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Post by Philip Ayres on Aug 29, 2015 16:50:06 GMT
Jonathan wants the original but I've not seen it cheap enough yet.
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Post by Llama God on Aug 29, 2015 16:50:35 GMT
Of course, I *do* own the AoE version. But I got that for thirty quid. It's fun for thirty quid. But that's not what'll retail at. It's like they never learn...
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Post by Philip Ayres on Aug 29, 2015 17:07:17 GMT
They did in Argos in the sale. But could I find an Argos that had one? Could I ****!
There's a £40 one on Amazon ....
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Post by Pinwig on Aug 29, 2015 17:12:40 GMT
Given that bubble bath Bumblebee was put up for fifty quid this'll at least be back to the £80 the first one started at surely... If they'd redone the robot head I could just about get it, but this is totally the wrong style for RiD.
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Post by legios on Aug 30, 2015 0:38:28 GMT
Mwahahaha. Another item for my local Smyths "when Hel freezes stocK...
Karl.
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 30, 2015 9:01:22 GMT
Oh dear.
It will be interesting to see if other toy lines are wiped out this Chrimbo by the big piles of Star Wars ep 7 stuff that I imagine will be everywhere.
-Ralph
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Post by blueshift on Aug 30, 2015 9:19:09 GMT
Given that bubble bath Bumblebee was put up for fifty quid Wait, what? On a tangent, I find it interesting how little people are caring about RiD. There was barely anything RiD at Auto Assembly this year. For what is ostensibly the big new line for the franchise, that's a bit uh, wow. |
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Post by Pinwig on Aug 30, 2015 10:44:42 GMT
I may have that price wrong, I was sure we saw one of the new big plastic RiD Bumblebees priced at £50. Or was it $50? it was discussed somewhere recently.
I think the lack of interest in RiD from the general fan community is partly to do with how flippin good the Generations line is at the moment, the attention and money is going there, but also the way that RiD is a definite step toward a younger audience than Prime was. I think Hasbro have that right, they need to chase their market and we know they're pitching RiD as a toy for 5-10 year olds, but the upshot is a fairly cheap looking simple toyline, and a cartoon that struggles to maintain narrative interest (I've quite enjoyed it, but it doesn't have the hooks that Beast Hunters did).
The Warrior scale is the sticking point. If they were the quality of the Generations deluxes I think more of the hardcore would be interested, but they just aren't. With the possible exception of Grimlock they really aren't good toys at all. Steeljaw is one of the worst Transformers I've ever played with, which is such a shame when initially it looked like that scale was going to be a fusion of Animated and Prime. Knowing aesthetically that's what they were going for, but the toys not being anywhere near as good as even Prime, and MILES away from Animated, was a big let down.
I bought the first four Warriors and was disappointed enough to ignore the rest and channel money into Generations instead. Oh, except for one-step Thunderhoof, which is the finest toy ever made. Period. Because... KOSPEGO COMMANDS!
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Post by blueshift on Aug 30, 2015 10:56:51 GMT
Oh, I'm well on board for making stuff more suitable for younger children. I remember finding the G1 figures hard to transform, I felt so sorry for kids with the movie stuff! That said what they've been putting out lately tends to be a combination of amazingly cheap and ugly looking AND really expensive. One of those wouldn't be an issue, but both is... ugh.
Edit: Just looked at some video reviews of that Steeljaw figure. Oh wow.
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Post by Toph on Aug 30, 2015 12:15:46 GMT
Yeah, all that, plus many of them tend to be lazy simple.
Like I've said before, Simple and easy is one thing. You can have a really clever transformation that's still simple and easy.
Plenty of armada minicons were simple, but clever.
So easy and simplistic transformation schemes are not mutually exclusive from clever transformations.
But many of the NuRiD stuff just feels lazy.
I think what also does not help at all, is there is zero sense of continuity. Hasbro has done the shittiest job possible in making sure that their precious Aligned continuity works. The only two elements that feel like they belong together, that feels like they share a continuity are NuRiD and Rescue Bots. Because NuRiD feels like it's the same world, same writers, but just geared for a slightly older audience.
Where as it doesn't work as the sequel to Prime (in the same way that Energon was a proper follow up to Armada). And it outright contradicts the games, as Grimlock and Sideswipe couldn't possibly be more different (visually and personality) than their game versions.
This is not me saying I don't like the nuRiD versions better as characters, than just being boringly slavish G1 knockoffs, but it is very unprofessional of Hasbro who try to push Aligned as their default go-to continuity.
