Super Mario

Super Mario 64 Question Mark Block

A yellow cube that springs open into four playable Mario 64 worlds.

4.4/5

Set 71395 · 2021

Pieces2,064

Minifigsn/a

Year2021

Set number71395

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The verdict

If you grew up with an N64 controller in your hands, this one hits different, and even if you didn't, it's one of the cleverest builds LEGO has put out.

It's an 18cm yellow cube that pops open to reveal four tiny Mario 64 levels, plus a hidden Bowser behind a sliding door. It's pricey and it retired in 2023, so you're buying on the aftermarket now, but the engineering alone makes it worth a look. Grab it if you want a display piece you can't stop fiddling with.

Best for: Nintendo-loving adults who want a display piece with a mechanism

The full review

What it is

Let me tell you about one of the most quietly clever LEGO® sets of the last few years. On the shelf, 71395 just looks like a smooth 18cm yellow question mark cube, the exact block you spent your childhood headbutting in Super Mario 64. Then you pull the sides down, the top springs open, and four little worlds unfold like a pop-up book. You get Peach's Castle, Bob-omb Battlefield, Cool Cool Mountain, and Lethal Lava Trouble, all rendered at micro scale, and there's a sliding door that reveals Bowser tucked away inside. It's the second Nintendo set LEGO aimed squarely at grown-ups, and it leans hard into nostalgia in the best way.

The catch

Now the honest part. This isn't a cheap set, and it's only gotten pricier. It launched at $199.99, retired back in 2023, and now changes hands on the aftermarket for around $280 new and sealed. So you're paying a premium for something that's really a novelty display piece. The four vignettes are genuinely tiny, so if you're expecting big sprawling recreations of each level, temper that. The magic here is the mechanism and the transformation, not the size of the scenes. And because so much of the 2,064-piece count goes into the internal Technic framework that makes the thing spring open, the finished model is compact for the part count. If you want maximum visible detail per dollar, there are better-value sets out there.

Who it's for

So who should chase this one down? If you love Mario 64 specifically, or you collect Nintendo pieces, this is an easy yes. It sits beautifully next to other gaming stuff and you'll find yourself popping it open and closing it again just because the motion is so good. It also makes a brilliant conversation piece because nobody expects the cube to do what it does. Who should skip it? If you're purely after value or you want a big buildable scene, your money stretches further elsewhere. But as a piece of interactive LEGO engineering wrapped in pure N64 nostalgia, it's hard to beat. If the aftermarket price doesn't scare you off, you won't regret it.

The parts story

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

Building this is unlike almost anything else in the LEGO catalog. It's a mechanical model first, so you spend a good chunk of the early bags assembling the Technic skeleton and the spring-loaded mechanism that lets the top burst open when you pull the sides down. That part is a proper bit of engineering and keeps the build fresh because you're constantly wondering how it's all going to come together. Then you shift into system building and micro-builds for the four level vignettes, each one packed with tiny recognizable details, before wrapping the whole thing in that smooth yellow shell with its rounded corners. The pacing stays interesting the whole way through, and the payoff moment when the mechanism finally works is genuinely great.

For parts nerds, there's real substance here. The set introduced a new mold, the Plate 2x2 Round Corner with 1x1 Cutout (part 79491), a curved corner plate that opens up design tricks you couldn't pull off cleanly with 1x1 pieces before. There are some lovely recolors too, including a transparent lightsaber blade element used in a clever way that previously needed a fiddly antenna workaround. The printed pieces are gorgeous and do a lot of heavy lifting for the Mario 64 detailing. At 2,064 pieces for what was $199.99, the per-piece value was reasonable at retail, though a lot of those parts are small structural elements powering the mechanism rather than showpiece bricks.

Fun facts

01The set recreates the iconic yellow question mark block from Super Mario 64, the game that launched alongside the Nintendo 64 in 1996 and defined 3D platforming.
02There's a hidden feature LEGO didn't show in official marketing images: a door slides upward inside to reveal a Bowser figure.
03It was only the second LEGO Nintendo set designed specifically for adult builders, following the earlier NES set.
04The finished cube measures roughly 18cm on each side with soft rounded corners, and Brickset's community scored it 4.4 out of 5 across 168 ratings.