Review: 71400 Big Urchin Beach Ride
Posted by benbacardi,
Of the six Super Mario expansion sets released this year, 71400 Big Urchin Beach Ride is the largest one targetted at Mario, rather than Luigi.
It's the first to take us to the beach, and uses curved roller-coast parts to add an additional fun element to the game, as well as a new boss and a couple of baddies.
Summary
71400 Big Urchin Beach Ride, 536 pieces.
£54.99 / $59.99 / €59.99 | 10.3p/11.2c/11.2c per piece.
Buy at LEGO.com »
One of the largest Super Mario expansion sets this year, with some fun elements, but a price tag to match.
- New opponents
- Another Yoshi!
- Fun gameplay
- Fragile build
- Fairly expensive
The set was provided for review by LEGO. All opinions expressed are those of the author.
Like most of these expansion sets, the Beach Ride is made up of four smaller modules that you can connect however you like. The smallest of these is a friend, another Yoshi; this time, a yellow one joins the previous line up of pink and traditional green. As ever, he has a barcode tile to scan for a cute Yoshi animation and sound effect to be played on Mario's screen. Yoshi has long been my favourite Mario character, so it's great to see them available in more colours.
There's also a small diving board, which bounces up and down as Mario jumps on it thanks to the rubber damper beneath it. Bouncing (and scanning) a few times before landing on the water below yields one coin per bounce.
The next build, we come to the first baddies in the set: a pair of Cheep Cheeps, first introduced to the line in 71368 Toad's Treasure Hunt in 2020. These are traditionally found under the water, or jumping over bridges as Mario crosses, as is the case here. In the photo below, I've propped the two fish up, but usually they lie flat until Mario jumps on the centre plank of the bridge, at which point they bounce up and over (assuming Mario has landed with enough force to do so).
On the back of each Cheep Cheep is a tile which, revealed once each fish has jumped past Mario, yields a single coin.
The "big boss" of the level is a Big Urchin, another of Mario's water-dwelling foes. It's perched atop a water spout between a pair of rocks, waiting for Mario to come along. The build is very effective, replicating the difficult spherical shape and iconic mouth of the in-game creature.
As expected, the back of the urchin features a barcode tile. In the video games, they're impossible to defeat without the use of a Super Star, and are usually an obstacle to be navigated around. Hopefully this set provides us with a star, however, otherwise there would be little point!
Finally, the build that gives the set its name is a blue circular rollercoaster track surrounding a small island with a palm tree. The track can pivot on all axes, using three white handles. The fourth is longer, and sits beneath the Big Urchin. A rather blocky Dolphin sits on the track, with space for Mario to stand on its back, and a tile to scan.
The tree in the middle is freestanding, and has a rounded base courtesy of a 2x2 slide shoe that means it doesn't quite stand straight. There's that all-important star block and tile hanging loosely from a branch beneath the leaves!
The idea is to stand Mario on the dolphin's back, and manipulate the circular track in such a way that Mario and the dolphin whizz around the tree enough times (collecting coins as you go, with no apparent limit) and with enough force to both knock the star block down and also knock Big Urchin off his perch. Doing so allows you to scan the star to activate Mario's invincibility, and then jump on the back of the urchin to defeat it, gaining 18 coins. However, I found this incredibly difficult to do! Either Mario would not stay attached to the dolphin, or I wasn't spinning him fast enough to generate enough force to knock the Urchin down.
As one of the bigger Mario expansion sets, there's quite a lot going on that you don't get in the smaller builds. The bridge is brilliant, with the simple but effective mechanism that triggers the fish to jump when the middle plank is stepped on. I like the idea behind the dolphin ride, and perhaps it's my age, but I found it quite finicky to get right. The set as a whole is very difficult to move around, with the disparate pieces falling apart quite easily.
Inevitably, the larger size of the set comes with a larger price tag, and unless you're particularly invested in the game I'm not sure if it's worth it. It's fun, but personally I can think of other sets for the same price I'd rather pick up.
73 likes
22 comments on this article
They're getting really quite imaginative with these play mechanisms. I don't really know what the longevity of a toy like this would be though. I guess once a kid gets bored of the game, it's broken up and put in the parts bin like everything else, so it's no different to a car or a rocket ship in a way.
I really want this set for the Big Urchin (to go with the Urchin from the Character Packs), but I've heard a number of reviewers say the play feature doesn't work well which is really discouraging. Where I live the price is the equivalent of 75 USD.
I think what I want is more of an underwater biome than a beach biome. That said, this wave of beach sets looks pretty good. Emphasis on looks.
Does the yellow Yoshi have the same functionality as the pink Yoshi, or Yoshi (the green one)? Based on the egg icon on the tile, I'm guessing the former?
