The Simplification of the LEGO Building Experience, What's Up With That...?

The first time after my dark ages, when I started building, these instructions seemed too easy. But when I build a 2500+ parts set, then it's a blessing. Just have it in print always Lego, don't settle for digital only instructions, please!

I don't like to do a step wrong while building. It ruins the fun if I have to trace back like ten pages, before I find the problem

I was building 8283 the other day, and I really had to pay attention compared to more recent Technic sets. I can imagine less experienced builders would find it a bit frustrating, but finishing a difficult model is really satisfying. So, your mileage may vary.

I just don't like the excessive use of paper and the need to be flipping pages more than I am placing bricks.

I like the idea of hard-mode building instructions.
They'd need to include a note of which "normal mode" steps a hard mode page refers to, so if anyone gets stuck they can look it up.
To save costs, though, I think the hard mode instructions would need to be digital only.
Otherwise too much printed papers and the boxed product does need to cater for the wider user base.

The only thing I dislike about modern instructions is how 4+ sets dedicate an entire page to showing which pieces to grab, doubling the amount of paper used and also greatly increasing how much ink is used. For a company that seems to care so much about the environment, it's a shockingly wasteful practice that I hope is abolished sooner or later.

@Maxbricks14 said:
" @R1_Drift said:
"Pretty Good. "

How come you're in India?"

Vacation.

@Brickdarg said:
"For a company that seems to care so much about the environment, it's a shockingly wasteful practice that I hope is abolished sooner or later."

That's a really specific and quite odd nitpick. These instructions at least have a value, they are used for something, sometimes multiple times. Meanwhile every week I take so many ads and flyers from my mailbox. Most of them printed on non-fsc paper. Are lego prints can be a significant percent of "ink usage for printing"? I highly doubt that, even tho the scale of operation for Lego is huge.

Thank you for the article. It's nice to see these points confirmed so they can be taken out of the realm of conjecture. Hopefully people can now see more readily that it's for inclusivity and having a positive building exerience rather than pandering to the lowest common denominator as I've seen people claim sometimes.

There's one thing I still wonder about: why exactly is it only one part per step, sometimes even per page? I've recently been building sets from all eras and whilst the 90s sets sometimes do require you to pay attention, I personally found that later instructions that have you place 3 parts per step felt just as clear as those with one part. The only difference was page flipping, and the daunting amount of steps on the latter. In this example I mean that both cases have the part call-outs above the step by the way.

Did lego find that users prefer flipping pages over having to focus on multiple parts per step at all?
Or is there another reason why instructions place one part at the time more often?
I'm curious what the rationalization is for this change in design. After all, my experience is just one perspective. Maybe lego's broad customer base would find more of an effect here?

Oh, and the comment '18+ is a marketing tool to get the non "mother's basement" crowd' felt a bit mean. You probably didn't mean to, but this sounds like the fans prior to 18-plus are all unsuccessful. I have a master's degree, a good paying job and live alone, but having an article link such a term to the reader didn't add anything. I do however have (high-functioning) autism, and the stereotype used here is an ugly one I've had to debunk my entire life as soon as people find out about my hobby. I take it that it was tongue in cheek considering you did follow up with saying that it's an outdated term. But ehm... maybe a more neutral term could have worked as well here?

I privately agree with a lot of AFOL gripes but this isn't one of them. My own version of "challenge building" is to just skip a few pages to see if I can guess the in-between steps, or to anticipate a "mirror image" build and put it together at the same time as the first one.

And I'll say this, too: as I get a little older, those "dummy steps" come in handy because one does start to overlook things...

I've been building Lego sets since around 1990. My dark ages were between 2003 and 2013. When I got back into the hobby, I was surprised to find how dumbed down the instructions got with the bubbles showing you which pieces you need and sometimes just one piece being added per step. I still build each of my sets without looking at the bubble and just spot the difference in each picture. Sure, I mess up sometimes and have to go back and see what I did wrong but I'm sure I did the same as a kid and it's just a nostalgia thing to me at this point. Takes me back to a simpler time in my life.

"...any LEGO set could be someone's first and should be treated as such."

I think this summarizes why I am on the side of not liking just how dumbed-down the instructions have become. I simply don't agree with this statement.
Some sets (probably most, considering the amount of products being made) should be treated as if they could be someone's first, yes. But if ALL sets are treated that way, I think a lot of depth is being lost.
Trying to come up with a suitable metaphor, I thought about DIY projects such as home renovations or car repairs. Any such project is not suitable as your first. People are smart enough to realize that, right? But if you start with something easy and that goes well, you might get inspired to try something more difficult. And so on, as you build on your skills. Most hobbies are like that too. There's a ladder of difficulty that you can keep climbing. LEGO have lost most of that by treating everything as if it SHOULD be suitable as someones first set. There need to be sets that are simply not. And there should be a spectrum in between.

Just don't look at the list of parts you need if you want to find them yourself in the picture (unless they are highlighted with red or all of them are directed by an arrow in place). :D

Thanks for the article, but I don't want any more hair on my chest.

On another subject, I love physical books, and have quite an extensive collection of literature. Thus, I have been passionate about having paper instruction books.

However, in the last year, I have set out on a tumultuous odyssey of reorganizing my collection of lego boxes- both empty and unopened sets. I am flabbergasted at the sheer weight of all those old instruction manuals.

They aren't like a nice book you can have on shelf and grab for easy reference. In fact, I've never pulled one out to rebuild or repair a set even though mine are fairly organized. I'd rather spend time building and sourcing parts. Besides, the digital database is just too easy, quick, and convenient.

Don't get me wrong. I love having the paper instructions to build a set, and would miss them terribly if they were gone. But, they are a pain to store, and have an enormous mass. They are quite a large portion of the mass of any boxed set.

I wonder how much money we could save by not having instructions printed and shipped?

Probable answer = nothing. Lego would instead hike prices, blame some sort of greedflation, and buy more Ferraris and dressage ponies for the Kristiansens.

P.S. I've always thought that builders who get upset at instruction simplification don't have enough stress in their lives. They also remind me of the kids who brag in reviews that they finished the entire UCS build in 15 minutes. As if stacking bricks quickly is a measure of intelligence. If the instructions are too simple, just simply skip a few pages.

P.P.S. It is unequivocally, measurably, and unfortunately true that kids are getting dumber, need to be spoon fed, have shorter attention spans, and are not obtaining adequate math, reading, writing, and speaking skills.

.... See ya later, Space Cowboy!

EDIT: Richard if you're reading this, poshhammer owes you a beer.

I quite enjoy at the very least having the “you need to grab these pieces” box in the corner, as it means if I’ve not used all of them there was some building going on in the background I missed. Been a few of the classic Castles where I had to retrace my steps when I noticed some structure had sprung up out of nowhere because it was happening in the back of the instruction image so had gone unnoticed.

For those lamenting the inclusion of such features, could you not just ignore them? Seems far easier for you to look past the additional help you don’t need rather than someone who -does- need it to go without it

I don't like the amount of paper these new instructions use. I also can't stand how every step is only 3-4 pieces, back in my day every step was 10-15 pieces and less paper. Also, older instructions store better and only had to be 1 book. Every set these days comes with 3-6 books which is bothersome.

@Brickalili said:
"I quite enjoy at the very least having the “you need to grab these pieces” box in the corner... "

I like those too. But when they show just one or two pieces they kind of loose their usefulness, don't they?

@poshhammer said:
" Richard if you're reading this I don't mean you "

He means you, Richard.

AFOLs: 'Kids these days are so lazy and stupid'

Also AFOLs: 'Turning the page is effort'

If you have a problem with page-flipping, either git gud (at page-flipping) or flip two or three pages per step instead of one.

I remember reading some years ago that there was a subset of players who wanted The Legend of Zelda games to have a hard mode, because next to Dark Souls they were too easy.

The solution I saw suggested was genius in its simplicity: just don't collect the extra heart containers when you solve a puzzle or beat a boss. Play the entire game on the three starting hearts that are given to you.

So, grab a handful of pages and skip a few steps. See how you go!

BAM! Instant hard mode. It didn't require anything more than just changing the way these people play the game, and nobody needed to do anything special to cater to their needs.

If you're someone who requires a game developer or a building block set manufacturer to provide something a certain way just to make you feel happy about engaging with that product, then you're guilty of needing your hands held just as much as the way you complain and claim that others who 'ruin' your hobby do.

I have rebuilt a few months ago, after many years, my good old Yellow Castle. I still have the instructions, but had a shock, after ten years or more building recent sets, to see that the whole process held in just a few pages/pics, with so many parts to add at each step. Impressive. I did not remember that at all, and found myself a bit bit admirative for the kid I was, who had patience and skills to build such sets at the time, while on each new picture of the instructions I had to search, find all the necessary parts that had to be built, without forgetting any of them. Now I am used to numbered bags, two, three, sometimes even one single part a step... But guess what: even today, the first thing I do after opening the box is to open all the bags, pour down all the pieces of the set in different little trays, just sorting colors. So that the process of building is not too easy, and I still have the pleasure to search and rummage in the trays to find the parts I need.

@RTS013 said:
""...any LEGO set could be someone's first and should be treated as such."

I think this summarizes why I am on the side of not liking just how dumbed-down the instructions have become. I simply don't agree with this statement.
Some sets (probably most, considering the amount of products being made) should be treated as if they could be someone's first, yes. But if ALL sets are treated that way, I think a lot of depth is being lost.
Trying to come up with a suitable metaphor, I thought about DIY projects such as home renovations or car repairs. Any such project is not suitable as your first. People are smart enough to realize that, right? But if you start with something easy and that goes well, you might get inspired to try something more difficult. And so on, as you build on your skills. Most hobbies are like that, too. There's a ladder of difficulty that you can keep climbing. LEGO has lost most of that by treating everything as if it SHOULD be suitable as someone's first set. There need to be sets that are simply not. And there should be a spectrum in between."

Well, what do you know? Lego did what you want. We now have Bricklink Designer Program sets where the instructions and building process do not need to follow this very idea of being a first set. I would argue the same goes for complicated technic sets. Also, take a look at @Harmonious_Building comment to realize you could have your advanced building experience by simply challenging yourself instead of lazily depending on what Lego employees will choose for general audience.

I think it has become too easy. A whole printed page to put one part on feels so wasteful. In smaller sets, I skip say step 1-3 & start at 4, just for a better challenge.

I like the way modular instructions do it - several parts to build but highlighted on the page.

Personally I credit my experience with childhood lego instructions for my aptitude with assembling Ikea furniture, but I welcome not having to search intently as often for things I've missed, or disassembling half a model because of something missing or out of place.

"jUsT fLiP mOrE pAgEs"

Uh, no. The instructions are not designed for this, so the page you land on might cover all the progress from the pages you skipped. That's not "making it harder".

I hear AFOLs all the time gushing over eye-watering SNOT tricks & life-changing NPUs, but the work that all of the folk in the design process put into ensuring a smooth & successful build experience for even inexperienced customers is positively astonishing if you really pay attention, and criminally underrated & undervalued.

More people should take note of all of these situations where five 1x2s are included in a bag instead of three 1x2s + one 1x4 and instead of complaining of "part count bloat to trick us into thinking there's greater value," see how much this a) reduces part hunting during the build and b) reduces costs by removing a part pull sequence at the factory for every unit produced. Observe the splitting of lower-elevation plate runs to bypass the annoyance of warping & difficult placement of long pieces across all studs. Appreciate the use of tiles & modified 1x4s with 2 studs to reduce the number of stud connections for a single part or assembly for the same reason. Recognize the re-scaling of entire builds to accommodate the use of a particular assembly that achieves the desired aesthetic with physical strength, instead of proceeding with a more sophisticated build that WILL shatter during assembly for an unacceptably high percentage of customers. On & on. Designers often toss entire concepts & start from scratch when what worked best in their mind or on the computer ends up requiring 3 hands to assemble smoothly and too many "here's what it should look like from another angle" instruction insets.

Separately, I somehow still hear occasional objections to the existence of numbered bags because the removal of 2-hour knolling marathons devalues the product and is an insult to the intelligence of builders. Why do these folks not realize they can just open all of the bags at once themselves and knoll to their hearts' content?

Seriously though, those 4+ instructions are ludicrous. More pages of instructions than there are parts is a bridge too far. [When I was 4, I was incredibly patient & diligent and most definitely building 2 meter tall Technic cranes durable enough to hold my entire weight, and I didn't need instructions at all smh] /s

I love this guy’s articles. He’s simultaneously encouraging and calling out the AFOLs.

@theJANG said:
"I hear AFOLs all the time gushing over eye-watering SNOT tricks & life-changing NPUs, but the work that all of the folk in the design process put into ensuring a smooth & successful build experience for even inexperienced customers is positively astonishing if you really pay attention, and criminally underrated & undervalued.

More people should take note of all of these situations where five 1x2s are included in a bag instead of three 1x2s + one 1x4 and instead of complaining of "part count bloat to trick us into thinking there's greater value," see how much this a) reduces part hunting during the build and b) reduces costs by removing a part pull sequence at the factory for every unit produced. Observe the splitting of lower-elevation plate runs to bypass the annoyance of warping & difficult placement of long pieces across all studs. Appreciate the use of tiles & modified 1x4s with 2 studs to reduce the number of stud connections for a single part or assembly for the same reason. Recognize the re-scaling of entire builds to accommodate the use of a particular assembly that achieves the desired aesthetic with physical strength, instead of proceeding with a more sophisticated build that WILL shatter during assembly for an unacceptably high percentage of customers. On & on. Designers often toss entire concepts & start from scratch when what worked best in their mind or on the computer ends up requiring 3 hands to assemble smoothly and too many "here's what it should look like from another angle" instruction insets.

Separately, I somehow still hear occasional objections to the existence of numbered bags because the removal of 2-hour knolling marathons devalues the product and is an insult to the intelligence of builders. Why do these folks not realize they can just open all of the bags at once themselves and knoll to their hearts' content?

Seriously though, those 4+ instructions are ludicrous. More pages of instructions than there are parts is a bridge too far. [When I was 4, I was incredibly patient & diligent and most definitely building 2 meter tall Technic cranes durable enough to hold my entire weight, and I didn't need instructions at all smh] /s"

theJANG on a harangue? ;)

Honestly, my biggest gripe on the instructions is probably that the booklets now take up so much more space. They used to fit very nicely inside a single full-page sheet protector, letting you stuff 'em into a binder to keep them in good condition. But now, a lot of the bigger books don't even fit in a sheet protector at all, and the sets often take multiple booklets. Not the end of the world or anything-- I actually like the newer style-- I just wish it could be more compact.

