LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan

Metro Detroit is getting a brand new entertainment attraction in a few days when LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan opens to the public on March 25, 2016.  The nice folks at Merlin Entertainments invited our family to an advance sneak peek of the 32,000 square foot LEGO themed indoor facility located at Great Lakes Outlet Mall which is geared towards entertaining children ages 3 - 10.  So I let my 7 year old twins play hooky from school one day for a few hours so they and I could explore the place.

As you enter LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan, guests are ushered into the Factory Tour room.  This presentation theater allows visitors to create their own customized virtual reality LEGO mini-figures projected on 360 degree screens then shows a video describing the process a factory would go through to make it.

Departing the Factory Tour you enter the queue area for the first of the attraction's two rides, Kingdom Quest.

Kingdom Quest is an interactive laser shooting experience where visitors will journey into the depths of a medieval castle and zap various targets to help save the princess from the evil mage's skeleton warriors.  It is a bit spooky but not overly scary so most children should be amused by the experience rather than terrified by it.  My daughter was a bit tepid about getting on the ride at first but as soon as we got off of it she immediately asked if we could do it again.

Kingdom's Quest incorporates both interactive video screens and physical models for riders to target with their laser shooters.  All the riders in your cart try to hit the most targets to gain the most points so they can have bragging rights to being the Princess's "Champion."  We rode Kingdom's Quest several times and this was hands down my kids' favorite part of our trip even though their competitive dad never let them win a shooting match.

Next to Kingdom's Quest is the facility's other ride Merlin's Apprentice.  This takes riders up into the air and spins them around the sorcerer's library.

Behind the rides and factory tour is a large open space that includes several themed galleries including DUPLO Farm, the LEGO FRIENDS play area, and the LEGO Racers: Build & Test Zone.  There is also a LEGO Café in this space where people can wind down with hot and cold food, snacks and coffee or tea. In the center of it all there is a park square filled with benches, tubs of LEGO bricks to be used for unstructured play, and a grand clock to decorate the space.

LEGO Racers: Build & Test Zone lets you build your own car and race it down a track.  This area also has special earthquake stimulating tables.  Build a skyscraper out of LEGO bricks and see if it can survive the shaking.

The LEGO FRIENDS section will delight the young ladies allowing them to play in and build upon the imaginary Heartlake City which is home to Olivia, Emma, Stephanie, Mia and Andrea from the LEGO toy collection.  It also contains life-size sculptures of the LEGO FRIENDS.

DUPLO FARM is a play zone for the Discovery Center's smallest visitors with its own play zone designed for young children and tubs of super-sized DUPLO bricks to play with.

To the rear of the building is a 4D Cinema and the LEGO CITY play zone.  The 4D cinema shows a LEGO three dimensional cartoon with real environmental special effects let loose withing the theater making viewers feel as if they are part of the adventure as images leap off the screen and you are immersed in fog, snow and water while sitting in your seats.  The LEGO CITY play zone next to the cinema is a great place to let kids run free and my children started begging to jump in it the second they saw this area that includes police, firefighter and construction work motifs.

For those parents comfortable enough to let their kids have a long leash once you've arrived there is a nice parents lounge with big windows looking out at the main area of the Discovery Center, plush chairs and free wi-fi.  Also to give parents some peace of mind about child safety, adults 18+ must be accompanied by a child aged under 18 to gain entry to this attraction to avoid there being any questionable characters lurking around.  For those 18+ who may want to come to play themselves once a month there is a dedicated Adult Night (no kids allowed) that takes place after the general admission hours are over.  LEGOLAND Discovery Center admission hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturdays and 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. on Sundays. The Discovery Center remains open for 2 hours after last admission.

Once your day of play has wrapped up you'll pass through a MINILAND exhibit of Metro Detroit landmarks built from LEGO bricks on the way out.  Take some time to linger through this area as every five minutes MINILAND completes a day to night cycle, with the models illuminated to show off the Detroit skyline after dark.  Watching a firework display in the night sky over the GM Ren Cen in the MINILAND is stunning.

Keep an eye out for buttons and controllers located throughout the MINILAND which activate special effects within the models.  For example you can control some vehicles moving through the streets of Motown in one section of MINILAND.

My kids had a great time during our visit to LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan and were already asking when we could go back again five minutes after we'd left during our drive home.  There are going to be a lot of happy kids in Metro Detroit once LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan officially opens its doors on March 25th.

For more information, visit www.legolanddiscoverycenter.com/michigan/

LEGOLAND Discovery Center coming to Michigan in Spring of 2016

A Geek Daddy was pleased to be a part of the groundbreaking ceremony celebrating the beginning of construction on LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan, a 32,000-square-foot indoor attraction featuring more than one million LEGO bricks and themed exhibits including a 4D cinema, two interactive rides, and a uniquely Michigan-themed MINILAND display, that will be located at Great Lakes Crossing in the city of Auburn Hills.  Bertie, the LEGOLAND Discovery Center mascot, joined the fun when a large construction loader dumped 50,000 LEGO bricks for local dignitaries and school children to dig in to as they ceremonially welcomed the facility to the community.  After checking out the layouts of the facility they had on display during the groundbreaking ceremony, I just have to say "Everything is Awesome!"

