Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Denyer
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

Post by Denyer »

The thing is, for a proportion (possibly a large proportion) of the 20-25% of sales that are to adults for personal interest the bubble isn't single-use in the sense of throwing away, any more than the figure is. I open almost everything and get stuff online -- but displaying in packaging seems to be the approach of more collectors than not. Can an industry with increasing overheads and reporting to investors afford to lose anywhere near that proportion of sales?

There are some nicer attempts at it, like the VHS tape box style packaging for a Jubilee Marvel Legends figure I got that looks nice in the background of a display or would look good behind a de-packaged figure... or the D&D cartoon figures. But nobody's likely to display just the box, or it might as well be empty and the contents re-sold or just not purchased in the first place.

Given the task I'd possibly make the window panel separate -- something that's held in position at the front of the box but not attached and less likely to go to landfill. Maybe you could dispense with a bubble in some circumstances. But it possibly doesn't solve the issue of needing to show off the accessories to justify price hikes.

Re: plastic waste, it's a plus as an occasional buyer to not have BAF parts included. But that seems to be a largish part of how ML is still viable at retail doing minor characters.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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I think I'd have a cardboard inner tray and plastic window... which is er, kind of what Transformers went for. I wonder why Hasbro didn't apply that logic to their other action figure lines.

I'm not one for keeping boxes (well aside from the Japanese TF stuff I have - except Masterpiece, all those black boxes were boring and took up loads of room), but did find I kept the most recent Spidey retro wave with Hobgoblin and that I have kept carded, as I like the look of the figures on those bright '90s cards. Cut up the 3.75" Retro cards though - if only because you get a wee cut out card on the back, which is nice to keep.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

Post by Heinrad »

I saw the Rise of the Beasts display at the local Walmart, and all the figures they had on one side were basically strapped to the card stock, and at least a few of them were missing heads and arms. Admittedly these definately weren't mainline figures, but who wants to buy their kid a headless Optimus Prime? Unless the kid is obsessed with the G1 "City of Steel" episode, that is.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but if Dunkin' Donuts or Cumberland Farms can get biodegradable plastic straws, why can't Hasbro use a biodegradable plastic for carded figures? Admittedly, I don't know if you can make it clear to use as bubble packaging, and the MOSC enthusiasts might need to figure out how to store them so they don't disintegrate, but it's got to be better than stock loss. That might be covered by insurance, though.

I don't mind the idea of the windowless boxes. That being said, I'm kind of at the collecting point where I'm being more choosy about what I'm getting. I'd love to get the Walmart exclusive TF:TM Hot Rod. I wouldn't open him and would just stick him on the shelf with the last reissue they did. Will they be worth anything? Probably not. The pervious release I got when it came out, and Walmart had already knocked 10 bucks off the price to start with. The box art looks nice, though.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Denyer wrote: Thu May 11, 2023 8:12 pm The thing is, for a proportion (possibly a large proportion) of the 20-25% of sales that are to adults for personal interest the bubble isn't single-use in the sense of throwing away, any more than the figure is. I open almost everything and get stuff online -- but displaying in packaging seems to be the approach of more collectors than not. Can an industry with increasing overheads and reporting to investors afford to lose anywhere near that proportion of sales?
That's the definition of unsustainable though, isn't it? That most collectors keep them in-package is besides the point; the plastic window will still be around a hundred years from now regardless of whether it's in a landfill, an ocean, or an estate sale.

I have no idea when the hobby of collecting mass-produced baubles ends on a large scale, but it's not likely to be quick or clean. In the meantime, the best practice would still be to produce as little "permanent" material in the ancillary packaging as possible. Collectors may whine and cry about it, but... they do that anyway? About everything?
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

Post by Denyer »

Energy from waste and microbial breakdown of materials are also options.

The point there is just that the packaging isn't ancillary. And then we get onto arguments about manufacture of non-essential items in general.
I have no idea when the hobby of collecting mass-produced baubles ends on a large scale,
Probably when the only consideration in life is survival in a radation-blasted wasteground. People have always hung onto bottlecaps, or trinkets produced for pilgrims. The modern age has just accelerated things, with commercial interests being allowed to produce at scale and without limits stuff that largely ends up in the ground.