The pros and cons are a great addition, I’ve never seen them in a professional review before (not that those aren’t well-written regardless, of course). I loved the beach levels in New Super Mario Bros. Wii and it was only upon examining these sets and the soda jungle one my brother got that I realized how much these appealed to my nostalgia of that game. It also makes me realize that I haven’t played New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe in three years and I gotta get back to that— preferably without using Nabbit to cheat my way through the game. :P
Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made?
@icey said:
"Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made? "
Kids love it, simple as that. Some adults buy them, but kids are very obsessed. It hits a sweet spot that balances creative building and rebuilding, interactive play that doesn't involve a video game, and execution of the license. It's absolutely the most successful game-y line from LEGO so far.
@icey said:
"Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made? "
They would be getting every cent out of the IP and its restrictions whilst its valid. Sales may not matter at this point.
“New opponents” absolutely “fairly expensive” Wallet starts crying.
@icey said:
"Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made? "
It's not necessarily the same kids buying all of the sets. Kids buy sets, and they enjoy them, and if they stop enjoying them they stop buying them even as other kids start. As long as the consumer base continues to refresh itself at a rate exceeding any decline, it doesn't particularly matter how much of that base is made up of completionists who "buy them all" and how many just buy a couple of sets and move on. In fact, I'd wager that for most themes (not just this one), the latter makes up a bigger overall slice of the pie than the former.
That said, I'm glad that this theme's sales structure (with the sales of "expansion sets" relying on kids first buying a starter set) has ended up working out, since that was a bit more of a gamble than your typical theme (where any set, big or small, can function as "entry level").
@hawkeye7269 said: "Kids love it, simple as that."
I always find the few weeks immediately after Christmas to be very telling, in terms of what kids like. I don't know if this happens elsewhere, but where I live, in December, the Lego shelves get picked clean. By NYE, before new stock arrives, the Lego shelves in the local toy and department stores are bare ... except for the sets that nobody wants.
A few years ago, the shelves were picked clean with nothing available ... except the piles and piles of Unikitty sets, which one might think were radioactive, given that nobody was touching them (and later in the year, they were discounted heavily but still didn't sell). This last year, it was the Eternals sets. The movie didn't exactly go gang-busters, and while the aisles were picked clean (certainly there are zero other superhero sets available, although the new Batman movie sets have just turned up. How absurdly over-priced are they?), the only thing left are the piles of Eternals sets. Nobody wants them (well, almost nobody. I picked up the Arishem set when K-mart tried clearancing them out, back in November).
But you know what else has been left untouched, the last couple of years? Piles of Mario sets. Nobody wants them. I was checking out my local Target last week. Picked clean, but for multiple shelves with nothing but Mario sets. My local Mr Toys (an Australian franchise) normally has this wide space for Creator and Technic, but after Christmas, it's all just Mario sets. Also, the Mario sets are over where the Ninjago and Harry Potter sets used to be. Everything else was bought over Christmas.
If kids are buying these, then I don't know where this is happening. Because it's not happening here.
I'm also surprised people are wondering why these are popular, like are people here not aware that Nintendo is extremely popular? Like major video game company with some of the most "buy anything" fanbases around? I don't mean that in a bad way necessarily, I'm a big Nintendo collector myself, I just think people are discounting the fact tons of people are buying these on the Mario name recognition alone. A lot of video game collector's I know never messed with LEGO stuff until Lego Mario stuff came out. I think they're just fun little exploratory pieces.
Having only recently gotten into these though, I'm glad to see a review. I mainly buy these sets for little brick built Mario characters and enemies I like, so it's fun to see how they come out. Maybe this'll go on discount later in the year/next year too, since it's a bit pricey on it's own.
@NatureBricks said:
"Here in the USA there were no LEGO sets left in stores about 2-3 weeks before Christmas, everything was gone.
"
There were world wide delivery challenges this year due to the channel block, too.
@MisterBrickster
@icey
I think viewing the Mario theme as a game is not quite accurate. It’s Lego that also has a gameplay element. My kids play with these the same way they play with any Lego theme. Which is to say, for hours.
On the adult side, fans of Mario and Nintendo collect these sets just like any other theme would be collected. The overlap of Lego and Nintendo is a big win from my perspective.
@TBOC said:
"I'm also surprised people are wondering why these are popular, like are people here not aware that Nintendo is extremely popular? Like major video game company with some of the most "buy anything" fanbases around? I don't mean that in a bad way necessarily, I'm a big Nintendo collector myself, I just think people are discounting the fact tons of people are buying these on the Mario name recognition alone. A lot of video game collector's I know never messed with LEGO stuff until Lego Mario stuff came out. I think they're just fun little exploratory pieces.
Having only recently gotten into these though, I'm glad to see a review. I mainly buy these sets for little brick built Mario characters and enemies I like, so it's fun to see how they come out. Maybe this'll go on discount later in the year/next year too, since it's a bit pricey on it's own."
