The Energon Pub

With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

Stargrave wrote:With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

The price they are charging, something like that is the very least they should be giving you with it.

"Kapow toys will be the only authorised outlet for this project within the UK / EU backed directly by Hasbro, please do not use unauthorised sellers"

Maybe if you don't wait two months to offer a chance to buy from an authorized seller, folks wouldn't have had to resort to an unauthorized seller.

Ironhidensh wrote:

Stargrave wrote:With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

The price they are charging, something like that is the very least they should be giving you with it.

Optional add-on available only through Pulse six months after he's released.

This is the sort of thing that concerns me about Pulse, not so much exclusive figures, but that they'll start offering add-ons for the figures only through Pulse.

Burn wrote:

Ironhidensh wrote:

Stargrave wrote:With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

The price they are charging, something like that is the very least they should be giving you with it.

Optional add-on available only through Pulse six months after he's released.

This is the sort of thing that concerns me about Pulse, not so much exclusive figures, but that they'll start offering add-ons for the figures only through Pulse.

Yup. That and more go-fund-mes. It's why I've found this whole deal shady from the start.

TrypticonCarne wrote:

Burn wrote:

TrypticonCarne wrote:when mine comes I shall take plenty of photos for you all.

You and 8,000 others.

yeah but mine will have a certain flair with his Four horsemen included

Which versions? The Armada versions?

Ironhidensh wrote:

Burn wrote:

Ironhidensh wrote:

Stargrave wrote:With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

The price they are charging, something like that is the very least they should be giving you with it.

Optional add-on available only through Pulse six months after he's released.

This is the sort of thing that concerns me about Pulse, not so much exclusive figures, but that they'll start offering add-ons for the figures only through Pulse.

Yup. That and more go-fund-mes. It's why I've found this whole deal shady from the start.

I really don't think that's anything to worry about, and if they do happen to do more Transformers this way I doubt it'd be anything as pricey as Unicron. I mean, if they said that to have Titans Metro Titan, Gigastorm, G2 Constructicons, Brave Maximus, or Omega Sentinel made they needed 2,000 orders of $200 to make it happen would that be a bad thing? I think crowdfunding is a great way to get things made that probably wouldn't perform well at retail. Just for the LOVE OF PRIMUS give us time to prepare, stop dropping this stuff on us out of nowhere!

Emerje

Burn wrote:

TrypticonCarne wrote:

Burn wrote:

TrypticonCarne wrote:when mine comes I shall take plenty of photos for you all.

You and 8,000 others.

yeah but mine will have a certain flair with his Four horsemen included

Those daggy repaints of Rhinox, Airazor, Terrorsaur and Cheetor?

The very same ones

Emerje wrote:

Ironhidensh wrote:

Burn wrote:

Ironhidensh wrote:

Stargrave wrote:With the C.O.M.B.A.T. System being such a big part of WFC how wild would it be if he had like Armada Upgrade Armor or Oblivion armor and it’s like rocket launchers in the legs and a mega canon in the chest like Armada Unicron had like how with Jetfire they gave him the Valkyrie-esque armor pieces.

The price they are charging, something like that is the very least they should be giving you with it.

Optional add-on available only through Pulse six months after he's released.

This is the sort of thing that concerns me about Pulse, not so much exclusive figures, but that they'll start offering add-ons for the figures only through Pulse.

Yup. That and more go-fund-mes. It's why I've found this whole deal shady from the start.

I really don't think that's anything to worry about, and if they do happen to do more Transformers this way I doubt it'd be anything as pricey as Unicron. I mean, if they said that to have Titans Metro Titan, Gigastorm, G2 Constructicons, Brave Maximus, or Omega Sentinel made they needed 2,000 orders of $200 to make it happen would that be a bad thing? I think crowdfunding is a great way to get things made that probably wouldn't perform well at retail. Just for the LOVE OF PRIMUS give us time to prepare, stop dropping this stuff on us out of nowhere!

