Percentage of Repaints

[Verno]

Repaints.

I don't know what marketing genius came up with the idea, and I'm fine with the idea in small doses, but what sort of percentage of lines are either repaints themselves or have been subsequently repainted?

I'll use the example of my beloved Beast Wars: Transmetals.

Razorclaw (Repaint of Original Razorclaw)
Airazor (Repaint of Original Airazor)
Tarantulas (Fox Kids Tarantulas)
Waspinator (Fox Kids Waspinator)
Terrorsaur (Armada Terrorsaur)
Rattrap (WalMart Rattrap [PackRat])
Cheetor (Fox Kids Cheetor) (Armada Cheetor)
Rhinox (Fox Kids Rhinox) (Armada Rhinox)
Airazor (Fox Kids Airazor) (Armada Airazor)
Megatron (Armada Predacon)
Scavenger
Optimus Primal (BotCon Apelinq)
Rampage (BotCon Shakoract)
Depth Charge (Universe Depth Charge)
Optimal Optimus (Beast Machines Primal Prime)

15 figures in total in the line, 14 of which have been repainted at least once, and I'm sure I've missed a couple. And this is just the Transmetals, let alone the TM2's or Originals.

The Armada ones make me laugh. The idea was that the mini-cons enabled missiles to fire or some other hidden feature, but when it came to the BW moulds, they just clipped on and that was the end. Ridiculous.

So, taking a line like DOTM or ROTF, moving into the future, are we to see figures from those lines super-imposed onto other lines? Or have they already been repainted enough within their own line? Nightwatch Optimus Prime. What a load of bollocks.

I like repaints if they are a different character. Without them I wouldn't have Tigatron or Blackarachnia, but the percentage of repaints in the line seems to be getting worse and worse with time - by worse I of course mean more.

TF: Prime is the new baby. What can we expect to see from it? Starscream painted into every other seeker out of principle? A Megatron repainted into a Galvatron, even though Galvatron isn't even in it (yet)? An Armada Unicron repainted to appear as a TF: Prime Unicron?

It's a bad, and seemingly ever worsening, habit that Hasbro have gotten in to. Yes, there were repaints in G1, but never to this scale.

[Golden Phoenix]

Interesting idea.
Would you include remoulds as a separate statistic or as the same as a repaint?

[Verno]

Interesting idea.
Would you include remoulds as a separate statistic or as the same as a repaint?

That's a tough one, and depends a lot on the amount of work done. Wolfang and K-9 are more or less the same mould, but then again, there is enough to make them different to be individual figures and counted as seperate. Megatron Croc and Iguanus are in the same boat.

So major retools would be seperate for me.

[kup]

Since 2001, the line has begun to increasingly be dominated by repaints specially after the second of third wave of a line.

[griffin]

Unfortunately it's a necessary evil to keep the costs down. Each time they can re-use a mould and sell the redeco (or even a new headed figure), the total investment for those toys comes down due to the cost of design, development and most importantly, the cost of the Moulds themselves. We may not see the cost saving in action, but for a long time during that period size classes like Deluxe was pegged at the US$10 price point, and I can imagine that they tried to prevent it going above that for as long as possible, despite inflation, cost of oil/plastic and weakening US$.

I don't like it either, but I'm willing to accept it if it means the toys are 20%, 10% or even 5% cheaper.
And on the plus side, it can also give us redecos that might look better than the original deco, giving "selective" collectors better choice on purchasing the best version for their "quality" collection. Even me as a "have to buy them all" collector, I will sometimes have a later deco at the front of a display shelf because it looks better than the first version.

[Verno]

Having said that though Grif, have the toys gotten cheaper in price with the increase of repaints over the years? Most of you, from what I read, only buy them when they're on sale anyway, rarely at full retail price.

[griffin]

But that's us here, who are being shafted with the prices... but I don't see redecos making toys cheaper, it just offsets a necessary price rise due to rising costs of production or weakening exchange rate.
If there really is any cost saving for hasbro to do redecos, imagine how much more expensive the toys would be here if they didn't do redecos.

I'd imagine that the only way to know for sure is being on the Hasbro board, or accessing their corporate archives, to know the reasons for redecos... so is all just guesses from me.

I did have a look at some figures though, to see how price has compared to inflation. Compared to inflation of about 34% in America since 1996, the rising cost of primary resources and fluctuating US$, a Deluxe class figure has (only) gone up 20% in that same time in America.
It's more difficult to assess that for us though with Hasbro America dictating our prices and everything being paid for in US$ before stock arrives in Australia, but Deluxe prices for us were at $20 during Beast Wars, went up to about $30 a few years back, and is now sitting at $25-30 at the major stores.