DaveE

Thanks James. I have to say that I liked your writing style as much I enjoy the content - a lot, just in case it isn't clear!

I really value the paper building instructions and the way they are laid out now. While I'm happy to plough through in 80s/90s kids hard mode, with all the bags opened and mixed together, I really enjoy it when my children join in too. They will frequently ask to help it ask just to build it, as a chunk of the 18+ models are really exciting for them. I love that even three year old can participate, and the seven year old can get through 95% of it.

I also don't take any pleasure in building instructions being hard, but NPU? I live for that! And there is so much more of it in modern LEGO sets. There are a lot more parts (both volume and variety) too, to be fair.

So, what's up with that? After the disaster in the 2000s with too many parts and colors, why are there so many specialized parts now, when are you allowed to make a specialized element, and why do some only get used once, whereas others stay around forever? (I'm looking at you Scala accessories, with the apples as big as your head).

James, you are doing us all a big solid on these articles! My girl and I are trying for many years to to get in on an Inside Tour, just to ask these questions you are basing your articles on! Ofcourse we'll keep trying to get in on a next Inside Tour, but your articles makes the wait a lot easier. Thanks so much for these insights! Just because of that, you got a new subscriber! Cheers!

I usually ignore the parts per step legend and work off the main pictures only. The odd time I miss something but generally works out.

If I’m not in a rush to finish I’ll open all bags and mix together but usually don’t. For a large set (1000 plus) I’ll do some additional sorting.

Hard mode instructions could be fun.

My only complaint about instructions would be the colours not always matching the actual colours. Usually not that much of an issue but has been noticeable for 31212 The Milky Way Galaxy.

Actually, I do have a problem with 5+ instructions being too simple. I think they were understandable enough several years ago, now they're just condescending.
Yes, I do understand that I'm not the right demographic.

I don't like modern building instructions.

* They they actively worsening my building experience. I want to place bricks not turn pages all the time. This would also have been true for my experience as a kid in the early 90s.
* Of course, as a kid, I wasn't happy when I had built something wrong and had to go back a few steps (never 10 steps because even large sets could be finished in less than 20 steps).
* As a kid, I genuinely liked finding the differences between the steps. It was part of the fun. I still like it and I am pretty sure it is one reason why I could built most my sets from the top of my head after a while, because I really looked, at what I was doing.
* Today, it is also a question of storage. All my childhood instructions easily fit into one folder. Today 5 large sets would use up the same space or maybe 20 medium sets. (Also FSC doesn't make it sustainable, recylcled paper maybe would, but even then, an 8-page instruction will be more sustainable than a 40 page booklet).

So the only reason, why the instructions should be a bit more supporting than back in the 90s is that modern sets are more complex and contain more pieces (number and type) than back than. The boxes that show all pieces in the step are okay, but please let us place more bricks per step, also the kids. Often with modern sets I go four steps at the time just to have bit more fun.

[EDIT]: And just remember how much fun it was to figure out the alternate models on the back of the boxes with no instructions whatsoever! :-)

@thor96 said:
"Well, what do you know? Lego did what you want. We now have Bricklink Designer Program sets where the instructions and building process do not need to follow this very idea of being a first set. I would argue the same goes for complicated technic sets. Also, take a look at @Harmonious_Building comment to realize you could have your advanced building experience by simply challenging yourself instead of lazily depending on what Lego employees will choose for general audience."

I'm not going to change your opinion, but I want to express mine. So for another metaphor; books. A regular adult won't find much satisfaction by reading a book with a target age of say 5-6. It will have larger text with fewer words per page and a simplified language. Flipping through more pages at once isn't going to make the experience any better for an adult. LEGO markets and sell sets specifically for adults, but it really only shows in the subject matter of the builds. I think there's room for a larger variety in instructions too.
LEGO have clearly spent a huge amount of effort into developing a system for clear and easy to follow step-by-step instructions for their products. It even ties in to how they package parts in separate bags, where for example there are never any parts in the same bag that are easily confused for one-another by shape or color. If such pieces are required, they are placed in different bags and the instructions are adjusted so that those similar, yet different, pieces are used in different stages of the build. That's super impressive. I can hardly express how much I appreciate that. But the pacing of the instructions could be altered for more mature audiences without changing those aspects.
To me, many set instructions today feel like being handed a children's book instead of a novel, even if you specifically chose an adult targeted product. Saying that it's insulting is going too far, but hopefully you get my point. Again, I fully appreciate the complexity and the craftsmanship that goes into making clear instructions. LEGO have worked really hard on being able to include everyone by lowering all requirements. But I really think there should be a broader range since there is such a wide target audience today.
Skipping pages or setting up personal challenges just to get the most out of the experience shouldn't really be necessary.

15+ year of building experience, and still making mistakes, also, people always forget that Lego should be accessible to EVERYONE! Ant this includes even with motorial/mental issues

And even if you don't have any disability, there's still tons and tons of people who have problem while building sets, and an example is my bf, he's not a novice, and he have some architecture skyline and botanical sets, but he still struggle a lot and he ask for my help more than once per set

So yeh, I'm always happy hearing about stuff like this and it's always more than welcome
Besides, AFOLs should have opinion honestly, they're becoming so toxic and unbereable to listen to

I'm sorry but the word "gatekeeping" is badly overused, and always from a very high horse. Nowadays it's thrown around any time there's even a slight hint of dissatisfaction from fans whenever a certain hobby or product gets made worse in some way because of, let's face it, what is 99% of the time just the insatiable corporate lust for money.

@RTS013 said:
" @Brickalili said:
"I quite enjoy at the very least having the “you need to grab these pieces” box in the corner... "

I like those too. But when they show just one or two pieces they kind of loose their usefulness, don't they?"

Not necessarily; means I definitively know only one piece has been used in this step and I don’t spend time looking to see if I’ve missed anything, exactly the same as if many pieces had been used. Useful anti-frustration feature

"5978 Sphinx Secret Surprise (The surprise is you realising you placed a brick wrong 10 steps later.)"

That's really the long and the short of ot for me. I did not enjoy the game of spot-the-difference on every step as a kid, and I don't enjoy it today when I rebuild an older set. I see the fun in building a set in watching it come together, seeing how functions or shapes are created. Not in conquering the instructions, or in hunting for the right part in a giant pile.
It's not like building any Lego set is truly HARD – unlike, say, building plastic model kits, painting, or sculpting, every step is reversible and redoable if need be, and none of it requires a skill as such, so taking pride in being able to assemble a set feels a little absurd to me. (For an adult anyway. Different story for kids.)

I’m one of those old guys who had sets from the early to late 1980s, and I’m glad for the changes. It’s definitely made the build experience a lot smoother. I think numbered bags were the biggest help, but the parts list before each step is a close second. Improved callouts are also great.

I have red-green color vision deficiency, and certain bricks are extremely difficult to tell apart in the instructions as well as in real life. But there’s been a lot of work to alleviate those problems and I really appreciate that.

I do think LEGO could work to improve or eliminate the single brick steps. There may be a time or two in a set every now and again; but you can’t honestly argue that the sheer volume of single part steps are necessary. It’s a little ridiculous.

Might be an appropriate place to say this: I have zero problem with the instruction covers going from box artwork to plain renders. To me at least, instructions are utilitarian, so I really don't care what the front looks like.

@djcbs said:
"Most Gen Z and Gen Alpha are too stupid to follow slightly more complex instructions.
So LEGO basically had to lower the bar to meet their room-temperature IQs. It's sad, but its a general problem in society.
The numbered bags are another example of that. God forbid they should look for the pieces! No no no, we have to cater to every whim and needs of the newer generations of spoiled little brats.

Honestly? Building LEGO with modern instructions has become such a boring unchallenging experience that, if LEGO sold me the models pre-built, I would probably buy them that way. 'cause I no longer take any joy in their modern building experiences anyway."

You know you could just…open all the bags all at once if you wanted to recreate that experience, right?

I had bought a Stuntz set when it was on clearance and had recently built it. The instruction pace was incredibly annoying: it was one piece a page, literally (as in, if there was two of a part, it was delegated to two different pages). I get that it's for younger builders, but I think this is oversimplification. Is highlighting added bricks not enough for 5+ builders?

“Challenge builds have always been fascinating to me. Things like build-in-the-bag, speed building, building blindfolded, and the most interesting I've seen, co-op building.“

I didn’t even know this was a thing! I’d love to read an article explaining more about the rules of all these challenge building ideas people have come up with.

The new instructions are much improved over when I was a kid because they take the guesswork out of building.

Not expending a bunch of time and energy trying to find which pieces you need and where they are supposed to go allows me to appreciate the beauty of the actual build experience.

SPEED CHAMPIONS is a favorite line of mine because of the unusual parts and interesting ways they are used. Allowing me to spend my time marveling at the elegant way a build comes together, or retrieving a piece from the list only to find it used in a way that is unexpected is way more fun than just "OK WHAT AM I DOING NOW?"

I can remember frustrating builds as a kid, most notably the old LEGOLAND Hospital (late 80s, I can't be bothered to fetch the set number). I always finished all of my sets, but I can remember angrily trying to track down pieces that I only later realized I had missed. That this was 34ish years ago and I can remember this frustration says a lot!

Kids also have more freetime than adults - personally, I am rarely able to devote more than 30 minutes to building LEGO during a typical day, and I want that time to be ALL KILLER, NO FILLER. Not some annoying parts-finding expedition.

The new instructions are improved in so, so many ways.

@Brickalili said:
" @djcbs said:
"Most Gen Z and Gen Alpha are too stupid to follow slightly more complex instructions.
So LEGO basically had to lower the bar to meet their room-temperature IQs. It's sad, but its a general problem in society.
The numbered bags are another example of that. God forbid they should look for the pieces! No no no, we have to cater to every whim and needs of the newer generations of spoiled little brats.

Honestly? Building LEGO with modern instructions has become such a boring unchallenging experience that, if LEGO sold me the models pre-built, I would probably buy them that way. 'cause I no longer take any joy in their modern building experiences anyway."

You know you could just…open all the bags all at once if you wanted to recreate that experience, right? "

Shhhhhh don't respond to the "Kids today are all stupid idiots, I'm a super genius" crowd with logical suggestions. It helps them feel better to complain.

Give me a big dead tree booklet with instructions or stop making LEGO.
I'm not staring at a stupid screen to build LEGO.

@poshhammer said:
"I should have clarified in the article, but yes, reducing paper use in all scenarios is good, but the paper The LEGO Group use is all FSC certified, so it is at least done sustainably (not shilling, its just what they do).

https://fsc.org/en/fsc-standards

https://www.lego.com/en-gb/sustainability/environment/sustainable-packaging"

as an architect, I can assure you that the FSC or PEFC label do not guarantee sustainable forrestry. It is, at best, a money-incentive form of greenwashing

In the digital era, I wonder if instruction steps could be merged. If you like challenges, digital instructions could group 3-5 steps into one.

Nothing like alleged adults attacking children for being "stupid" or "lazy" as if those same adults aren't the ones that raised those kids to be that way...

Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set...

The parts call-out gets me the most.

I was always irritated how the parts call-out was not used regularly for every single set. Maybe I am remembering this wrong but between 1999 and 2002 it felt completely random what set would get the call-out.
And if you had asked me how to improve the call-out it would just be to increase the quantity number because it is really small on default.
Never would I have imagined anyone would actually need the "Hands" page. Even though it is a neat idea for children up to about 2nd grade, I feel like the "Hands" call-out could still be confined together with the regular step on one page with how wide instruction pages are.

Overall it irritates me greatly how much empty space modern instructions have. Empty as in showing zero new information. It makes me want to skip pages which works well enough but eventually this does lead to misplaced bricks. I would think with the prevalence of ADHD claims about young people that the average <20 year old would act the same. At least enough that it should be considered to create Hard Mode instructions for at least Digital-only as an option.

Creating instructions with the Stud.io it also feels like that system has ease of building nailed down perfectly. Highlighting new pieces in a color the set doesn't use & zooming into the model to get more steps on one page. Also trying to keep all bricks limited to about the same size, not placing 1x1 plates alongside 2x4 bricks unless the submodel being worked on is tiny enough.
I really love the idea of publishing ones own hard-mode instructions for sets but sadly Rebrickable does not allow uploading instructions or .ios of Sets with zero changes to the model, unlike Mechabricks. It would make publishing mods to sets so much easier if there is a good respository of official sets as digital files. For some reason people published countless of such models in the 2000s but since the discontinuation of Lego Digital Designer it's rare that anyone posts anything.

Just skip pages -- that should make it challenging.

@RobA said:
"Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set... "

Give examples, please. I cannot find any such warnings, only the statement "Batteries included" on sets with light or sound bricks.

I think there's a happy medium to settle on regarding this debate, as I'm the guy who rolls his eyes at a modern building instruction booklet sometimes. One piece per page, etc....

Simultaneously, I can recall one very SPECIFIC little childhood melty I had while building 6692 - a set so old you have to navigate here https://lego.brickinstructions.com/en/lego_instructions/set/6692/Instructions to go back in time to see how few pages there are in the instructions. They weren't even 'books' in those days - more like a folded leaflet!

Anyway, for those who are curious, look at Steps 3 & 4. To this DAY it's not very clear where to place the front wheels and axle. I remember this like it was yesterday - I came apart. Total helmet fire - lost my shit. Needless to say it ruined the building experience. Obliterated it, really xD

So, I guess modern day me can just find ways to make the build more challenging without LEGO's assistance. Childhood me would probably be grateful for the clearer instructions.

$ .02

@560heliport said:
" @RobA said:
"Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set... "

Give examples, please. I cannot find any such warnings, only the statement "Batteries included" on sets with light or sound bricks."

https://www.reddit.com/r/legolotrfans/comments/1d5vf7k/baraddur_box/

@Nick said:
"I'm sorry but the word "gatekeeping" is badly overused, and always from a very high horse. Nowadays it's thrown around any time there's even a slight hint of dissatisfaction from fans whenever a certain hobby or product gets made worse in some way because of, let's face it, what is 99% of the time just the insatiable corporate lust for money."

