The Energon Pub

Sun Oct 07, 2012 10:14 pm

Joined to answer another thread, so I figured I might as well ask something I've been wondering for a long time.

Is anyone else a Transformers fan who doesn't collect the toys?

I am, and it puts me in a rather strange place with the fiction. I'm generally aware of what the toys are doing, and how they've affected whatever series I'm watching/reading, but it ends at that.

It also means I'm subjecting myself to a bunch of fiction that's generally a few shades ... stupider? ... than what I generally enjoy. But while I always hope someone will come along and do a really smart Transformers series, I still love what's there just because it's so fun, somewhat nostalgic, and has so much potential.

So, is anyone else here masochistic enough to be a TF fan in fiction only? It'd be cool to hear some thoughts.

News Credits: 6188 · Mon Oct 08, 2012 3:00 am

I wouldn't call it masochistic at all! Your wallet must consider you its best friend, as far as I'm concerned.

I was like you for quite a while, either because of toys not being released where I was or for lack of funds. But once the bug got back, it stuck. Oh did it stick.

Mon Oct 08, 2012 6:34 am

Ah. So I'm not the only TF fan who doesn't collect the toys. Hurray!

Cipher wrote:So, is anyone else here masochistic enough to be a TF fan in fiction only? It'd be cool to hear some thoughts.

I don't know how you got masochistic out of it, but as Va'al said, you ain't that. And neither am I, I'd like to think--or at least hope to think. But since I don't bother myself with the comics as well, who knows what I am. :-?

Anyway, what maintains my love for Transformers--and what fuels it, too--is the original cartoon and fan-fiction. Those two wonderful things are all I need. And all I'll ever need, if I may be so bold.

Mon Oct 08, 2012 2:35 pm

well... that would be impossible for me, but I see your point... for example, I like to play and watch soccer (futbol) but that doesn't mean that I go out and buy jerseys, collector cards or figurines of players, and I love the Marvel stuff, but I dont' buy their toys, but theres something about a freakin Transfomer that it's just too cool to pass, I remember being a kid and watching the G1 cartoons, so amazing... especially when the Dinobots came out! oh my! :grin:

but hey! to each their own!

Mon Oct 08, 2012 6:15 pm

Trickster wrote:I don't know how you got masochistic out of it, but as Va'al said, you ain't that.

Oh, I was joking, but I meant it in the sense that I'm willingly subjecting myself to a bunch of fiction at the total whim of stupid "to sell toys" moments, without even being interested in the toys.

But, uh, yeah? Is it really as rare as it seems?

Or maybe it's just that my type of fans don't show up on message boards very often, and thus aren't very visible. I know one of the major reasons I've been put off from joining a Transformers board is because of how toy-centric they all seem to be, to the point all talk about the actual series gets bunched into a subforum or two.

Tue Oct 09, 2012 10:43 am

I got into Tf's because of the G1 cartoon. I collect the toys, but it all goes back to watching that cartoon when I was growing up.

Wed Oct 10, 2012 6:12 am

When I was a kid during the Beast Wars era, I collected the toys. When Armada, Energon and all those new series came out, I wasn't interested in the toys, because they weren't the characters I grew up with.

I was bitten by the G1 bug when I started reading the IDW Transformers comics (I wouldn't have bothered if I hadn't read the Beast Wars one they did), but I never got the toys, because I didn't like the look of the toys at the time (from the movies... I can't stand Bayformers!), although I did grab a Classics Bumblebee around that time. Then Animated came out, and again, I wasn't interested in the look of the characters.

Then War for Cybertron and Fall of Cybertron came out, and finally there were Transformers I liked the look of, so I've started collecting again.

So I went over a decade without collecting, but it's sucked me back in again.

News Credits: 38 · Wed Oct 10, 2012 7:42 pm

I used to collect quite a few in each series. Now I am insanely particular. I probably pick up one every 5-6 months if that now. I like watching Prime and Animated on the Hub when I get home from work, but I feel the toys are severely lacking so I avoid them for the most part. Starscream from Prime sucked me in though. Great toy.

Other than the odd one out though, I'm in the same boat man.

Sat Oct 13, 2012 11:55 am

I'm gravitating towards being mainly fiction based as a collector now.
I was heavy into the toys for a good stint there but now i find that the offerings are not equivalent to my expectations any longer or i pretty much have purchased all the figures that i want that directly relate to my nostalgia of TF's. Collecting the same character over and over again with each new iteration in toy form is incredibly redundant to me and bordering on "masochistic"

see what i did there?. So i've been reading.

