BrickWarriors vs. some other company by Gabә F, on Flickr
*Just a disclaimer, when I say "BA" I am talking about another vendor, with whom you are probably acquainted
To start off, we have an AK-74/47 (At this scale, its objective) from BrickWarriors and BA. I'm actually going to take this opportunity to do a review and comparison of the two.
The BA "AK" as we have come to know it, is a very well accepted weapon in our Lego community here, and has won itself quite a bit of praise, but now, there is a new kid on the block, and if I may say, this new kid is pretty sweet. When comparing the two, you need to look at the attention of detail in both. An everlasting problem with 3rd party items is the question of how much detail is too much, and how much is too little, for Lego. Some vendors, like AMA and some other company's "TS" line, pay a huge amount of attention to the details and have great products, but is it too much? When considering this, you need to consider how much detail Lego puts into its products, such as the SW blasters, lightsaber hilts, machine guns, pistols, and so on.
Personally, when comparing the BW and BA AK's, and I know every BA fan will give me crap about how experienced Will was when he made the AK, but I feel that the BW AK is perfect. This little beast (BW AK) hits the nail flat on the head when it comes to details and scale. The handguard is perfect, the barrel and gas tube length are to die for, and the added details of the selector switch (on semi-auto) and bolt are a priceless touch. For an AK, this is as perfect as you are going to get. This isn't to say that the BA AK isn't garbage though, although the barrel is a bit thin, and the random bolt lever with no bolt is a bit disappointing, but the BA AK is still a very nice weapon, and very useful for certain things. When looking closer at the AK's, and looking at real ones, the BW AK seems to resemble the AK-74, in that the flash hider is longer, the spacing and shaping of the gas tube is more accurate to the 74, and the handguard has the smooth likeness of the 74 as well. Whereas the BA AK has the stereotypical "wooden" stock look of an AK-47 and the small flash hider and large-curved "banana" magazine resembles that of the AK-47 too.
All in all, both are wonderful weapons, worth of any FOL's collection, but I feel like the added details and Lego sizing of the BW AK just makes it all the more savory, and I personally would prefer it over the BA AK, but if you're like me, you'll find a use for both weapons, one for the strict eastern military, and one for the savage tactics of those rebel groups.
