The Energon Pub

ScottyP wrote:

Megatron Wolf wrote:People need to stop buying TRU exclusives so hasbro picks a better store to use cause this has officially gotten out of hand.

Hasbro doesn't necessarily pick the store in this case. I'm sure they'd sell the MP stuff everywhere if they could, but TRU is the only place that'll touch them. Target has never had an MP except maybe 25th DVD Prime, and even then I think I'm wrong on that. Walmart won't touch MP stuff ever since Skywarp literally had to go to Ross/TJ Maxx/etc. to get liquidated. I'm afraid TRU is all the US is gonna get anytime soon

Exactly. TRU is the retailer willing to work with Hasbro. That's really all there is to it.

Remember how TRU's MP-10 was announced at $99.99 and then mysteriously, and suddenly jacked up to $119.99? That's TRU's MO. Really nothing we can do about it, so the misdirected rage is just not productive. If you want it, get it. If you don't, look to getting a Takara version on sale or on eBay.

But please, please don't buy MP KOs. Be patient and wait for a sale. It will come. Buying KOs is a short-term solution that just hurts the long-term potential of the line.

megatronus wrote:...please, please don't buy MP KOs. Be patient and wait for a sale. It will come. Buying KOs is a short-term solution that just hurts the long-term potential of the line.

I just wanted to parrot this.

Convoy wrote:

megatronus wrote:...please, please don't buy MP KOs. Be patient and wait for a sale. It will come. Buying KOs is a short-term solution that just hurts the long-term potential of the line.

I just wanted to parrot this.

Ditto.

Also, I consider buying a KO, meaning an exact copy (often at lower quality) of something, anything, to be the dumb thing to do. However, it's not the same as buying a 100% original mold from a 3rd party, even if that toy is closely based on an existing character.

-Kanrabat- wrote:

Convoy wrote:

megatronus wrote:...please, please don't buy MP KOs. Be patient and wait for a sale. It will come. Buying KOs is a short-term solution that just hurts the long-term potential of the line.

I just wanted to parrot this.

Ditto.

Also, I consider buying a KO, meaning an exact copy (often at lower quality) of something, anything, to be the dumb thing to do. However, it's not the same as buying a 100% original mold from a 3rd party, even if that toy is closely based on an existing character.

As (probably) the biggest supporter of KOs around here, I'd just like to interject some pragmatic arguments into this moralizing.

I've bought KOs of MP Sideswipe, Red Alert, and Frenzy+Buzzsaw, and because these MP KOs are made from actual leftover factory parts, often deemed below the cut for QC, it's a crapshoot; you pay half price but takes yer chances. My Red Alert's head doesn't want to stay together, and his gun doesn't really notch into his hand, so I'm going to have to replace him with the real deal someday.

I bought the 2 cassettes because I got Hasbro Soundwave, but wanted a better representation of Marvel Frenzy; I'm RIR/FIB for life, but even I keep calling the blue/purple guy Rumble because he's (ironically) more show-accurate than Takara's all blue guy. While the figure himself is okay, he came with two of the same gun. Buzzsaw's paint is all messed up, but I just wanted him for spare parts in case a real bird breaks.

My KO Sideswipe, on the other hand, is perfect. And for the record, that KO is NOT the same as the Takara MP because he has the better Tigertrack face (without Sideswipe's weird squinting), just barely nudging him into the same category as the CHMS Classics Seekers in colors Has/Tak has yet to do: The truly worthwhile ones for fans who want something there's no official option for. That's why I buy KOs: no matter how far Hasbro has come from the dark days of the '90s when it looked like they might just let the whole franchise keel over dead, there will always be a few things they can't do (including reissues of toys whose molds are lost or degraded), necessitating KOs to fill the gaps.

But back to my main point here, if you buy too many of those MP KOs to the exclusion of the real ones, in the long run you'll get what you pay for, with little savings to show for it. They're made from spare parts, and many of them are only good for being used as such when your real TFs break.

That brings up a potential advantage of buying from your local TRU that I'm surprised no one has brought up: It's a tad easier to exchange a defective MP in person. Though I admit, I don't personally know how much easier, since I've never seriously tried to return an online purchase, and exchanging it for the same toy isn't really an option for MPs like this year's Grimlock and last year's Soundwave that sold out immediately. In fact, I'd argue that buying KOs of the cassettes replace a few small parts is actually far more ethical than exchanging a figure as underproduced as that Soundwave, because sending that whole box of 6 TFs back defective means there's one less to go around; Hasbro could've cranked out twice as many, and supply still wouldn't have met demand on Sounders.

Yesterday, Westland MI's TRU got in 4 Sunstorms and 3 Prowls that sold out before noon, 1 of each by me, what with the BOGO (though that's mostly dumb luck; waiting for a TRU sale to synch up with them actually having the MPs you want might just be possible if you used layaway, but IDK the nuts and bolts of it.) Prowl has a paint defect on his hood, but I'll probably just sharpie it. If I want a more substantial fix, I can always buy the KO for the parts.