Toy manufacturers would cry about cost margins, but with adult collectors becoming such a large proportion of sales it possibly becomes more viable to offer different things for different demographics. At the moment that's mostly having general retail lines for kids and collector-oriented lines. As prices rise, there's less shelf space for general retail lines for kids anyway, but if there's a big enough proportion of buyers of that stuff who are adult fans then having a disposable version and a better-packaged release sold online for keeping for decades until everyone who's interested snuffs it might be more viable.

I think a lot of stuff will just disappear completely anyway as economies of scale are lost. Most things aren't viable at the scale the Super7 business model produces.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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https://news.tfw2005.com/2023/06/22/gen ... der-487966
>Make a new Antagony
>Go to the trouble of making a new head for her when you don't really need to
>Its goddamn Scavenger's head for some reason

Sometimes I'm just baffled by what Hasbro will spend time and effort on. Is the idea that people will buy this and pretend that it's a Transmetal? That they'll use this as an alt-head for the Inferno that they probably can't buy in stores anymore? If they wanted to include an alt-head, why not make an actual Antagony head? She certainly has enough to choose from! :lol:

Its actually a pretty nice redeco, I'm just confused.

Denyer wrote: Fri Jun 09, 2023 11:58 am I think a lot of stuff will just disappear completely anyway as economies of scale are lost. Most things aren't viable at the scale the Super7 business model produces.
I think Transformers probably would be, but I also doubt the brand would ever get to that point. Not with Hasbro, anyway. I'd see them shelving the brand entirely before I could see them trying to sell Deluxe-sized figures for $80 through Haslab.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Warcry wrote: Fri Jun 23, 2023 1:21 am https://news.tfw2005.com/2023/06/22/gen ... der-487966
>Make a new Antagony
>Go to the trouble of making a new head for her when you don't really need to
>Its goddamn Scavenger's head for some reason

Sometimes I'm just baffled by what Hasbro will spend time and effort on. Is the idea that people will buy this and pretend that it's a Transmetal? That they'll use this as an alt-head for the Inferno that they probably can't buy in stores anymore? If they wanted to include an alt-head, why not make an actual Antagony head? She certainly has enough to choose from! :lol:

Its actually a pretty nice redeco, I'm just confused.
I'm not familiar enough with Antagony to be baffled by this. I assume they wanted to keep the original bot head because the original bot head is awesome. I bought Inferno because I liked the opening/shouting bot head. After opening him today (finally) I was delighted to find that the light piping works there, making his inner mouth glow. You can't give that up. Any alternate head is going to be inferior, so I guess I'm just confused as to why Hasbro would bother to include any.

I'm flummoxed by Shadow Striker having her Cyberverse colors/head, but old universe body. Cyberverse SS is best known for being blown to bits and rebuilt with parts of other bots. They're currently making Junkions that can do that. But, SS isn't compatible for some reason.

The thing is, having seen the original SS, I like that deco better for that mold. The bright colors on the limbs help them pop against all the black kibble, where CSS is just a miasma of dark purple. I'd be more likely to give Hasbro $50 for 2 SS Deluxes, one homaging each of the two designs, than $25 for this unsatisfactory combo.

Legacy Strongarm is another puzzler. After seeing SS, I was worried that this would be a combo of RiD15 and the old Energon design. I was pleasantly surprised to see it be pure RiD, but disappointed that it's a retool of Elita-1. If you're going to retool Elita-1 into Strongarm, this is probably as good as you can do, which is why you shouldn't do that. None of that back kibble could've been reworked into Strongarm's door wings? They've been doing door wings since '84. Did they forget how?

Remember during Cybertron, when G1 fans had to settle for homages like sticking a Wheeljack-looking head on a bot that turned into a green muscle car? It seems like Hasbro's now doing the same for other continuities. Sure, they could make satisfactory versions of those characters now. But, they've got to do some half-assed ones first, to get as much money out of those characters as possible.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Tantrum wrote: Sat Jun 24, 2023 10:20 pm I'm not familiar enough with Antagony to be baffled by this. I assume they wanted to keep the original bot head because the original bot head is awesome. I bought Inferno because I liked the opening/shouting bot head. After opening him today (finally) I was delighted to find that the light piping works there, making his inner mouth glow. You can't give that up. Any alternate head is going to be inferior, so I guess I'm just confused as to why Hasbro would bother to include any.
Reusing Inferno's head is a perfectly fine choice! Geoff Senior drew her that way in some of the BotCon comics, and it really is the coolest thing about the toy. But the character has never been drawn consistently and she's got four alternate head designs of her own, ranging from the original toy...

Image

...to the original box art/comics...