[SkyWarp91]

Sounds like not only are you not fond of repaints, but all other lines that aren't BW :D:D:p

[Verno]

Sounds like not only are you not fond of repaints, but all other lines that aren't BW :D:D:p

That's not true. I'm not a fan of other lines bastardising BW moulds. I quite like the look of Alternators and really think that, coupled with RID, gave birth to G1-esk figures of goodness that we're seeing now in Generations, which also look quite snazzy.

I question why it's BW specifically that's been so heavily borrowed from? BM has 40-odd moulds that could have been reused in the time since, but even that line wasn't devoid of borrowing from BW: T-Wrecks, Dinotron, Rapticon, Terranotron... It's a smaller percentage, but they couldn't resist repainting their rider figures.

[GoktimusPrime]

I don't mind repaints if there's some creativity behind it rather than just complete randomness. I tend to prefer repaints where the repaint is a new character instead of a variant of the same character.

Look at the CHUGUR Seekers for example - they're all repaints (and retools in the case of Ramjet, Dirge and Thrust) of the Classics Starscream mould, but people like to collect them because each one of them is a unique individual.

I don't want more versions of Optimus Prime and Bumblebee... I want more new characters! Instead of giving us another repaint of Movie Optimus Prime, why not paint him white and finally give us movie Ultra Magnus? We had Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage pegwarming badly... why not repaint Ravage as movieverse Glit and Howlback? Or heck, even Steeljaw would have been preferrable.

Transformers Generations did pretty well in retooling/repainting certain moulds to give us new characters. e.g.: Drift/Blurr, Darkmount/Skullgrin, Sunstreaker/Red Alert, Tracks/Wheeljack, WFC Bumblebee/Cliffjumper, and the upcoming Junkheap (from Wreck Gar).

And we saw that there were other potential retools/repaints that they had planned for Generations but for some reason didn't happen (but it would've been so awesome if it did), e.g. Thunderwing/Black Shadow, Kup/Gears... and there's a lot of other potential repaints they could do with Generations that I reckon would sell, e.g. WFC Optimus Prime --> Ultra Magnus, Scourge --> Sweep, Cyclonus --> Armada, Warpath --> Treds...

And there's potential in RTS too like Jazz --> Ricochet, Windcharger --> Tailgate (just needs a new head), Perceptor --> Reflector etc. And Legends Starscream could be repainted five more times as the other Seekers and Legends Prowl could be retooled/repainted as Legends Bluestreak.

...there's a LOT that Hasbro can do with repaints to make them interesting and appealing with creativity instead of just random and banal with things like "Yet Another Bumblebee." Boo.

And Beast Wars did pretty well in this department - sure we had repaints and retools, but often they became different characters.
e.g.:
Cheetor/Tigatron(/Shadow Panther)
Terrorsaur/Lazorbeak
Waspinator/Buzz Saw
Tarantulas/Blackarachnia
Dinobot/Grimlock (Grimmie needs a GPS free reissue stat!!)
TM2 Cheetor/Tripredacus Agent
...etc. Far more imagination and creativity at work there instead of "Nitro Cheetor." Erm... okay.

[SkyWarp91]

That's not true. I'm not a fan of other lines bastardising BW moulds. I quite like the look of Alternators and really think that, coupled with RID, gave birth to G1-esk figures of goodness that we're seeing now in Generations, which also look quite snazzy.

I question why it's BW specifically that's been so heavily borrowed from? BM has 40-odd moulds that could have been reused in the time since, but even that line wasn't devoid of borrowing from BW: T-Wrecks, Dinotron, Rapticon, Terranotron... It's a smaller percentage, but they couldn't resist repainting their rider figures.

Haha my comment was only a joke :) - maybe BM isnt popular enough to be borrowed from?

[liegeprime]

Well Im just assuming repaints = more profits for Hasbro. Also less trouble coming up with a new mould for another character... but for same character repaints beats the pus out of me, mebbe as mentioned earlier = profits still behind as reason, coz lets face it, WE, are not the target customers of Hasbro.
It's the toy stores, who are targetted to buy the random repaint Hasbro offers up. Whether these shelfwarm or not is not anymore Hasbro's concern, it's the toy stores that have to make up for their losses.

Not all repaints are bad though, I can attest to that, at times better than original and even at times offer an incentive to the fandom;) (Hasbro throwing us a bone from time to time) e.g. G1 colored Generations/Classicverse whatever Starscream which I really prefer over the first release only because I didnt like the stylized wing deco - I sold the Classics one shortly after. Another would be the generations minicons combiners repaint... if it werent for that I wouldnt be able to get them as the G1 originals are kinda pricy for such little figs seeing as well that these are jap exclusives on first release.

