Quote Originally Posted by Bidoofdude View Post
I wouldn’t rush to go slamming Hasbro’s products, as for the most part the differences between the two are a matter of personal taste, while quality is not the issue at hand. Many (including myself on many occassions) have favoured the Hasbro deco over the Takara (which although generally more appealing can easily fall flat), but that doesn’t even matter anymore. The lack of options is probably the most alarming part, without any kind of Has vs Tak fire heating up too quickly amongst fans.
In some cases, certainly it comes down to different choices, but it's not that simple.

The fact is that there is a clear quality difference between Hasbro and Takara on several ground.

Take the Titanmasters for example. There aren't just different deco choices at play, the Titanmasters themselves in robot mode are fully painted (sometimes with as many as 5 paint apps on the titanmaster robot mode - eg Broadside) as compared to, in some cases, completely unpainted and moulded plastic on the Hasbro version (and yes I'm talking about the little guys, not the transector bodies). In fact it was the reason I only bought Hasbro releases of Titanmaster figures where there wasn't a Takara release.

Likewise, look at Hasbro vs Takara with Combiner Wars. It was Takara who gave us a proper Blast-Off and Groove, just as it was Takara who, even though they were recolours, gave is Slingshot and Wildrider. While the later three did see a Hasbro release, the Blast Off mould, to my knowledge, has yet to show up as a Hasbro release.

Certainly, sometimes there are going to be mere deco difference, however you can't deny that in some cases, the Hasbro product is simply inferior to the Takara product because Takara knows collectors will notice the little extras, while Hasbro is convinced that kids couldn't care less about them.