Rtron wrote:If I was rich, I'd start a youtube channel exclusively dedicated to weighting, taking apart, and counting the parts and plastic distribution of every figure that comes out. Given there's so much people (rightly) worried about what they're getting for their money, it seems like an endeavor that could gain a good bit of traction.
I actually tried to do something like that a while ago by counting all the parts of a bunch of TFs to compare them across toylines. I'm unfortunately not rich, and the project kinda sputtered out since I don't have many Prime Wars figures (which is what most people would probably want to compare WFC figures to). I did find out some interesting stuff though, and I'd be glad to continue the project if people are interested (and especially if people wanted to help).
Jelze Bunnycat wrote:Rtron wrote:Jelze Bunnycat wrote:Rtron wrote:You don't lower Blitzwing to voyager price just by removing the gauntlets. I can't say I know how Hasbro specifically budgets, but my educated guess is that those gauntlets are not what makes that figure leader price. Blitzwing's parts count and weight for the figure itself is probably between voyager and leader, with parts count being very close to a "normal" leader. There's now way not including the gloves makes him suddenly a voyager, as they only represent 4 parts. That's less than a Core class worth of parts, and they probably don't represent that much weight percentage either.
I bolded and underlined the crucial part here. When figures in the end fall between two standard price points, Hasbro will always go for the higher one, but adding things to make it seem more worth while isn't necessarily a bad step to take even if it's to "cover up"
Hasbro's no stranger to that you know: when they imported Takara's Car Robots line for RiD 2001, Takara's liberal pricing made quite a few figures not fit with Hasbro's set price points, like Wedge and the Bullet Trains. Wedge was cheaper than Deluxe, but got bumped up to Deluxe anyway, and the trains got bumped to Mega.
Exactly, otherwise, they'd be losing money on the figure. In this case, they'd be losing money on one of the most expensive figures of the "normal" classes. Could Hasbro tank that money loss? I have no idea, but that's not how ANY business works, specially not corporations. They're not going to lose even a single usd per figure just because the design fell in-between classes.
Worth noting is that this phenomenon only props up because of their focus on accurate robot mode cartoon scale: as the characters are different heights, their figures end up in different sizes that may or not coincide with any set price points. If you look at other lines, you may find that they are sized to price point, but not current (WFC and later) Generations.
A bit of a tangent, but I do worry that the "in between classes" figures are going to end up lowering fan's standards over time. At what point will the not-quite-a-class figure just become accepted as the standard for that class? When ER Cliff and Netflix Bee came out, people complained about their size, but eventually warmed up to them because they felt complex, weren't hollow, were slathered with paint, and had a ton of accessories. Then Huffer comes along, who's simple, has very hollow legs, and has an average amount paint and accessories, but nobody batted and eye. Bee and Cliff were worth deluxe money, so obviously Huffer is too, right? Classes are just price points now, after all. I don't know if an overall lowering of standards will ever really happen, but it's food for thought.
Also, a tad off topic, but there are some businesses/corporations that willingly sell certain products for a loss, usually in order to encourage more sales of other products with higher profit margins. A good example are Sony and Microsoft with the PS5 and Series X, which are sold at a loss to make the consoles more competitively priced and affordable, which in turn encourages more people to buy more games (which is where the real money is made). Not really applicable to transformers of course.