Why are you a Transformers fan?

[1orion2many]

Toys but comics and cartoons come a close second

[i_amtrunks]

I'm a Comics fan (though the are has been fairly lean of late) and Animated has suckered me in very nicely.

I am finding myself more of a toy fan than a story fan, but the lack of comics is not helping there.

[hound]

Toys but cartoons only apply mainly to G1

[Bartrim]

I voted for Story as thats what got me into Transformers originally and I only collect toys of characters I like.

[Gutsman Heavy]

I'm more down the middle.

[G1Optimal]

Although it is mostly the toys....

but, i went for toys and stories as i like some of the cartoons.

[kup]

The fiction and characters are mostly my primary motivator to collect the toys.

So far the only fiction that I have enjoyed enough to get me to buy the toys are G1 and Beast Wars. As a result I buy toys from those lines or directly related (Classics, Binaltech, MP, etc).

Even though I did not like the Animation style chosen, I had hoped that Animated would be a third fictional linw that I would collect from but that didn't happen.

[Kyle]

I love the toys, however story and characters are not any less important. They can't really be mutually exclusive. For example, there were heaps of well designed and engineered toys in Transformers Energon and Cybertron, but I refused to buy any of them because I didn't like the story/characters. On the other hand, I like the War Within comics so much, I could tolerate the Titanium Optimus Prime toy with all his flaws.

Another example is the Binaltech series. There wasn't really any cartoon or comic behind it. However, I saw the Binaltechs as re-incarnations of the G1 characters I loved. If Takara released toys of the same quality but as completely different characters with different backgrounds, I don't think I would have bought so many.

An interesting question is: If someone likes Transformers for the toys only, does it make him less a "Transformers fan" than others? On the other hand, if someone likes the Transformers story, the characters, the universe and mytho but has no toy whatsoever, does it also make him less a fan? I reckon being a fan is about enjoying what you like, in your very own way.

[Pulse]

I luv the figures & various series equally!

Hell, Has there been any other 24-year long continuous animated/comic series that exists to primarily advertise a toy line?

[Paulbot]

An interesting question is: If someone likes Transformers for the toys only, does it make him less a "Transformers fan" than others? On the other hand, if someone likes the Transformers story, the characters, the universe and mytho but has no toy whatsoever, does it also make him less a fan? I reckon being a fan is about enjoying what you like, in your very own way.

I think it's unlikely there'd be anybody that would say they like toys or stories to the complete exclusion of the other. I don't think you have to be even actively buying, collecting, reading, watching to be a Transformers fan. I am curious though what got people into it and what keeps people going.

The responses coming through are what I pretty much what I expected, although I thought there'd be a bit more sway to mostly toys as a lot of converstation on the board is focussed on the toy collections, much more so than comic or dvd or merchandise collections.