[2023] What happened this year to Rayque?

Another year's end, another summary.

This year marks the 13th summary on this blog. As always, the Rayque3 Staff wishes you a great 2024!

To me, 2023's been a rough year. Despite my best efforts, I was unable to prevent several major setbacks that makes me unable to leave this godawful place. For the past 25 years I've been working myself to the bone trying to become a LEGO Product Designer and live a better life. But in every step of the way I keep receiving the short end of the stick.

Due to being born with abstruse health issues our government can't provide the necessary aid I need. I'm physically too disabled for a job, let alone self-sufficient. But as they can't identify what I have, they can't classify me as such, despite observations acknowledging that there is "at least something". On top of that, our government has been cost-cutting for decades on health care, which further makes it difficult to receive any aid at all. I've become stuck in a rather impossible situation to get out of, caused by an implausible scenario to begin with.

The worst part about it, is that this status quo will not change unless either they adjust the law or my health recovers. The latter is completely out of my control as the only person that is able to make any meaningful changes to my health and get me out of this mess is also the one that knowingly condemned me to this fate and chose to feign ignorance.

Despite all of it, I'll do whatever I can do. Earlier this year, I did receive some financial aid from the government. It's not much, but it's better than nothing. I'm not allowed to sit on it, but it's good enough to invest in my future. But aside from that... this year I've exhausted the last options I had left. It's going to take several miracles to get out of here, and it's clear that I still have a long journey ahead. Dangit, I really can't catch a break now can I?

Anyway, let's get to those statistics of 2023.

[Lego] Spybotics!

Only at a place like Bricklink can you casually grab a complete set of sealed 21-year-old LEGO products... Insane.

I initially planned to get the remainder of the 12V train accessories, but I came across a much better deal. In my never-ending quest for collecting all kinds of (niche) LEGO products, my favorite chapter in the company's history is the time they went nearly bankrupt with a 800 million dollar unpaid debt: the Ploughman era. It's the gift that keeps on giving.

During this time (late 90s to early 2000s) lots of unique products were released, even more so were not. It was the time of great leaps in technological advancement, so much in fact that toy companies were threatened to become irrelevant. In response and an act of desperation, LEGO gave carte blanche to their development team. As a result, their unchecked expenses went through the roof and every LEGO theme except for Bionicle was running at a loss*.

*I'm currently reading the book "Brick by Brick" by David Robertson. It goes into painstaking detail on precisely why the company went nearly bankrupt under Paul Ploughman's leadership, and how Jørgen Vig Knudstorp dragged the company out of it. It's a fascinating read. I might eventually write a blogpost about it once I've finished reading it.

I've made it no secret that I firmly believe the company's most interesting and fascinating products come from this era. Any of these products have the same quality as any other LEGO product. It's just many older LEGO fans find that these products strayed too far from the traditional brick. It's easy to make the argument that unconventional products were the reason for the company's downfall, but the only reason why LEGO got out of troubled waters was by sheer discipline, planning, innovation and a bit of luck with Bionicle catching lightning in a bottle. Not just the traditional brick.

But enough talk about that - what are Spybotics? It's a short-lived offshoot of LEGO Mindstorms, aimed at a lower price point. Released during a time before adults were willing to spend a lot for LEGO products, Mindstorms (like the monorail) were priced exceptionally high. This was also before computers were readily available and user-friendly, let alone asking a child to program a toy was a tall order. Spybotics however, seemed to aim to address these issues.

Spybotics were priced at almost a quarter of the retail price of Mindstorms, it simplified the building experience and provided an easier entry to programming robots through play with missions on its CD-ROM. Released during the middle of a resurgence of the spy genre, it like many other products on the market, hoped to piggyback off of it.