Are you seriously gatekeeping the word 'gatekeeping'?

"Kids these days have no attention span."

"Kids these days are lazy."

"Kids these days just stare at screens all day."

These statements have been around for decades, and I doubt there's anyone here in the comments from a generation that these arguments haven't been used against. (Seriously, even before television there were concerns that the proliferation of inexpensive paperback novels would be the downfall of society.)

And for those of you who think you were amazing young builders in the 1970s and 1980s, I suggest you find some old instruction booklets and compare them to modern sets.

I adore the classic Yellow Castle, and it's one of my favorite sets of all time. But it's a straightforward stacking of bricks to make vertical walls. There's a similar simplicity in the Classic Space sets, which I also love. Modern sets are incredibly complex by comparison, and modern instruction booklets have adapted to handle that complexity.

@sipuss said:
" @560heliport said:
" @RobA said:
"Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set... "

Give examples, please. I cannot find any such warnings, only the statement "Batteries included" on sets with light or sound bricks."

https://www.reddit.com/r/legolotrfans/comments/1d5vf7k/baraddur_box/"

Oh hey, that link also answers the question: it's legally mandated.

@RobA said:
"Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set... "

Because it's now legally required? Despite the age rating on the box (which, as it has always been, is only a suggestion), even the most expensive Lego sets are still toys and thus subject to toy safety laws the same as any other set.

Nice article. I am from the 90s but I defeinitely enjoy the new style of instructions far more. I've rebuilt a few odler sets recently and not having the piece call out was annoying. Even worse was the absence of numbered bags xD

But one thing I noticed in the more recent BI is the removal of the numbered bags callout. There used to be a break down of which numbered bag will be used to build what part of the set on the first pages but it's gone. I found them very useful when I break a set apart as I've come to the habit of putting them back in numbered bags in case I want to build them again later but now I have to go through the entire book to find the relevant pages :/

I really want to rebuild my 10030 but I keep porcrastinating because everything is in one giant bag and I don't have the courage to spend hours looking for the one piece I need among all the others xD

Still like paper instructions, You got remember
1. thing....
What if power went out, or no power. Some places have no power.

I grew up on LEGO in the 80s/90s, so I was capable of doing those instructions. I also know only myself and one other kid in my class had any LEGO. I had friends come over to play with them, but they were unable to build anything and didn't have any of their own.

With that said, as an adult and parent of a once enjoyed LEGO child, easier instructions definitely helped to an extent. I agree on age/maturity playing a role in terms of what we have experienced as adults and what we remember about being that target age. I know my kid is highly gifted so she had no problem soaring through instructions, but I also can appreciate how they were still effective no matter her level of ability. (yes, a small humble brag. She's way smarter than I ever was)

As for instructions in general, I'd love better contrast on pieces. Some when get printed don't resemble the actual color as needed, or some of the darks are just too dark to see sometimes. I know on digital you can turn up the brightness and sometimes that gives just enough contrast, but on paper it can be tricky at times even with the outlined pieces. BUT I say that knowing I'd hate to only have digital instructions. I like getting away from the screen for my LEGO hobby.

@Brickdarg said:
"The only thing I dislike about modern instructions is how 4+ sets dedicate an entire page to showing which pieces to grab, doubling the amount of paper used and also greatly increasing how much ink is used. For a company that seems to care so much about the environment, it's a shockingly wasteful practice that I hope is abolished sooner or later."
Plus, after the first time it's totally unnecessary.
Seriously, LEGO constantly underestimates kids. Even little ones are intelligent enough to get the gist of it after the first time. And if they don't then perhaps LEGO is not the appropriate toy for them.
Because let's be brutally honest, LEGO tries to show that everyone can achieve everything. But that's dishonest, and cruel too. Because while with instructions that are dumbed down to the max even a totally incompetent person can build any LEGO set, in real life there's no one who takes you by the hand and explains every little step of everything in minute detail.
Kids who are treated like that grow up to think that it will go on like that forever. Guess what, they will have a real hard time adapting to life as it truly is.
Do parents really want their kids to grow up into people who are incapable of achieving anything without constantly being taken by the hand?

And as for "hard mode" instructions, why not make those the printed standard (since that would use much less paper and be better for the environment), and the "baby step" version digital only?
After all, since LEGO has shown time and time again that they think every kid has a high end smart device anyway, that would be only logical.

I like reading the comments on these articles because it’s clear a lot of people didn’t actually read the article themselves where their usual complaints are addressed.

Anyway, another fantastic article.

@AustinPowers said:
" @Brickdarg said:
"The only thing I dislike about modern instructions is how 4+ sets dedicate an entire page to showing which pieces to grab, doubling the amount of paper used and also greatly increasing how much ink is used. For a company that seems to care so much about the environment, it's a shockingly wasteful practice that I hope is abolished sooner or later."
Plus, after the first time it's totally unnecessary.
Seriously, LEGO constantly underestimates kids. Even little ones are intelligent enough to get the gist of it after the first time. And if they don't then perhaps LEGO is not the appropriate toy for them.
Because let's be brutally honest, LEGO tries to show that everyone can achieve everything. But that's dishonest, and cruel too. Because while with instructions that are dumbed down to the max even a totally incompetent person can build any LEGO set, in real life there's no one who takes you by the hand and explains every little step of everything in minute detail.
Kids who are treated like that grow up to think that it will go on like that forever. Guess what, they will have a real hard time adapting to life as it truly is.
Do parents really want their kids to grow up into people who are incapable of achieving anything without constantly being taken by the hand?

And as for "hard mode" instructions, why not make those the printed standard (since that would use much less paper and be better for the environment), and the "baby step" version digital only?
After all, since LEGO has shown time and time again that they think every kid has a high end smart device anyway, that would be only logical. "

Your attitude is another perfect reason why Lego sets should make sets more accessible—so that fewer of the people who grow up to be Lego fans get oversized egos from thinking being better at toys makes them superior human beings.

@AustinPowers said:
"Because let's be brutally honest, LEGO tries to show that everyone can achieve everything. But that's dishonest, and cruel too. Because while with instructions that are dumbed down to the max even a totally incompetent person can build any LEGO set, in real life there's no one who takes you by the hand and explains every little step of everything in minute detail.
Kids who are treated like that grow up to think that it will go on like that forever. Guess what, they will have a real hard time adapting to life as it truly is.
Do parents really want their kids to grow up into people who are incapable of achieving anything without constantly being taken by the hand?"

"Lego instructions are not only dishonest, but cruel."

"Children who grow up using Lego instructions will be incapable of achieving anything without constantly being taken by the hand."

I knew this article would lead to some extreme out-of-touch comments, but this one has to be parody, right? Right?

" @Brickalili said:
You know you could just…open all the bags all at once if you wanted to recreate that experience, right? "

Tell me you don't know the difference between the old instructions and the dumbed-down ones without telling me you don't know the difference between the old instructions and the dumbed-down ones

" @poshhammer said:
I guarantee if I look through your LEGO displays I will find building errors in your models.
"

I guarantee you won't.
We're not the same, mate.

My older sister is an MD and a college professor in neuroscience. She just published a book chapter about the way brains work. She is EXTREMELY intelligent. But she's not a big Lego fan, and the few times she's tried to build a modern Lego set she's struggled due to its complexity. My wife is also a smart cookie, and she's had so much trouble building the spaceship I gave her for Christmas that it still sits, half-finished, on top of the dresser. I agree that Lego instruction books should be as clear as possible, even if that makes them longer than they could otherwise be.

And seriously, the kids are all right. Anyone who thinks "kids these days are so stupid" should stop yelling at clouds and remember that the older generation has been saying that "kids these days are so stupid" for literally thousands of years of recorded history, and the world hasn't ended yet.

Great article, @poshhammer. Thanks again for sharing. Subscribed!

@iwybs said:
"And seriously, the kids are all right. Anyone who thinks "kids these days are so stupid" should stop yelling at clouds and remember that the older generation has been saying that "kids these days are so stupid" for literally thousands of years of recorded history, and the world hasn't ended yet."
Google "PISA test Germany" and you will find that kids indeed are getting worse year after year. There are plenty of studies that show that kids are getting less intelligent, it's not something I made up. And it can be experienced every day. I get to work with apprentices, and for years every new generation has been less able to perform tasks that say ten or fifteen years ago young people had no problem with. Shorter attention spans, less diligence, less understanding of basic knowledge in maths, German, etc. It's not an illusion but fact I experience at work every day. Perhaps it's different in the US, but in Germany kids are definitely getting "more stupid", to use a drastic expression.

@Andrusi said:
" @sipuss said:
" @560heliport said:
" @RobA said:
"Now I just need someone to explain why we need enormous, ugly warnings to not swallow a battery on the front of a $500, 18+ set... "

Give examples, please. I cannot find any such warnings, only the statement "Batteries included" on sets with light or sound bricks."

https://www.reddit.com/r/legolotrfans/comments/1d5vf7k/baraddur_box/"

Oh hey, that link also answers the question: it's legally mandated."

I totally understand the legal requirement to put a warning on the box - but so large? on all sides? It's just such an eyesore.

@poshhammer said:
" @AustinPowers How are you not a LEGO fan? You are posting in the comments of this LEGO fan page on the reg..."
Actually I came to Brickset originally because I found it was an awesome site to keep track of one's collection. The comments in the beginning didn't interest me all that much.
As for why I had a collection in the first place, that's because of the sets from my childhood and those that I bought after I came out of my dark ages around 2010 or so with my kids getting old enough to play with LEGO themselves.
It's only since LEGO ran my once second favorite (after Classic Space) theme TECHNIC into the ground that I started to lose interest in LEGO again. It's also at that time that alternatives became good enough to be interesting to me. And nowadays it's rare that I buy a LEGO set and far more often that I buy something from the competition. LEGO still has the occasional gem now and then for my interests, but those sets are few and far between.
I would call myself a fan of brick building, not of LEGO in particular.

A tiny, little warning on just one side of the box would be almost useless.

@Binnekamp said:
"Thank you for the article. It's nice to see these points confirmed so they can be taken out of the realm of conjecture. Hopefully people can now see more readily that it's for inclusivity and having a positive building exerience rather than pandering to the lowest common denominator as I've seen people claim sometimes.

There's one thing I still wonder about: why exactly is it only one part per step, sometimes even per page? I've recently been building sets from all eras and whilst the 90s sets sometimes do require you to pay attention, I personally found that later instructions that have you place 3 parts per step felt just as clear as those with one part. The only difference was page flipping, and the daunting amount of steps on the latter. In this example I mean that both cases have the part call-outs above the step by the way.

Did lego find that users prefer flipping pages over having to focus on multiple parts per step at all?
Or is there another reason why instructions place one part at the time more often?
I'm curious what the rationalization is for this change in design. After all, my experience is just one perspective. Maybe lego's broad customer base would find more of an effect here?

Oh, and the comment '18+ is a marketing tool to get the non "mother's basement" crowd' felt a bit mean. You probably didn't mean to, but this sounds like the fans prior to 18-plus are all unsuccessful. I have a master's degree, a good paying job and live alone, but having an article link such a term to the reader didn't add anything. I do however have (high-functioning) autism, and the stereotype used here is an ugly one I've had to debunk my entire life as soon as people find out about my hobby. I take it that it was tongue in cheek considering you did follow up with saying that it's an outdated term. But ehm... maybe a more neutral term could have worked as well here?"

The writer of these articles has shown their hand to be haughty and arrogant. They do not care how insulting they are.

I'm not going to lie: I've always thought of myself as an excellent LEGO builder, but in some recent 18+ sets I did make tiny mistakes, and in some instances I only found out near the end of the bag of bricks for that portion of the instructions. It really sucks tracing back where you've made the mistake, so it's probably a good thing the instructions don't add twenty bricks at a time. I'm sure every adult LEGO bulder has made mistakes once in a while during a large build, even with simplified modern instructions.

I do want to point out that the mistakes I made were mostly down to me being unable to distinguish colors properly or because certain colors (like reddish brown) look incredibly dark in the printed instructions, especially in artificial lighting, to the point where I had to use the flashlight on my phone to figure out what the instructions were telling me to do. So a better color match between the instructions and the bricks would be helpful.

I have a friend who's a casual LEGO Harry Potter fan, but she finds the building experience in itself rather tedious, so if the instructions would be more like in the ol' days, she'd probably never finish a set all by herself -- if she even does that at all.

@560heliport said:
"A tiny, little warning on just one side of the box would be almost useless. "
In order to even get to the battery one has to at least know how to use a screwdriver.
And if you're intelligent enough to use one of those without impaling yourself on it you should also be intelligent enough to know that one doesn't eat batteries.
Then again, this is the US we're talking about, so there you go... ;-)

I actually enjoy the challenge of building LEGO sets without the instructions at all, relying only on the box and 3D view, and sharing the sped up process on my YouTube channel, mistakes and all!

Recently I have built 10326, 10330, 21349, 75382, and more!

Check it out here: https://youtube.com/@VersatileFunDesigns

This is crazy. If you want a "harder" building experience, skip a few steps. Quit getting mad at how other people have fun or enjoy their hobbies.

I'll start out by saying that the simpler instructions of today have helped me personally, as my stroke left me with field cuts to the left of my field of vision. I occasionally miss whole steps, so the simpler things are, the better, for me at least.
"This is where one person stacks bricks without seeing the instructions and one person has the instructions and can't see the model. The instructions-wielder has to describe where to place the bricks to the builder and then, at the end, they can see if what they built was correct." I hadn't heard of that one. So it's sort of like Kriegspiel ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kriegspiel_ (chess)) in Lego form?
"Just buy 21327 Typewriter before it retires, that'll put some hairs on your chest..."
Funny you should mention that one, because I made a couple of mistakes with my copy of that one. I put the sub-assembly from step 152 on the wrong side, and I left a https://brickset.com/parts/design-18654 (don't remember which color) out. Neither one is the fault of the instructions, but I just wasn't paying enough attention. The first one did require a partial teardown and rebuild once I tested the finished model and realized the mechanism wasn't working correctly. The second wasn't a big deal, and I'm not enough of a perfectionist to insist that that one was in there; just enough of a perfectionist to remove and reapply stickers, sometimes multiple times. Also, my chest is no hairier than it was before, not that that's a problem.