There were also people on this site who genuinely doubted kids knew Sonic or played any of the games. Meanwhile I was at the LEGO store the other day and I counted so many kids from so many different families getting excited at seeing Sonic on the shelves or in the display case. And Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) didn't become the best-selling video game movie of all time just from fans alone. Keep in mind the hardcore fanbase is extremely divided over the movie and the redesign only helped so much.
@B_Space_Man said:
" @MisterBrickster
@icey
I think viewing the Mario theme as a game is not quite accurate. It’s Lego that also has a gameplay element. My kids play with these the same way they play with any Lego theme. Which is to say, for hours.
On the adult side, fans of Mario and Nintendo collect these sets just like any other theme would be collected. The overlap of Lego and Nintendo is a big win from my perspective.
"
Indeed, I've been saying from the very beginning that there's so much potential to be had with LEGO Super Mario and unfortunately people just can't seem to see it unless they see actual MOCs of it. I mean, it's totally fair to not want to invest in the theme given the prices, or to not want to pay for the sets themselves if you're only interested in the characters — those are real drawbacks preventing people from spending money on them. But other than that, LEGO is LEGO, it is really not hard to imagine Mario himself or any of the characters and builds in different brick-built environments and scenarios. There's nothing stopping you from turning your UCS Falcon into a gigantic Goomba simply by placing the Goomba's action tile on it. Or perhaps modding a TIE Fighter with the Clown Car tile so Mario can fly it and it can make comically unfitting noises. Make a train for Mario to ride on and collect coins as the train goes around the city layout.
I for one, love the theme and buy sets for me. My kids love the theme as well. Its really easy for my 4 year old to make courses using the pieces and built-structures, and plays with her older brother (9) lots with this. Its a theme that really transcends ages - when friends visit, you can bet that Lego Super Mario is the one thing that comes out!
Yes, the sets can seem expensive, but no stickers (that you have to apply)!!!!!! There are large pieces, which bump up the price. Also, I always buy at a discount since this is the general thing now with Lego - I mean, who buys Lego city sets at full price?!?! talk about one over-priced theme - the worst in my opinion......
@icey said:
"Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made? "
Its litteraly game with DLCs so kids and some adults gobble that up.
I really live small mechanisms they put in these. Wish more normal sets used ordinary bricks for mechanisms more.
LBG LURPs? Where have I been?
It's really interesting to hear about how actual kids enjoy these sets! To clarify I am 100% a fan of the theme, I think it's a really clever idea. Most of Lego's failed digital themes seem to rely on phones, which is absolutely a mistake, as the second a kid picks up a phone, they're subjected to a hundred carefully-designed attention-harvesting apps and the plastic bricks don't stand a chance.
My kids (6 and almost 9) love the Mario Lego sets. They're big fans of the 3D Mario games (Odyssey, 3D World, Bowser's Fury, etc.), and building and then playing with the characters from the games is great fun for them. And I've noticed that the interactive techniques have become much more interesting and varied over the last year or so. Compare 71369 Bowser's Castle to 71391 Bowser's Airship. The former looks impressive, with the huge Bowser statue looming over the set, but the latter has an ingenious method of allowing the ship to unfold, which not only gives more room to play, but does a better job of showing off what's possible to do with Lego.
One thing I'd like to see is sets of Mario environments which could be built and used to connect the various expansion packs/character packs into more lasting courses and/or display pieces. Oh, and my kids want a Plessy set.
I'd love to hear more about HOW kids play with these sets. I mean, you can absolutely "cheat" so what are the "rules" for playing?
I really wish Lego had gone down a similar path with Vidiyo. Let you arrange bricks to "compose" music. Then, sure, use an app instead of Mario to play the results, but all the action is in the bricks, not the phone, which is there just as a processor. Would've been more fun and cheaper since you wouldn't even need to license any IP nor develop that flashy yet forgettable AR tech
Oh wow. Very nice. This is a really pretty stand alone set. I’ll get one I reckon- Ninjago never looked so good.
@Padmewan said:
"I'd love to hear more about HOW kids play with these sets. I mean, you can absolutely "cheat" so what are the "rules" for playing?
I really wish Lego had gone down a similar path with Vidiyo. Let you arrange bricks to "compose" music. Then, sure, use an app instead of Mario to play the results, but all the action is in the bricks, not the phone, which is there just as a processor. Would've been more fun and cheaper since you wouldn't even need to license any IP nor develop that flashy yet forgettable AR tech"
I wouldn't be surprised if some people just made up their own rules for the game. LEGO themselves don't really provide much more than a handful of game mechanics, functionality and gamemodes (different start pipes) so to speak, so gameplay is intentionally very open-ended and it's really up to you how you want to play.
@icey said:
"Honest question: How can this theme be so popular? Who's the target age group that keep expanding their Lego game so much that TLG continue to release more?
Is this the first successful game LEGO ever made? "
Slap the plumber's name on something, no matter what, and it will sell.