Today, we continue out exploration of the second wave of LEGO Super Mario Sets. The wave is significantly smaller than the first, featuring a range of Buildable Characters, three expansion sets, featuring the Soda Jungle biome, and finally 71380 Master Your Adventure. With 366 Pieces, and priced at $USD 59.95/EUR59.95/AUD89.99, this set will be released on January 1 2021. I was fortunate to be able to have the opportunity to get some experience with the set, thanks to the LEGO Group.

Continuing on with some of the themes we saw in the first wave of LEGO Super Mario sets, we still see the set requiring the LEGO Super Mario Starter set 71360 to use it, as well as the dependence on the App as a way to download instructions, as well as watch short videos outlining some of the more subtle aspects of gameplay. The App was updated to incorporate the new sets on the 18th of December, so it has been a bit of a crash course, both in building and getting to experience the functionality of these sets.

As with all expansion sets, 71360: Adventures with Mario Starter Set is required.

Again, the sets aim to create an experience that would only be possible by having Nintendo and LEGO working together on the design. There has been a lot of disappointment expressed by fans that there has not yet been a set of mini figures releated to Super Mario. Personally, I feel that the brick built aesthetic of the theme contributes a lot to its character, and adds to the experience.

This Maker set is in a more conventonally shaped box than the wedge shaped starter set.

As has been the habit in recent months, my wife laid all the elements out for easy location, and visualisation.

As with all sets, there is one character in bag one who unlocks the set instructions in the App. In this case, it is the Bob-omb. The first bag contains a couple of new prints: particularly the medium and dark Azur 1×2 bricks, with a gear and question mark on them. There is also an orange bric, featuring a clock, with a stylised gear around the rim.

We also have a number of ‘regular’ biome paththway elements: water; lava and grass. The other ‘obvious’ new element is the yellow warp pipe. This is used with a new starting tile to create a new, faster game, where the timer is set at 30 seconds, rather than 1 minute. Regular time bonuses obtained from other bricks can still be used, to extend the game.

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We also have a new ‘Half 8; element, where a plate can be inserted to make a wider biome. As well as elements to creaste some new characters: Koopa Paratroop, and Larry – one of the Koopalings.

Instructions are included in the app to build the scenery, characters, landscape and the Maker machine, which is used to define 3 action bricks.

Maker Machine

This part of the build is key to the experience of this set. The machine looks a little like a cement mixer. You insert one of the customisable action bricks, place the Mario brick on top, and hold down the red button. Mario’s screen will show a powerup symbol on his chest. Mario, and the action brick are both mounted on a ‘splat gear’, which, it turns out, meshes reasonably well with a stardard ship’s steering wheel.

We have 2 different types of programmable action bricks: One programmable time brick; and two programmable bonus bricks.

Mario can be set up to register the time bonus action brick as adding 10, 15 or 30 seconds to the clock. OR jumping to the last few seconds of the – with the faster ‘hurry up ‘ music.

The two Programmable ‘?’ boxes may be programmed as Super Mushroom, Poison Mushroom, 10 coins or Star Power

Poison mushroom is new for this wave of sets: Mario enters a no-coin state for 10 seconds, unless ‘washed’ in water (stand on a blue plate), or shaken. Points awarded at the end of the poison mushroom state can be variable. I have received between 3 and 10 points so far.

The Landscape.

There are examples of every biome from wave 1 in this set: Blue green, yellow and red. As mentioned previously, green represents grass, blue water and red lava. If you step on the lava for a period of time, Mario will be stunned and enter a no-coin state, until he is cooled down by standing in the water.

These are the available path elements:

We only have one ‘Action brick’ holder. but also a hill, as well as some leaves and flowers for decorations.

The ‘Half plate elements are expanded with a 6×8 plate to become a 10×8 node. We have some trees and clouds here.

We build some small islands.

Hmmm… desert in the sky. I dont quite understand. I suspect that’s just me.

Some dark orange masonary bricks allow us to build up some small towers between the lava tubes.

There are also some smaller and larger towers based in the Lava biome. We also have a series of steps for Mario to climp up in order to follow on the the nexts obstacle.

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The Foes:

Goomba

One scan, one coin. Repeat

Bob Omb!

Scanning Bob-omb results in being able to scan him as many times as possible, before he explodes. you can get one coin per scan, but if you are scanning him as the bomb explodes, you will not gain any coins that you might have earned by scanning him. He can only be scanned once per game. Striking him once, with Star power in effect, yields 10 coins. (It is possible, under normal conditions to gain 25 coins or more)

Koopa Paratroopa

A new element allows our old koopa troops to grow wings. These fellows take 3 scans to defeat, yielding 4 coins. Subsequent scans yield one point each. There is a second Koopa Paratroopa in 71386 Wiggler’s Poison Swamp expansion. It has a different barcode, allowing both to be scanned for full points in the same timed game. Having him perched on a single transparent antenna makes it easy to knock the Koopa Paratroopa out of the sky. If you have star power in effect, you can defeat him with one strike, and earn 8 coins.

Larry Koopa

One of the Koopalings – a similar creature to Bowser and Bowser Junior. It takes 6 strikes to defeat him, yielding 10 coins. Again, repeat strikes only yield a single coin. This is the equivalent to the boss fight. If you have star power in effect, you can defeat him with one strike, and earn 20 coins.

Action Tiles

There are two action tiles inclused in this set: a new start tile, for a 30 second game: Dash 30. The Warp Tube is yellow. Starting the game using this tube brings us the fast paced music from Super Mario 64 as our background music, rather than the classic ‘above ground’ theme we have with the Green starting pipe.

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We also have a new slider tile:

As with some other sliders, we see a change in music to that associate with the dungeon levels. There are additional points every time you change directions, including bonuses if you manage to stay on board for the ride, and direction changes. This time, we only have a tile, rather than a plate, making Mario’s ride a little more challenging.

Run-through:

Overall, this set adds additional value to the starter course. The bonuses from the customisable Action Bricks can be used in conjunction with the tradtional 60 second, green start pipe game. Its a neat addition to the base game, providing additional challenges through being able to adjust the effect of the time-bonus, as well as other bonus boxes. The addition of Larry Koopa to the collection of figures is fun, and ultimately, I was intrigued to discover that the ‘splat’ gear could mesh with the ship’s steering wheel.

71380 LEGO® Super Mario: Master Your Adventure goes on sale January 1 2021, and has 366 pieces. It will retail for  59.99 USD/EUR – 49.99 GBP – 89.99 AUD – 69.99 CAD.

What to you think of this set?Why not leave you comments below, and until next time, Play Well.