There's an enormous world of fiction to explore, that to me at this point, is FAR more interesting than the figures and it's being released monthly. I really enjoyed the novels by Alex Irvine that, in my opinion, injected some "sophistication" to the fiction and some refreshing cohesion in the canon. I believe more novels should be written. I like the comic format but i like the long read of a novel over a ten minute glimpse you get from a by-monthly comic.

With that being said. I'm also really enjoying the latest round of comics. RID, MTMTE, and Regeneration. Great art (which is a huge point of interest for me) and fun reads.

Sun Oct 14, 2012 10:45 am

I collected the toys as a kid (or at least as many as mom would get me). Then eBayed them off in college, when I started switching to more of the fiction like monstergrostusque, once I came back around and got in to them again. But yeah, no more toys now.

But I snag the novels, all three of the current line of comics and get a regular dose from our fiction factory downstairs in the fan-fiction and rpg forums. That scratches the itch enough for me.

Sun Nov 18, 2012 9:13 pm

Yep. I just got a few but mostly the comics and I've been collecting the comic art from the comic itself for several years now. I think the only series I don't have are the Armada, Energon, and Beast Wars series, but pretty much everything else I have. Still looking for an encyclopedia though.

Fri Jan 04, 2013 12:04 am

I happen to find a box of G1 transformers when I was a youngster. That's about the extent of my collection. I have sparked an interest in trying to recollect some Toy Transformers. However, I am married now with my own children and just don't have the room to collect. I mostly game now with the Transformer titles and waiting for Transformers Universe to be released.

Tue Jan 15, 2013 9:40 pm

I buy a few a year, but most of the time that means getting rid of one of the others to make room. I give them away to friends' kids or to the thrift shop. My wife sometimes asks "don't you have that guy already?" (Most of my figures are Optimuses.)

News Credits: 273 · Wed Jan 23, 2013 12:52 pm

There is nothing wrong with not collecting. Everyone likes Transformers in their own way and there is no "right" or 'wrong" way to be a fan, no matter what some would have you think.

For the record, I love Star Wars and while I have a had few figures here and there I have never had an extensive collection of them.

Wed Jan 23, 2013 4:54 pm

I wouldn't say I was ever a serious collector of Transformers toys, despite being in over the deep end with the series. Back when I was in my mid teens, had a job and a lot of disposable income since I had nothing to pay for, I collected the entire first wave of the RiD figures, and the Transformers Armada toys. I also bought a bunch of the G1 Japanese reissues of the characters that I liked.

I stopped "collecting" Transformers on a regular basis when I went to college when I was 19 or 20 (can't remember which). Plus, my then wife was my girlfriend who I was in a long distance relationship with, so I saved my money all the time for flight tickets so we could be together. Since my wife and I have been going to Auto Assembly together, we buy a couple of Transformers here and there over the last few years, but the lack of space in our apartment means I'll never collect a whole wave, or series or anything. Most of my Transformers collection is still at my dad's house! :HEADHURTS:

News Credits: 1 · Thu Jan 24, 2013 1:11 am

Like many of the others here, I'm really starting to taper off in my collecting. I outgrew TF's after reaching my teens, bypassing Armada, Energon, BW etc., although I did watch all three series. The live-action movies were what made me start buying the toys, but after DOTM, I've become VERY particular with what I buy, mostly because of shrinking display space and not really liking the current TFP/BH designs.

Nowadays, I'm focusing my collection on MP figs and the odd TF gem (TFP Voyager Breakdown) every now and then.

Odds are, I'll stop collecting "mainstream" TF's altogether in the future, and go exclusively Takara with its Alternity, MP, and United lines.

Sun Feb 03, 2013 7:14 pm

I did go through a phase of getting as many Armada toys as I could, but stopped as I realised it would bankrupt me to do it long term, plus I had a distinct lack of space.

These days I have about a dozen or so boxed figures, including reissues and of course
the usual bunch of Prime variants but thats about it,the comics are what really got me into it :-B

If I ever get a hankering to randomly pick up a toy I usually go to seibertron's gallery and see how good it looks, by the end I'm just satisfied to look at the pictures

News Credits: 6188 · Mon Feb 04, 2013 3:29 am

RedArrow wrote:If I ever get a hankering to randomly pick up a toy I usually go to seibertron's gallery and see how good it looks, by the end I'm just satisfied to look at the pictures

That does happen to me too! Not only with the galleries on here, though.

Professional, well-taken and not-tampered-with photographs are always a treat, and usually give me enough aesthetic satisfaction to overpower the physical need for a figure.

I guess it's a similar process to the one which leads me to admire comics and visual arts, without feeling the need for a 'real-life' version of them. :-?