The press release is dated November 4, 2011 and informs us in all sobriety that the LEGO Universe joke will permanently shut down its servers on January 31, 2012.

I announced the end of this online game from February 2011, by slightly mistaking the date ..... You didn't have to be a guesser to imagine that this MMOG (massively-multiplayer online game) was not going to go the distance. Too expensive, at least initially, ugly, slow, boring, full of activities all more infantilizing than the others, this universe could not seduce many people, even when it became free ....

LEGO claims to have been able to bring together 2 million players (registered?, Active?) And to have decided to close because of the non-profitability of the whole. There is a paradox here: How can a game that has become free be profitable? Why make it free if it is necessary to invest elsewhere to welcome all the players who come to register because of this same free? Are there enough MMOG AND LEGO fans? Wasn't the game just way below the current standard when compared to other online games of the same type?

But it is not the end of the game that bothers me the most: LEGO is laying off 115 people in the process, who were employees of "Play Well Studios" in the United States and the marketing department of Billund (Denmark) and simply announces them to be insured. reclassification assistance at LEGO or elsewhere .....

A great mess, which will not mark the spirits, and which sets the limits of what can be done by trying to follow too closely and too opportunistically current trends in leisure and entertainment.

 The official press release:

LEGO® Universe to close in 2012

Christo and Calin alias CAB & Tiler offer a Han Solo whose particularity is not to have the endless piece Minifig Headgear Hair Male (3901) on the head....

Here Han Solo is wearing a hairstyle made in "CAB & Tiler" which still looks more like Harrison Ford's hairstyle in theEpisode IV... And just for that, this custom has its effect.

Speaking of Christo, come and fight over his eBay store, there is something very very heavy currently being auctioned .....

Finally, here is the list of the winners of one of the 5 copies of the book LEGO Star Wars Character Encyclopedia among fans as of 31/10/2011.
The drawing of lots was carried out by my son in a totally random manner and I would ask each of you whose name is in the list below to kindly give me your postal details when I contact you via the Message function of Facebook.

I will ship and ask you to kindly confirm receipt of your lot on the page Hoth Bricks in order to guarantee a certain transparency.

The list of winners:

1. Maxime Soler

2. Mico Hien

3. Med Drouillon

4. Aurelien Blondel

5. Stephanie Miatello

Well done to the winners, and sorry to the others. Don't go yet, another draw is planned soon with other equally nice prizes ....

Because there are a little fed up with speculations of all kinds that turn into absolute reality from blog to blog or from topic to topic, I come back in this article to what has been spelled out about the collaboration to come between LEGO, Warner / DC and Disney / Marvel as of 2012 and this over several years as indicated by the mention "... multi-year agreement starting as of January 1st, 2012... ".

By relying on the official press releases released by LEGO that few people have finally read to the end, it is possible to clearly define what we are going to be entitled to, and what is only pure speculation. 

First of all, let's remove the doubt about the Marvel range. LEGO announces clearly in his official press release what will this range be made of: "... three Marvel franchises - Marvel's The Avengers movie, and X-Men and Spider-Man classic characters ..."

It is clearly stated here that the lineup will be based on the movie The Avengers which will be released in May 2012 and the classic characters (as opposed to those in the licensed films) of the X-Men and Spiderman. Exit therefore the X-Men seen in the various films, or the Spiderman of Sam Raimi. Back to the good old comics.

Regarding the Avengers, and as I announced in previous articles (6868 Hulk's Helicarrier Breakout ... et 6869 Quinjet Aerial Battle ...), the sets will be well based on the film, and by extension, the vehicles and the theme of the action as well.

The characters confirmed in the Avengers lineup are: "... Marvel characters as Iron Man, The Hulk, Captain America, Thor, Hawkeye, Loki and Black Widow to LEGO minifigure form ...Wolverine, Magneto, Nick Fury and Deadpool ... Spider-Man, and Doctor Octopus ... "the rest is pure speculation as well.

The minifig of Wolverine was presented at the San Diego Comic Con in July 2011. It will likely be delivered in the set 6866 Wolverine Chopper.

Regarding the actual release on the market of the Avengers range, here again LEGO gives a clear and precise indication which leaves no room for speculation: "... The retail debut of the Marvel-inspired LEGO SUPER HEROES collection is timed to coincide with the highly anticipated Summer 2012 blockbuster movie release of Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures feature film Marvel's The Avengers ..."The official release will therefore be based on the release of The Avengers movie in 2012.

On the DC Universe line, again the official LEGO release leaves little room for interpretation. 

First of all, this agreement is considered as an extension of an already existing partnership, and which had allowed the development of the LEGO Batman range a few years ago, with the success that we know, especially for video games. taken from the license sold 12 million copies since 2008: "... Warner Bros. Consumer Products (WBCP) with DC Entertainment (DCE) and The LEGO Group has announced the extension of a successful partnership ..."

The planned launch date, January 2012, without geographical precision is written in full: "... Construction sets, minifigures and buildable characters and creatures inspired by the universe of DC Comics are slated to launch in January 2012 ..."

The confirmed characters of the range are: "... Batman ™, Robin ™, Catwoman ™, The Joker, The Riddler ™, Two-Face, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn ™, Bane, Bruce Wayne, Superman ™, Lex Luthor ™ and Wonder Woman ™ ..."

We also have confirmation that  Green Lantern will at least be entitled to a minifigure, the one distributed during the San Diego Comic Con in July 2011. No set has been announced with this character yet.

It is clearly stated that the DC Universe line is a reinterpretation of the LEGO Batman line released between 2006 and 2008: "The company will revisit their previous successful collections like LEGO BATMAN ™ ... Given the fan enthusiasm for previous LEGO BATMAN collections, we couldn't be more thrilled to continue the build-and-play adventures ..."

In short, these two press releases give us sufficient details, it suffices to read and translate correctly what is mentioned therein. Everything else is pure speculation and should be seen as such.

To put in the box contradictory information : The catalog page that I presented to you in this article clearly indicates in French that the launch of the LEGO Superheroes range is planned for MAY 2012, at least in France. The images from the foreign catalog which presented the Ultrabuild range also indicated a launch in MAY 2012.

To put in the box speculation, no evidence is officially available:

The biggest sets in the LEGO DC Universe range will come with a comic inserted in the box. I got this info from one of my sources, and it is confirmed today by another source on Eurobricks.

 The two official LEGO releases: 

The LEGO Group to create LEGO® DC universe SUPER HEROES (20 / 07 / 2011)

Marvel Entertainment and the LEGO Group announce strategic relationship in construction toy category (21 / 07 / 2011)

Echoing the version offered these days by TrueDimensions and partly composed of Bionicle pieces, Omar Ovalle offers its version System of this Droid Destroyer. Obviously, the overall shape suffers from the use of classic parts and this Destroyer Droid gets a little clumsy. Omar Ovalle has retained a certain modularity with the ability to partially withdraw into himself.

I am not really convinced by this version which remains very scholarly and which does not pay homage to the real Droideka, but it will at least have the merit of showing that we can recreate this machine very simply and using classic parts . We can therefore consider this MOC as strictly respecting the concept System from the LEGO range.

Let's not forget thatOmar Ovalle is above all a designer and that his work is part of a global creative process in the LEGO universe. His work also includes the highlighting of his creations visually with the design of the boxes, some of which are really very successful, and the staging of his achievements by placing them in a fictional context of the Star Wars universe that it describes under each creation. 

You can discover his three series of LEGO-themed creations on these dedicated flickr galleries:

Star Wars Custom Lego Set 1

Star Wars Custom Lego Set 2

Star Wars Custom Lego Set 3