Emerje

I get that it's a good avenue to get stuff out there that general retail would not be willing to accept.

That's not my concern.

I'm talking about stuff that general retail WOULD be willing to stock. It's a slippery slope. With more and more retailers starting to struggle, and some even closing, that limits Hasbros avenue for retail sales.

But if they sell direct, they cut out retailers. If they crowd fund, they can then produce near exact numbers required and jack up the price a bit by slapping a "exclusive" label on it.

Now I know people are going to come back at me and say "that's not going to happen, you're being stupid", well, you know, **** you. I know it may not happen, but that doesn't mean I can't still be concerned.

As a collector, I've already effectively been priced out of the Masterpiece market, with all the exclusives in the last six months I feel I'm slowly being squeezed out of the general release market as well, hence why I'm concerned about where things are headed.

I think Hasbro should lower the boom on ALL 3P Transformers makes period

I get that, but at least in the US your only real options, or at least the ones that Hasbro cares about, are Walmart, Target, and "the internet". We really only have those two physical locations along with a bunch of smaller ones that most of us don't have access to. It's been that way for a while now and Hasbro shifted their major sales to the plethora of web outlets when they realized nobody was picking up TRU's slack like the industry expected them to. They're bending over backwards for Entertainment Earth and Amazon now as a result.

And are we really getting more exclusives? Walmart has the reissues, but those aren't really a mass appeal type thing. Target has two Siege exclusives right now, but those come pretty few and far between. Amazon got the two Siege box sets, but a lot of it is either so obscure people can be forgiven for skipping it or things we would have definitely wanted, but wouldn't fit in the mass retail release schedule so no harm there. So far EE's stuff hasn't really been exclusive, just a tiny bit cheaper than other retailers. Walgreens does one figure, once a year, that's usually hard to get. Then there's Selects which is available everywhere online and there's no real rush to buy them, in fact you might be rewarded for waiting as they go on clearance. Meanwhile we no longer have $400+ BotCon exclusives or TRU exclusives (outside of Canada) and the SDCC and NYCC exclusives have gotten smaller and easier to get. Takara Tomy's exclusives shouldn't be a factor since they aren't Hasbro's and Hasbro is really doing a great service by giving us a cheaper source for them.

All in all it just feels like the same situation we've had for years, just spread out in a different way. The best part is that most of it doesn't feel "limited", very few have sold out entirely. Lancer sold out instantly on Pulse, but she's still available elsewhere for slightly more (and to be fair those retailers sell all Siege figures for slightly more than MSRP). I'm sure it's an entirely different situation if you're overseas, say, in Australia, but here it just feels like business as usual.

Emerje

Emerje wrote:And are we really getting more exclusives?
...
and other stuff

Yes. Because you listed a whole bunch of things that aren't readily available outside of the US.

You, and I mean this with no disrespect, like many others, seem to forget about the rest of the world.

So while your Walmarts and Targets are getting "exclusive" figures, those figures aren't getting a world wide release.

This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

Burn wrote:You, and I mean this with no disrespect, like many others, seem to forget about the rest of the world.

Did I?

Emerje wrote:I'm sure it's an entirely different situation if you're overseas, say, in Australia, but here it just feels like business as usual.

Has your access to exclusives really changed that much because it seems just as limited as ever? And aside from Skywarp, Bluestreak, and maybe Soundblaster, what exclusive characters do you think would have seen regular retail in the past? I doubt the Powerdashers or Rainmakers would have. Maybe Nightbird? Greenlight and Lancer feel like a bonus they couldn't fit in anywhere easily after noticing the demand to for a finished fembot team. As it stands Hasbro claims they're giving us an extra wave of figures due to the popularity of Siege, they seem to think there's room for more figures on the market so I wouldn't expect anything to change in the next series.

Emerje

Burn, that’s not going to happen, you’re being stupid.