However, Spybotics never saw success. Like how Galidor and Knight's Kingdom II met its demise by competing against Bionicle, the unexpected rising success of (hacking) Mindstorms blew the wind out Spybotics' sails. And like many other LEGO products at the time, Spybotics still couldn't sell even at large discounts. But unlike themes such as Galidor or Bionicle, Spybotics has almost no following - only a handful of fans*. It's a niche within a niche, if you will.

*As is common with many LEGO products, it's well researched and analyzed by fans and thus what is on that PCB board, how to run the CD-ROM on modern computers and connect the Spybotics through serial is well documented.

What we're left with, is a perfect encapsulation of the Ploughman era... or is there more to it? Aside from the coolness factor with these toys having a strong visual presence on a display shelf, Spybotics genuinely has things going for it.

While you can't add motors or sensors to these units, they are arguably the most compact remote-controlled LEGO unit, jam-packed with functionality. It includes all of the components found in the original Mindstorms kit: it reuses the same internal components found in the 9V motors, the light sensor and touch sensor. All of it is just integrated directly onto the Spybotics PCB. Furthermore, it includes the pinnacle and bane of Ploughman's carte blanche: the fiber-optics unit. And not only can you directly remote control the Spybotics without having to program it, because LEGO reused the base code from the original Mindstorms in all of its offshoots, you can let the Spybotics communicate with any of these (not just only other Spybotics), and vice versa. Spybotics is just a wonderful toy full of untapped potential.

Icing on the cake for these sets are the many exclusive recolors for parts, found nowhere else. It's stuff like this that comes from the Ploughman era that's never going to happen, ever again. Because remember: LEGO lost money for each single Spybotics produced. It's insane how that went. But like I said: it's the gift that keeps on giving. It's a rabbit hole you can spend your entire life digging into, and it's something I'm probably going to end up doing out of love.

That's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post!

[EMS] Level 279!

Ding! One more level to unlock the next milestone: Arteria! 

6th Job is here! I've done my 6th Job Advancement on the night of release. Raging Blow VI is unlocked tonight. 

I'll write my in-depth 6th Job blogpost for the first wave of 6th Job skills next year. I want to have the Destiny blogpost out first, followed by Crest of the Solar to wrap up my coverage on 5th Job. If I'm able to have the Destiny blogpost released this January, expect Crest of the Solar in February, and 6th Job in either March or April.

Speaking of the Destiny blogpost: it's the final stretch. I still need to complete 9 GIFs, 10 images and one video. For most of the GIFs I already have the footage - I would just need to convert it into a GIF (which is most of the work). After that, it's just one more time to proofread all of it (again) before publishing. I'll definitely keep you guys up to date.

However, as December is one of the busiest months of the year, I'm not expecting to have a lot of time to work on it. Next week I'm having one of the most important legal proceedings in my life. One that's going to decide my future, so I have to make preparations for that one. I'm also going to publish one more LEGO-related blogpost mid-December, and during the last two weeks of the month I have to work on my year summary to make sure it's out on time. 

That and I'm also trying to wrap up this LEGO proof of concept for one of my projects. One I've been trying to get to work for eight months (!) now. It's easier said than done. But after almost one hundred Bricklink orders trying all kinds of approaches, I might have figured it out... Maybe I'll be able to share something at the end of the year. Who knows.

Anyway, that's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post!

[Lego] Bionicle Retail Flags

With #8989 Mata Nui for scale. Y'know, the small yellow thing on the right that's hardly visible, standing there, menacingly!
Eventually, the Barraki retail flag is somehow going to be relevant to my journey in becoming a LEGO Product Designer...

In my never-ending quest for collecting all kinds of (niche) LEGO products, this is my first time getting my hands on retail flags. Earlier this year, I've hinted at a Bionicle parcel that was stuck in customs limbo, which were these two.

When it comes to product design, there are parts in this process that is often overlooked. Engineering, advertisement, package design, to name a few. When products are about to be sold in stores, stores have the option to decorate their interior to drive sales. There are many ways a store can do this, as there are all kinds of items to fulfill that purpose.