@Binnekamp said:"Oh, and the comment '18+ is a marketing tool to get the non "mother's basement" crowd' felt a bit mean. "

@poshhammer did admit that it's a dated concept.

@StyleCounselor said:".... See ya later, Space Cowboy!"

Ordinarily I'd like a comment with a Cowboy Bebop reference, but I disagree with some of what you said, so I'll just say, "Bang."

@ALEXDTI said:"15+ year of building experience, and still making mistakes, also, people always forget that Lego should be accessible to EVERYONE! Ant this includes even with motorial/mental issues"

My own issues have somewhat tempered my desire to own certain sets; I love the Botanical line, but having built 10281 and 10309 , I'm not sure how many more sets from the line I'm going to get, as assembling those fiddly details with only one hand that works properly has been a challenge. Well, maybe 10329 , so 10309 won't be the only set scattered around my room...

@peterlmorris said:"I have red-green color vision deficiency, and certain bricks are extremely difficult to tell apart in the instructions as well as in real life. But there’s been a lot of work to alleviate those problems and I really appreciate that."

I don't have any such issues, but there were times, when I was putting 40644 together, that I had some trouble determining which shade of green the instructions wanted me to add. I know it's been said before, but Lego needs to work on its color matching.

@AustinPowers said:
" @iwybs said:
"And seriously, the kids are all right. Anyone who thinks "kids these days are so stupid" should stop yelling at clouds and remember that the older generation has been saying that "kids these days are so stupid" for literally thousands of years of recorded history, and the world hasn't ended yet."
Google "PISA test Germany" and you will find that kids indeed are getting worse year after year. There are plenty of studies that show that kids are getting less intelligent, it's not something I made up. And it can be experienced every day. I get to work with apprentices, and for years every new generation has been less able to perform tasks that say ten or fifteen years ago young people had no problem with. Shorter attention spans, less diligence, less understanding of basic knowledge in maths, German, etc. It's not an illusion but fact I experience at work every day. Perhaps it's different in the US, but in Germany kids are definitely getting "more stupid", to use a drastic expression. "

Kinds are not 'more stupid' nowadays than they used to be, but there's no denying that the level of education has severely slipped in the past two decades across many countries, at least in Europe. Basic language and mathematical skills aren't up to the level they were 20 years ago, and good luck finding a history teacher. I don't think kids are less intelligent now, but attention spans are certainly shortening across the board. If I had Instagram when I was 15, I'm sure I'd suck at school too -- I already find it very distracting now.

I think it depends a bit on context, usually the separated bags also help out, but with the increasing number of very similar colors (which didn't exist in the limited palette of the '90s, except the annoying Trans-Yellow/Trans-Neon-Green mix-ups which could happen) things are much more prone to errors I think. I also remember the time around 2002-2009 were certain greyish colors were barely distinguishable at all in the instructions, so I guess things went for the better?

And as versatilefundesigns mentioned, you can of cause always opt to not use the instructions at all, which can be a funny puzzle experience, very reminiscent of the old back-of-the-box B-models.

Always thought I didn't need those overly-simplified instructions, but yet still made 2 mistakes I yet have not found the time fixing them:

-Finished building 75255 and realized I had still had a 1x6 plate lying on the table...
-71411's foot has a 1x6 plate in Bright Yellow switched with one in Cool Yellow...

Oddly it's always those 1x6 plates, yikes!

@AustinPowers said:
"Then again, 4+ instructions are really taking it to an extreme level as far as "dumbing down" is concerned, don't they? "

I don't know if you've noticed, but most four-year-old children are pretty dumb. I mean it's one thing to lack a formal education, but it's almost like they have barely any life experience. (Sarcasm.)

Lego isn't just guessing with this stuff. They have done decades of research using thousands of children building a variety of Lego sets in a variety of ways.

Personally, I don't think opportunities should be closed to kids who don't show an immediate natural aptitude for something, whether it's art or sports or school or hobbies. I've made a nice career out of being a writer, but writing wasn't something that strongly "clicked" for me until I was 17 years old and had the right teacher.

As for your personal experience, I can't argue with that. Clearly Lego's simplified instruction booklets have made all of the kids you encounter extra stupid.

Regardless of one's views on whether they are "correct" or not, I love these more thoughtful in-depth pieces (HEH) that have been becoming more frequent lately.

(Also, the first link in number 15 has a menacing aura about it that has prevented me from clicking on it both out of principle and fear)

I'm still taking a stand against the use your hands pages in 4+ sets. There has to be a better design out there, a 4 year old doesn't need an entire page of hands, they just need a clear picture of what parts to use and the hands pages are clunky and unnecessary, and a complete waste of paper.

Apologies to the TLDR folks….

@poshhammer - I was a bit apprehensive at first as I initially considered this to be another “not so controversial” take. I was obviously wrong as there are clearly strong opinions here about building instructions (BI). That being said, I think you’re really finding your groove here. The article was well written, poignant, funny, and unlike LEGO BI, enjoyable to read. :o). Thank you!

I myself don’t have big concerns with building instructions, though I have indeed noticed how different they’ve become since my first set 4005 Tug Boat. And I’m excited to see a number of folks rebuilding me after all these years. ;o). As DaveE and Style mentioned, storing the bigger and more numerous instructions booklets has begun to be a pain. But that isn’t a deal breaker for me. The argument that we’re wasting more paper IMHO puts the straw in straw man. I was also surprised to realize how many folks here have experience with 4+ directions. I can honestly claim to currently having a 4yo in the house along with multiple previous 4yos.

My septuagenarian father, as a fan of military history, recently picked up a NON-LEGO (very expensive but intriguing) building set of a WWII Grumman Avenger. This was probably his first ever foray ever into this type hobby and seeing this set was my first experience ever with NON-LEGO pieces and building instructions, the whole time thinking of @AustinPowers. :o) I was so surprised at the frustrating quality of the building instructions.

The colors were indecipherable and this other company likes to white out all the areas of the model not involved in the current step which was beyond confusing for my father, not to mention me. Additionally, the limited amount of numbered bags contained multiple instances of “too similar” items ( @theJANG) that led to mistakes during piece placement.

Even after a 90 minute coaching session from me, he hasn’t gone back to try and finish the set and I can’t imagine he’ll be motivated to pick up any other building set going forward, off brand or not.

I totally get everything that James has been telling us now. So I’m off on a hunt to find a candidate LEGO set for my father to try and rekindle that spark that so surprisingly came to him at this point in his life. I’ll probably leave introducing him to the @StyleCounselor bag dumping leather piece walking experience for another day, though.

@yellowcastle said:
"My septuagenarian father, as a fan of military history, recently picked up a NON-LEGO (very expensive but intriguing) building set of a WWII Grumman Avenger. This was probably his first ever foray ever into this type hobby and seeing this set was my first experience ever with NON-LEGO pieces and building instructions, the whole time thinking of @AustinPowers. :o) I was so surprised at the frustrating quality of the building instructions.

The colors were indecipherable and this other company likes to white out all the areas of the model not involved in the current step which was beyond confusing for my father, not to mention me. Additionally, the limited amount of numbered bags contained multiple instances of “too similar” items ( @theJANG) that led to mistakes during piece placement.

Even after a 90 minute coaching session from me, he hasn’t gone back to try and finish the set and I can’t imagine he’ll be motivated to pick up any other building set going forward, off brand or not."
At first I thought you meant the Grumman Avenger by Cobi. But that couldn't have been it since it's neither expensive nor complicated to build.
Which set was it? Which manufacturer? And how much did it cost? Google didn't yield any results for me.

In general I wouldn't recommend an off brand set as a first foray into brick building for someone with no prior experience. A novice will always be happier with LEGO's approach to doing building instructions.

Definitely the Grumman Avenger by Cobi. Of all the other brands I've tried, Cobi has by far the best part and print quality, but by far the worst instruction quality. Cobi instructions are AWFUL.

I think the idea of having a set of 'hard mode' instructions which is shorter than the regular instructions would have another use. I'm not a huge fan of the digital only instructions when kids are rebuilding sets (Lego time is a nice electronics-free time - pulling out the tablet then feels like it defeats some of that), so I've tried to print out the pdf instructions for some of the Mario sets. But the number of pages for some of them was pretty massive. If a shorter set of instructions could be automatically generated by whatever tool makes the regular instructions, it would be much easier to print out that way.

" it is unambiguously nice for kids to not get frustrated with the toys they are given. As product designers, it is our inherent goal to remove "pain points" from the user experience and maximise the number of people that can enjoy the products that we have worked so hard on"

I think this whole premise is incorrect. It is through frustration that learning takes place; not through having everything spelled out. So the product can only be 'enjoyed' when there are no bumps in the road?

And I get that the old instructions were an I Spy-exercise and a summary of bricks needed in every step are fine. It is just the bloated amount of steps and the way they are presented.

I also think it to be kinda condescending in general to consider only the 1% qualified enough to build a complex set without too much hassle.
It is a load of paper, it hinders the experience and the explanation for it is kinda paternalistic.

@AustinPowers said:
"At first I thought you meant the Grumman Avenger by Cobi. But that couldn't have been it since it's neither expensive nor complicated to build.
Which set was it? Which manufacturer? And how much did it cost? Google didn't yield any results for me.

In general I wouldn't recommend an off brand set as a first foray into brick building for someone with no prior experience. A novice will always be happier with LEGO's approach to doing building instructions. "
That’s the one. He bought it at a museum so no idea what kind of venue markup was involved but the sticker said $80 or $90, if recollection serves. The instructions were very difficult for him (nor great for me). Some of the novel piece types were intriguing but the instructions technique, color and line confusion, piece distribution and imprecise pictures were a big fail.

That's one heck of a venue markup. It's listed on Amazon for $50, and Bluebrixx sells it for 36 euro, which is about $39.

Remember that one jang video when he review a 4 plus set with the instructions and he said YOU GOT TO USE YOUR HANDS!

When I build, the point is to get something cool and playable out of it, not to stroke my ego about the super challenging steps I was able to complete (might be because I'm primarily a Technic guy, and in that world challenging step simply means having to align ten pins at once; I don't think anybody enjoys that!), so simplified instructions don't bother me. I make full use of the parts call outs in each step, and would be happy if they started consistently highlighting the newly added pieces too (they used to do that at some point I think, right?). But even so I strongly dislike one part per step instructions. It's extremely wasteful. Make it five parts per step minimum and stop wasting paper and ink. Then builders will be able to spend their time building, not flipping pages.

But this feels like a good time to bring up another topic relating to instructions - it feels like the physical dimensions of instruction booklets are a real wild west situation, with no standards in sight. What's up with that? That seems like something that should benefit both the consumer (storage is much easier if you have only a few standard sizes to contend with) and TLG (admittedly I don't know a lot about the printing industry, but I imagine standard sizes would make printing cheaper).

@iwybs said:
"That's one heck of a venue markup. It's listed on Amazon for $50, and Bluebrixx sells it for 36 euro, which is about $39."
Indeed. I bought mine for 30 Euro on Amazon but the official RRP is 39.99 Euro.
Which isn't cheap for slightly shy of 400 pieces, but remember that all decorations are printed in Cobi sets, and their parts quality is excellent. Plus they are completely manufactured in the EU, not China, which imho also counts for something these days.

I do admit that Cobi instructions aren't my favorite either, but once one has gotten used to their way of doing things they are not that bad. Their classic warships in particular are loads of fun to build, as was their large version of Titanic, although even their largest Titanic is still dwarfed by LEGO's behemoth version.
As for Cobi planes, I have several, and none seemed particularly challenging to build, to be honest. One thing LEGO builders new to Cobi might find challenging is their gigantic parts library, which is far larger and varied than LEGO's. But they always show what to be mindful of at the beginning of the instructions, which is a good idea imho, especially for less experienced builders.

As a parent with a 4-year old, the new instructions for that age group are phenomenal. The kid is so proud of being able to do an entire set without any help. When we do older sets (including newer older sets and my sets from the 90s), it’s enjoyable, but the kid just needs help. This isn’t evidence “kids these days”, but I think a reflection of the fact that sets - including those for younger kids - are more complex with smaller pieces than they used to be.

And the 4+ instructions do a wonderful job of training the kids to be good builders in the future - reinforcing finding parts and focusing on one step at a time instead of (as kids are wont to do) jumping to the last step on the page because it’s got the big shiny windscreen. I’m here for it.

@TheNameWasTaken said:
"But this feels like a good time to bring up another topic relating to instructions - it feels like the physical dimensions of instruction booklets are a real wild west situation, with no standards in sight. What's up with that? That seems like something that should benefit both the consumer (storage is much easier if you have only a few standard sizes to contend with) and TLG (admittedly I don't know a lot about the printing industry, but I imagine standard sizes would make printing cheaper)."
Excellent point and one that also has been annoying me in the last few years with LEGO.

When I was a kid there were four sizes of instructions. The largest was the standard European A4 size, the medium ones were A5, and the smaller ones came in two non-standard sizes, roughly square and usually folded in the middle from the factory.
That made storage extremely easy.
Nowadays there's more than a dozen different sizes, and every time I open a set there appears to be a new one (or several, since many sets come with a handful of instruction booklets these days - another fact that really annoys me since it makes storage even more complicated.) Almost makes me want to throw away all the instructions, but then I would have to use the digital version, and I would hate that since for me the whole point of building with bricks is to get AWAY from screens in front of me.

While we dislike for ourself those young age sets, they are wondeful for my newly 3 years old : he can nearly autonomously pick the correct number of pieces and build whatever 4+/6+ set we choose for many months now.
We adults sometimes forget there was a time where we didn't know how to read and those BI are great for young ones.

Fine points, and grade A straw-manning, too. I recently discovered that my mother in law was building Speed Champions sets just for fun (prior to that, I didn't even know she was into Lego at all). Anyone who's built one of those knows they're actually among some of the most complicated sets ever designed. I can't imagine a new-comer being able to assemble a SC set with 80s style instructions.

@Paperballpark said:
"If people want harder instructions, they could just skip every other page and use guesswork ;)"

...Or just toss the instructions and figure it out from the box pictures alone.

@Murdoch17 said:
"...Or just toss the instructions and figure it out from the box pictures alone."

Or build the B-models from the box art, or ideas books...

A whole page for a single piece is my main complaint. When I was young, building sets in the 80s, comparing each step to see which pieces were added was frustrating. The inclusion of a box for each step showing the pieces used in that step is ideal, but each step should have at least six pieces. I can see no reason for any step to be for a single piece.

