[REVIEW] 4644 -- Marina

[DrBeaker]

Indexed

[REVIEW] 4644 – Marina

My sons and I have been looking for some different elements for our expanding LEGO city. The idea of a beachfront set caught our attention and we picked up the new 4644-Marina set during the last Toys R Us BOGO sale (which I learned about here on TnB!).

Set Details

4644 -- Marina
Pieces = 294
Minifigures = Five
MSRP = $49.99
Price per piece = 17.0 cents/piece

Box

The box is one of the older style, large boxes which makes it seem like the set is slightly larger than it actually is. It shares the bright blue background of other City line sets and also emphasizes the modular nature of the build.



The top panel of the box gives a shot of the five included minifigures.



The rear of the box is packed with action shots showing all the different elements and play features of the set. I prefer this style of box art to the SW LEGO sets that devote a good part of the box rear to advertising other SW sets in the line.





Opening the Box & Minifigures

Inside the box, there are four numbered bags, one separate bag for large elements, notably the boat, two instruction books and a sticker sheet. This set lacked the separate packaging for the instruction books and they were slightly warped. I’ve gotten accustomed to seeing nice, pristine books and their absence is slightly annoying. My guess is that they are focusing those on adult/collector sets.





The minifigures are an interesting mix of beachgoers: one female beachgoer, one lifeguard, one surfer and two divers. The wetsuit on the divers is a torso I haven’t seen before and is very nice.



It is a little unclear why the diver is wearing a lifejacket if he plans on going SCUBA diving.

The rear of the torsos all have some degree of printing.




The Build

This is the first LEGO boat of any size that I’ve added to my collection. The base of the boat is one single molded piece.



From the base, the build is fairly straightforward, adding seating, equipment racks and two outboard motors. Here is the boat from two angles. It feels very solid and has a nice “swooshability” factor, to steal a term from my SW reviews.





There are two other vehicles included in the set: a small four-wheeler for our lifeguard and a windsail. The 4-wheeler isn’t particularly notably. The windsail has a nice appearance, but isn’t overly stable with a minifigure attached.



The remainder of the marina consists of three structures, linked by a boardwalk and bridge. First up is the lifeguard tower. It is extremely spartan, with very few distinguishing characteristics.



The lifeguard tower is connected to boardwalk by a pedestrian bridge.



One quibble here: the bridge is barely high enough for either the windsail or boat to fit beneath. The far side of the boardwalk is occupied by a two story building made up of our other building units. On the ground floor is a surf shop, selling all manner of beach accessories.



The second floor is a small café. It features some nice green elements and is probably the most detailed of the three play areas.



The roof of the café is hinged so that it can be opened up for both play and to enjoy the nice beach weather. My six year old son was puzzled by how minifigures were supposed to get upstairs to the café as there is no ladder or stair access. The ladder on the front of the surf shop is used to display lifejackets and leads into the second floor overhang.



Here is the finished set with all of its elements.



Pro’s

Nice colors & included elements
Included boat is a nice addition to any LEGO city
Significant playability

Con’s

Minifigures aren’t as distinctive as LEGO Minifigures Series 1-4
Price is extremely disappointing for content

Final Thoughts

We enjoy this set as part of our LEGO city, but I cannot recommend it at MSRP. While I expected the price/piece to be higher with the large boat hull, there just isn’t enough here to justify the $50 retail price. The minifigures are appropriate for the set but pale in comparison with some of the recent minifigures included in Series 1-4.

If you want this set for your City, I’d encourage you to wait until you see a sale or deal here at Toysnbricks.com

[ncbarrett]

I too got this on BOGO 50%.
It is a really good set, but would say it is priced about $10 too high.

My daughter loves it, and my wife said it reminds her of sets from when she was a kid.

RE: minifigs, I actually liked the divers and the surfer dude.
I like that you get 2 surf boards, plenty of life vests, and lots of extra frogman feet.

[zdog89]

Nice set, anyone remember the coast guard set 6435? I had that years ago, looks like mixing the two sets could be promising. :) I purchased the 3.99 jet ski and it came with two of the mini-figures included so I do agree for the price it should of included more figures or more exclusive ones.

[koromo]

-Thinks mini-fig no.2 from the line up should have been equipped with the CMF swimming shorts.

Neat set overall, invokes memories of the paradisa theme when I grew up. I never owned it but it was all over the catalogues back then,

[Knobby Plastic]

Thanks for the review, I can imagine kids really enjoying playing with this. It has so many different sections to it and quite a few play features. For builders like me who build a set and then organize it into my collection it also has its selling points. It has many water-related accessories, SCUBA tanks, a myriad of flipper colors, life vests, etc. It also has some of the newer parts like Plate, Modified 1 x 4 with 2 Studs, and Brick, Modified 1 x 1 x 3 with 2 Clips Vertical. One big thing is the red flex-tubing on the boat. But then you look at the price, like ncbarret said, ten bucks lower would greatly improve the set.

[sadowsk1]

I like this set, it's very colorful. Very nice review!

[lukeskywalker]

Good review, Now all I need is a sale so I can pick it up.