Burn wrote:

Emerje wrote:And are we really getting more exclusives?
...
and other stuff

Yes. Because you listed a whole bunch of things that aren't readily available outside of the US.

You, and I mean this with no disrespect, like many others, seem to forget about the rest of the world.

So while your Walmarts and Targets are getting "exclusive" figures, those figures aren't getting a world wide release.

This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

I’m sorry bro it sounds frustrating as hell being a TF fan in Australia. The internet is cool and all but I wish you got more of that excitement of having the stuff more readily available, on shelves or pegs or otherwise.

Burn wrote:This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

I'm not sure about this. Many of these figures seem to just make up for the defunct club and those figures were impossible for most to get. We are getting more mass release generations toys now than 5 years ago. Does anyone else remember when one out of two waves of deluxes only had 2 toys?

william-james88 wrote:

Burn wrote:This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

I'm not sure about this. Many of these figures seem to just make up for the defunct club and those figures were impossible for most to get. We are getting more mass release generations toys now than 5 years ago. Does anyone else remember when one out of two waves of deluxes only had 2 toys?

Yikes when was that??

Sabrblade wrote:

Stargrave wrote:

william-james88 wrote:

Burn wrote:This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

I'm not sure about this. Many of these figures seem to just make up for the defunct club and those figures were impossible for most to get. We are getting more mass release generations toys now than 5 years ago. Does anyone else remember when one out of two waves of deluxes only had 2 toys?

Yikes when was that??

Back the original Generations line first started in 2010-2011.

And it kept going well into 2014, right before the Prime trilogy. About half the waves only had 2 new deluxes (Rattrap/Tankor, Chromia/Arcee, Hoist/Thundercracker) and there was only 1 leader released in the first 4 years of Generations toys.

So yeah, we have more general release toys now than 5 years ago.

At the moment of posting this, approximately 134 new backers per day are required to reach the goal.

Counterpunch wrote:At the moment of posting this, approximately 134 new backers per day are required to reach the goal.

So what you're saying is, Unicron needs a miracle or a big influx of backers.

ZeroWolf wrote:

Counterpunch wrote:At the moment of posting this, approximately 134 new backers per day are required to reach the goal.

So what you're saying is, Unicron needs a miracle or a big influx of backers.

Frankly, I've had very little to say on the whole event.

I don't much care for how it came about. I don't much care for the price or timing. While it should be a really cool thing to be a part of, nothing about the entire news cycle of Unicron or the conversations surrounding it have brought me a bit of joy.

My opinion on the toy is that it looks really cool.

The yellow color should be more orange and it should only have 6 abs instead of 8.

Also, the incentives to participate in the whole crowdfunding process have been utter ass.

There.

ZeroWolf wrote:So what you're saying is, Unicron needs a miracle or a big influx of backers.

megatronus wrote:Burn, that’s not going to happen, you’re being stupid.

I know you are, you said you are, but what am I?
It's early and I have the beginnings of a head cold and I'm at work so that's the best I can come up with.

william-james88 wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

Stargrave wrote:

william-james88 wrote:

Burn wrote:This is why I say I feel like I'm being priced out of the general releases, because five years ago, those figures would have seen a more mass release.

I'm not sure about this. Many of these figures seem to just make up for the defunct club and those figures were impossible for most to get. We are getting more mass release generations toys now than 5 years ago. Does anyone else remember when one out of two waves of deluxes only had 2 toys?

Yikes when was that??

Back the original Generations line first started in 2010-2011.

And it kept going well into 2014, right before the Prime trilogy. About half the waves only had 2 new deluxes (Rattrap/Tankor, Chromia/Arcee, Hoist/Thundercracker) and there was only 1 leader released in the first 4 years of Generations toys.

So yeah, we have more general release toys now than 5 years ago.

I actually miss those days. There is so much product out right now, i miss the days of a wave having 5 figures total between size classes I wanted.