Another item is that modern sets also use much more varied and complicated build techniques than ye olden days. They often have a lot going on; more than just "stack a whole bunch of blocks to make a wall". More diversity in wall pattern, more common mixing plates and bricks. And that's without getting into the SNOT techniques and other things like that.

"Now, I'm all for a good bit of gatekeeping. I'm someone who thinks Sekiro doesn't need an easy mode." L opinion. Accessibility has never ruined any experience for anyone who doesn't need it.

@PurpleDave said:
" @lowlead :
Both hang off the end one stud."

Oh, to have known that back in '83 =oD

Oh well, perhaps over time it taught me to pause and do a double-take, who knows. After reading some posts above, there's an apparent learning curve to building LEGO sets that I rarely notice now - likely due to growing up with the brand. Great discussion either way.

Not once have I ever felt like the instructions have been “dumbed down” in any way.

And even if they have been; I dunno about you lot, but I get enough “challenge” from my day-to-day, I don’t need it in the things I do to relax.

Whatever Lego is doing with their instructions, it’s clearly the right thing; more and more people are buying Lego, and nobody here complaining about the instructions have stopped buying because of it.

Thanks for another interesting and entertaining article: I’m with those who remember that the old ‘build a castle in 20 steps’ days featured a narrower range of piece types, colours and techniques, and appreciate the clarity and techniques that modern instructions (and their designers) use to remove unnecessary frustrations from the build process.

Even my kids’ aunts and uncles, tertiary educated professionals, struggled on occasion to help them build Friends sets - why should Lego not design instructions that take all abilities into consideration?

Wonder how I was able to build in the 90s with super thin instructions that didn't even contain the list of pieces per step. I surely didn't throw out the sets in frustration but actually put my mind and focus into it. I could also distinguish a 2L and 3L black axle from a 2L or 3L black pin. Oh and LEGO sets were not dusting on the shelves either, but were merely parts packs for the craziest MOC's. Certainly didn't need a "rebuild the world" commercial to know that.
I'm sure people would still be able to build even the most complex and largest of sets perfectly fine if the nr. of pages would be halved. Just think of the tons of paper and shipping costs saved this way. And the ones who still can't, should build with the digital 3D building instructions or find a different hobby. I'm tired of the excuse of color coding the sh** out of everything just to get everyone on board and ruin every single LEGO set with pieces in the wrong color and dumbed down 1 piece per page instructions. The minute LEGO stopped writing an age span rating on all boxes and started this 18+ marketing BS, is when things started to really get out of control. Like if a 4 year old needs to see on every page two hands with the pieces needed, maybe he/she should stick to Duplo or Playmobile for the time being. There is really no rush.

@R0Sch: my feelings exactly.
Just look at the instructions for 8880 for example. One of the best classic Technic sets. The instructions are a thin leaflet compared to the phone book sized instructions of even a smaller Technic set today. And that thin leaflet even contained the entire instructions for the only slightly less awesome B-model.
I got this set as a birthday present, and many friends of mine also had it. Not one wasn't able to build the set using the instructions provided. And it's not a simple set by any means either.
Every time I hear people talking about "getting frustrated" while building a LEGO set I wonder what is wrong with them. How can one get frustrated by building with bricks (from any manufacturer actually)? If someone gets frustrated by something as nice as that, why don't they turn towards a hobby more suited to their needs? After all, no one is forced to buy and built a brick based building set.

@R0Sch said:
"Wonder how I was able to build in the 90s with super thin instructions that didn't even contain the list of pieces per step. I surely didn't throw out the sets in frustration but actually put my mind and focus into it. I could also distinguish a 2L and 3L black axle from a 2L or 3L black pin. Oh and LEGO sets were not dusting on the shelves either, but were merely parts packs for the craziest MOC's. Certainly didn't need a "rebuild the world" commercial to know that.
I'm sure people would still be able to build even the most complex and largest of sets perfectly fine if the nr. of pages would be halved. Just think of the tons of paper and shipping costs saved this way. And the ones who still can't, should build with the digital 3D building instructions or find a different hobby. I'm tired of the excuse of color coding the sh** out of everything just to get everyone on board and ruin every single LEGO set with pieces in the wrong color and dumbed down 1 piece per page instructions. The minute LEGO stopped writing an age span rating on all boxes and started this 18+ marketing BS, is when things started to really get out of control. Like if a 4 year old needs to see on every page two hands with the pieces needed, maybe he/she should stick to Duplo or Playmobile for the time being. There is really no rush."

"I enjoyed Lego the way it used to be so everyone who didn't is wrong or too dumb for it". That's what you sound like right now—elitist, exclusionary, and generally unpleasant to be around.

I remember being a kid and figuring out less straightforward instructions. I also remember my peers struggling to build the same sets I was good at, and believe it or not, that was not a good feeling for them or for me! I wanted to be able to share the enjoyment of my hobby with more people! Maybe that doesn't matter to the handful of elitist complainers who feel like enjoyment of Lego should be an exclusive club only for those who can put up with unnecessary, avoidable difficulty, but as a kid who struggled to make friends and relate to other people it sure did to me.

@yellowcastle said:
"Apologies to the TLDR folks….

@poshhammer - I was a bit apprehensive at first as I initially considered this to be another “not so controversial” take. I was obviously wrong as there are clearly strong opinions here about building instructions (BI). That being said, I think you’re really finding your groove here. The article was well written, poignant, funny, and unlike LEGO BI, enjoyable to read. :o). Thank you!

I myself don’t have big concerns with building instructions, though I have indeed noticed how different they’ve become since my first set 4005 Tug Boat. And I’m excited to see a number of folks rebuilding me after all these years. ;o). As DaveE and Style mentioned, storing the bigger and more numerous instructions booklets has begun to be a pain. But that isn’t a deal breaker for me. The argument that we’re wasting more paper IMHO puts the straw in straw man. I was also surprised to realize how many folks here have experience with 4+ directions. I can honestly claim to currently having a 4yo in the house along with multiple previous 4yos.

My septuagenarian father, as a fan of military history, recently picked up a NON-LEGO (very expensive but intriguing) building set of a WWII Grumman Avenger. This was probably his first ever foray ever into this type hobby and seeing this set was my first experience ever with NON-LEGO pieces and building instructions, the whole time thinking of @AustinPowers . :o) I was so surprised at the frustrating quality of the building instructions.

The colors were indecipherable and this other company likes to white out all the areas of the model not involved in the current step which was beyond confusing for my father, not to mention me. Additionally, the limited amount of numbered bags contained multiple instances of “too similar” items ( @theJANG ) that led to mistakes during piece placement.

Even after a 90 minute coaching session from me, he hasn’t gone back to try and finish the set and I can’t imagine he’ll be motivated to pick up any other building set going forward, off brand or not.

I totally get everything that James has been telling us now. So I’m off on a hunt to find a candidate LEGO set for my father to try and rekindle that spark that so surprisingly came to him at this point in his life. I’ll probably leave introducing him to the @StyleCounselor bag dumping leather piece walking experience for another day, though."

Nice comment. Moving. Especially poignant as the guys you mention (perhaps posh and theJANG excepted) have all recently lost our toy-loving fathers.

Keep 'em young. Keep 'em around. Cherish the times before they become only memories.

I have no idea what you're talking about concerning that other leather business. Sounds intriguing, but obviously and strictly out of bounds.

Oh well, satire can't write itself! Except for that leather business, I really had no choice. These people sharing tips on how to make a pleasurable experience more and more tedious and painful. You see. I had no choice. You see it, don't you? I'm not the sickie. You see it?!...

right?! ;)

@Lyichir said:
"I enjoyed Lego the way it used to be so everyone who didn't is wrong or too dumb for it". That's what you sound like right now—elitist, exclusionary, and generally unpleasant to be around."
But he's absolutely right. And at least to me he doesn't sound unpleasant to be around either, quite the contrary. I completely understand where he is coming from.

And I hate to have to break the news to you, but yes, some people are indeed too dumb to to put together a LEGO set, and no matter how stupidly simple the instructions are, those people will still not be able to manage it.

The point is, not everything needs to be inclusionary for everyone. It's completely ok if not everyone can achieve everything.
I for example have always marveled at professional model builders. I would love to be able to do what they can. I even bought all the necessary equipment. I read books, watched instructional videos, etc. Guess what, my models still end up mediocre looking at best. Perhaps I just haven't got the necessary skills for it.
Or musical instruments. I have both an electric as well as an acoustic guitar. I took lessons, I practiced, but in the end I had to admit that I simply lacked the necessary talent. Or in other words I am too dumb for it.

Would I be happier if I had what it takes to achieve what I described in those two examples above? Maybe. Is it the end of the world that I don't? No, it isn't.

The point being, not everyone has to excel at or even just be able to do everything.
And just like some posters above described that even with LEGO's current instructions they, their kids or relatives, friends etc. still sometimes have problems or get frustrated while building, just goes to show that no matter how hard you try to include everyone, for some it just won't work because their talents might lie elsewhere.
Isn't it ok to realize and admit that?

I'm not here to promote excluding people from anything on purpose, but some things just are exclusionary by design due to requiring certain talents (like in my examples above about model making or musical instruments).
It's certainly commendable that LEGO tries to make the hobby enjoyable for as many people as possible, but even if they made all instructions like the 4+ ones and only included one new piece per every step of the entire build there would still be people who had problems or got frustrated, for whatever reason.

@Lyichir: At least I am not personally attacking other users for having a different opinion and twisting their words. You don't like how I think, simply scroll down. It's not the first time you disagree with my beliefs, so maybe find like minded folk and start a merry club. But only if you feel like it.

So just tip the all the parts out on the table, and use the pictures on the box as the only reference.

There, hard mode unlocked, get to work and best of luck, elitists :P

I also like how this argument always glosses over how much more complicated Lego models are these days, even in the kid-friendly segments. Some of the Speed Champs and Friends sets feature some insanely clever building techniques that would be practically IMPOSSIBLE to show with 1980s building instructions.

The difference between Lego and other model kits is Lego requires no glue or paint, only manual dexterity. So yes, theoretically anyone should be able to do it.

@darthsutius said:
"I also like how this argument always glosses over how much more complicated Lego models are these days, even in the kid-friendly segments. Some of the Speed Champs and Friends sets feature some insanely clever building techniques that would be practically IMPOSSIBLE to show with 1980s building instructions."
Yet this also glosses over the fact that in the Eighties there was only a tiny fraction of the types of pieces available today. These days whenever something apparently can't be built with available parts a new one is designed and produced, even if in the end it turns out that a clever combination of available pieces might have sufficed. Just look at how many single use parts there are today, meaning parts that were designed new yet only ever used in one set.
Back in the Eighties LEGO designers imho were far more creative in using what was available instead of simply requesting a new parts design be produced.

@Maxbricks14 said:
"I don't like to do a step wrong while building. It ruins the fun if I have to trace back like ten pages, before I find the problem"

Building on this point (no pun intended), I hate it when I finish a bag and I see an out-of-place leftover piece (for example a 2x2 plate) and I have to flip back through the manual to see where that should go.

Things get even more complicated with sets like the Star Wars Helmet Collection which are pretty densely packed with bricks and have a mostly consistent colour scheme, so it's hard to spot individual pieces in them.

@Binnekamp said:
"Oh, and the comment '18+ is a marketing tool to get the non "mother's basement" crowd' felt a bit mean. You probably didn't mean to, but this sounds like the fans prior to 18-plus are all unsuccessful. I have a master's degree, a good paying job and live alone, but having an article link such a term to the reader didn't add anything. I do however have (high-functioning) autism, and the stereotype used here is an ugly one I've had to debunk my entire life as soon as people find out about my hobby. I take it that it was tongue in cheek considering you did follow up with saying that it's an outdated term. But ehm... maybe a more neutral term could have worked as well here?"

I, too, have Asperger syndrome, as a 17-year-old soon-to-be AFOL I found the term amusing and had a good chuckle over it

I'd be against harder instructions for harder sets, because the "advanced" challenge factor should come from model size/build endurance and intricacy of the build, not from the instructions requiring more focus. I don't love the sets I grew up on in the 2000s where grey and black tones were too difficult to distinguish in the instructions. Having graded instruction difficulties could easily be taken as a barrier to accessibility or a demotivator for buyers who started with the current standard, and with a more complex product, you generally want the most clarity and pacing to be able to work with it as intended. If anything, the instructions for *simpler* builds could stand to go back to a little more per step while the advanced builds should stay paced as they are. But I wouldn't want a more intricate build to throw more pieces at me per step. That's a recipe for error.

I'm all for clarity and accessibility, but I can agree one part per step is pretty unjustifiable.

And hey, at least LEGO never reprints the steps over and over whenever an assembly needs to be built in identical multiples!

@AustinPowers said:
" @iwybs said:
"The difference between Lego and other model kits is Lego requires no glue or paint, only manual dexterity. So yes, theoretically anyone should be able to do it."
It's not just manual dexterity though. You have to be able to understand the instructions, make out the colours of the pieces, have a long enough attention span, frustration tolerance, etc. "

Which is the whole point of this article and comment thread, making it easier to understand the instructions and reduce frustration! /facepalm

The argument that everything was less specialized in the eighties, particularly the argument of drastically fewer specialized parts, has been debunked several times, but I don't have the time to find the reference right now.

@lpleim said:
" @gunther_schnitzel said:
"I usually ignore the parts per step legend and work off the main pictures only. The odd time I miss something but generally works out.

If I’m not in a rush to finish I’ll open all bags and mix together but usually don’t. For a large set (1000 plus) I’ll do some additional sorting.

Hard mode instructions could be fun.

My only complaint about instructions would be the colours not always matching the actual colours. Usually not that much of an issue but has been noticeable for 31212 The Milky Way Galaxy."

I totaly agree about the colors!!! The only mistakes I seem to make are mixing up which color is which."

Aw, yes. Those old instructions (even LOTR) for sets with brown and dark brown.

I usually have to go to Brickset and look at images to see what is what and goes where.

@darthsutius said:
"I also like how this argument always glosses over how much more complicated Lego models are these days, even in the kid-friendly segments. Some of the Speed Champs and Friends sets feature some insanely clever building techniques that would be practically IMPOSSIBLE to show with 1980s building instructions."

Not to mention the much smaller parts palette.

