6199 - Hydro Crystalation Station

Rating:
Pros: Good array of new pieces, trap door into jail, red coral
Cons: Huge gap in the jail, the price is a little high for the number of pieces
Contents: 472 pieces
Price: $89.99
Reviewed: 18-Apr-1998
Reviewed by: Mark Bauer

It was a dark night in the sea when in the distance it stood, tall and mighty. Hydro Henry was on guard for the massive station. He sat in the observation area and thought everything was fine, but little did he know a sneaky Stingray hid within the red fire coral, waiting. When the searchlight passed by he went to the station unseen in his dark spy sub. He reached the station and approached a glass window. Inside was his friend being held prisoner. With out any pause, the Stingray attached a rope to the glass and to his sub and yanked.
BOOM!
The Stingray was free to escape with his friend. Henry heard and swam quickly to the scene of the crime but was too late. The Stingray had disappeared into the mist.

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When I had heard that Aquazone had a new station I got excited and even before seeing a picture of it I ran out and got it, and I have to say that I am very pleased with the set.
Overall the station is the area of intrest in the set but it also comes with two subs, one for the Stingrays and one for the friendly Hydronauts.
The Stingray sub is very simple. It is just basically a one piece sub. This piece is two pegs wide until the front where it has half a circle (like the U.F.O. saucer pieces but smaller) in the front. This piece is cool, but you can never create a large alternate model with it.
The other sub on the other hand is large and much cooler than the Stingray sub. It consists of two cockpit areas for the Hydronauts and an area in the back for a jail pod to slide into. The sub is basic but does feature two very cool spring pieces also found on Blacktron II's Spectral Starguider. These pieces are attached to two propellers and allow the propellers to rotate around 360 degrees.
Now onto the station itself. I will discuss two parts: floor 1 and floor 2.
Floor 1 is basically a jail with both pros and cons. The good thing about the jail is the glass wall that can be blown away with the use of string and a tipping platform (have to see it to understand). There is also a cage like piece on one side to hold in intruders of fierce sea creatures (your choice). Now there's one large con to the large jail cell and it all has to do with Lego's laziness. On one side of the jail there is a large gap that isn't filled in. When I built this set I was very disappointed about this. (come on, Lego! It would only take 5 or 6 pieces to fill in the gap so nothing can escape! Sheesh!) I found that to be the only thing wrong with the jail.
Now onto Floor 2. This floor is basically an observation tower halfway covered with two octagon-like pieces in glass green color. In the area is a hose with a suction cup. I think this a pretty cool idea, although I would have preferred if they used magnets instead. One other thing in the observation area that is worth noting is the trap door. This is a pretty cool function cause when you drop a figure through the door they're stuck in the jail.
So all in all the Hydro Crystalation Station is a very cool set with lots of cool function and playing ideas. The only thing that keeps me away from five stars is because of the large gap in the jail (mentioned above), but it definately deserves 4 stars.