The Crooks Island is a new City Police set with two hundred and forty four pieces that is available since the beginning of 2016. It features a Police Helicopter, a small island with the Croker’s’ hideout, a red water scooter and three mini-figures (a couple of robbers and a police heli pilot) with assorted accessories.
Not being the most appellative set in terms of beauty or playability, I find this set quite interesting if you wait to create a Police chase or pursuit scenario. The robbers have to go somewhere!
The small hideout is built near a big rock (the grey sharp pieces with some grass intend to recreate that) and basically is constituted by two elements: a small hut in the middle with the basic stuff and a garage for the scooter just right next to hit. At the front, the entrance is a sort of mini harbor with a small lamp on the edge and inside there is only the minimum space for a seat and a table, a clock in the wall and a heater with a chimney on the roof.
Next to it there is, for me, the best part, the water scooter garage. As you can see through the pictures, it has only the enough space for the bike and no studs on the ground and this part has a reason: in the back there’s a small launcher, easily triggered with a knob, which allows the scooter to escape in high speed if the police arrives.
The Police Helicopter is the simpler and usual model used in “thousands” of city sets with the traditional long windshield that covers the cockpit but this one particularly has a few additional elements such as the surveillance camera with a spotlight on top and the several red and blue emergency lights distributed over the heli.
Overall, it’s a quite interesting set with a small hideout that will surely be a good complement for the more traditional Police sets. The garage with the launcher is perhaps my favorite part and the mini-figures despite being cops and thieves seem to bring new suits, especially the robbers. The set should retail around the twenty five dollars but unfortunately for now will be only available in some countries and at shop@lego.com