@Torrent_Studios said:" @Binnekamp said:"Oh, and the comment '18+ is a marketing tool to get the non "mother's basement" crowd' felt a bit mean. You probably didn't mean to, but this sounds like the fans prior to 18-plus are all unsuccessful. I have a master's degree, a good paying job and live alone, but having an article link such a term to the reader didn't add anything. I do however have (high-functioning) autism, and the stereotype used here is an ugly one I've had to debunk my entire life as soon as people find out about my hobby. I take it that it was tongue in cheek considering you did follow up with saying that it's an outdated term. But ehm... maybe a more neutral term could have worked as well here?"

I, too, have Asperger syndrome, as a 17-year-old soon-to-be AFOL I found the term amusing and had a good chuckle over it"

I've always said that if you can't laugh at yourself, the world will do it for you.

@iwybs said:"The argument that everything was less specialized in the eighties, particularly the argument of drastically fewer specialized parts, has been debunked several times, but I don't have the time to find the reference right now."

Here's a start, https://www.newelementary.com/2014/08/when-lego-was-never-just-bricks.html

@AustinPowers:
You're certainly not the only person here who has expressed a desire to return to the days when instructions were challenging, but I know you're one of the regular voices to champion that idea. Consider this. Not everyone found the old instructions to be challenging. What if they'd cranked up the difficulty so that nobody found them easy, and those of you who lament the lack of challenge simply gave up at an early age?

When I think of challenging instructions, 10018 is the single set that comes to mind. I've never built it, so I have no idea how well I'd fare, but I know that top-down makes it difficult for anyone to distinguish between a brick and a plate, and I know that the inventory includes at least a few examples of bricks and plates with the same footprint and color.

Also, I had no idea that (and still have no idea why) some AFOLs like the ones in these comments are so against these new building instructions.

I do care about the building experience, and will usually take my time with sets (e.g. spending 15 minutes on a small polybag) but it's definitely not the most important things that LEGO sets have to offer to me - that would the actual models and how good they look when displayed.

Like others have said, why not just do it your way then? LEGO has been great with offering digital building instructions, so if you don't want papercuts or page-turning is too hard for you, then why not use your tablet to scroll through them instead?

The way I see it, just like spare pieces included in every set, you aren't required to use EVERYTHING included in a set. If you don't like the instruction manuals, scan the QR or look them up in the building instructions section on LEGO's website.

LEGO includes what they do in their sets to ensure the best possible experience for ANY user, new or returning. It's like the brick separator elements. AFOLs can surely say something along the lines of "Back in my day, we chipped all our fingernails trying to prise 2x4 plates apart! Why do children nowadays need those separators?" Well I say, if you would like to relive the good ol' days, then just leave the brick separator to the side and carry on building.

This is all coming from a TFOL who just wants to enjoy his hobby. I recognise that LEGO as a company makes some decisions that not everyone understands (CLONE TROOPER HELMET HOLES), and some of them are plain stupid. But better building instructions are definitely far from the worst of LEGO's decisions.

" I am willing to bet I would still find a few mistakes in the models from your displays that you didn't even notice "
As someone who makes sure stacked 1x1s are flush and properly aligned, and has even even been known to pay attention to which way the LEGO logo on the studs face, I accept your challenge! Good call on the Destroyer Droid, though--I remember that one being a challenge even as a teen. I remember at the time thinking it was actually more complicated than 8448.

djcbs is one of the most toxic commenters I've ever seen on Brickset, so... you know he did what you said he did ;)

@R0Sch said:
" @Lyichir: At least I am not personally attacking other users for having a different opinion and twisting their words. You don't like how I think, simply scroll down. It's not the first time you disagree with my beliefs, so maybe find like minded folk and start a merry club. But only if you feel like it."

Sorry, I'm going to continue to call out elitist and exclusionary beliefs when I see them. There was a time when I'd entertain the notion of trying to appeal to attitudes like yours but ultimately for every one high-minded haughty AFOL who thinks that because they personally enjoyed older sets they should stay that way for everyone, there's dozens of people who decided Lego "wasn't for them" (as your initial comment suggested they do) who could've found enjoyment in it if things were designed with more consideration for different abilities and skill levels. Having grown up with a learning disability, and having gone to a college for students with disabilities, inclusion and accessibility are things I'm very passionate about, and I'm not going to back down on challenging the kinds of regressive attitudes that treat those sorts of considerations as "dumbing things down" or somehow leading to kids being too dumb or soft for the "real world".

The good thing is that Lego's design philosophy these days seems to agree, and by making sets less frustrating to build they've been able to massively expand their audience so that more people than ever can experience the love of creative building. Too bad people like you or AustinPowers seem to consider that a bad thing.

I am nearly 39 and have been building for as long as I can remember, and I love the detailed instructions. My only comment is that the colour matching is sometimes off or just unclear. I recently built 76920 and placed a 1x2 plate, only to realize several pages later that I placed the wrong 1x2 and had to disassemble several steps to get the right piece. The more detailed the instructions, the better, IMO.

I build Legos to have fun and relax, not to get frustrated. There is nothing I hate more than having to go back because I did a mistake. The easier to understand the instructions are, the better. If you need a challenge, go play Dark Souls :-)

Maybe we need an article on "are there too many colours these days" and how instructions could distinguish between different browns for instant

@iwybs said:
" @AustinPowers said:
" @iwybs said:
"The difference between Lego and other model kits is Lego requires no glue or paint, only manual dexterity. So yes, theoretically anyone should be able to do it."
It's not just manual dexterity though. You have to be able to understand the instructions, make out the colours of the pieces, have a long enough attention span, frustration tolerance, etc. "

Which is the whole point of this article and comment thread, making it easier to understand the instructions and reduce frustration! /facepalm"
I believe no one has argued in favor of making instructions more frustrating. But there's a point when it becomes overkill. Having pages upon pages of adding only a single piece, or sometimes even only showing the current stage without any new piece being added, definitely qualifies.

I do agree about the colour issue though. Too many too similar colours and very bad colour reproduction in the instructions (often even worse in digital ones) can make things very frustrating (with any manufacturer by the way).

@posthammer - I appreciate the overview you've given. Not sure if you are allowed to, but the "What's up with this" series will also make for good Youtube videos.

LEGO instructions has really came a long way since the 90s when it was a game of 'spot-the-difference'. That said, at the time they could get away with it as the builds were also significantly more simple than today (it was entirely possible, if you build a small set once or twice, to build it a second time from memory).

I think that LEGO instructions is sometimes under appreciated, especially since they are doing such a good job at it: It really is one of those things where you don't know what you have, until you don't: consider building 8868 from 1992 today: http://www.peeron.com/scans/8868-1/ -- 954 pieces over 31 pages (32 steps).

It's interesting how different the opinions are. There seem to be two main camps; "simpler is better" and "the past was better". Obviously there's more to it, there are numerous variations of those, as well as outliers. But I think people are largely misunderstanding each other.

I for one, don't really like the modern style of instructions. That would put me in "the past was better" group. So the assumption is that I want builds to be more challenging, harder, and with more room to make mistakes. Why don't I just skip a few pages, or try to build the sets only by looking at the box-art? Because that's not the issue here. Those that want that have nothing to argue about, they can just go ahead and do that.

Bear with me. I had my childhood spell of sets from the late 80's to mid 90's. I had sets from all sorts of themes. One of my largest sets, 8880 from 1994, with 1300+ pieces is constructed in 36 steps over 51 pages. About 26 pieces per page. For comparison with something newer that I also own, 42108 from 2020, with just under 1300 pieces is constructed in 436 steps over 265 pages. Less than 5 pieces per page.

But many things have changed over the years, so a quick comparison like that doesn't give you the full picture. And I'm not saying the old instructions were straight up better. The parts library and color palette has grown a lot, and modern sets reflect that in using more pieces relative to the size of the build. Parts are packaged differently, in separate numbered bags corresponding to different stages of the build instructions, rather than just being all together in a box, perhaps sorted by type in a plastic tray-insert. I don't even remember anymore if that is how it actually was. But the idea of pieces being sorted from factory to align with the build instructions was not a thing.

I can understand why people would find the older instruction frustrating or hard. It requires a different mindset compared to modern style of instructions. The old instructions will have you sort out 10-20 pieces from the box, and then assemble those onto the model. That counts as one step, even though they often have sub-steps for that process. Even without numbered sub-steps, you would still practically pick and place one part at the time, right? Only you would do so from the small pile you sorted out for that step. The newer instructions are different, because the parts are already sorted in numbered bags so that they are easier to find. "Wrong" parts that look alike are usually in a bag that's not even opened yet. So they just show what piece to grab from the current bag and where to put it on the model. As one step.

One thing I would argue is that the old style was better for rebuilding a set. Because it makes no difference if you have the parts still in the original bags or not. But the new ones are made with so much more experience of what needs to be shown to be clear. That's a huge improvement. With all the newer colors, harder to differentiate in printing, I'm also happy with the numbered bags system.

The frustration for me, even though I usually take my time and build slowly, is the pacing of the newer instructions. With so few pieces per page you are constantly flipping to the next page. It feels like you are not building a model kit, but watching someone else do it for you. Piece by piece, one or two at the time. You spend more time interacting with the instructions than the actual model. Sometimes I have no idea what I'm building, it's only a few pages later that it makes sense. All because the progress on the page I'm currently at is so minuscule. Not knowing what you are doing or why, I think makes you learn less as a builder. It's less rewarding. More of a chore that you just sit through. I want more of the larger picture.

edit: oups too long, continues below

... continued

In my opinion the newer style of instructions are better in many ways compared to the ones from my childhood. They are much more clear and allows more people, of different ages and abilities, to be included. That's great. And I like not having to spend a lot of time just searching for pieces. But they miss the core point of why I like LEGO at all by focusing too much on giving you the completed model no questions asked. The point is that it's constructed from small pieces, that you have to assemble yourself. And you can take it apart and assemble again, or make other things out of. I don't think the newer style instructions prepares you for that. It's just build once and be done. I think if I grew up with the newer style instructions, I would not have built as many things of my own as I did. And that's sad. Building things, learning what makes them hold together or fall apart, how to approximate complex shapes with simple pieces - that's LEGO.

I have no issue with the "hands" pages in the 4+ sets, they are for really young kids, most of which haven't even started learning to read yet. After just a couple of those sets the kid is probably ready to move on to the next level. But from there it kind of levels out really quickly. There isn't much more progress to be had, in terms of the build instructions. There are more complex and bigger models, and subject matters more suited for an older audience, sure. But as I mentioned in an earlier post, I am disappointed that everything is treated as if it SHOULD be suitable as someones first set. I think there's plenty of room to further improve the experience for the more invested audience by not doing that, while still having enough options for the casuals.

[ @djcbs said:
"" @poshhammer said:
I guarantee if I look through your LEGO displays I will find building errors in your models.
"]

I guarantee you won't.
We're not the same, mate."

Ha!
He'd never get past my zombie sharks with laser eyes. My mistake pevention detection security system can not be beat.

And, if he somehow makes it inside, and starts poking around in my collection, he better damn well do some dusting while he's there 'fixing' things!!

You truly want to include everyone? Have the sets preassembled. Can't find instructions too difficult if there aren't any. Anything else is just half measures.

What? Too extreme and there's a middle ground to be had somewhere? Maybe stop ridiculing and deliberately misconstruing the other side's arguments (no, not liking too many pages doesn't mean we find turning pages too hard, and liking instructions of the old days doesn't mean we want the current ones to be exactly the same; likewise, accepting current phonebooks of instructions doesn't mean one likes one-piece-per-page regardless of the "recommended" age). Not everything is vehement defence of current status quo, and not everything is fervent gatekeeping from everyone but the most AFOLest of AFOLs.

I swear it's becoming impossible to have a normal conversation here, no matter the topic or opinion.

@sipuss: if I could I would give your comment 1,000 likes at once. It sums up my feelings perfectly.

Every time one offers an opinion someone else feels personally attacked by it these days.
There seems to be no middle ground any longer. Everything seems to be either black or white for some.

You like the old type of instructions?
You're obviously a gatekeeper, an exclusionist elitist AFOL who hates LEGO for not providing everything exactly the way you like it.

You prefer the modern 4+ phone book style?
You're apparently an inept fool, too dumb to tie your own shoelaces. Every "true" AFOL should look down upon and laugh at you.

That's the impression I get these days, extreme positions everywhere, and it makes commenting far less fun than it used to be.

Just because someone has a differing opinion doesn't mean he hates you and you have to go into self-defense mode! Just accept that everyone has their own opinion. You might disagree, but guess what, that's totally fine.

As a child of the 80s recently returning to building Lego, I really appreciate the part lists - both the parts per step, which I always liked about building Technic as a kid, and the BOM at the back of the instruction book. The newer sets I've bought have a mixture of new-parts outlines and no new-parts outlines, and it's quite noticeable how much difference those make - for instance in the Blacktron Cruiser the magenta outlines really make a difference, particularly when that set involves so much building in black-on-black.

I do find it weird when steps only add one or two pieces, which sometimes feels like unnecessary step-count/page-count padding. Having said that, when I've made instructions for MOCs in stud.io, sometimes a single-piece step is necessary - if the single piece is the important one to lock together previously unstable parts into a newly rigid structure, or if all the other obvious next pieces would obscure part of it, then making it a step on its own can feel right.

When I rebuild sets from my childhood, I'm struck by how many old favourites just had a folded, two-sided instruction leaflet rather than a booklet, and how often I'm having to count studs to add new pieces correctly.

I do find that with the larger and more naturalistic colour palette than in my childhood, it's not always obvious what colour I need next, especially for small pieces: when building under artificial light I sometimes find myself squinting at the instructions wondering whether I'm meant to be picking out a dark blue, dark grey or black plate (equally true with paper or on-screen PDFs, interestingly).

I'd encourage anyone who doesn't like the official instructions to have a go at making their own, either for MOCs or for official sets - perhaps you'll find that things aren't as simple as you thought, or perhaps you'll get a PDF of instructions in a style that you like better (and either way that seems like a win). When doing instructions for MOCs in stud.io, I've tried to do them in the style I'd want to see.