Image

...to the modern IDW...

Image

...to whatever this horror show is meant to be.

Image

So it's hilarious to me that they decided to give her a totally different, unrelated alternate noggin when there were already so many of her own to choose from.
Tantrum wrote: Sat Jun 24, 2023 10:20 pm I'm flummoxed by Shadow Striker having her Cyberverse colors/head, but old universe body. Cyberverse SS is best known for being blown to bits and rebuilt with parts of other bots. They're currently making Junkions that can do that. But, SS isn't compatible for some reason.

The thing is, having seen the original SS, I like that deco better for that mold. The bright colors on the limbs help them pop against all the black kibble, where CSS is just a miasma of dark purple. I'd be more likely to give Hasbro $50 for 2 SS Deluxes, one homaging each of the two designs, than $25 for this unsatisfactory combo.
They did the same thing with Skyquake and I thought it was crazy then too. They could have picked one of the designs, made as good a toy of that as they could and made one group of fans very happy, but they chose to make awkward mishmashes that aren't going to satisfy any of the fans who were actually excited when they heard those characters were getting a new toy. I love G1 Skyquake, and including his signature details on a toy that's 70% the Prime character really just made me mad because it was as good as saying "Nah, we're never going to make the one you want so you'd better settle for this instead."

My knee-jerk cynical reaction is that they really just made this mold to make Sideburn later, don't care about Shadow Striker at all and decided that a half-assed reference to the popular Cyberverse character would still sell better than a more faithful rendition of one of the least-remembered BotCon exclusives of the era.
Tantrum wrote: Sat Jun 24, 2023 10:20 pmLegacy Strongarm is another puzzler.
I'm really not aware enough of RiD to know what Strongarm's meant to look like offhand beyond the head (which I thought looked really out of place on the Elita body) and the colours, but I wasn't surprised to hear that they'd cheaped out on making a new mold for the character. I feel like she and Shadow Striker both had two strikes against them from the get-go -- they're not G1 and they're female characters, and Hasbro's design team doesn't seem to put much effort into either one. For the female characters in particular, it really feels like they make them because corporate ESG metrics tell them they have to, and not because anyone on the team gives a shit about the characters they're making. Elita's a great example. She's gotten four toys over the past six or so years, and shared molds with Starscream, G1 Arcee, Minerva (and Strongarm) and Prime Arcee in the process. Absolutely zero thought put into any of it, zero consistency, just slap some pastels and a girly head with lipstick paint apps on and call it a day.
Tantrum wrote: Sat Jun 24, 2023 10:20 pmRemember during Cybertron, when G1 fans had to settle for homages like sticking a Wheeljack-looking head on a bot that turned into a green muscle car? It seems like Hasbro's now doing the same for other continuities. Sure, they could make satisfactory versions of those characters now. But, they've got to do some half-assed ones first, to get as much money out of those characters as possible.
I don't think it's quite that greedy, but I definitely do get the feeling sometimes that the design team just absolutely did not give a shit about a character that they were told to include. A lot of the non-G1 characters they've made lately simply don't show the same care and concern as a lot of the G1 stuff does, like remaking Armada characters with zero Minicon partners or compatibility.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Warcry wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 4:43 amReusing Inferno's head is a perfectly fine choice! Geoff Senior drew her that way in some of the BotCon comics, and it really is the coolest thing about the toy. But the character has never been drawn consistently and she's got four alternate head designs of her own, ranging from the original toy...to the original box art/comics...to the modern IDW...to whatever this horror show is meant to be.

