Review: 71410 Super Mario Character Packs series 5

They're nice, but the price increase is a bummer and seems once more unjustified. The number of pieces hasn't really increased that much and swapping out the smaller base plate for a bigger one doesn't really do much. Luckily I already got the red Yoshi and the Hammer Bro - from a random Amazon order of two of these packages no less - so I could stop and not miss much, but perhaps I'll try to get a complete line-up, after all.

Nice review!

The price increase stings a little, but it's allowed both the brick-built bases and some of the figures themselves to be a bit bigger and more complex. And as you mention, having fewer figures to collect means the price of a full set hasn't actually gone up too much.

My favorites in this series are probably Nabbit (who is very distinctive in both his look and function) and Hammer Bro (who up until now was the last unreleased enemy from the original Super Mario Bros.). But I also appreciate some of the recolored enemies and allies like Purple Toad, Blue Shy Guy, and Red Yoshi.

With all the small parts in the characters, how many extra parts do you get? Please, show an image of all of them!! That would be a way to tempt us to continue collecting this new series!

"Yoshi is, as always, an ally of the Mario brothers and scanning his barcode will yield 5 coins and a greeting."
That can't be right. The Red Yoshi has the same effect as the Pink Yoshi in Luigi's Starter Course, as shown by other reviewers.

"This character is identified as Magikooopa [sic] on the instruction sheet, but it's actually a Toady and I'm unsure how such confusion could arise given they are completely different."
Even the games aren't 100% consistent on this. The confusion may stem from the fact that in Japanese, Kamek and Magikoopa are used somewhat interchangeably. Maybe somehow it spilled all the way over to LEGO.

The more substantive builds make these a lot more appealing as little desk toys. Too bad it's impossible to know what you're getting in advance.

I tolerated the bags but I draw the line at blind boxes.

The large number of specialized pieces and reliance upon printed details has always turned me off to the Mario series. I am, however, happy to see clever re-use in non-Mario sets when the pieces turn up there! This series doesn't seem to do much to push that forward, focusing instead on obvious recolors too many times. Seems like series collectors will enjoy this wave, others won't have much reason to pay it any mind.

I litteraly only want new plant pieces from this set.

We just completed this series last weekend and really love it. Nabbit's bag-holding hand clever assembly was our highlight.

I don't know if I can post that here (it may be considered "cheating the system"?) but you can search Reddit for a weight chart to help you identify the different characters without opening the boxes. We used a small kitchen scale and it worked very well. Decimals are important for the 61-63 grams ones because there are many within that range, but we succeeded even without them.

As stated in this review's intro, factory boxes seem to include 2 complete sets of 8, divided in 2 rows, so if you have the chance to grab one full row from a freshly opened box, you're basically guaranteed to have a complete set. I'm repeating it for people who, like me, sometimes jump to the comments directly, but also to say we have verified this ;)

I'm really surprised to see Mario still going strong. I thought, apart from the original starter set to stick on top of the NES, it would just fizzle out like Vidiyo!

The plant in the Waddlewing set is a microscale beanstalk FYI, representing the "Skyward Stalk" level from New Super Mario Bros. U that they appear heavily in.

"This character is identified as Magikooopa on the instruction sheet, but it's actually a Toady and I'm unsure how such confusion could arise given they are completely different."

I wouldn't say that they're *completely* different, Toadies are something of a mini-Magikoopa. They first appeared in Yoshi's Island as the cronies of Kamek, the "main" Magikoopa.

@sjr60 said:
"I'm really surprised to see Mario still going strong. I thought, apart from the original starter set to stick on top of the NES, it would just fizzle out like Vidiyo!"

I confess I was also highly dubious of Lego Super Mario when it first debuted, but it seems to be selling very well if the volume and variety of sets are any indication.

Toady *is* a type of Magikoopa.

We only want two of the characters at my house.. So since they are boxed does anyone know what order a row is packed in?

