Oh! And let’s not forget the rock whales & scorpions! While we may have received the spiders and bats, the other monsters did not appear in the sets. Apart from that, they were a pretty good effort on LEGO’s part. Other monsters in the video game included: the Ice monster, Lava monster, slugs, bats and spiders. The monsters had a smiley face, which was a bit unsettling. Each monster’s hand could even hold a minifigure if placed just right.

Rock Monsters (a first and only appearance), basically a large brown rock-like creature with moveable arm terrorized the crew. Once collected, the crystals can power the ship to get them home. While the Rock Raiders are repairing the ship, they must explore inside the dangerous caves of the planet to collect the energy crystals. The planet they discover has a vast amount of mysterious energy crystals. The captain orders the ship to use its remaining power and head for the nearest planet. Sucked into a wormhole it exits in an alien galaxy. The story involved the crew of a large ship called Explorer which suffered damage after wandering into an asteroid field. I did know LEGO included a little comic book in the first 8 sets released that explained how the vehicles functioned and a little history of the characters who operated each bit of raiding machinery. LEGO advertised Rock Raiders poorly, and the game came out after the sets were released. Unsure as to exactly why they did this, I found out later it was a distribution issue. I was lucky enough to pick up most of the main sets when they first came out.

You could say the Raiders explored uncharted territory! Not to mention, the theme introduced LEGO fans to an assortment of wonderfully unique characters. Most of the Rock Raiders action took place underground, which again LEGO had never done before. The sets featured an assorted array of new, unseen LEGO parts and colours. Rock Raiders left a big impact due mostly to related story books, comics and a video game, and perhaps mostly the game! LEGO Rock Raiders included 16 sets, most of which related to playing the video game in some way. Short lived, LEGO discontinued it in 2000. The LEGO Rock Raiders theme came to the scene in 1998.

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