Star Wars: The Force Awakens has blown away box office record after box office record, and will likely be the top-grossing movie in the US for a while to come. With such popularity of course comes merchandising, which we know Star Wars was good for already. So today we're looking at one of the many Episode VII LEGO sets that has come out recently, namely 75132 First Order Battle Pack. Blog Assistant Ta-metru_defender shares his thoughts below and lets you know if this set is worth buying. Is it a good way to build up your First Order army? Or is it just fodder for the Resistance to defeat? Read on to find out!

Presentation
From the design of the box to the instruction manual, these are the first things you see before building the set.

Battle packs! You know them, you love them! An affordable way to build up a sizable army! With The Force Awakens breaking Every Box Office Record Ever, it's time to get your soldiers together to do Star Wars stuff!

Like all Lego boxes, it's made of cardboard. We've got our two Stormtroopers, a Tech, and a Crew charging into battle, backed by a turret.

The back has a technical readout that's on all Force Awakens sets. As I've said in my other reviews, I like it.

Inside the box is pieces and an instruction manual. Duh.

Building
Half the fun is had building the set. How fun is it to build and how easy or challenging is it?

Minifigs go together quick, the turret is hardly interesting... Look, you didn't buy a battle pack for the exciting build.

Set Design
Now that the set is complete, we can critique how it looks from every angle. New or interesting pieces can also be examined here.

Bam. Minifigures. Turret.

The turret feels a little lazy on the top. It's a stud shooter. Couldn't LEGO have sprung for a spring launcher? Or something with a little more pizzaz? Also feels like such a big structure for such a little gun.

That said, the turret itself (minus the gun) is well made. It wouldn't look out of place on a Death Star and its opening panels to store studs and house a control panel are both great additions that move it above pure filler. It's not awful, just kinda a let down in the gun department.

But, really, we're here for the minifigs. So let's talk about the minifigs.

You get four, like in all battle packs.

First up, let's talk about the Technician and the Crew. The Tech is the exact same as the one in the new TIE Fighter, down to the head. So not much to say there.

The Crew-guy is a new 'fig with a new hat. He also has a not-a-white-guy head which is a great way for the LEGO sets to reflect the diversity of the film. It's in a cheap set, it's generic, and it means that we can customize our LEGO sets to be more different. Woo!

If you're curious, this is how the Crew dude compares to the Officer from the TIE. Different uniform, head, and hat. So hey.

One of the Stormtroopers is a gunner, with a vest over his armor to hold more ammunition. These guys do show up in the movie and it's cool to see some variety here. As much as I'd have liked to have two generic Stormtroopers, it's neat to have some variation that's not as major as some of the recent clone trooper battle packs.

The 'figs look great. I personally really dig the First Order design, and these capture them excellently. Really can't complain. Under the helmet they have LEGO's Standard Evil Trooper Head going on which, while okay, The Force Awakens showed us that some troopers were women, would it have been too much for LEGO to have diversified this battle pack even more? They definitely didn't need to - and I'm more than grateful for the Crew dude we got - but nonetheless. This, of course, doesn't diminish my thoughts, it's just a bit of what could have been.

Playability
The other half of the fun is in playing with the set. How well does the set function and is it enjoyable to play with?

Ah, play features. The stud-shooting turret can shoot its studs, but the fun's more in being able to open the sides.

Each soldier comes with stud-shooters (no blasters) which can fire, but look nowhere near as good as proper blasters. But it's playability, which I suppose may be more important to Lego than displayability. Still a bummer that we got these instead of some proper blasters.

But if you have other sets from The Force Awakens...

Look! Battle! Roleplaying is a thing and this set is great for it. You can get more troopers to make bigger, cooler fights. And at the end of the day, that's what these battle packs are about. That's a win in my book.

Final Thoughts
Once it's all said and done, how does the set stack up? Should I get it?

Pros What's to like? Great minifigs Hey, look, that officer isn't white! The turret is not awful Cons What's not to like? I'd like another Stormtrooper The turret has a bit of a weak gun

You can compare this battle pack to the Resistance one which has three troopers and an officer. This one, has two troopers (one with a vest), a Tech, and a Crew. As fun as the Tech is, I'd have liked him swapped out for another generic Stormtrooper. Army building and all that. That said, it's hard to complain about this set. The heavy Stormtrooper is a nifty variation too, so this set has a lot going for it.

I'm definitely going to be picking up another one of these and, at the end of the day, what more do you really want from a battle pack?

Thank you all as always for reading this review. We welcome your feedback and any questions or comments you might have, which you can post in the Talkback. And of course you should keep checking back on BZPower for more set reviews and LEGO news!

« Return to News