@WizardOfOss:
These may be somewhat exempt to some of the part rules other themes have to deal with. For one thing, a lot of the prints are faces, which were the only printed parts in the Chima Legend Beasts. They also swap out each CMF wave after four months, though I don’t know if these are on the same schedule. With a hard swap, all previous parts are removed from the lineup, freeing up those slots for new parts. They may not inventory these parts the same way. At the very least, any part that’s intended for print would not be stored unprinted very long, and they may not stock replacement parts (I know they don’t for CMF exclusive parts). And they do still have stickers for the barcodes, though that was ironically because the stickers hold up better than print when Mario keeps stomping on them.

@sjr60 said:
"I'm really surprised to see Mario still going strong. I thought, apart from the original starter set to stick on top of the NES, it would just fizzle out like Vidiyo!"

Especially since they have no minifigs.

@chrisaw said:
"Are those plant pieces from the Farm sets? I don’t think I’ve seen them. "

They are!

@Modeltrainman said:
" @chrisaw said:
"Are those plant pieces from the Farm sets? I don’t think I’ve seen them. "

They are!"

Actually are not.

Mario plant pieces are: https://brickset.com/parts/6400112/plant-w-3-2-shaft-no-4

City plant pieces are : https://brickset.com/parts/6388070/plant-w-3-2-shaft-no-1

I do think they are compatible in stacking though.

@PurpleDave said:
" @WizardOfOss:
These may be somewhat exempt to some of the part rules other themes have to deal with. For one thing, a lot of the prints are faces, which were the only printed parts in the Chima Legend Beasts. They also swap out each CMF wave after four months, though I don’t know if these are on the same schedule. With a hard swap, all previous parts are removed from the lineup, freeing up those slots for new parts. They may not inventory these parts the same way. At the very least, any part that’s intended for print would not be stored unprinted very long, and they may not stock replacement parts (I know they don’t for CMF exclusive parts). And they do still have stickers for the barcodes, though that was ironically because the stickers hold up better than print when Mario keeps stomping on them."
This all could be, your guess is as good as mine. But that still doesn't take away that Lego produces these €6 sets to higher quality standards than their €500+ sets. Which remains just plain weird. Can you name any other company that does this?

As for those bar code stickers, these are nothing like the regular stickers. For one, you don't have to put them on yourself, so they should always be absolutely perfect. And from what I've seen they are nearly impossible to remove and like you said made to be more durable than prints. I bet if all stickers were like these (which obviously won't ever happen) 99% of the complaints would be history....

@WizardOfOss:
The stickers are definitely different, and yes, alignment is probably better than some prints. But in terms of inventorying the parts, there’s probably no distinction. Bare parts would get one EID, and the stickered version would get a unique one that’s burned when it goes out of production.

If you really want the stickers gone, there’s a really easy solution. Soak them in some type of oil and it will interfere with the adhesive bond. An old trick for this is to smear peanut butter on the sticker and let it sit for at least a few hours. Goo Gone is another option, either by itself or to clean up the oily adhesive after the peanut butter trick.

And I wouldn’t say they make these to better standards, but rather to different ones. Designers have budgets they have to stick to. Every sticker they replace with an expensive one-time print means one less printed minifig part, or one less recolor for an unprinted part. If people don’t mind them seriously compromising the overall design of the set to free up budget to print parts that may not be the ideal color…

@PurpleDave:
Don't worry, I wouldn't want to remove them, but from what I've seen it's VERY hard. So very unlike regular stickers. And indeed, since they will probably be considered a unique part, apart from those specific purposes it won't make sense to do such stickers instead of prints, which are probably even cheaper to do.

But like I mentioned before, I'm not all against stickers. I think they are to some extent perfectly acceptable in play sets, and also for additional (non-essential) decoration on display sets. Heck, I think it was a great choice they included some extra stickers with the 10279 VW T2, that's something they should do more often! And I even wonder if they could make reusable stickers, that would add quite some extra value in play sets at very limited cost.

