The Energon Pub

Sun Jun 13, 2010 2:10 am

This is another example of something obvious, but Hasbro does the opposite.. Looking around you see and read about how Animated Arcee is still very hard to find in stores, but cybertron Ratchet is still shelf warming.. Awhile back I said why didnt Hasbro give us Arcee with cybertron Ironhide first(said to be from the cybertron ratchet mold whenever we get ironhide- so it could have been ironhide first) thus having two hot toys that would BOTH sell out everywhere.. Instead of having cybertron ratchet shelfwarm, thus making it harder to convince stores to carry more animated.. Thus hasbro making less money then they could have.. NOW we here that the Animated Buster Bulkhead repaint or whatever its called, is with Thundercracker when we get them.. SAME PROBLEM, BusterBulkhead is gonna shelf warm, when they could give us Thundercracker with Blackout and have two hot sellers instead of just one.. Maybe the bulkhead repaint will shelf warm so bad, we never get the Hasbro blackout.. Again, Hasbro refusing our cash.. Avoiding the obvious best sellers, and choosing shelf warmers/less cash instead.. It seems logical that Hasbro wants to make as much cash as possible, but they always seem to choose the illogical instead.. Just a rant, once again, thanks for reading..

News Credits: 1452 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 2:28 am

Arcee and Cybertron Mode Ratchet's existence barely came to fruition if it weren't for TRU, who probably didn't expect their sales to be good anyways. Arcee's a chick and Ratchet's an old bot, they didn't believe they'd sell well. Regardless, we are getting Ironhide and Rodimus Minor, and what you perceive to be shelfwarming is going to happen to Ironhide compared to the superior Rodimus.

I also don't see Thundercracker and Mudbuster Bulkhead appealing to the everyday person. Thundercracker's the third repaint of the mold, and Mudbuster is a repaint too.

News Credits: 3 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 3:32 am

I don't think Hasbro is refusing our cash, I just think the sales from Animated just weren't strong enough to give the line full presence.

Personally, I wanted to like the toy line, but there were QC issues with them I did not like, for me or my then 8 year old.

Sun Jun 13, 2010 5:20 am

bvzxa wrote:I don't think Hasbro is refusing our cash, I just think the sales from Animated just weren't strong enough to give the line full presence.

Personally, I wanted to like the toy line, but there were QC issues with them I did not like, for me or my then 8 year old.

There were, and still are, quite a few QC issues. That is one of the first things that made me immediately dislike the line. The first Animated figure I got was Starscream, and the hands fell off while I was taking him out of the box. That was my first impression of the Animated line. Never really cared for the line ever since.

Don't get me wrong though. There are some real winners in that line. I am done with it though.

News Credits: 104 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 6:58 am

Wow, of the 6 animated figs I did pick up none had QC issues.
And as far as them not selling, I know down here you were hard pressed to find them especially the deluxes (after a new wave was out for a little while it would become a little easier to find them).

Sun Jun 13, 2010 7:11 am

Cyber Bishop wrote:Wow, of the 6 animated figs I did pick up none had QC issues.
And as far as them not selling, I know down here you were hard pressed to find them especially the deluxes (after a new wave was out for a little while it would become a little easier to find them).

I will maybe have to adjust my stance a little bit. I actually did get a few Deluxes-I don't want it to sound like I got the one bad one and then gave up. I had good luck with the few others I bought.

Lockdown-complete and utter WIN. A near perfect TF.

Jazz-A truly great figure.

Oil Slick-Exceptional. Maybe one of the most poseable TFs ever.

Samurai Prowl-Ditto. Excellent figure.

I had trouble with Starscream, Ultra Magnus, and Skywarp. So, pretty much everything I have gotten that was voyager or bigger. Deluxes gave me no problems. I will also admit that it did nothing good for my opinion of the line when the VERY FIRST TIME I actually touched an Animated figure, it took a crap and fell apart in my hands. :shock:

Sun Jun 13, 2010 7:54 am

I don't really care what figures come out when, as long as they all get released.

News Credits: 3 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 10:36 am

Prime Riblet wrote:
Cyber Bishop wrote:Wow, of the 6 animated figs I did pick up none had QC issues.
And as far as them not selling, I know down here you were hard pressed to find them especially the deluxes (after a new wave was out for a little while it would become a little easier to find them).