As for the reuse of BW to Armada - even though there's no gimmick when one does attach a minicon to them (ending up with minicons just look like unsightly over growths) I guess coz Armada ended up more of a lumped up homage line which carried on to Energon so it kinda paid tribute to both G1 and BW - using the names of old character in new molds/characterizations, but with the BW moulds the moulds are still useable and quite poseable really, so instead prolly of major new mould creation , a reuse was decided - again this is just pure speculation.

Then, there's the filer line repaints.The very first generations line (filler) was filled in by whatnot recolours and slapped with the random names that the people at Hasbro thought would fit:p at times it works somehow - e.g. Nemesis Prime (Big Convoy) at times it just looks tacky as e.g. Purple Fuzor Silverbolt, i dont know what color Optimus Primal, eeeww - the bottom line is, for me, basically profit and cost saving:)

[GoktimusPrime]

Yeah but that doesn't explain why Hasbro can't be more clever and creative with their repaints. Look at the Classicsverse Seekers -- a relatively inexpensive concept because you just need to repaint Starscream as Thundercracker and Skywarp, and repaint/retool Ramjet as Dirge and Thrust. It's such a cheap and simply idea that Hasbro should have done with Classics, but no, instead they let it drag on for five freakin' years across Classics, Timelines, Henkei/Gentei, Universe and Generations. They gave us Acid Storm long before they gave us Thundercracker, Dirge and Thrust at retail! Whaaaa? (although at least Acid Storm was a new character and not something like "Sky Cruise Starscream")

I understand the need for Hasbro to do repaints, and I don't necessarily object to the practice per se, but what I'm not fond of is when it's done as a half-bum effort (IMO). Instead of giving us banal repaints of the same character like Battle Steel Optimus Prime, Battle In The Moonlight Optimus Prime, Lunarfire Optimus Prime, Firegutsburst Optimus Prime etc., give us Movie Ultra Magnus and Movie Nemesis Prime... as simple and mundane as these ideas may seem - and I remember a time when I was getting sick of all the Optimus Prime moulds being repainted white and black for Ultra Magnus and Nemesis Prime... but I much prefer it over "Yet Another Optimus Prime"!

[liegeprime]

yeah well, I dunno the r real reasoning for such random releases of recolours Gok.:p:p I don't wanna say it, but you might wanna refer to the part first of GiJoe the movie where Serpentor, Cobra Commander and the Cobra Officer were having a heated argument on why they always lose... and you'd get the answer hehehe;);)

[Tober]

Some lines seem more susceptible than others. Animated didn't get many repaints (Starscream aside, but that was story driven at least). So far it doesn't look like there will be many for Prime either.

It does fet to me when they start re-purposing characters tho. Cybertron Soundwave as Classics Blaster... :rolleyes:

[Quickstrike]

Haha my comment was only a joke :) - maybe BM isnt popular enough to be borrowed from?

Robots in Disguise and Universe both had a bunch of redecos of Beast Machines toys.

[GoktimusPrime]

Robots in Disguise and Universe both had a bunch of redecos of Beast Machines toys.

RiD had limited number of BM moulds redeco'd... and Universe 1.0 was just craptacular... or as I called it, "Beast Wars Generation 2" :p (cos we saw lots of BW (and BM) moulds re-released with weird colours, just like G2 started off with G1 toys released with weird colours)

[Cat]

Yeah but that doesn't explain why Hasbro can't be more clever and creative with their repaints. Look at the Classicsverse Seekers -- a relatively inexpensive concept because you just need to repaint Starscream as Thundercracker and Skywarp, and repaint/retool Ramjet as Dirge and Thrust. It's such a cheap and simply idea that Hasbro should have done with Classics, but no, instead they let it drag on for five freakin' years across Classics, Timelines, Henkei/Gentei, Universe and Generations. They gave us Acid Storm long before they gave us Thundercracker, Dirge and Thrust at retail! Whaaaa? (although at least Acid Storm was a new character and not something like "Sky Cruise Starscream")

I understand the need for Hasbro to do repaints, and I don't necessarily object to the practice per se, but what I'm not fond of is when it's done as a half-bum effort (IMO). Instead of giving us banal repaints of the same character like Battle Steel Optimus Prime, Battle In The Moonlight Optimus Prime, Lunarfire Optimus Prime, Firegutsburst Optimus Prime etc., give us Movie Ultra Magnus and Movie Nemesis Prime... as simple and mundane as these ideas may seem - and I remember a time when I was getting sick of all the Optimus Prime moulds being repainted white and black for Ultra Magnus and Nemesis Prime... but I much prefer it over "Yet Another Optimus Prime"!