I think zero consistency really hurts it with the long time fans. I mean, look how many fans STILL believe WfC and FoC are G1 based games? After how many years, now?
(Though IDW pointlessly stealing FoC designs for their G1 setting doesn't help)
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Post by blueshift on Aug 30, 2015 12:37:51 GMT
Yeah but lets be fair, they totally ARE G1 based games for all intents and purposes  |
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Post by Benn on Aug 30, 2015 12:51:50 GMT
And IDW isn't G1 either.
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Post by blueshift on Aug 30, 2015 12:57:19 GMT
I'd argue that it is. I mean, it's G1 in that it's an offshoot of G1 in the way that the original comic and cartoon etc etc were all offshoots of the same thing. It's clearly set in that universe with variations on the same characters (as opposed to being its own new thing like say, Armada and the original Robots in Disguise).
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Post by Toph on Aug 30, 2015 13:28:08 GMT
I'd argue that it is. I mean, it's G1 in that it's an offshoot of G1 in the way that the original comic and cartoon etc etc were all offshoots of the same thing. It's clearly set in that universe with variations on the same characters (as opposed to being its own new thing like say, Armada and the original Robots in Disguise). Very much this. G1 consists of Sunbow, Marvel, Blackrock 3D, several dozen storybooks, Dreamwave (Both miniseries, ongoing, War Within, vs GI Joe), IDW (Infiltration to CW/RiD/MtmtE), Classics, Wings of Honor universe, Hearts of Steel Related/spinoffs/sequels consist of Generation 2, Beast Wars, Beast Machines, Machine Wars (for lack of any other placement the default is usually accepted as G1), Shattered Glass. Just because the term Generation 1 didn't exist back then, does not mean it isn't a real term that is canonically and officially used to signify that era of characters. Beast Wars has a few different continuities attached to it by now. The characters vary wildly in personality between each one. Toy bios, Cartoon, IDW, DofP, Beast Wars Uprising. No one has once yet argued that Uprising Rampage isn't Beast Wars because he comes from a newer continuity, and his personality is a bit different. No one has argued that cartoon Waspinator isn't BW because he's not the hard Arnie-like badass his toy bio says he is. IDW's main continuity is as much G1 as the Marvel comics, the sunbow cartoon, the toy bios, the dreamwave setting, and the three blackrock comics. |
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Post by Benn on Aug 30, 2015 14:04:06 GMT
And yet pulls in characters and settings that are not Generation One, from Beast Wars to Prime to Victorion. It's as inspired by G1 as the Bay films in that there's an Optimus Prime and a Megatron but that doesn't make it G1. To me anyway.
All the lines you mention as G1 share visual cues in the look of the robots (except Hearts of Steel, not sure why that's not a spin-off), but right from the get go, IDW's robots did not share the cartoon/toyline aesthetic of all the other G1 properties, and has drifted further away the longer it's gone on. The only G1 IDW book I can think of is the Mars Attacks! crossover.
I am aware that this is not the standard viewpoint, and that this is just my own opinion.
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Post by Toph on Aug 30, 2015 14:21:48 GMT
That's what happens in new fiction. It grows. It changes. It evolves.
Marvel 616 is constantly working in elements from other marvel continuities. From X-23 being brought in from X-Men Evolution, to Nick Fury becoming Samuel L Jackson from Ultimate, to Falcon becoming cool from MCU.
Why shouldn't the current G1 continuity use newer concepts and characters, instead of rehashing the exact same themes and stories told with these characters before?
Why does it suddenly become not G1, just because there are some new characters like Windblade and Victorion?
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Post by Benn on Aug 30, 2015 15:11:17 GMT
Mostly becuase whenever something like Marvel bring in elements from the movies and whatnot, it's added to a preexisting continuity. If TF's had been a consistent story/plot/universe for 30 odd years, I wouldn't be having this discussion.
But Transformers has rebooted every few years. It's always new. And I find it disingenuous to claim IDW to be G1 when anyone returning to the franchise being told it's G1 would be baffled at, say, Megatron and Galvatron being different people, Daniel being Spike's dad, and the Ark not being crashed in a volcano.
It's a whole different thing. Just because it's G1 inspired doesn't make it G1. Okay... in Marvel terms, IDW is the Ultimate to G1's 616.