Side note: They also got that Joe "Danger at the Docks" set, which I thought was a SDCC exclusive, but then I wasn't paying close attention to any non-TF toy news.

And for the record, the biggest threat to the future of the MP line, and toy collecting in general, is not KOs, but rising plastic prices. F@#% the oil companies!

Regardless of size and whatnot, in my opinion the Autobot cars are just better figures with way better engineering and better show-accuracy (and real-world alt mode accuracy as well) than the Seeker mold; even the new and improved Seeker mold.

Also, Sunstorm isn't a mainstream character. Prowl is.

Put all that together and I can sort of see where the justification for the pricing might come from (though it doesn't mean I necessarily agree with it, just sayin' ).

I guess aside from the comparisons to the larger MPs, the fact that the internet has changed how we buy things (especially collectors) has had a pretty big impact on our expectations for things like this. I mean if you look at MP-10, it retailed at around $200~$250 USD for the Takara version and then Hasbro turns around and drops a slightly modified version with more paint and all the same accessories and a few different colors etc. for $99, it sets certain expectations I suppose. Likewise with the new Seeker mold. Starscream retailed for around $150~$200 (or more) for the Takara version and Sunstorm for even more because he was an Ehobby exclusive. Hasbro again turns around and dramatically drops the price. They did the same with MP-08 Grimlock. The recent Takara reissue is going for $200 or more retail (though maybe slightly less locally in actual Japanese shops) and TrU had it for a mere $50 (which I actually got one of since I never bought the original or the reissue just because that price was hard to resist for what it was). And here we are with the first of the Autobot cars and that steep discount is nowhere to be found.

That makes me wonder what is different about this particular MP when compared to all the others (even Soundwave, who got packaged with all of his cassettes as 'accessories' and still got a hell of a price) and the only thing I can come up with is the one thing that would modify Hasbro's cost vs the actual production cost of the figure (which is all the previous ones would have been based on since all they had to do was produce and package them), and that's LICENSING. I'd be willing to bet that the reason Mr Prowl (and likely Mr Sideswipe and any other MP Autobot cars they choose to import from the current line) costs so much is because Hasbro had to work out and pay for their own licensing deal with the automotive company that owns the rights to that vehicle, just like Takara did when they initially created them since licensing rights do not carry over to different companies and probably don't cross national borders either (i.e. they might even have had to pay separately to distribute it in the UK vs the US and possibly the same for Canada and other countries). If that is true, then it makes perfect sense why he costs so much, because Hasbro has to cover their initial overhead of not only production, but also the licensing fees in order to turn a profit.

xyl360 wrote: Hasbro again turns around and dramatically drops the price. They did the same with MP-08 Grimlock. The recent Takara reissue is going for $200 or more retail (though maybe slightly less locally in actual Japanese shops) and TrU (USA) had it for a mere $50 .

MP Grimlock cost 100$ in Canada.

Bumblevivisector wrote:

-Kanrabat- wrote:

Convoy wrote:

megatronus wrote:...please, please don't buy MP KOs. Be patient and wait for a sale. It will come. Buying KOs is a short-term solution that just hurts the long-term potential of the line.

I just wanted to parrot this.

Ditto.

Also, I consider buying a KO, meaning an exact copy (often at lower quality) of something, anything, to be the dumb thing to do. However, it's not the same as buying a 100% original mold from a 3rd party, even if that toy is closely based on an existing character.

As (probably) the biggest supporter of KOs around here, I'd just like to interject some pragmatic arguments into this moralizing.

No moralizing... just pragmatism. When you buy an MP KO, you're decreasing the chances the line will continue. Plain and simple. It's a self-defeating purchase.

Whether buying a KO is "wrong" or not is a completely different topic of conversation.

Bumblevivisector wrote:And for the record, the biggest threat to the future of the MP line, and toy collecting in general, is not KOs, but rising plastic prices. F@#% the oil companies!

Not only is that point debatable, it's irrelevant. We have no influence over oil or plastic prices. What we DO have power over is our buying habits.

i wont pretend that i havent bought any KO's, but they were only of things that werent actually available in an official sense. ie: the CHMS seekers.

if theres something i want and it exists in an offical sense, im buying the real deal. and if theres one thing, ONE thing to support, its the MP line. when it comes to MP's i dont even stray into the 3rd party territory because i think has/tak will eventually get to everyone.

i cant stand poor quality. if youre going into a purchase accepting that it might be crap, why are you buying it? instead of buying three KO MP cars, why not buy one or two official MP's? ive seen the prices of those cars, and for how cheap you can get the real thing (with some internet hunting) the money you save going with the KO is negligible.