 

Opening in Spring 2016, the attraction will provide an immersive 2 to 3 hour LEGO experience for its visitors. LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan will be the 8th LEGOLAND Discovery Center attraction within the United States and the 14th in the world.  Aspects of the LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan will include:

a 4D Cinema that takes 3D films featuring popular LEGO characters and adds some extra special effects like wind, rain, snow, and lightning to bring the experience to life.   

Kingdom Quest is an interactive ride that has you jump into a chariot and use your laser to zap evil doers as you attempt to rescue a Princess and win the highest score.  The better your aim the higher your score will be.  Challenge your friends and family on who will achieve the highest ranking.

LEGO Racers:  Build & Test lets you build your own vehicle and test it on a test track.  Times are recorded to the hundredth of a second so it might be a close competition between friends on who has the bragging rights to claim the fastest LEGO racer.

LEGO Factory Tour provides a virtual reality experience that lets you discover how LEGO bricks are made to get their shape and color. It has you guide factory workers through each stage of the LEGO brick making process; mixing, heating, molding and decorating.

The LEGOLAND Discovery Center Michigan will also include a LEGO Duplo Village play area for guests under 5 years old, LEGO MINILAND depicting Michigan landmarks, Merlin's Apprentice Ride and a LEGO Master Builder Academy plus a Cafe and LEGOLAND Discovery Center Shop.

LEGOLAND is owned and operated by U.K.-based Merlin Entertainments, the world's second largest visitor attraction operator, which also recently opened and operates SEA LIFE Michigan at Great Lakes Crossing.  Great Lakes Crossing is an outlet mall located 35 miles north of the city of Detroit conveniently off of the I-75 highway within Oakland County, Michigan.  If your kids love LEGO building blocks (seriously what child doesn't?!) and are as excited as mine are about this brand new Metro Detroit attraction you can get updates about its opening while it is under construction by following @LDCMichigan on Twitter or liking its Facebook page.

LEGO creates a new niche for Kindergarteners

Up until now, my son's all time favorite toy has been his DUPLO BLOCKS.  He'd spend hours having fun with imaginative play building all sorts of things with those building blocks.  Duplo Blocks are made by LEGO for kids aged 18 months to 5 years old.  They are bulkier blocks with large props and no small parts compared to standard LEGO meant for toddlers to safely and easily play with.

My son turned 5 in December and I noticed towards the end of last year, he was losing interest in his Duplo's and even told me that "Duplo's were for babies."  So at Christmas we gave him some "real" Lego building block sets.  Although the age range for the LEGO CITY item from Santa was listed at 5 - 12, we still had some troubles.  My son had a hard time with some of the motor skills necessary to build, and more importantly take apart, the Lego City vehicles and I found myself barraged with requests from a frustrated child to constantly be pulling apart bricks for him.  And than there was, I'm embarrassed to admit this, the visit to the doctor's office.  Our other 5 year old twin thought it would be funny to steal one of her brother's really small lego pieces and stick it up her nose so he couldn't take it back from her while grandma wasn't babysitting.  My daughter couldn't pull it back out herself, Grandma couldn't get it out, my wife came home early from work to help try and get it out, and finally a trip to our pediatrician's office and an extra long pair of tweezers saved the day.  So the Lego's were put away until our kids get a little older and we also stored away a memory that we can use to embarrass our daughter when she has a family of her own.

We must not be the only parents who are finding themselves in a gap when it comes to transitioning from Legos to Duplos because in a few weeks LEGO will introducing a new line of building block sets aimed at children ages 4 to 7, a kindergarten niche so to speak.  The new LEGO JUNIORS sets will be compatible with tradition Lego sets for continued use as children get older but will have easier components to assemble and not include the small parts that could potentially get stuck in a child's nose, ear, or who knows where else they might be stuck.

LEGO JUNIORS will be on store shelves starting March 1 2014, just in time for Easter gifts.  We're planning on the Easter bunny leaving "DEFEND THE BATCAVE" Batman playset and THE PRINCESS PLAY CASTLE playset in our kids' baskets this Spring.  Other interesting playsets include a pony farm, race car rally, spiderman adventure, and a teenage mutant ninja turtles assortment.  Check out all the sets here:  http://www.lego.com/en-us/juniors/products/products

Obviously, I haven't bought these products yet but once we've picked them up and given them to our kids, I'll post A Geek Daddy review.While we're waiting you may want to check out the FREE Lego Juniors Create & Cruise game available on Apple App Store & Google Play.  Kids can create their own minfigures and vehicles to cruise around a 3D world collecting coins.  As they gather coins they will be able to unlock virtual LEGO sets that can be build with a few easy touches.  The game is aimed at the same age group for the Lego Juniors toys 4 - 7, but looks  like an app kids' geek daddies and mommies may enjoy playing along with their little ones as well.