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Mykltron wrote:I'm not bothered about lack of paint as I can fix that myself and do a far better job than Hasbro or Takara could ever do and it gives me another hobby.

Same here. That's also why I rarely go Takara. Same more money and I can do better than them, plus give me something to do at night.

Mykltron wrote:Having said that, have you seen the colours of TFP figures? They have great paint.

Sometimes this part puzzled me. Around the same line, there are figures Hasbro didn't care to give any damn paint (like DOTM deluxe Sideswipe, RTS Jazz) but almost at the same time they did excellent paint job on some others (like DOTM deluxe Lunarfire Optimus Prime, Generations Warpath, Generations Thundercracker).

Comparing back to RiD line or even AEC line wouldn't be fair since the economic situations are totally different, but sometimes just comparing DOTM to ROTF, you see the difference. I somehow hope Hasbro can go deeper in one line, more characters to choose and more mold options to play with but now they have something here and something there and they are all kind of shortage each. PCC, Kre-O, Rescue Bots, etc. may all have potentials but Hasbro just touched it and go. Yes, I understand they want to expand and explore their brand to many different customers. Even Lego now has "Friends" line to almost girls only but they are build on top of the same brick. This is the market opportunity and why not try it, but at the same time I kind of feel directionless.

Imagine if they couldnt use slave labor and had to actually pay human beings decent wages.

JackStraw wrote:Imagine if they couldnt use slave labor and had to actually pay human beings decent wages.

Please keep that debate out of this. No need to reopen that can of worms.

I personally wouldn't mind paying an extra couple dollars to maintain the same quality (I'm Canadian, I've been paying extra all along), but I understand the average consumer wouldn't.

I'm even fine with the downsizing, but what I'm not okay with is raising prices AND reducing paint apps & complexity at the same time. If you're going to over-simplify the figures, at least give us a nice paint job. Actually, that is the biggest issue I have with modern TFs, lack of paint detail. Cars should have painted tail lights and wheels. It just looks cheap without it. Downsize and simplify if you must, but keep the paint apps.

I would say I'd go for Takara releases to remedy that but after Henkei the prices for Japanese releases have skyrocketed and they're no longer within my means unless they are the most special of exceptions.

kirbenvost wrote:I personally wouldn't mind paying an extra couple dollars to maintain the same quality (I'm Canadian, I've been paying extra all along), but I understand the average consumer wouldn't.

I'm even fine with the downsizing, but what I'm not okay with is raising prices AND reducing paint apps & complexity at the same time. If you're going to over-simplify the figures, at least give us a nice paint job. Actually, that is the biggest issue I have with modern TFs, lack of paint detail. Cars should have painted tail lights and wheels. It just looks cheap without it. Downsize and simplify if you must, but keep the paint apps.

I would say I'd go for Takara releases to remedy that but after Henkei the prices for Japanese releases have skyrocketed and they're no longer within my means unless they are the most special of exceptions.

I totally agree. I dont even mind the over simplicity....some of my favorite TFs are very simple, in fact in the case of g1 soundwave or optimus, that's the beauty of them.

Someone mentioned gi joe. Maybe they have gone up a little more, actually maybe even a lot more relative to TFs, (anyone remember when a gi joe figure cost under $2). Anyway, not much about them feels cheaper now, in fact they have brought detail and paint apps to a new level in my opinion. Same with Star Wars, and all three are Hasbro. I collect some of all three lines, as well as random other stuff and there's hasnt been a time I can rememeber where I bought something from any line other than Transformers where I got that "Oh they're really cheeping out on these things" feeling.
There must be some hidden costs associated with the engineering that goes into making a Transformer.

JackStraw wrote:
Someone mentioned gi joe. Maybe they have gone up a little more, actually maybe even a lot more relative to TFs, (anyone remember when a gi joe figure cost under $2). Anyway, not much about them feels cheaper now, in fact they have brought detail and paint apps to a new level in my opinion. Same with Star Wars, and all three are Hasbro. I collect some of all three lines, as well as random other stuff and there's hasnt been a time I can rememeber where I bought something from any line other than Transformers where I got that "Oh they're really cheeping out on these things" feeling.
There must be some hidden costs associated with the engineering that goes into making a Transformer.

well sure. Star Wars is likely the easiest one to sculpt for, since, in general the designs are meant to work on the one figure. There has been a bit of mixing and matching molds when it comes to Troopers and Jedi robes, but there are still a lot of unique molds in the line. GI Joe has always been a line where parts from one figure tend to end up being reused for at least one or two others, either in conjunction with newly sculpted pieces, or other repurposed parts from other figures, but most of the time it's not so bad. At any one time there's a relatively uniform layout of a Joe figure. I'd suspect there are base dimensions given to sculptors and certain limits on how much some bit can be changed. The addition in the 25th Anniversary line of separate web-gear/ammo-belts/etc for figures has made it even easier for them to use the same basic molds but vary them greatly with paint and accessories.

With Transformers, it's very difficult to get 2 completely different figures out of one toy, and mixing and matching parts between molds is virtually impossible. (maybe, on some, heads could be swapped out) A bit of very skillful engineering at the early planning stages could theoretically give us slightly different alt and robot modes (as seen in Tracks/Wheeljack) but, whilst there are a lot of differences between the two, one is clearly a retool of the other and it's not something that could work for many designs. You can take 3 Star Wars toys apart, and probably cobble at least one or two decent figures out of the parts. 3 disassembled Joes would probably yield 3 brand new okay looking frankenjoes, but take 3 random Deluxe class TFs, pop off their arms and legs and try to put those parts back together with anything other than the ones they're designed to do and it's going to look silly, at best...before you try and transform them.

Also, within reason, there's no set construction of a Transformer. Sure, there are familiar things that crop up from time to time (alt-mode on my back, shell-formers, car-hood chests, etc) but the number of parts and method of construction vary wildly between individual bots. Lets not forget that in Transformers, the designers are not just making a cool looking robot, or an accurate representation of a car or jet, but both of those things, out of one set of parts. I'd probably be able to walk into Hasbro's offices tomorrow and knock out a wave of GI Joes using even 60% of recycled parts with the rest new sculpts, and I'd not be surprised to learn that they could be completed and on shelves in less time than it takes to design some Transformers, let alone have them built.