But it is frustrating to see how often in itself great sets are ruined by loads of usually badly color-matched stickers. At least make them clear backed in all display sets (I hardly minded them in the 10274 Ecto-1). And stick it (pun intended...) to simple, straight and flat pieces. A few days a go I saw a review of the new Hogwarts Express, which in itself I think is a pretty fabulous set. But at the front you have this curved tile which always poses a bit of a challenge....and a sticker that doesn't really match that curve. Meanwhile some other stickers again don't match the color (although we've had much worse). For a €500 set I do very much consider that low quality standards. Now as we all now print quality of Lego isn't always that great either, but I still prefer a bad print over a bad sticker. And if they insist on putting stickers on weirdly shaped pieces, could they at least provide a few spares for when you mess one up beyond salvation?

I do understand the logistics involved, on this scale it's never easy. But in the end it's all about priorities. And for such very high priced sets I have higher expectations/demands than for a cheap set. I surely can't be the only one? They even seem to understand themselves, looking at the Technic Lamborghini and Ferrari. But those are still pretty rare exceptions to the rule. And it is kind of ironic that the other Technic Ferrari is one of the worst offenders ever....

To be fair, Lego isn't the only one. Yesterday I watched a review of a Perfect Grade Unleashed Gunpla set of around €300 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlt2aomFvi4). Which is a truly mind-boggling build considering both detail and (relative) ease of construction. And for some part, special metallic stickers are used to great effect, which probably couldn't have been done otherwise. But how disappointing is it to also see regular stickers (and for some part badly color matched, just like Lego!) instead of water slides which they use for some of the lower (much less expensive!) grades. And sure, prints would be even better, but we are talking about a model kit.

I've read other reviews that say the individual boxes were in the same order in the left and right rows. I found a box that was opened but appeared to be untouched. Unfortunately, I got the four packages I didn't want instead of the four that I intended. :-(

Another comment mentioned this and it's important to note that Lego put all the pieces inside a ***plastic bag*** within these boxes. Further, these boxes aren't recyclable due to the printing method used. For Lego to say they are switching the packaging for environmental purposes and then still use plastic and non-recyclable boxes is a credibility problem for me.

If i can get a whole series again in one buy like i did with this series, i’ll say bring on series 6!

The only bad thing about this series is that you don’t really need more of most of the characters. I’d like to have more waddlewings, blue shyguys and one more hammer bro, but due to the price increase i won’t likely be buying random extra figs.

@TeriXeri said:
" @Modeltrainman said:
" @chrisaw said:
"Are those plant pieces from the Farm sets? I don’t think I’ve seen them. "

They are!"

Actually are not.

Mario plant pieces are: https://brickset.com/parts/6400112/plant-w-3-2-shaft-no-4

City plant pieces are : https://brickset.com/parts/6388070/plant-w-3-2-shaft-no-1

I do think they are compatible in stacking though."

I stand happily corrected They do look compatible, though.

Regarding the stickers. I have seen an interview with one of the designers, when Mario was released. He explained they tried printed pieces, but these got scratched too easily during play. So they had to switch to the stickers so the barcodes stay readable for the whole lifetime.

@huw "Each row has a complete set of eight which makes it easy to avoid buying duplicates if you are able to find an unopened box."

This isn't correct as the whole left hand side row I took contained two red Yoshis and no baby Yoshi

Man…some cool stuff here. Makes me wish that I’d been a Nintendo kid growing up. I was an Atari boy, Intellivision, PlayStation, XBox…but my only brief experience with Nintendo was the GameCube…and I got that for the brief time they had exclusive Resident Evil titles on it. I wanna get a Switch…yeah me and a lot of people. Once I do that I’ll finally actually PLAY a Mario game (and Zelda, I hear that’s awesome).

Sorry…way off topic. But seeing this theme unfold I love all the builds but am somewhat grateful that my wallet isn’t torn apart by any emotional pull. So many other things from LEGO that I feel I gotta buy…

These are REALLY cool tho…