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Post by blueshift on Aug 30, 2015 15:21:02 GMT
But Transformers has rebooted every few years. It's always new. And I find it disingenuous to claim IDW to be G1 when anyone returning to the franchise being told it's G1 would be baffled at, say, Megatron and Galvatron being different people, Daniel being Spike's dad, and the Ark not being crashed in a volcano. At the risk of going wildly off-topic, it's no different to Spike vs Buster or Dinobots being built on Earth vs pre-existing on Cybertron, and no-one would argue that the Marvel G1 comics and Sunbow cartoon aren't both G1. The IDW comic is built off exactly the same base, as opposed to say, Armada and Beast Wars and even Prime, which clearly have a nod to G1 but have their own unique divergence on designs and setting and personality. (Prime is an odd one as Aligned is some sort of frankensteinish slavish G1 homage monster that is trying to claw its way back to G1 and bunging in everything that is released into a hodgepodge.) |
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Post by legios on Aug 30, 2015 15:36:40 GMT
And yet pulls in characters and settings that are not Generation One, from Beast Wars to Prime to Victorion. It's as inspired by G1 as the Bay films in that there's an Optimus Prime and a Megatron but that doesn't make it G1. To me anyway. All the lines you mention as G1 share visual cues in the look of the robots (except Hearts of Steel, not sure why that's not a spin-off), but right from the get go, IDW's robots did not share the cartoon/toyline aesthetic of all the other G1 properties, and has drifted further away the longer it's gone on. The only G1 IDW book I can think of is the Mars Attacks! crossover. I am aware that this is not the standard viewpoint, and that this is just my own opinion. Actually it isn't just your opinion, I share most of it as well although not for the same reasons. I tend to end up grouping things together by their thematic similarities than aesthetic ones necessarily. So I'd say that Masterforce and Beast Machines are more similar to each other, with their spiritual elements as a strong thread of their narrative, than Masterforce is similar to the Sunbow series. But then, I prefer not to use the term G1 because I feel it has mutated so much that it no longer appears to function as a clear demarcation. At least not in the way it did when I entered fandom, when there was "The Comic", "Generation 2" and "G1". But *eh* I was a Legion of Superheroes fan. I've dealt with their not only being successive versions of the Legion which are unrelated to the ones before them, but having two simultaneous competing "true and only" versions coexisting simultaneously. As a result I tend to do a lower level segmentation of things, so I don't see the Dreamwave comics, IDW comics and Marvel comics as being any more related to each other than they are to the Sunbow show, Animated or Beast Wars. Karl |
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Post by Toph on Aug 30, 2015 16:16:52 GMT
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Post by Benn on Aug 30, 2015 18:15:58 GMT
I am not the fandom!  Seriously though, I'm happy enough in my own little corner. I don't mind how everyone else views it, and how I think of it doesn't impact on anything. Head-Fanon-Canon, innit? |
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 30, 2015 19:27:48 GMT
Nothing called 'Generation 1' existed when I was a kid growing up with Transformers stuff so I tend to ignore the term except as an understandable qualifier when discussing toys, ie referring to 1984 Ironhide toy as G1 Ironhide etc so folk know which Ironhide toy I mean.
-Ralph
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Post by blueshift on Sept 5, 2015 13:18:17 GMT
I was in ASDA earlier. So uh... since when have Legends been £7 toys? Jeez. I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone.
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 5, 2015 13:38:02 GMT
Heh. Don't go to TRU then, £7 is the cheap price. CW Legends retail for anything up to £10.99.
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Post by blueshift on Sept 5, 2015 13:39:56 GMT
What the what
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 5, 2015 14:32:25 GMT
Oh yes. The CW Legends started at £9.99 in Sainsbury's and have been discounted to £6.66, but Ralph's the only one with a magical shop that actually stocked them. I think the RiD ones were a bit cheaper (they're discounted now to £3.50 I think in Sainsbury's, so £7 was probably the start point).
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Post by blueshift on Sept 5, 2015 14:37:28 GMT
The CW ones are more complex though aren't they? More like your basic figure. Or rather sub-basic, I guess.
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Post by Pinwig on Sept 5, 2015 14:39:34 GMT
Yes, you're probably right there. The RiD ones are Legion size aren't they? I haven't bought any. Legends are a bit bigger.
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Post by blueshift on Sept 5, 2015 14:53:46 GMT
Yeah they're the tinnnnnnnnnnnnny ones.
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Post by The Doctor on Sept 5, 2015 20:26:04 GMT
Oh yes. The CW Legends started at £9.99 in Sainsbury's and have been discounted to £6.66, but Ralph's the only one with a magical shop that actually stocked them. I think the RiD ones were a bit cheaper (they're discounted now to £3.50 I think in Sainsbury's, so £7 was probably the start point). You are correct though the CW legends are now at a magical £5 (though no sign of Powerglide grrrrr). -Ralph |
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