So it's hilarious to me that they decided to give her a totally different, unrelated alternate noggin when there were already so many of her own to choose from.
Maybe Hasbro figured Antagony had so many alt heads that including any 1 of them would just annoy fans of the other 3, so they decided to include none of them so all Antagony fans would be equally unhappy? At least that's fair. Though, as a Selects release, is she even beholden to standard price points? They could've included all 4 heads and charged a few extra bucks.
Warcry wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 4:43 amI love G1 Skyquake, and including his signature details on a toy that's 70% the Prime character really just made me mad because it was as good as saying "Nah, we're never going to make the one you want so you'd better settle for this instead."
Having looked up G1 Skyquake, I can see why you're mad. It looks like the only reference in the Legacy one is the clear chest plate which appears to be related to a gimmick the new toy doesn't have, and the ability to dock with Needlenose, instead of the G1 character the original toy docked with. Maybe they plan to reshell the new toy into a more G1 figure and announce the corresponding Needlenose retool later?
Warcry wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 4:43 amMy knee-jerk cynical reaction is that they really just made this mold to make Sideburn later, don't care about Shadow Striker at all and decided that a half-assed reference to the popular Cyberverse character would still sell better than a more faithful rendition of one of the least-remembered BotCon exclusives of the era.
You're probably right. Though, I'm not sure Hasbro is. On the tfw2005 thread, there seemed to be as many people hoping for Roulette as there were excited about this Shadow Striker. Hasbro could've released a Botcon SS/Roulette 2-pack and sold this mold 3 times instead of just 2.
Warcry wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 4:43 amI'm really not aware enough of RiD to know what Strongarm's meant to look like offhand beyond the head (which I thought looked really out of place on the Elita body) and the colours, but I wasn't surprised to hear that they'd cheaped out on making a new mold for the character. I feel like she and Shadow Striker both had two strikes against them from the get-go -- they're not G1 and they're female characters, and Hasbro's design team doesn't seem to put much effort into either one. For the female characters in particular, it really feels like they make them because corporate ESG metrics tell them they have to, and not because anyone on the team gives a shit about the characters they're making. Elita's a great example. She's gotten four toys over the past six or so years, and shared molds with Starscream, G1 Arcee, Minerva (and Strongarm) and Prime Arcee in the process. Absolutely zero thought put into any of it, zero consistency, just slap some pastels and a girly head with lipstick paint apps on and call it a day.
Strongarm has much broader shoulders than the typical fembot. You can see them in the pics on tfwiki, especially the one with a caption referencing "Da Rulz", and the one just below where she's saluting. She really could've benefited from the Dragstrip/Dead End engineering, where the front wheels fold out and attach to the passenger compartment sides.

It's actually a pretty good rendition, otherwise. Everything from the waist down is pretty much spot on. The head sculpt is great, though the paint is hit or miss depending on the lighting in any particular picture. But look at pics 66 through 68. The backpack has so much mass attached to a part with not enough mass. And it looks like there are door wings, just not where they can contribute to matching the character model.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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I think the currently design philosophy is to maximise mold re-use with as little new tooling as possible, leading to everyone having to carry design traits for 6 different versions of a character or adjacent characters. Kind or economical, if unsatisfying.

... As well as leaving the feet just hanging off the back of every bloody vehicular Transformer which at first I thought was fair enough, given how hyper articulated everyone needs things to be for standing on a shelf with a billion other figures, but now is just starting to irritate me.

Why can't the feet go somewhere instead of just hanging around the back?
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Notably only building options for reuse as other characters, though. They know they can get people to buy another version of the same character if it's part of the core few dozen.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Tantrum wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:08 pm Maybe Hasbro figured Antagony had so many alt heads that including any 1 of them would just annoy fans of the other 3, so they decided to include none of them so all Antagony fans would be equally unhappy? At least that's fair.
That's fair. I've polled the other three people in the world who care about Antagony and none of us agreed on which head she should have. :glance:
Tantrum wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:08 pm Though, as a Selects release, is she even beholden to standard price points? They could've included all 4 heads and charged a few extra bucks.
Selects Artfire came with an entire extra $7 figure (his Targetmaster) and a ton of blast effects and somehow didn't cost any more than the other Selects Voyagers at the place I got him from, so I feel like these brown-box releases have a lot more flexibility even within their usual price points.
Tantrum wrote: Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:08 pm Having looked up G1 Skyquake, I can see why you're mad. It looks like the only reference in the Legacy one is the clear chest plate which appears to be related to a gimmick the new toy doesn't have, and the ability to dock with Needlenose, instead of the G1 character the original toy docked with. Maybe they plan to reshell the new toy into a more G1 figure and announce the corresponding Needlenose retool later?
The alt-mode is where most of the G1 Skyquake references show up, and it's actually a reasonable, if superficial, facsimile of the 90s toy. The bomb bays, "megavisor" and his armoured windows are all replicated...purely as sculpted detail, of course, they don't actually do anything. But the transformation scheme and robot mode design really look nothing like G1 Skyquake, so I'd have a hard time imagining any retool really "working". At best I could see a new head and maybe getting rid of the shoulder pads somehow, and that's not a very satisfactory rendition of the original.

