Re: Takara Tomy Transformers Masterpiece MP-17 Prowl Teaser
Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2013 7:48 am
mandingo_rex wrote:No need to start tossing in legal terminology or "debate team" lingo to try and boost your opinion. This isn't a court of law, and there's zero facts to base anything off from either side. There's no right and wrong at this point, it's all speculation! The difference about a courtroom and this is that in a court of law, you can disprove something. You can't disprove something that hasn't occurred yet, no matter how much you argue the case.
By Zero proof, you mean Mp-10, MP-11, MP-12, MP-13, MP-14, MP-15 and MP-16, which all follow the same design philosophy which you claim there is no proof that exists?
mandingo_rex wrote:Look, I don't care if Jazz gets all-new tooling and hours wasted on semi-redundant new engineering or "reuses" some engineering from the Datsun mold, or if anyone else agrees with me at this point. I'm just enjoying the discussion, as silly as it is. You and those on your "side" of this argument could very well be right and Jazz will share zero similarities with Prowl, but I don't expect that will happen. I actually don't even own the vintage version of Prowl, but I've messed with it once or twice but I do own Jazz, and when I transformed my friend's Prowl, I even recall being like "Oh, it's sorta like Jazz!" The Sunstreaker/Wheeljack example was probably just a bad example. It was a casual one based off first glances with little experience with either vintage toy, so I wouldn't spend too much time trying to deconstruct that example.
First off, my comment about not owning the toys was directed at First Aid whose entire argument was a straight up prima facie (I'm using that civil and impersonal term, because the "layman" version of it is generally personal and inflammatory - which I'm trying to avoid here).
Secondly, we've already seen the attention to detail remoulds get. If there were going to be lazy steps taken then Red Alert wouldn't have had specially tooled biceps. The fact that they would get that pedantic with the designs means that if something isn't true to the design then we wont see it in the MP version.
mandingo_rex wrote:Look, here are some things I do know, though, that folks keep bringing up from actual "fact" that isn't actually true, no matter how eloquently it's worded or how many debate-terms are tossed in to try and boost the argument. And I can say without a doubt, I know this from the Takara MP track record because I actually own every MP mold release to date...
• The point of the Masterpiece line is not to recreate the vintage toy with "masterpiece" articulation and design. It's to create a "masterpiece" version of the vintage figure AND the Sunbow cartoon appearance. The best of both worlds, literally. Sure, there are a few compromises, but they did a damn fine job finding the right middle ground for most of the MPs. As an example, Megatron is significantly different from his G1 toy, and while he had to follow the original's transformation somewhat, it achieves the visuals of the cartoon much more effectively than the original figure. Sideswipe's shoulders and wheels mimic the cartoon look, not the toy. True, the doors form the arms, but the wheels hide away completely.
Which contradicts nothing in what I actually said. Remember the Masterpiece line is essentially doing the original designs with current engineering levels and technology- staying true to the original designs. You bring up the doors being the amrs and the added complexity, but the fact is that added complexity is still built on the foundation of the original transformation.
You can be fairly certain that if a G1 cartoon design looked a certain way that it would be the "ideal" design of the figure by both Takara and Hasbro. Remember that Hasbro had to deal with engineering limitations from 30 years prior and a 1/72 scale line which was pre-existing with the original figures.
Working off the animation sheets and from the original design only proves the attention to detail being taken by the designers and that cost cutting has no place in it.
You might find some measures, like the fake wheels are going to be employed, but it is going to be where scale issues affect the design far more than it is to cut corners. Ultimately though, it all points towards a line where the focus is on high price ticket, high authenticity products.
mandingo_rex wrote:• I'm not sure that the thing you said about Sideswipe and Red Alert's shoulders made sense to me. Did you mean the vintage figures had different transformations? Because the new ones have new molds for the shoulders, they're not exactly radically different, I don't think. The transformation is the same, and Red Alert has fake wheels on them. That's about it. If the transformation happened the same as the vintage figure, the actual wheels would be visible on both, and would've been the actual wheels on the shoulders, not tucked underneath the arms to form the bot's ribcage.
No I meant that with the Masterpiece version they went the extra step and made Red Alert cartoon accurate when they had the excuse of toy accuracy to hide behind if they wanted to cut corners and just re-use Sideswipe's shoulders. However if they're not even going too cut corners with something as minor as that then there's no way they're going to do something as radical as shoehorn Prowl into Jazz. What happened with Red Alert proves that it simply goes against the entire business plan whicch Takara currently have for the Masterpiece line.
mandingo_rex wrote:• Ultra Magnus (MP-02) was a total cop-out, and a huge "cutting corners" effort. So much in fact, that I didn't bother with MP-02. True, UM was originally a Prime repaint with a new suit-of-armor/trailer, but the end result looked nothing like Prime in robot mode once he was "suited up". While I do believe (well, really, really hope) that they'll make a new Ultra Magnus with trailer since they did completely retool Prime and not just scale him down (plus, this also milks the tooling for the main market, where not everyone will shell out the money for the Nemesis or "dark awakening" niche repaints), I feel like their efforts so far were just a cash grab. So I do consider that a cost-cutting, lazy cash grab. That's not Ultra Magnus.
Except that it's already been established that everything prior to MP-10 (you could possibly take MP-09 as that point even) is irrelevant to the current line. As of MP-10, we have a new scale and new approach so any shortcuts which may have previously been taken are almost certain to never see the light of day from this point on.
mandingo_rex wrote:Now, to jump to the other side, and argue FOR your stance, here's what is actually starting to sway my opinion, and it's nothing that's been said, really, but from the photos posted of the G1 cartoon models...
Jazz didn't have door-wings in the cartoon! And Prowl didn't have shoulder cannons! For Prowl, I think it could just be that they didn't include them in the promo shot, and we'll get them regardless with the figure. (Fingers crossed here, as I like the toy look versus the cartoon.) But it is cartoon-accurate. I think the MP version of Jazz will likely do their best to either hide the doors completely, or have them be able to be displayed with or without, so that little tidbit alone may require a significantly different transformation for Jazz, regardless of the leg transformation difference (which I personally think they have enough room to simply shift things around below the waist and still use a similar above-the-waist transformation for both Jazz and Prowl... but that's with my old thinking).
Considering how pedantic the attention to detail on this line has been to date, nothing in that reveal surprised me tbh and when Jazz comes out, I know I'll be proven right on that front too. As for the torso of MP Jazz when it does hit - the radical differece in waist engineering alone will requre a radically different mould, regardless of what happens with the doors.
In fact about the only parts which might see reuse would be Prowl's hands and thighs and even the thighs might be completely different sculpts.
mandingo_rex wrote:Stepper/Ricochet is also not a huge "repaint" draw from Jazz, I don't think. Sure, he can be repainted, but Stepper isn't anywhere in the realm of G1-must-have like Prowl/Bluestreak/Smokescreen or the Seekers. If they do make Jazz, I fully expect to see Stepper, but not as an individual figure. He's more along the lines of Tigertracks or Sunstorm in terms of popularity, with the exception of Stepper actually having a vintage figure.
And yet he was popular enough to get a reissue. Here's the thing though- he requires very little in the way of custom tooling. Besides the mounts, everything is either Jazz or the inevitable Cyclonus Artfire release (whose partners all use the Nightstick mould). If a figure like Tigertrack is getting a release and if everyone is lapping up everything Masterpiece which at this rate they will be, then I can totally see Takara "risking" a Stepper release.