Other

Ludo Game

A board game you build before you can play it, and somehow that makes it better.

Brick Rated Score

4.0/5

Set 40198 · 2018

Pieces389

Minifigs16

Year2018

Set number40198

Check price on Amazon

Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

The verdict

I love that this set makes you earn the game night.

You build four little seasonal quadrants, snap them into a board, click together a working spinner, and only then do you actually play Ludo with sixteen tiny minifigures racing each other home. It scratches two itches at once, a satisfying afternoon build and then a real, replayable game with people you love. The four-seasons theme (spring, summer, autumn, winter bases) gives each quarter of the board its own personality instead of one flat grid, and that small choice does a lot of the heavy lifting for how charming this feels on a table.

Best for: families who want one box that's both a building project and a game night staple

The full review

What it is

I love that this set makes you earn the game night. You build four little seasonal quadrants, snap them into a board, click together a working spinner, and only then do you actually play Ludo with sixteen tiny minifigures racing each other home. It scratches two itches at once, a satisfying afternoon build and then a real, replayable game with people you love. The four-seasons idea (spring, summer, autumn, winter bases) gives each quarter of the board its own personality instead of one flat grid, and that small choice does a lot of the heavy lifting for how charming this feels on a table.

The catch

I'll be straight with you about the spinner, because it's the one thing that comes up in almost every discussion of this set. It's a clever bit of engineering, no batteries or electronics, just a spinning arrow on a friction axle, but the pointer can land ambiguously between numbers and it's easy for a competitive six-year-old (or a competitive adult) to give it a helpful nudge. Agree on the rules before you start or you'll be refereeing more than playing. Price is the other honest caveat. At around forty dollars for 389 pieces it isn't a part-count bargain, though you're really paying for sixteen unique minifigures and a lot of large baseplates, which don't come cheap anywhere in LEGO's catalog.

Who it's for

This is for families and LEGO fans who want a project that ends in something you actually use, not just something you display. If board game night is a real thing in your house, or you've got kids who'd rather build the game than just play it out of a box, this earns its spot on the shelf. If you're shopping purely for piece-count value or you want a set that becomes wall art when you're done, this isn't your set. It's retired now too, so if the seasonal board charms you, don't sit on it.

What works

Sixteen distinct minifigures split across four teams gives it real game-night stakes and a stack of extra minifigs for parts bins
The four seasonal quadrants each get their own look, so the board reads as four little dioramas stitched together, not a repeating grid
A genuinely functional buildable spinner, no batteries, no app, just LEGO mechanics doing the job

Worth knowing

The spinner's pointer can be nudged or read ambiguously, so honest players need to agree on the rules before someone gets cranky
At roughly 10 cents a piece it isn't a piece-count bargain next to a basic store-bought Ludo or Sorry board
It's a board game first, so if you're only after a display build or a minifigure army, the base plates and board pieces don't do much for you afterward

Sold? Grab it.

Check price on Amazon

Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

Building this one feels different from a typical LEGO set because you're really building four small, separate scenes and then marrying them into a single board. Each bag corresponds to a season and a team, so you get a satisfying little rhythm: finish a quadrant, see its landscape and team of four minifigures come together, then move to the next. It's a nice format for building with a kid or a partner since you can split the four quadrants between people and race to see who finishes their season first.

The real value here is the minifigure count. Sixteen distinct figures split evenly across spring, summer, autumn and winter teams is a lot of variety for one set, and LEGO board game sets have quietly become one of the better sources of minifigure diversity per dollar in the catalog. The buildable spinner is the standout mechanical piece, a genuinely working, LEGO-native dial that doesn't rely on any part outside the system. Large 16x16 baseplates in tan, dark tan, bright green and bright light blue anchor each season's color story, and the seasonal landscaping (bare winter trees, summer greenery) gives the board more texture than a plain gridded track ever could.

Fun facts

01The set was designed by Mel Caddick and released September 1, 2018, retiring at the end of 2019.
02Each of the four bags builds one full season quadrant, complete with its own 16x16 baseplate color and four minifigures for that team.
03A spin of 6 grants the player an extra turn, letting them either advance a minifig already on the board or bring a new one into play, straight out of classic Ludo and Parcheesi rules.
04Since retiring, the set has held its value well, with BrickEconomy tracking it around 60 dollars against its original 39.99 dollar US retail price.