I know I'm mostly grumbling about one of my obscure childhood favourites, and I'll happily admit that neither Skyquake is particularly important to the franchise in the grand scheme of things. But I feel like there's got to be a ton of people uphappy with the impact this had on the new Prime Dreadwing -- an actually popular character from a TV show that's now 0/5 when it comes to Legacy remakes being any good.
Skyquake87 wrote: Sat Jul 01, 2023 10:23 pm... As well as leaving the feet just hanging off the back of every bloody vehicular Transformer which at first I thought was fair enough, given how hyper articulated everyone needs things to be for standing on a shelf with a billion other figures, but now is just starting to irritate me.
I miss the days when the toys were packed in alt-mode. They actually had to put some effort into the vehicles and beasts in those days! Now it feels like 90% of the design energy on a lot of toys goes into making the robots look...not even "good" necessarily, but "right" compared to some sort of source material. If they have to use fake parts or completely punt the alt-mode to get there, that's a sacrifice the designers seem willing to make. So we get toys like SS86 Jazz and his foot-bumpers, or Legacy Inferno and his "scrunched robot in an ant-hat" beast mode. But a surprising number of fans don't seem to care about how well (or even if) their toys can transform, so from a marketing perspective maybe that's the right call?

All I know is that my favourite toys over the last few years have been the ones that I'm constantly transforming because I enjoy both of the modes too much to leave them static! But maybe I'm in the minority for caring about that?
Denyer wrote: Wed Jul 05, 2023 12:26 am Notably only building options for reuse as other characters, though. They know they can get people to buy another version of the same character if it's part of the core few dozen.
Anecdotally, I'm surprised by how many fans on more active boards will pop up and say things like "I only started collecting with Kingdom, should I pay $250 on eBay for a Siege Megatron or will they make another soon?" But I'm even more surprised to see how many people post pictures with eight different variants of Siege Megatron. :lol:

I don't blame Hasbro for wanting to keep the brand's most popular characters in circulation, I just wish they'd find a way to make it less boring for long-time fans that aren't a hardcore fan of that particular character.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

Post by Clay »

Well, after seeing the variety of new stuff shown for the SDCC, I think that Hasbro's doing quite well with the variety of characters/decos offered. I like the breadth offered, even if it's simultaneous with frequent character retreads (Ultra Magnus again already?).

Sticking by the criticism of prices and availability, though.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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https://news.tfw2005.com/2023/07/21/sdc ... ics-490879

Bravo for not releasing anything I'm interested in, I suppose. Whereas Mattel has apparently decided to kill off their toy design oriented MOTU Origins line early by making any further releases exclusive to their own online store. There aren't many figures left to do and most would need a 'deluxe' price point to pull off, granted, like the ones they've just previewed, but it's a big **** off to big online stores that have kept the brand going and to the rest of the world if Amazon also aren't getting them.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-OpWTu7FKlQ

It also really emphasises how many retail SKUs they've burnt through on other figures over the last few years that got remaindered.

Which I'm guessing will be a problem for Hasbro too with a lot of the redeco type figures they've just previewed. Maybe the last few years of rushing out new stuff at speed are about to catch up with them.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Okay, this is cool:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=X0eP5YGdla8

I mean, it's no Deathwader but the fact that the MP Grimlock design is so close to the original toy and the simple fact that the transformation means the figure can begin and end right way around resonates in a way the Prime doesn't. It almost makes up for the lurching and planking to provide a workaround for its centre of gravity. Robosen then only have to contend with being a very niche, fragile and expensive form of one step changer.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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All I know is that my favourite toys over the last few years have been the ones that I'm constantly transforming because I enjoy both of the modes too much to leave them static! But maybe I'm in the minority for caring about that?
Nope! It's probably one of the biggest reasons I cycle through Transformers fairly quickly these days. The new stuff might be every fan's wet dream, but I appreciate toys for being toys, y'know? Things that are to be played with. Not just sat in a display cabinet for the rest of time. Absolutely love the Legacy Stunticons, for example. Really great looking figures that properly transform into cars and have nice robot modes. Motormaster's trailer can do stuff other than be arms and legs for the big robot and I love having his warriors posed around his battlestation - just a shame it doesn't work with all the weaponizers and that, which is a huge miss, but not the end of the world.
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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It's like convention repaints never went away, isn't it? And there seems to have been a lot of stuff previewed recently that's similar with Legacy Evolutions, with every mould getting a repeat soon after an original use (deliberate strategy to maximise production run time in some way perhaps?) On the one hand it's nice that they're not sticking mostly to slavish variations on early characters, nor putting out stuff I might be interested in, but it also feels like a while since they did any fun updates of e.g. Double Targetmasters, Triggercons/bots, Pretenders, etc. This is a distinctly underwhelming head swap. I suppose it could count as an update of the RID (2015) one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Lb_xnFUBAk

