by mordhelm » Fri Feb 09, 2018 10:54 am
- Weapon: Electro-Sword
So did anyone else read that editorial on another TF site (not sure if I'm allowed to mention the name not, always forget the rule). Anyway, he seems to think Generations is coming to a close with PotP Wave 4. It's an interesting theory, one that I think does warrant discussion, but I don't believe it to be correct on a great many assumptions. Here are some of my thoughts (keeping it pertaining to PotP as much as possible):
1. It was stated that Generations WOULD be continuing after PotP (by John Warden I believe). It was hinted though that they would do away with line-wide gimmicks for the next set.
2. Generations, IDW, and Earth Wars are pretty much hand in hand in many respects. And we know that there is a big event coming later this year and in 2019 for IDW (Unicron). Earth Wars is still making a crap load of money off of whales in the game, and they entered even more interesting territory by being an official sneak peek avenue for new releases (Volcanicus and Predaking). If EW slows down, you can bet Earth Wars 2 will come in short order to fill the gap.
3. It was pointed out that maybe TF Authentics/Evergreen will be the spiritual successor to PotP. I doubt it, because we haven't heard a peep about the Cyberverse line. I am guessing Cyberverse will tie into Authentics.
4. CW, TR, and PotP are definitely making money. Transformers in general is one of Hasbro's hot tickets. In spite of TLK being somewhat of a flop (compared to the other films) toy sales still hit growth. Why would they sabotage that?
5. PotP ending earlier than we think is starting to feel a bit more feasible. I cannot remember the exact dates for CW releases, but PotP definitely seems to be releasing slower. Robot Kingdom just posted that Wave 2 will ship in April 2018, while BBTS and TFSource seem to think it will still be Q1 (which could technically be as late as March 31st). If it does slip to April, that's a 4 month difference between releases. Even if it picks back up to 3 months, that's July for wave 3, and October for wave 4, which means new waves will be 2019.
6. What if PotP is intentionally stopping early? Not as a way to sabotage Generations, but to improve the release process. What if, each sequence is yearly, instead of 18 months. PotP may very well be a trial run for the new system (much as the tail end of TR was). Introduce a new subline for January stock (some hitting in December), new toys/characters in the beginning and middle (Wave 1 and 2, and mostly 3). Then Wave 3 starts the repacks. Why would they do this? Well, I think it's to try to get more sales during the holiday season. B&M stores overload on the same 4 deluxes/legends because they get the latest wave. My Walmart STILL has Scourges, Blurrs, and Hardheads. What if retailers pushed on Hasbro to find a way to combat that, and Hasbro's way is to trickle down the new characters, so they can reload the rest of the years toys back in. For collectors, kids, and parents, more choices will lead to better chances of purchases. During the massive holiday rush (late november) you could actually see so many different characters on the shelves. I really want to see if this is the plan.
7. Shorter release cycles mean less time they have to spend in a particular ecosystem (Combiners/Headmasters) to be able to get new characters out. People are clamoring for Apeface and Snapdragon, but if PotP is a normal release cycle (18 months), that means it won't be till summer 2019 when we maybe could get them. Shorter releases would allow them to be a bit more agile and get a better breadth of characters/play patterns out there.
So really, my question is, has anyone's opinion changed as to whether PotP is going to be a shorter than usual cycle? And do you think it is for better or worse if that is the case?
Moderators, if this strays too far off topic from PotP (which I tried not to do) feel free to let me know and we can start a new thread about it.