@AustinPowers said:
"...Just because someone has a differing opinion doesn't mean he hates you and you have to go into self-defense mode! Just accept that everyone has their own opinion. You might disagree, but guess what, that's totally fine. "

Indeed!
With this pair of comments from @sipuss & @AustinPowers we have completed the natural cycle of the Brickset Comments section =oD

1) Read article on a compelling topic that will surely attract differing opinions
2) Make popcorn
3) Dive into the comments section
4) Watch the dialouge spiral among members who would otherwise probably get along great if next to one another at a LEGO Con
5) Arrive at the 'Let's all chill and agree to disagree' post
6) *scene*

I love this place! Despite polarization being the high-octane fuel of the internets, at least we can keep it civil here overall. Try wading into other forums (without riot gear) - I won't say where. ;)

Well, it looks like we're done here, folks. I had opinions I was planning on expressing at some point, but once "Idiocracy" is in play, the conversation is unsalvageable.

I still remember the pain I felt about not being able to build my Castle sets exactly as they should be and leaving too many pieces behind. My grandfather helped me, but he was also new to LEGO and couldn't do it with perfection. Besides, I have a son who is now in the same age group I was when I started building LEGO, and he can follow instructions on sets that are for older age groups - like Minecraft - with such ease that makes me wonder how much thought went into these modern instructions. It's one of the areas where LEGO has only improved over the years.

As for every set potentially being a first, it’s important to add parents and guardians into the calculus. They may be newcomers to a jump in skill level as well, and making the experience enjoyable for the whole family is important.

As complexity and set size increases yielding results that are visually appealing to all ages: There seems to be no limit to what folks will gripe about when it comes to a company that makes toys for children at its core.

Not just for kids, but the elderly too. I’ve been getting my Grandpa into building sets, and recently he got the ucs equivalent corvette. Even though he is a decade-experienced electrician and mechanical engineer, the build was still a challenge for him especially with how bad his sight can be. Lego is like a coding language, you may know others similar to it, but ultimately it is a very different process than what many may be used to.

There's one aspect of instructions from a few years ago that I'm very glad has gone away, hearkening back to the last two WUWT? articles: instructions that have you place a piece, and then, several steps (which could equate to several pages, sometimes even when there were multiple steps to a page) later, told you to put a sticker on the piece. Made rebuilding the set a pain, especially if there were others of that piece in the set that had different stickers or no stickers.

@RTS013: The plastic trays weren't for sorting, they were to display a minifig or two and a selection of interesting parts through a cellophane window on medium to large sets. The window was, in turn, covered up by the front of the box, which hinged up so you could get a look at the goodies inside.

I think if Afol's want a more challenging building experience then it's best to Moc and create new original models.
Or go into the old school model building kits. So you have to cut, sand, prime, color and glue those kits. I loved those growing up, building tanks and small battleships with the water slide decals.
Those would present the challenge aFol's are looking for.
They do have snap together model kits too. Some have all the colors and decals but other snap together need gluing, coloring, etc.
Best for the aFol looking for a model building challenge to go into that hobby.

@dylanwho is spot on.
"As for every set potentially being a first, it’s important to add parents and guardians into the calculus. They may be newcomers to a jump in skill level as well, and making the experience enjoyable for the whole family is important.
As complexity and set size increases yielding results that are visually appealing to all ages: There seems to be no limit to what folks will gripe about when it comes to a company that makes toys for children at its core."

It's a shame that it has to be said over and over to aFol's.
Like you said Dylanwho, EVERY set is a potential first time Lego buy for someone, anyone, any kid or adult. The business model is to make it easy and enjoyable so there's no frustration building the kit and then Lego hopes you buy more...and many do. That leads to a billion dollar decades old company being successful.
Do aFol's understand any of this? The building challenge for Lego is very large high piece count sets to Technic high piece count and if kids are building these, parents are there to build with them which is part of what they promote as a kid's toy company - building together with your loved one.

My issue with many of the LEGO instructions is that sometimes it is difficult to tell what the actual colour is supposed to be. Black/dark grey, brown vs dark red.

@TheNameWasTaken said:
" @Andrusi said:
"Well, it looks like we're done here, folks. I had opinions I was planning on expressing at some point, but once "Idiocracy" is in play, the conversation is unsalvageable."

Why? I haven't seen it so not exactly sure what's going on there."

It's a comedy with the premise of stupid people outbreeding everyone else, leading to a future where everyone is extremely stupid. Apart from this premise being pretty eugenicist in nature as @poshhammer suggests (and relatedly looking uncomfortably similar to what Certain Specific Groups have been saying about people who don't look like them and/or don't practice their religion and/or aren't from their country), and generally being often cited as "basically a documentary" by the most insufferable people imaginable, I've found that introducing the concept that the point of view you're opposing is the result of some people just being Inherently Stupid tends to put a damper on any productive discussin.

@legoDad42 said:
"I think if Afol's want a more challenging building experience then it's best to Moc and create new original models.
Or go into the old school model building kits. So you have to cut, sand, prime, color and glue those kits. I loved those growing up, building tanks and small battleships with the water slide decals.
Those would present the challenge aFol's are looking for.
They do have snap together model kits too. Some have all the colors and decals but other snap together need gluing, coloring, etc.
Best for the aFol looking for a model building challenge to go into that hobby."

Talking about model kits reminds me of the Christmas I shook my presents and three rattled, so I thought all three were Lego. As it turned out, only one was. One was a model kit, and the last was a jigsaw puzzle. Yes, I've always liked putting things together, can you tell?

@Brickdarg said:
"The only thing I dislike about modern instructions is how 4+ sets dedicate an entire page to showing which pieces to grab, doubling the amount of paper used and also greatly increasing how much ink is used. For a company that seems to care so much about the environment, it's a shockingly wasteful practice that I hope is abolished sooner or later."

I've been building these 4+ sets with my daughter from when she was about 3 years old.
And the separate page for the bricks you use is exactly what she needs.

Kids of that age need separate tasks to complete,
Sort first, then build. An unexperienced child first needs to learn to identify all the different shapes and colours wich is quite hard when its all mixed up :p

@Huw What is the record for "comments received within 48 hours after posting" for an article on Brickset? 200 sounds pretty good to me, so well done, @poshhammer.

Fun fact: Richard does read it.

@AustinPowers said:
"I believe no one has argued in favor of making instructions more frustrating."

Ah, but when you, and others, come here and lament that the instructions don’t present enough of a challenge, and recall fondly the difficulties you had building sets as a kid, that is _precisely_ what you’re saying, just without actually saying it.

@and_ninthly:
There are also times when the only thing left to add is a stack of parts. That’s not really the complaint, as that was not unheard of in decades past. I do all of my designs digitally, and even those who regularly complain about how simplified the instructions are would curse mine for being too difficult. I only make them for me, I don’t use subassemblies or rotation steps, and I’ll frequently be adding parts to two or more sides of the model in the same step. But even I sometimes see a step where a single piece is added and wonder why it wasn’t combined with the step before or after. I don’t complain about it, though, because I recognize that the changes have made them exponentially more successful than “the good ole days”.

@dylanwho:
In spite of longstanding claims that Friends would have been as successful with minifigs, someone once pointed out to me that it’s the mothers and grandmothers who grew up playing with dollhouses who were buying those sets for their daughters and granddaughters. When you rightly point out that the assisting adult may be building for the first time, it’s also important to remember which of these two actually bought the set. Generally speaking, it’s not the kid.

@ricci229:
Considering how many articles have broken 200 in one day, this isn’t even in the top ten. But it doesn’t happen that frequently.

@AustinPowers:
None of us, and I mean not one single one of us, is personally harmed by having simpler instructions. Lots of people were harmed by having more complex ones. The only benefit I get from them being simpler is I don't think there's a set currently in production that I couldn't finish in one day. But 12-15 times a year, I have parents and grandparents commenting on how much patience I must have. I've had a friend tell me that he "gets it" now, before I explained to him that the old instructions were just awkwardly cryptic. I don't think it should ever reach a point where an assistant is setting the parts in place for you to press down, but I fully endorse making the hobby more accessible to a wider range of people, and I don't for a second look back fondly on the instructions of my youth. I cared about the models and the parts. The instructions were simply a means to an end.

You say kids are smart, yet your treat them as idiots. Lego is using simplified BI for all models, and it is wrong. Just like using 80s style BI for all modern sets will be wrong. Kids MUST challenge themselves in order to develop, and they need to feel "bad" feelings too, like being frustrated, angry or sad. To counter it, they will be rewarded with feeling of achievement and overcoming a difficulty. It's not just Lego, it's video games as well. Too much hand holding.

I think you spent too much time with Lego's PR. Some of the things they do might be good for the revenue, but not objectively the correct action that they should take.

Pretty much everything I wanted to say has already been said, except for:

My four year old daughter can assemble the 4+ sets and the next level up, but she is more likely to become tired and need my help halfway through with the latter. Lego is supposed to be fun, and sometimes easy things are fun... I'm sure there are some people who think everything kids do should be challenging them to the max of their ability, but that is one way to guarantee the kid will drop the hobby as soon as they can.

What I really miss, that no one has mentioned yet, is the *stapled* instruction books that will open fully flat. The new style of binding means you can never get the pages flat without creasing the books, and my OCD won't tolerate that....

There has to be some give and take with instructions. As I have gotten older, and probably others in my demographic of 58+, your eyesight, color and depth perception is not the same as it was when we were 20 or 30. With kits now containing the same parts with similar colors used in the the same step, I need a little extra instructional guidance to make sure the part with the correct color is in the correct place. The builds now are much more complex than three-digit numbered kits I started with and the detail has increased and thus increased the number of parts in sets and the number of steps to complete. I might be in the minority, but I need as much help as I can get at this point to simplify the building process.

@poshhammer said:
" @raven_za said:
" @posthammer - I appreciate the overview you've given. Not sure if you are allowed to, but the "What's up with this" series will also make for good Youtube videos."

I'll make YT videos and swap all the "subscribe to my channel" bits to "read my Brickset articles".

"

'Dislike and rant'?

Ok, ok... and, to be charitable- 'and reminisce.'

@Brick_Master said:
"Pretty much everything I wanted to say has already been said, except for:

My four year old daughter can assemble the 4+ sets and the next level up, but she is more likely to become tired and need my help halfway through with the latter. Lego is supposed to be fun, and sometimes easy things are fun... I'm sure there are some people who think everything kids do should be challenging them to the max of their ability, but that is one way to guarantee the kid will drop the hobby as soon as they can.

What I really miss, that no one has mentioned yet, is the *stapled* instruction books that will open fully flat. The new style of binding means you can never get the pages flat without creasing the books, and my OCD won't tolerate that.... "

As a book-lover, I can relate. (Don't set books down split with their bindings up!!!!!!!!!)(Aaaarrgh!)

I use a television remote or two (or phone) to hold them open. Works well with irony.

@StyleCounselor said:
"As a book-lover, I can relate. (Don't set books down split with their bindings up!!!!!!!!!)(Aaaarrgh!)

I use a television remote or two (or phone) to hold them open. Works well with irony. "

I use my hands, which are frequently handy. Or I use a bookmark (which are remarkably useful). I have a small collection of bookmarks, so I like to pick one that’s theme-appropriate.

@thor96 said:
"The first time after my dark ages, when I started building, these instructions seemed too easy. But when I build a 2500+ parts set, then it's a blessing. Just have it in print always Lego, don't settle for digital only instructions, please!"

The day paper inscrutions die is the day I'll stop buying sets. Digital instructions kill the experience completely for me.

The problem with today's instructions is that, with only one brick per step, they become so bloated that the A model needs a tome in three volumes to complete. Then, to "save paper/the planet/climate change/whatever" (actually, to save printing costs), you're asked to go online to find the B-model. I want my kids to spend less time staring at a screen, not more!
Back in the 80s, you could get a multi-model set with five or more models detailed in the instructions book (and it wasn't that thick), plus other ideas on the back cover and one the box itself.

Every so often, I wonder what a comment section would look like if Brickset had a downvote function. The WUWT? articles (especially this one) are some of those times.

@ssgdave said:
"There has to be some give and take with instructions. As I have gotten older, and probably others in my demographic of 58+, your eyesight, color and depth perception is not the same as it was when we were 20 or 30. With kits now containing the same parts with similar colors used in the the same step, I need a little extra instructional guidance to make sure the part with the correct color is in the correct place. The builds now are much more complex than three-digit numbered kits I started with and the detail has increased and thus increased the number of parts in sets and the number of steps to complete. I might be in the minority, but I need as much help as I can get at this point to simplify the building process."

I'm not as old as that (I'm forty-four)but I know what you mean. I started building 10334
(speaking of old things) yesterday evening. It just so happens that that was the first large set I've started building since I got my first pair of bifocal.

@PurpleDave said:
" @AustinPowers:
None of us, and I mean not one single one of us, is personally harmed by having simpler instructions. Lots of people were harmed by having more complex ones."
If "building experience is less enjoyable because of difficult instructions" is harm, then so is "building experience is less enjoyable when more than half of it is just turning pages."
Plus, I'm sure someone, somewhere was harmed by a heavy box of instructions falling on their head, that would be otherwise fine if the instructions were thinner and lighter. Never speak in absolutes.

Not sure if this was mentioned before (sorry too many comments to read through!) but one thing that could easily be improved - especially for perfect bound instruction booklets - is to put the parts boxes on each page on opposite side from the binding (currently they're always top left I believe)

... sometimes with big thick manuals you really have to obliterate the spine of the instruction booklet to make sure there's no parts you're missing out on for the right side pages!

@sipuss:
I’ve never known young kids to get frustrated with video games because they’re too easy, but the opposite is certainly true. And that box would just have more sets of instructions in it, to the point that it was just as full. That’s why it ended up on a high shelf, instead of someplace convenient for adding more instructions as they’re acquired.

@poshhammer:
You’re assuming you’d be able to find any mistakes someone made, and that’s you’d be willing to slog through the massive number of sets some people have on display to find them. I’ve seen pictures of you. Your hair is plenty long enough to get a good solid grip for the purpose of tearing it out.

And I think my opinion on the “too difficult for me” question should be fairly easy to guess.

@poshhammer said:
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build, would you accept that as "well I guess I'm just not patient or smart enough to build these"? Or would you complain about how unintuitive the BI is?"

I would complain. I would even put the set away if it becomes too much. And I will bet my entire LEGO collection that the vast majority of people buying LEGO think exactly like me. Anyone who claims otherwise is imho just living in an alternate reality populated with slightly arrogant AFOLs who tend to feel superior to those "dumb kids of today", who love to say that kids should be taught to make an effort and even, when they think nobody is looking, love using terms like "idiocracy".

