Others say...

"Get the glue out!!!"
This was a fun thing to put together for my son's social studies project. There are over 10,000 pieces which we separated into tupperware bowls with lids. Be careful not to lose any pieces because it can compromise the entire structure. When transporting the tower from one place to another, put a solid piece of wood under the base. The middle and top parts are separate and can easily be moved. It can fall apart with a good bump, so you might want to considering gluing the pieces.

"This set consists of 6 gazillion pieces, all of them gray."
Okay, okay, I'm exaggerating: it's only 3428 pieces, and only 3027 of them are gray.

This is an incredible set, and looks amazing when finished. It's the most difficult build I have done, though I hear that the Ultimate Millennium Falcon is even harder.

The almost completely uniform color scheme demands a disciplined approach and plenty of multi-compartment trays. I hate to think what it would be like if I followed my usual habit of ripping open all the bags, dumping all the pieces in a pile, and building the coolest bits first regardless of official sequence. Some of the parts are packed in sorted bags (eg. the 230 gray 1x4x1 fences are packed in three bags). Other pieces are mixed in together, which means you have to sort them out, all the while grumbling about why they didn't sort all the pieces. Seriously, why sort some but not all?

The middle and top sections of the tower are relatively simple, and very sturdy. The lower section is both fragile and tricky. In some places the pieces are not so much locked together as balanced against each other. It is vital that you make sure all the pieces are aligned and tightly connected. A slightly loose piece in the bottom of the structure can be a huge problem for the pieces a foot above it. It's not easy to tighten two pieces after the fact without disturbing lots of other pieces.

For the first time ever I found some of the instructions hard to follow as the uniform color made it hard to figure out the perspective in the instruction drawings. Twice I found that two parts which were meant to join up were a tile-thickness different in height. I had to go back through the steps to figure out which teeny-tiny piece I had put in the wrong place, then dismantle and rebuild. In one case I had put one too many 1x2 plates in one of the legs; in another I had a 1x3 plate one stud out of place. You need to be methodical, gathering all the pieces for a given step, paying careful attention to the diagrams, and making sure all pieces from a step are accounted for.

I also strongly advise keeping small children at bay. My 5 and 8 year-old sons thought the Eiffel Tower really needed a train station under it, and track surrounding it, which might have been workable had not a dispute over the exact placement of the station led to a massive engineering catastrophe.

As others have said, I would love to see more world monuments. The Colosseum, Taj Mahal, Angkor Wat, or Ely Cathedral would be awesome. The Seven Wonders of the Lego World would be a fantastic series.

An update (May 11, 2008): According to brickset.com Lego will be releasing a model Taj Mahal later this year! No pictures or a release date as yet, but the set number is 10189. Bricklink hears about new sets several months in advance so I imagine this will be a Q3/Q4 release.

"Great Toy for my 10 year old Son"
My 10-year-old son got the Lego Eiffel Tower for Christmas and he worked diligently on it for the next 3 days. He completed it by himself, working approximately 20 hours on it. It is a great looking finished product. He is hoping Lego will begin producing other landmarks, such as the Empire State Building, etc.

"Lego should make more sets like this"
I purchased this set a couple of weeks ago and just finished building it today, I must say I haven't been this impressed with a lego set in many years.

You don't understand how large it is until you have finished it. By the time I put the spire on I was amazed.

The actual building of the set isn't complicated, you can actually figure out how to build the different levels by building the first couple w/o the instructions, but can be frustrating due to the thousands of tiny pieces that comprise the set. Three or four times I spent 10+ minutes searching the sprawling pile of pieces for the elusive piece.

You build the set in three stages. The first stage is the base and is the only section I have any complaints about. The base is very fragile, don't even think about trying to lift it up by any way other than the base plates. The fragile nature is a consequence of just how well the set resembles the real thing so it is acceptable, just be careful. The middle and top stages are much more sturdy and easy to handle.

I was missing 15 pieces which made finishing it complicated but Lego is very good and prompt about replacing them so it did not turn out to be an issue.

I highly recommend this set if you are into the model sets, not much fun for playing.

"My son really enjoy this!"
My soon to be 16 year old son got this as a Christmas gift. He started working on it the night he got it and finished it two days later. Total working time was somewhere between 6-10 hours.