The Classics Seekers is down to one thing: popularity. The popularity of Classics took Hasbro by surprise. They had no intention of continuing it, thus when Botcon got them, they weren't going to be produced otherwise. (I've still got my Botcon Seekers, still love them for different reasons to the later releases).

Of course it ended up in drama, but it wasn't malice by Hasbro.

They ended up giving a fair distance between the Botcon release, and their own domestic release. In between that you had the Gentei releases in Japan, so at that stage, you had had two chances to get them.

Acid Storm was neat, I was pleased to have a totally new Seeker. It seemed obvious that the others were coming at some stage.

[Cat]

As for the reuse of BW to Armada - even though there's no gimmick when one does attach a minicon to them (ending up with minicons just look like unsightly over growths) I guess coz Armada ended up more of a lumped up homage line which carried on to Energon so it kinda paid tribute to both G1 and BW - using the names of old character in new molds/characterizations, but with the BW moulds the moulds are still useable and quite poseable really, so instead prolly of major new mould creation , a reuse was decided - again this is just pure speculation.


The BW moulds were used in Armada because the line was proving more popular than Hasbro had anticipated. They needed product, and they needed it QUICK.

Not enough time to create new moulds, so they dug out the ?four? BW moulds and released those, to fill shelves.

[GoktimusPrime]

Five. Don't forget the retool/repaint of TM Megatron.

Perhaps not releasing all the Seekers during Classics may not have been malice, but it was odd that they'd release Starscream and Skywarp for Classics but not Thundercracker. And then it took Hasbro years to release the rest of the Seekers in retail... why release Acid Storm before releasing Thundercracker, Dirge and Thrust??? Acid Storm was a peg-warmer too - but surely it makes more sense to release the rest of the "core" G1 Seekers before venturing off with obscure characters like the green Rainmaker. If anything, Thundercracker should have been released in retail sooner and Acid-Storm should have been a BotCon exclusive (IMHO).

And why give us Classics Ramjet but not Dirge and Thrust?? If they didn't want to give us all 6 Seekers, they should have just released Starscream, Skywarp and Thundercracker in Classics -- it would have been inexpensive to do because they just repaint the same mould... then if they sell well, do the Coneheads.

And that's the thing that frustrated me... the whole idea of doing repaints is that it's such an inexpensive way of pumping out "new" toys because Hasbro doesn't need to invest in any R&D to develop a new mould. If the repaint shelf warms, then they don't lose out as much as with a new mould... so it's a relatively "safer" risk. Yet with the Seekers Hasbro were ultra ultra cautious... but took risks with other weird crap like Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage - who peg-warmed something chronic.


They ended up giving a fair distance between the Botcon release, and their own domestic release.
Which was nigh on frustrating. Five years to collect the Classicsverse Seekers? Gah!!


In between that you had the Gentei releases in Japan, so at that stage, you had had two chances to get them.
Not very good chances considering that:

a/ They were limited exclusives
b/ They were f'expensive ($50 for a Deluxe?!? Owch!!)

I did get Gentei Thrust, Skywarp and Thundercracker... but it cost me a pretty penny. :(

Also, this would not have been part of Hasbro's plan because Hasbro and Takara are contractually forbidden from 'cross-contaminating' each other's market; i.e. Hasbro can't go and tell Takara to release Seekers that they haven't done to "cover" them or vice versa.


Acid Storm was neat, I was pleased to have a totally new Seeker. It seemed obvious that the others were coming at some stage.
It's easy in hindsight to say that the others were coming at some stage - I don't know about you - but at the time Acid Storm came out I really had no idea if Hasbro or Takara would ever release Thundercracker, Dirge or Thrust in retail. Why else would I have bothered to pay fifty freaking dollars each for Gentei Thundercracker and Thrust?? (I got Skywarp because he came with Thundercracker - I already had Classics Skywarp at the time)

I missed out on Gentei Dirge too... so Dirge eluded me for a long time. I was so desperate that I got Universe Dirge (repaint of Voyager Cybertron Starscream) as a placeholder in hope that Hasbro or Takara would release Dirge again (hopefully in retail) and that I would be able to get it. Three years later I finally got Generations Dirge and I sold off Universe Dirge.

I don't think it was any intentional malice... I highly doubt Hasbro execs sat back evilly laughing saying, "Let's make TF collectors wait 5 years to complete their Seekers, wahahaha!" -- that's not what I'm implying... but it does seem to be a rather unfocused, inattentive and sporadic effort from Hasbro. As Ultra Magnus says, Consistency is victory! :cool:

[UltraMarginal]

Five. Don't forget the retool/repaint of TM Megatron.

