>> Product Reviews

By Barry Kay (SAFOLs co-founder, CapeLUG Exco, Batman … Ssshhhh!)

When I first saw this set was accepted by LEGO® Ideas I was overjoyed. Childhood memories of watching the cartoon show on TV came flooding back. When I received the delivery of the set, I just left the box standing sealed for a while so I could just admire it – the largest LEGO® mech released to date.

Needless to say, a LEGO® set is for building and so I began.

The box consists of sixteen packets and six instruction books. One book for each lion and the sixth for the mech assembly. There is a small sticker sheet with five 2×2 plate stickers numbered from one to five. These are used on each of the lions.

The first two builds are the yellow and blue lions. I like the way LEGO® incorporates Technic elements and building styles into system sets these days. It helps for a stronger sturdier model that does not fall apart so easily. At first it seems like you are just putting together a lump of bricks, but as you continue the build, the lion starts to take shape.

The base body of the yellow and red lions, which make up the legs and feet, are the same build but what is great is that each lion has different features that take away any monotony of building the same thing a number of times.

The third build is the black lion, which is also Voltron’s head and torso. This is also a very solid build – the only downfall being Voltron’s face that can fall out very easily. The different elements used for the features are great especially the gold socket wrench as the symbol on Voltron’s chest.

The last two lions, green and red, are smaller and quicker to build than the others. These lions make up the arms.

Seeing all the lion’s features develop is a rather fun use of the SNOT technique which gives the lions an all-round solid body and great look.

The last book gives a little information about the Voltron cartoon show as well as the designers of the set. It starts with the building of Voltron’s sword and shield which is a really quick but fun little build.

Then for the assembly. It amazed me how easily the lion’s legs swivel around into position and each one clips so effortlessly into place to form into Voltron.

I really enjoyed the whole build and would highly recommend it to any mech fan.

As for playability, the lions are solid enough for gentle play, bearing in mind to be careful of Voltron’s face on the black lion as mentioned above. Once fitted together as Voltron, it should remain as a display piece due to it only having minimal manoeuvrability in the arms, and pieces tend to fall off if you pull and push the arms to move around.

The set retails at around R3200 and is an all-round great build.

By Marick Hornsveld (SAFOLs Member, Founding member of CapeLUG – The Western Cape LEGO User Group. Loves Technic, Creator vehicles, and dragons.)

The set is divided into six numbered bags, each containing a small number of parts. The box is modest, but the front cover image is quite a bit larger than the actual model.

The build starts with the inside base around which the body is to be built. I really like how regular bricks and pieces are combined with studless and studded Technic beams in this set. All LEGO pieces, no matter what theme they are from, are part of the LEGO universe, and I therefore think that combining Technic with regular bricks and pieces makes sense, despite some fans’ resistance.

The set contains a number of interesting pieces (and some great Technic parts) that have lots of potential for use in MOCs, especially if you are planning to build in white or orange.

SNOT techniques are used to great effect in this model to create an organic bird-like shape that looks interesting and is aesthetically pleasing from all sides. The way that the feathers are created is also fantastic – it looks very real.

The build itself is uncomplicated, and aside from the clever use of SNOT techniques and feathering, the build offers no interesting or surprising techniques. I spent just over two hours putting the set together, and all in all it was an enjoyable build.

Different techniques are used around the body, so the build doesn’t feel repetitive.

The final model is quite sturdy, although I won’t recommend it as a toy for kids. This is mainly a display model. It does make a good companion to last year’s BB-8 droid, especially because their colours match. They are also similar in size, which does mean that the scales of the two models are vastly different if compared to the movie characters.

Pressing on the tail of the Porg makes the mouth open and wings flap, although the wings don’t return to their original position entirely. Moving the mouth does give the Porg a cute facial expression.

At the current retail price, given the piece count, and despite some of the nice pieces the set includes, it is a bit on the pricey side and would therefore appeal mainly to Star Wars fans looking for a nice display model to add to their collection, rather than a purchase for parts.

The Star Wars franchise has received criticism for ‘creating’ the Porg, with fans saying that it is purely a mechanism to sell merchandise. Whether or not that is true, the island where The Last Jedi was filmed has a very large colony of Puffin birds. Rather than trying to digitally remove the birds from the film, the producers digitally altered the Puffins, turning them into Porgs, and even giving them a small storyline.

To summarise: 75230 Porg is a quick, easy build, with some interesting parts, but isn’t a bargain. It makes a nice display model.