis Shark Warrior

For those of you on the Lego email mailing list you will probably be familiar with this keychain. It’s the Lego Atlantis shark warrior minifig keychain that they were offering for purchases over $75. Little did I know this applied to in-store purchases as well. So this is a nice little guy to have even though I haven’t really been interested in collecting the keychains. I picked up a couple packs of the magnets they had a few years back right before they were discontinued. They are covering my refrigerator. I kinda wish they’d bring those back.

Lego Atlantis secret decoder notepad

I also got for free this Lego Atlantis notepad with secret decoder cover. It’s really pretty neato. Hopefully you can see it demonstrated how it works in the image. The pages of the notepad all have a pattern printed on them. When you close the cover one of the Atlantis treasure key icons is revealed, magically! Plus, each page has a different pattern printed on it so all five animal symbols can be seen. Sweet, huh.

Lego Club Magazine with 3D comic

Next I got a free issue of the Lego Club magazine. Which is basically just a pretty 12 page advertisement. Not that I am knocking ads, I make em for a living. There are some nice features like the 3D Atlantis comic (you even get a pair of 3D glasses).

Lego Universe teaser ad

And as you can see there was a very nice looking fold out ad for the Lego Universe- still to come. They have been hyping this thing up something fierce. I am interested to see what it is like. But I don’t have a lot of hope that it will live up to the level of marketing and promotion they have been pouring into this for years now. Some interesting facts I heard recently is that all the structures and elements that they used in the development of Lego Universe were all first built using real Lego bricks. That’s a cool thought. Also, the target market for the game is said to be boys 8-12. So that can kind of gives you an idea of what to expect. So it’ll be not too violent or complicated, and probably full of a lot of silly humor like the Lego Star Wars games. (The Lego Star Wars games rock btw!) Still I don’t think older fans will get much out of Lego Universe. We shall see.

Free Lego Minifig Promotion

Finally, one of the last things I showed on that image of my haul way at the top was the Chicago Lego Store’s calendar of events. Which I included to show you all an interesting promotion they have going on. With a purchase of $99 or more you can make three minifigs. I saw the plastic buckets containing the different elements you could use to make them with. You get five pieces for each three minifig: a head, a torso, legs, a hat or hair and an accessory item for them to hold. Sounds fun. I don’t know if I will be doing this however. I can just imagine me taking 20 minutes slowly deciding on minifig parts while a big line of kids curse at me under their breath. hehe. But if you are in Chicago and wanna blow a hunsky on Lego and love minifigs then go for it! Who knows I may do it just so I can show all of you what crazy minifigs I can come up with.

Shop for all Lego Atlantis sets here!

-Daniel