I will maybe have to adjust my stance a little bit. I actually did get a few Deluxes-I don't want it to sound like I got the one bad one and then gave up. I had good luck with the few others I bought.

Lockdown-complete and utter WIN. A near perfect TF.

Jazz-A truly great figure.

Oil Slick-Exceptional. Maybe one of the most poseable TFs ever.

Samurai Prowl-Ditto. Excellent figure.

Starscream was the worst of the bunch. I was so psyched to get him home, but unfortunately, when I opened mine, his leg was loose. My son did loose the hands on his, but overall it was just not right. Prowl, Cybertron prime, and Cybertron Megs were decent. BlackArachnia had issues too, especially with the wench.

The only animated toys I kept was Safeguard. Probably the best because it doesn't have any issues.
I had trouble with Starscream, Ultra Magnus, and Skywarp. So, pretty much everything I have gotten that was voyager or bigger. Deluxes gave me no problems. I will also admit that it did nothing good for my opinion of the line when the VERY FIRST TIME I actually touched an Animated figure, it took a crap and fell apart in my hands.

News Credits: 5749 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 2:34 pm

I've bought the entire Animated line and only had one figure with any real QC issues.

News Credits: 273 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 6:29 pm

Blurrz wrote:Regardless, we are getting Ironhide and Rodimus Minor, and what you perceive to be shelfwarming is going to happen to Ironhide compared to the superior Rodimus.

I actually wouldn't be shocked if Ironhide does as well or better than Rodimus - the character is more popular in the fandom. I guess time will tell.

News Credits: 335 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 8:15 pm

Well I don't see them turning away cash. I can still find any Animated or ROTF figure on a shelf around here save maybe a few short wave figures like Swoop and Sentinel.

When Ironhide and Rodimus come out, they'll fly off the shelf. When Takara comes out with Crystal Rodimus and an obvious shiny all silver Ironhide those will be impossible to find after only a few months as well.

Regardless, Hasbro & TT will be getting our money hand over fist. Even Mudbuster Mudflap will sell out in time. (maybe not as long as it took for stores to get rid of Armada Laserbeak, but still)

News Credits: 668 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 8:29 pm

Animated's QC on the whole, was good at best, though questionable. I would definitely say it wasn't exemplary.

I had a few figures that seemed a bit iffy at first. In fact, Wreck-Gar still has stress marks on his shoulders simply from transforming.

That being said, I'd say at least 92% of the TFA figures in my collection came out of their packages in excellent and sometimes perfect condition.

So, I guess YMMV applies here.

As for ROTF... as the waves went on, the QC went up and got better with each new figure. But the first wave? Rushed. Just a constant rush job on them, really. Paint wasn't quite right, some of the clear plastics had bubbles or a milky discoloration, or in the case of my Sideswipe (and I wasn't the only one), strings of melted plastic where the parts came off the sprue too quick.

I think 2007-2009 was a long and drawn out conversion time for Hasbro. They failed to foresee the demand the first movie's toys would have and learned to up their productions in the future. They had to change their paints due to lead content (and/or cadmium possibly). They're now in the process of changing factory locations, and so on.

As time goes on, I'm sure we'll see more stable price points (though probably more expensive), they'll figure out the paint issues, they'll work more on QC, and we'll see a lot of the complaints go away. (In terms of construction. People will still whine about paint apps and overall design.)

News Credits: 3 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 8:50 pm

I was at the store and had a whole cart full of TFs and I was wheeling it up to the check-out counter and, out of nowhere, a Hasbro rep came running up and intercepted the cart and told me to F off, that my money was no good here and wouldn't allow me to buy the cart full of figs! Luckily they were all chitty, uninspired ROTF repaints so I later realized the Hasbro dude was actually doing me a favor...

Can I get a cool story, bro?

News Credits: 668 · Sun Jun 13, 2010 9:01 pm

Kibble wrote:Can I get a cool story, bro?

No. No you cannot, sir!

News Credits: 129 · Mon Jun 14, 2010 6:27 am

Kibble wrote:I was at the store and had a whole cart full of TFs and I was wheeling it up to the check-out counter and, out of nowhere, a Hasbro rep came running up and intercepted the cart and told me to F off, that my money was no good here and wouldn't allow me to buy the cart full of figs! Luckily they were all chitty, uninspired ROTF repaints so I later realized the Hasbro dude was actually doing me a favor...

Can I get a cool story, bro?

You too bro?

Life sure is hard.