LEGO VIDIYO 43114 Punk Pirate Ship review

LEGO VIDIYO sails the seven seas in 43114 Punk Pirate Ship, using an early BeatBox as a springboard for a fully-fledged concert stage.

43114 Punk Pirate Ship builds into a hybrid of a concert stage and – as the name suggests – a pirate ship, taking its cues from 43103 Punk Pirate BeatBox. That’s a promising premise, but is this brand new LEGO VIDIYO set filled with enough swashbuckling references and details to allow for both an interesting building experience and a fun final model?

— Set details —

Theme: LEGO VIDIYO Set name: 43114 Punk Pirate Ship Release: June 1, 2021

Price: £59.99 / $59.99 / €69.99 Pieces: 615 Minifigures: 3

LEGO: Available now

— Build —

Despite containing just 615 pieces, 43115 Punk Pirate Ship comes in as one of VIDIYO’s largest builds yet. In that sense, it’s more than capable of holding its own when it comes to display, and is also colourful enough to catch your eye.

The front portion of the build is pretty simple, however – the detailing doesn’t span much beyond a steering wheel and oversized speakers. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything impressive here: a simple yet extremely effective brick-built skull is located towards the top, which adds a nice amount of character to an otherwise straightforward build.

The rear section is where things get a little hazy. Between the black and white checkered floor, green surfboard, pizza and treasure chest, it isn’t immediately clear what ‘room’ this is intended to be – and the official description provides no real insight. Context would suggest some kind of captain’s cabin, but maybe – like the VIDIYO theme as a whole – it’s actually intentionally difficult to put a label on.

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Located behind the brick-built skull is a similarly-sized brick-built shark head, reminiscent of the one found in 31088 Deep Sea Creatures. It is also possible to swap these two elements around to have the shark on display from the front, although the whiteness of the skull is a nice palate cleanser from the otherwise vibrant build.

43115 Punk Pirate Ship adopts a similar colour palette to the slightly larger LEGO VIDIYO set, 43115 The Boombox, with vibrant blue and pink tiled finishing. This overly colourful approach is intended to draw kids in, but could also push away certain sections of the adult market – no big deal given the theme’s intended audience, but worth bearing in mind as you approach this build.

Along for the ride with this set is a stripped-down version of one of the smaller BeatBoxes. There is no real purpose for this other than a place to display the BeatBits that come with the set, but even then, there’s only space for 12 of the 17 total printed 2×2 tiles in the box.

— Characters —

43114 Punk Pirate Ship comes with three minifigures, who have all been given very standard names: Squid, Shark and Mermaid. Despite their uncreative monikers, they’re actually the highlight of this set. Squid has an amazing rubber headpiece, and comes complete with an impressive amount of torso, leg and arm printing. Shark boasts a uniquely-printed shark headpiece with large teeth and a tongue on show to add some character.

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Last but not least, Mermaid has great torso and leg printing and comes complete with arm tattoo printing. Arm printing is almost always appreciated across any minifigure, but rarely seen – and in that sense, VIDIYO’s characters continue to be given the same reverence seemingly otherwise reserved for the Collectible Minifigures series.

If there’s one criticism to make, it’s over the absence of a traditional human pirate minifigure. But how else will the LEGO Group sell you on 43103 Punk Pirate BeatBox?

— Price —

43114 Punk Pirate Ship is priced at £59.99 / $59.99 / €69.99 and includes a total of 615 pieces. The price for this is a fair one as the build is large and sturdy, integrating a couple of moving parts and a stud-shooter. Despite being pretty simple to put together, it’s a relaxing model to construct over the course of an hour or so, and in that regard feels just about worth the price tag.

— Pictures —

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— Summary —

Is 43114 Punk Pirate Ship everything VIDIYO has been missing? To an extent, yes – it’s a thematic and vibrant set that brings much more of a traditional building experience to a previously minifigure-focused theme, without sacrificing the fun and unique designs those characters provide. But that build experience feels very basic and limited in parts, and the absence of a traditional pirate is lamentable.

For that certain subsection of fans who eat up anything LEGO Pirates-related, though, there’s still enough here to warrant diving in.

This set was provided for review by the LEGO Group.

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— FAQs —