@poshhammer said:
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build... "
Since I've just noticed that my favorite "nemesis" @MrBedhead has now joined the discussion I can turn up my arrogance level to 11 and proudly claim that I have yet to find a single building instruction by any manufacturer that I would have called too difficult. Yes, I am THAT good! And I'm still constantly honing my skills by building many sets from the oh so despicable alternatives, some of whom have instructions that would make any casual LEGO builder's hair stand on end. People who find counting studs too frustrating, or having to rebuild part of a set because of an error made a hundred steps earlier may have chosen the wrong hobby. After all, the longer the build time the more you get for your money isn't it?
:-p

@poshhammer said:
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build, would you accept that as "well I guess I'm just not patient or smart enough to build these"? Or would you complain about how unintuitive the BI is?"

Depends. If there's logic behind the BI, it will be fun as trying to solve a mystery or playing an adventure video game. If it's difficult for the sake of being difficult or lack of planning then I guess less so. I see it with less famous BIY furniture, some manufacturers are trying to print all steps on one page with tiny text and unmarked bags for screws and it's a horrible experience.

Anyway, TLG can solve it very easily be having a digital version for "hard mode" for those that prefer, but I still feel most kids oriented sets BI are insulting with how they treat the kids.

@AustinPowers said:
" @elangab : very well put.

A lot of commenters here talk about "frustration" in this context (i. e. during play) as if it was something bad. But kids need to learn how to cope with frustration too. After all, life doesn't work like a LEGO building instruction. "

Do all toys need to be frustrating in you two's view, or is LEGO uniquely saddled with the burden of being a harsh lesson in how some things in life are unpleasant experiences that you'd prefer to abandon forever and never play with again and lead your parents to post angry rants on the Internet?

When my son finally built his first Lego set without any help from me, he was either 4 or 5. The instructions had those hands holding the bricks he'd need for the next step. I watched as he found the pieces and held them in his hands exactly like the instructions before placing them on the model. He did that on his own with no instruction from me and managed to build the whole (small) set. I was proud and the simple instructions made it possible.

He's moved on since then, is 6 now, and doesn't need the hands holding the pieces anymore and is building Minecraft sets targeted beyond his age range...but those simple instructions helped him get started without getting frustrated.

@poshhammer
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build, would you accept that as "well I guess I'm just not patient or smart enough to build these"? Or would you complain about how unintuitive the BI is?"

I can guarantee, sales would dip, many new inexperienced parents would buy one, not be able to help their kid properly build the kit, the child would get frustrated, not enjoy building it, not enjoy the accomplishment to completion and the parents wouldn't buy another set for them.

@AustinPowers said:
" @poshhammer said:
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build... "
Since I've just noticed that my favorite "nemesis" @MrBedhead has now joined the discussion I can turn up my arrogance level to 11 and proudly claim that I have yet to find a single building instruction by any manufacturer that I would have called too difficult. Yes, I am THAT good! And I'm still constantly honing my skills by building many sets from the oh so despicable alternatives, some of whom have instructions that would make any casual LEGO builder's hair stand on end. People who find counting studs too frustrating, or having to rebuild part of a set because of an error made a hundred steps earlier may have chosen the wrong hobby. After all, the longer the build time the more you get for your money isn't it?
:-p"

Yet another fantastic example of your demeaning attitude, your arrogance and your complete and utter lack of social skills.

@AustinPowers said:
" @MrBedhead said:
"Yet another fantastic example of your demeaning attitude, your arrogance and your complete and utter lack of social skills."
I found your first reply funnier, but you deleted it before I could reply.
But like you alluded to in that one, German humor, it's an acquired taste. :-)

In any case I find it funny that you call out arrogance about a post that was so deliberately over the top and specifically geared to come across as arrogant as possible.*
Mission accomplished I guess. Then again, sarcasm and irony, sometimes hard to decipher...

*Especially since your first, deleted post, indicated that you indeed noticed that it was meant ironic instead of serious. "

And, yet again, with the comment "then again, sarcasm and irony, sometimes hard to decipher..." you prove my point. Your problem is that you always want to be right, that you do not really listen to what other people say or mean, you completely disregard people's emotions and feelings, and that you do not listen to people's arguments. You just use other people's arguments to try to prove that they are wrong and you are right. Oh, and you also don't seem to care about facts.

That comes across as arrogant and slightly narcissistic, but is mostly just slightly annoying.

Also, claiming that it is true that kids need to feel frustration because otherwise they will not learn things or grow, is just plain.... wrong. All kids are different. Some kids love to be challenged. Other kids will just get frustrated and give up. But what an educator should not do is to willingly frustrate a kid. Because kids will learn much more from the satisfaction of completing a task by themselves, than from constantly needing help because the task at hand is too difficult for them. That is why LEGO keeps its instructions simple. They want to include everyone into their world, and (of course) sell as many sets to first customers and hopefully keep these customers as return customers.

If you will excuse me now, I will no longer respond to any of your posts. If you do not realise that your comment directly aimed at me was incredibly ill-advised, arrogant, impolite and just plain wrong, then I really cannot help you.

@poshhammer said:
"Another question I would like to put to the forum: If building instructions were made MORE difficult to the point where YOU, the person reading this, find them too difficult to build, would you accept that as "well I guess I'm just not patient or smart enough to build these"? Or would you complain about how unintuitive the BI is?"

100% with you on this - a few years back, I bought an architecture set, I think it was the burj khalifa, and found it a little difficult. Not difficult in the sense that I didn't complete it, but difficult enough that I had several times to dismantle the last few steps and repeat them because somewhere in the endless stream of grey pieces I'd missed a step and had a section that was too short. Quite possibly I wasn't paying enough attention, but I can confidently say that if every Lego set required extremely close attention to avoid getting similar sections confused, I would buy less Lego.

I still rarely buy architecture sets (or many of the botanicals) because I don't particularly enjoy the experience of having to precisely position extremely similar pieces in very repetitive structures. I have bought one or two clone brand models (where I particularly liked the design and it wasn't a copy of Lego) but now I very rarely consider it because I know the building experience will probably be awful.

I can understand people who enjoy, and ask for, a challenge, but I cannot understand people who think that something you buy for enjoyment (presumably) should be difficult enough that you don't enjoy it, particularly when you're buying it not for yourself, but for a small child whom you want to make happy (again, presumably) ....

@Andrusi said:
" @AustinPowers said:
" @elangab : very well put.

A lot of commenters here talk about "frustration" in this context (i. e. during play) as if it was something bad. But kids need to learn how to cope with frustration too. After all, life doesn't work like a LEGO building instruction. "

Do all toys need to be frustrating in you two's view, or is LEGO uniquely saddled with the burden of being a harsh lesson in how some things in life are unpleasant experiences that you'd prefer to abandon forever and never play with again and lead your parents to post angry rants on the Internet?"

I think you're mixing "frustrating" with "challenging".

A toy, needs to be challenging*, even the basic toy that you give a baby, the one in which you need to fit a triangle, sphere, block etc into the correct places so they get in the bucket. A challenge can lead to frustration, but that's when the parent/teacher helps the kid to navigate these feelings. It is crucial for the child development to learn how to handle these feelings.

A "Hot Wheels" car should have smooth drive, fits the tracks nicely and should not break easily - if it's not, the kid will get the "bad frustration", but the tracks should be challenging enough to make the kid work in order to have the car jump through the robot or activate the sound or whatever. Same with sports, musical instruments, a book you might need to re-read a chapter etc.

One example I have of Lego for a "bad frustration" is set number 41347. It was badly designed, and my daughter just stopped playing with it because it broke every time she tried moving it (or when I tried). It was too fragile of a build.

*From this group of toys. Some toys are about curiosity (like a rattle of a baby) or with creatively and self exploration ("free play" of dolls for example, and that's why most Barbie sets says adult assembly required, as it's not part of the play feature). Puzzles, building blocks etc should be challenging.

@AustinPowers said:
" @elangab : very well put.

A lot of commenters here talk about "frustration" in this context (i. e. during play) as if it was something bad. But kids need to learn how to cope with frustration too. After all, life doesn't work like a LEGO building instruction. "

Which is ironic because, by your own admission, you don't collect Lego anymore because of how frustrating you find it. Feels like you're not exactly practicing what you preach here.

@StyleCounselor That level of vehemence did seem a bit out of character and unwarranted. Sorry that you were having a bad day, hope things have improved for you :)

@AustinPowers said:
" @Brickalili said:
" @AustinPowers said:
" @elangab : very well put.

A lot of commenters here talk about "frustration" in this context (i. e. during play) as if it was something bad. But kids need to learn how to cope with frustration too. After all, life doesn't work like a LEGO building instruction. "

Which is ironic because, by your own admission, you don't collect Lego anymore because of how frustrating you find it. Feels like you're not exactly practicing what you preach here. "
Well, that's a perfect example of what I meant. But first for clarity, I never "collected" LEGO like in collecting stamps, trading cars, etc. I simply had sets from my childhood first and then bought sets I wanted to build. I often sold them off afterwards or kept the parts for MOCs or for my kids to use with their sets. A collector imho would be someone who either kept his sets sealed, or displayed, or tried to collect all of a certain theme, type, etc.
But anyway, about the "having stopped due to frustration" point. No, I have not stopped, I have simply changed the way in which I go about choosing which sets to buy. Formerly I only bought LEGO, since I didn't even know about any alternatives. Then, at about the same time when I regularly got annoyed about TLG, alternatives gained more prominence, and I tried out some. Nowadays I mainly buy sets from alternatives, but also the occasional set from LEGO.
The point is, like a kid that learns from frustration and develops ways to deal with them so have I learned how to deal with my frustration with TLG, in that now I only buy a set from LEGO when I find it absolutely awesome in terms of (my subjective opinion on) value for money. "

That’s still finding something frustrating and giving it up because of that. You’re trying to dress it differently but that is what you’ve done. So rather than use these instructions as lessons on patience and understanding, much as you’re insisting similar lessons should be learned from older instructions, you’ve gone “ugh, not for me, do not want” and have further limited your experiences with Lego. You’re a living refutation of your own point and proof of what @poshahmmer says about frustration turning people away

After all the relative negativity and occasional harsh words here, I am happy to report that this morning my BDP sets from wave 1 have shipped. Looking forward to building the Mountain Fortress.

@poshhammer said:
" @StyleCounselor No xenophobia in my comment threads, please. :P"

No xenophobia implied. Sorry.

I love the Swiss. The mountains, the chocolate, the lack of banking oversight, and money laundering. Besides, neutrality is a basic human right.

And, Germany, give me a break. One of my very first comments on BS was to tell AP he was my favorite grumpy German commentor. In fact, I am a quarter German thanks to Grandma Hegge. There's also the four stars on the Fusball jersey. Who else has a Fullkrug? Besides, fashion begins and ends with lederhosen.

In seriousness, it was just an inside joke with the two gentlemen concerned. They both like to point to each other's nationality to make some other kind of point. I was just using satirical generalalities to try to help with the detente. ;)

@AustinPowers No, my logic still holds up. Watch:

Child: “I find this aspect of the Lego experience (complicated instructions) to be frustrating, I will therefore think twice before buying more Lego.”

You: “Pah, idiot child, you should be knuckling under and learning lessons from this frustration!”

But also You: “I find this aspect of the Lego experience (build quality, price) frustrating, I will therefore think twice before buying more Lego. I should not need to knuckle under or learn lessons from this at all!”

You’re treating your own complaints as inherently justified when they’re really just the same: “This thing is not catering to me in the way I like, therefore I’m less interested.” Why do you give yourself leeway but are much harsher to literal children? It’s just hypocrisy m’dude

@Brickalili said:
" @AustinPowers : Your complaints are generally of the “this is too simple and easy!” variety so I assumed that was your problem with the builds too. So you could just treat it as a fun experience rather than some block building challenge. You won’t, but you could.

When you talk about value you could realise that fun is subjective and buy something because you want it, especially if you’re as affluent as you say. You won’t, but you could.

So if you can make those choices, and do some without expectation of judgement, why can children not do the same? If you can make subjective choices based on frustration and not expect to be called foolish or shortsighted, children can make the same choices and not expect to be called lazy or stupid as you’ve been doing. You’re applying leniency to yourself, trying to frame it as logic, that you aren’t giving to them, and that’s hypocrisy "

You are correct, so if a child prefers to spend all summer in front of the TV they should be allowed to do so.

Frustration is not challenge. There are good Frustrations and bad ones. Low quality of bricks is not a challenge, it's an example for bad frustration. Large models or ridiculous price tags are not challenges but frustrations. You deal with it by either work around it (sell fine art to make space for Lego, replace bad bricks etc) or by walking away (not buying sets).

I think that there is a group of people here that looks at non hand holding BI as a challenge, and a second group that sees it as frustration.

Lego is NOT an educator, it's a company made with one goal which is to make money. If market research shows hand holding instructions, or adding figures representing minorities, producing licensed sets etc, lead for more sales - I get why they do that. For every parent stopped buying Lego because BI are bad, there are 100 parents buying them because they're good. IDK, maybe I'm cynical but if the BI are simple, parent can be on their phone and not spend time building with their kid so most prefer it?

I just remembered a bad frustration about the BI that all agreed about, when Lego printed adult sets with black background which was hard to read. That was not about a challenge.

About point 5: no, as a six-year old I obviously don't have many years of experience. Nobody I knew failed to build sets per instructions at that age, as long as they didn't immediately go for complicated TECHNIC sets. Should I be able to build every single set at that age? I think not. It's a learning curve. For 18+ sets I can maybe understand it (then again, parts call-outs should make more pieces per step easy enough), but I was surprised how chewed out the instructions were even for the simplest sets like a 4+ Friends set and Benny's Space Squad (the latter has more pages than the largest Classic Space bases, or than the 6990 monorail!). Modern sets don't let people develop in problem solving if everything is chewed out for them. Typical how I found a non-LEGO site discussing this same thing, with another construction toy using just a picture of the final result (like LEGO used to do on the back of the boxes) and LEGO using easy step-by-step instructions not triggering problem solving and dealing with failure, whilst they posted a picture of a 1980s set which is rocket science compared to nowadays instructions.