Previous readers of the blog know that I am intrigued every time I see a new block collection and want to see what they have to offer. I was looking at a new post tool and it listed all the collections it was compatible with, most of which I had seen. But it listed one called “Kioken Blocks” which I had never heard of, so I wanted to give it a try.
It comes with 19 blocks, and so let’s see how they do on my site…
Accordion: Simple vertical accordion block, click to expand;
Container Row: A common block in the higher-end collections, this gives you a quick layout of one row x multiple columns of different size and proportions. It not only has animation options, it lets you customize the look for five different screen sizes, and lots of tweaks to backgrounds for six different columns;
Divider Plus: This is a REALLY well-done block. It has all the standard separator line options — dots, full width, short distance, stars, etc. But then it offers lines with text (you enter the text, it spaces it between two lines across the page), or an icon between two lines, etc.;
Fancy Buttons: Decent enough tweaks, but major selling feature would be that it allows for some transition animation, although I have no desire for such functionality;
Features: Simple box layout to draw attention to features in parallel columns;
Google Maps: Standard block for inserting a Google map with an API key;
Icon: Standard fare, lets you insert icons, although it will let you do up to 10, which is higher than most;
Image Box: Most collections have an image box, this is one of the few that gives you hover and animation options, plus all the normal tweaking options;
Kinetic Wrapper: Same as most collections “group” or “container” options, with added animation;
Kinetic Posts: Options to show recent posts in different layouts with FIs, but most seemed way too big for the layout, but some different options than most;
Numbers Counter: Simple “count up” block to go up to a user-entered value;
Open Table Form: A good layout if you want to embed an Open Table form for a restaurant booking;
Price Line: A basic box with a spot for a title and a description beside it, and the price right-justified;
Split Headings: I wasn’t sure what this was at first, or why I would care, but it basically allows you to have a multi-line heading without needing line wrap;
Tabs: Very basic block;
Testimonials Carousel: Basic testimonial layouts with image, content description, name, title, all wrapped in a carousel;
Video Box: Designed for Vimeo or YouTube insertion, standard fare; and,
Visual List: If you don’t want to use a table, but you want to arrange some items in a list, how about 40 rows by 6 columns? Well, not really, as it limits you to 40 items overall. So more like up to 40 items spread over up to 6 columns. Still, pretty slick setup if you had a bunch of info to list in a grid.
They are mostly all decently-rendered and designed, with a few standouts. Most of them have an extra animation option, which most block collections do not do. And their extra 19th block is for Kioken Elements which lets you load a lot of pre-designed block patterns, with options to upgrade to pro modes.
A decent collection, but none of them screamed “must-have”. If I had to identify the best three, I would say Divider Plus, Visual List, and Split Headings as all three are relatively unique to Kioken, haven’t seen those in other block collections. Unfortunately, I don’t really need any of them enough to keep the collection around.