The world of LEGO-themed store decorations is a bottomless pit. Each time LEGO releases a new product, there's an entire industry of its own, dedicated to produce all kinds of promotional materials. When it comes to collecting and cataloging these items, three categories are common: retail flags, product displays and other decorative objects.

What are retail flags? Large, printed cloth banners designed for halls or rooms, specifically designed to be hung from tall ceilings. In stores, you would see these from far away, marking the location of the corresponding toy aisle. If you've ever been to a large toy store or convention, you've probably seen one of these before.

As store decorations continuously comes and goes, all of it is treated as disposable. After products are removed from shelves, related store decorations are destroyed. There's simply too much of it; store owners don't think twice about it. Although, as with everything, there's always some that eventually finds its way on the aftermarket. To obtain specific items however, is not as easy as it sounds. It takes a lot of patience, a lot of digging, and they aren't cheap.

So, what about the two retail flags I've obtained? In particular, I was after the Barraki retail flag on the left. 2007 was such a fantastic year for the franchise, it is by far my favorite. Consider this retail flag to be the one I wanted the most. In order to purchase it however, I had to throw in another retail flag to meet the seller's minimum purchase threshold. By coincidence, the seller also happened to have another retail flag I was interested in: 2009's #8989 Mata Nui.

Suffice to say, these retail flags are huge. Given the purpose they were designed for, both are two meters tall and 90 centimeters wide, each. Both ends have a small channel, just large enough to fit thin rods or strings inside, so you can mount them on a wall or ceiling. Unfortunately, I don't have space for these in my room. Too large. Once I move out of here, I'll definitely find a spot where they can be admired - as they should be. Heck, finding a method and location to temporarily hang these up for this photo was a challenge in itself! That's why it took me this long to write this blogpost.

There are still a handful of other retail flags I'm specifically after; mainly the other Barraki retail flags. You see, some retail flags are designed as a set. While the one I have is the main one, three others exist. One is the same but without the Barraki (which is a fantastic backdrop of Mahri Nui), the other two (example 1, example 2) are thinner retail flags depicting three of the six canister sets each. Unfortunately, Bionicle retail flags specifically target canister sets, so retail flags of the larger Bionicle sets do not exist. A shame, really. Some of them would've made great retail flags.

Aside from retail flags, am I after any other store decorations? Yes, there are some. I've always wanted to obtain a product display. Preferably one of 2007 Bionicle, but any theme I'm fond of is fine, as long as the display is visually interesting. Bricklink isn't an exhaustive list of the many store decorations out there - for instance, at a convention I once saw a large product display of #6979 Interstellar Starfighter with lights and sound. One that I'll never forget was during my childhood in Tokyo, where there was this massive display of the 1998 Ninja theme at our local Daiei. They built a deep ravine out of BURPs, about two meters tall, and had the sets displayed in them. Honestly, it was amazing for its time and awe-inspiring. It's that kind of ambition and passion that makes this never-ending hobby so great.

But that's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post!

[EMS] Level 278!

Ding! Two more levels to unlock Arteria. I'm almost there!

New Age is around the corner, so the reduced EXP curve and higher EXP rewards from dailies come into play soon. While I'm expecting to reach Level 280 before the end of the year, both Arteria and Carcion are scheduled for mid-December. It's too early to say if I'll reach Level 280 before that. I have to see the post-New Age daily EXP yield first.

As for the Destiny blogpost, I'm expecting to wrap up 3rd Job later today. That also means the most time-consuming chapters are done - the remaining GIFs won't require as much. I'm aiming to have 4th Job and Hyper Skills done next month, and to wrap up the remaining chapters in December. However, whether that's possible is uncertain, as until the end of January I no longer have a say in my own schedule. If that situation stays relevant enough, I'll write about it.

By the way, our latest episode in the High-Dex Hero series is out! We should have another video later this year...

That's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post!