I found this set to be very expensive when it was announced, and I don't think I would have ever bought it for myself. Luckily I received it as a gift and I really enjoyed building it.
It's a very generously scaled building. The way one would free-build if one had an abundance of bricks. Along with the extra high ceilings, the walls are double thick. It's beautiful and solid.
I was worried it wouldn't scale too easily with the rest of the modular builds, but actually it fits in fairly well.
Technically, the designers used some nice, clever tricks, with a lot of attention to detail. For fans of the movies there are lots of easter eggs and the potential for scene replication is tremendous.
The pieces you get among the 4634 are another interesting way to look at the potential value of this set.
131 2x1 bricks with studs at 90 degrees (6015344)!!!
61 6x1 bricks (4541528), and that's just in the brick-red color!!! That's astounding for any free-building. 2 of these sets would give you enough pieces to build virtually any kind of city building on a very generous scale, as long as you were happy with the colors. And albeit at a hefty $700.
I really liked the way the build was structured too. They mixed up the heavy lifting with the fine detailing very nicely, and it was rewarding to watch these intricately sculpted scenes come to life. Again, a luxury feel in the multiple heads for Tully and multiple wigs for Ghost Librarian.
As usual I'd push for more printing and fewer stickers, but there's is tons to discover in this set. Dancing toaster is one of my favorites, along with the arcade machine and ice-box style fridge. Ditto the styling in the bathroom, really clever and style-accurate.
Minor quibbles. Once agains chairs that minifigs cannot sit on well (I'm looking at you Simpson's House). If you look at instruction 469, why use two 1x1 tiles instead of a single 1x2? SIMILARLY, given the spare no expense feel of the rest of the building, I was surprised to see the use of the large wall panels on the back of the building (leaving a depression). Maybe it was to save weight on the hinged section and they carried it through for consistency, but it would have been nice to use solid bricks there instead.
Some nicely colored transparent pieces and of course the fireman's pole is awesome. The traffic light is lovey and the fire escape breaks up the outside surface nicely, and I really like their flying ghost solution to add texture to the other side. Beautiful barn doors, and a shout-out to the designer that did the kitchen sink - that was a new one for me.
So, if you want to splurge, if you have a windfall coming your way, it's a great set. The 13 point ratio is tough, but it's really well done.
This is the first set I built completely digitally. I pulled the pdf from shop.lego.com and there's a pic of my setup below. It worked really well. I had trouble finding clear instructions for 42025 but this set was no problem, and I didn't have a problem telling colors apart as some others have reported.
Logistically Lego must be happy. Very few extra pieces, and nothing really more than a 1x1 tile in weight. Lots of extra whips and an extra fireman's pole (but no handle). In terms of building sequencing, I had one unlabelled bag amongst the free floaters, and because I spotted the Venkman torso, I was able to figure out it was for Set 9. In terms of separation not quite as tight as some other sets. often you'd have a situation that had a 1x2 flat tile in the same bag as a 1x2 single-stud tile. I've had other builds that seemed to be very careful to avoid a situation like that. But again, this is an extremely minor quibble. Building time was longest for the Set 1 - I started the first Ghostbuster's movie when I started the build, and finished at 1:21. By the time I finished Set 2 I was 40 minutes into the second movie. After that I settled into an average of about 45- 55 min per Set. It's a big building and there is some repetition, but once you learn the pattern it goes quickly, and this is where you have to pay particular attention to the 1x1 tiles to keep them even (if that's your thing).
Minifigs are great. Nice arm printing. Beautiful job with Dana's outfit. Sharp all around, though admittedly I'm not as picky as some others.
So that's it. If you can, you should.
P.S. Only thing missing would be a nice fluorescent green wiggly tube to use as a beam from the proton pack.
P.P.S. and kudos on the slime coming out of the sidewalk. Beautiful touch!
KIDS ZONE