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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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Skyquake87 wrote: Mon Jul 31, 2023 7:16 pm Absolutely love the Legacy Stunticons, for example. Really great looking figures that properly transform into cars and have nice robot modes. Motormaster's trailer can do stuff other than be arms and legs for the big robot and I love having his warriors posed around his battlestation - just a shame it doesn't work with all the weaponizers and that, which is a huge miss, but not the end of the world.
What kills me about the Menasor is the extra piece just laying around. It wouldn't have been much extra effort to give it a "backpack" mode or something and you could give the combiner a kind of hunchback like the toy had. That's not to say that they needed to take what they had and make it do something totally different (like having the limbs scramble or something). It's 95% of the way there already!

Denyer wrote: Sat Aug 05, 2023 12:04 pm every mould getting a repeat soon after an original use (deliberate strategy to maximise production run time in some way perhaps?)
Would imagine it's simpler to produce multiple decos from the molds already set up in production than one deco this year, put the mold in storage in a different facility, then put out a new deco two years later, and so on. Probably a bunch of other variables that we can't guess, though.

but it also feels like a while since they did any fun updates of e.g. Double Targetmasters, Triggercons/bots, Pretenders, etc.
Skullgrin, Bomb Burst, and Needlenose came out this year? Skullgrin is a bit weak, but the other two are fun...
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Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

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I think I'm just reacting to the slew of reveals that are redecoes and/or new head stuff. And jibing at Skullgrin and Bludgeon a bit. Bomb Burst is indeed nifty, as is Needlenose. Pointblank and Crankcase also get some credit for showing up, particularly if you upgrade the cannons on the latter.

If I don't score a G2 trooper later in the week I might go for the troop builder pack too, by the time you've bought two of them parted out plus shipping costs it's worth it and there isn't really a bad figure in there... so was happy enough to be outbid earlier on a seeker. I've just got two of them already as Crosshairs and the earlier Allicon. In many ways it's a rare good attempt at a bundled release.
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Tantrum
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Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 1:24 am
Custom Title: Systems Analyst
Location: Aquidneck Island, RI, USA

Re: Grumpy old men: armchair brand management

Post by Tantrum »

Skyquake87 wrote: Sat Jul 01, 2023 10:23 pm... As well as leaving the feet just hanging off the back of every bloody vehicular Transformer which at first I thought was fair enough, given how hyper articulated everyone needs things to be for standing on a shelf with a billion other figures, but now is just starting to irritate me.

Why can't the feet go somewhere instead of just hanging around the back?
Or just sculpt the feet so they look like the back of the vehicle. Strongarm seems a particularly egregious example. It's not like her feet are a defining characteristic. Also, Earthrise Ironhide/Ratchet. SS 86 Jazz would've looked fine with smaller toes that formed a well-proportioned bumper. OK, maybe not, since a grey bumper would look odd. But, Jackpot would look good.

That Bludgeon/Tarn screen shot shows the problems that can arise when only retooling the head. There's a lot of sculpted detail in that mold that's meant to be picked out with paint, like the two-toned forearms, shin and foot stripes, and toes. When trying to use that same sculpted detail for another character, there's 3 options:
1) Pick out the same detail in paint, probably with different colors. This just reinforces that the two are the same figure, while likely making the retool less accurate to the original design.
2) Apply paint details elsewhere. This would probably look bad since the paint and sculpt would conflict instead of complimenting each other.
3) Apply less paint detail. This is what they went with here, making the lower legs look unfinished.

If you design the mold for multiple characters, there's
4) Have lots of sculpted detail. Apply paint to different detail for different characters. Don't apply paint to all detail for any one character.
This is what they did for the PotP fembot Deluxe. It only "works" if you don't care about homaging any one character very well.

The best option is:
5) Retool the outer part of the mold to better match the second character.
It seems like they've done this a few times, but not often. Maybe this go around, they decided to leave the mold mostly unchanged in case people who couldn't find Tarn wanted to paint Bludgeon.

A samurai skeleton Transformer sounds too awesome to pass up. But, I've already got the old movie-verse figure to look cool, and the RiD15 one to fiddle with, so I'll probably pass on this one.
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