Perhaps not releasing all the Seekers during Classics may not have been malice, but it was odd that they'd release Starscream and Skywarp for Classics but not Thundercracker. And then it took Hasbro years to release the rest of the Seekers in retail... why release Acid Storm before releasing Thundercracker, Dirge and Thrust??? Acid Storm was a peg-warmer too - but surely it makes more sense to release the rest of the "core" G1 Seekers before venturing off with obscure characters like the green Rainmaker. If anything, Thundercracker should have been released in retail sooner and Acid-Storm should have been a BotCon exclusive (IMHO).

And why give us Classics Ramjet but not Dirge and Thrust?? If they didn't want to give us all 6 Seekers, they should have just released Starscream, Skywarp and Thundercracker in Classics -- it would have been inexpensive to do because they just repaint the same mould... then if they sell well, do the Coneheads.

And that's the thing that frustrated me... the whole idea of doing repaints is that it's such an inexpensive way of pumping out "new" toys because Hasbro doesn't need to invest in any R&D to develop a new mould. If the repaint shelf warms, then they don't lose out as much as with a new mould... so it's a relatively "safer" risk. Yet with the Seekers Hasbro were ultra ultra cautious... but took risks with other weird crap like Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage - who peg-warmed something chronic.





I'd wager that they were seperated by so much time largely because they were the same mold. apart form collectors, many parents would have said to little johnny "but you got that jet only a couplemonths ago". too many of the seekers would have shelfwarmed like the ravage did. too many of the same thing in a short period of time = shelfwarmer.

releasing the seekers 6-12 months apart, gave them a gauranteed % of sales in each wave.

[GoktimusPrime]

Okay, but in the original Classics series Hasbro gave us 3 Seekers:
* Starscream
* Skywarp
* Ramjet

I would have preferred:
* Starscream
* Skywarp
* Thundercracker

...unless you think a simple retool would really persuade more parents to have purchased Ramjet over Thundercracker. Even if this were the case, why release Acid Storm before Thundercracker? I can see now appeal advantage to G1-ignorant kids (especially considering how freaking obscure a character Acid Storm was in G1 - having only appeared briefly in ONE episode of the G1 cartoon, whereas Thundercracker was a recurring character across all G1 mediums).

Surely Hasbro could have given us Thundercracker during Transformers Universe instead of Acid Storm. I still don't know why we had to wait half a decade between getting Starscream and Skywarp, then finally getting Thundercracker in retail. Gah.


too many of the seekers would have shelfwarmed like the ravage did. too many of the same thing in a short period of time = shelfwarmer.
And yet they still went ahead and pushed out those pegwarming Ravage repaints. So Hasbro denied us a Classics Thundercracked and denied a Universe Thundercracker, but they were more than happy to throw Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage at us!

And I would say that Thundercracker would have more marketing appeal than Recon and Sea Attack Ravage because he's a whole different character. As I said before, if Hasbro wanted to repaint the ROTF Ravage mould, I reckon they should have tried to make it a new character - so instead of giving us Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage, give us Movie-verse Howlback and Glit. Sure these are obscure characters - no more obscure than Acid Storm. And they couldn't have possibly peg-warmed any worse than Recon and Sea Attack Ravage. G1-ignorant kids wouldn't know the difference, and fans would be more attracted to them.

There just seems to be lack of consistency in Hasbro's approach to repaints...

[UltraMarginal]

Okay, but in the original Classics series Hasbro gave us 3 Seekers:
* Starscream
* Skywarp
* Ramjet

I would have preferred:
* Starscream
* Skywarp
* Thundercracker


as would we all, but who knows why they did it in the particular order they did.



And yet they still went ahead and pushed out those pegwarming Ravage repaints. So Hasbro denied us a Classics Thundercracked and denied a Universe Thundercracker, but they were more than happy to throw Recon Ravage and Sea Attack Ravage at us!

And I would say that Thundercracker would have more marketing appeal than Recon and Sea Attack Ravage because he's a whole different character. There just seems to be lack of consistency in Hasbro's approach to repaints..

I would have said a kick in the shins was a more marketable gimmick than any repaint of movie ravage, all I can suggest is they might have been trying to strike while the movie iron was hot, but personally any other mold would have been a better choice for that.

[Verno]

As somewhat of an out-sider on the movie-verse toys, I still had a wander through the toy aisle at Kmart from time to time to have a look at what the toys were like.

I must say it's very off-putting seeing repaints next to their original figures, en masse. It makes you wonder what the parents make of it.