LEGO Pokémon needs to take a page out of Minecraft's book

While we wait for details on LEGO Pokémon, there's a clear path for the theme to take and LEGO Minecraft has been down that road for a decade.

LEGO Pokémon has officially been confirmed, with a teaser featuring a peek at a brick-built Pikachu. That doesn't necessarily mean that the theme will be entirely brick-built, but it would be a wise path for the LEGO Group to take with over 1,000 Pokémon that would require at least dozens of new pieces at a smaller scale.

The bevy of new elements that minifigure-scale Pokémon would need might be seen as a limitation by those hoping for minifigure-centric Pokémon sets, but the same might have been said about Minecraft and its various uniquely shaped creatures before a decade of minifigure-scale models and figures. There might be a lesson for the new theme to learn from LEGO Minecraft, similar to Star Wars, Marvel and DC.

Thankfully, the LEGO Group has been keen to create minifigure-scale Minecraft figures of the many creatures found in-game, with several using specialised elements for their head to capture details that are too iconic and small for building techniques.

The armadillos in the new 21269 The Armadillo Mine Expedition are an example of this, making use of a specialised head element to best depict their game based designs at a smaller scale. The same tactic has been used for several other Minecraft animals, including the wolf and some such as the cow and sheep have even utilised the same head element, which may be possible between select Pokémon too.

These depictions aren't perfect, but the LEGO Minecraft design team are seemingly given some creative freedom in recreating the creatures for the sake of playability and hopefully, the new multi-year partnership will grant the LEGO Pokémon team a similar level of artistic liberty.

Just as Speed Champions has created new pieces that are intended to be diverse enough to be used outside of LEGO cars, Minecraft's elements have occasionally found places outside of the theme from the Tesseract in LEGO Marvel to part of the roof trim in 10278 Police Station.

It's not a requirement for new LEGO elements, looking at the specialised pieces in LEGO Animal Crossing, for example. Featuring new elements that can be versatile may be a challenging yet important task for LEGO Pokémon to tackle, though, should minifigure-scale Pokémon be a goal for the theme.

LEGO Minecraft has frequently explored larger figures though, both at minifigure-scale such as the Ghast and Great Hog in 21273 The Ghast Balloon Village Attack and 21272 Woodland Mansion Fighting Ring respectively and in standalone models at a different scale.

21281 Baby Pig's Birthday Celebration is a good example of how LEGO Pokémon can mix bigger buildable figures alongside minifigure-scale models in the same theme. The 2024 build is not at all minifigure-scale, instead depicting various Minecraft creatures at a larger scale with more moving parts and posing options, as well as some accurate play features related to their in-game biology.

Aside from its block-based nature (unless they're aiming for Pokémon Quest), LEGO Minecraft offers an ideal framework for LEGO Pokémon should the theme be aiming for a mix of minifigure-scale models and bigger figure builds. Alternatively, the LEGO Group and the Pokémon Company might have their eyes on the likes of LEGO Super Mario and eschew minifigures entirely.

Whatever the case, LEGO Pokémon remains undeniably exciting for fans of all ages and we're currently waiting for more details on the promising multi-year partnership ahead of the theme's launch at some point in 2026.

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