I just got mine. I'm not opening the clamshell yet because of the breakage issues. Has anyone got a translation of the warnings?
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I just got mine. I'm not opening the clamshell yet because of the breakage issues. Has anyone got a translation of the warnings?
Rank 8 - Deluxe Member
I just used google translateOriginally Posted by DELTAprime
Dovie'andi se tovya sagain
Rank 8 - Deluxe Member
Ok, well I just transformed him with the help of YouTube.
My takeaway is that if you are applying anything more than the most minimal of force to clip his back together you haven't got everything positioned correctly and you should stop trying to force it before you break it and go back a couple of steps. If you have it done correctly there should be very little pressure holding that backpack in place.
But that waist joint is going to be easily broken if people don't apply pressure correctly especially given how incredibly tight mine was.
Rank 6 - Dedicated Member
Ben of Ben's Collectables says his hasn't had so much as a stress mark and he isn't super careful either. Either the QC might be hit or miss, or some people are just really careless.
(skip to the 9:45 mark)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_c6eqW_vj9c
Last edited by Tha_Phantom; 4th April 2019 at 10:21 AM.
Looking to buy lucky draw Armada Prime and Diaclone Marlboor Wheeljack.
Actually from a value perspective, those issues are entirely reasonable. The fact is that it started with Dinobot, but now we're well and truly at a point where the value isn't there as much on MPs from MP-43 onwards, that was there in the past - with Dinobot again, being right on that demarcation line. When the value is there, people tend to be a lot more forgiving with things, however the public perception with these newer releases has been largely that people are essentially getting the exact same thing, but paying a lot more for it. When that happens, the usual argument is along the lines of "it better be made out of gold at that price" or something to that effect. Just look how divisive an issue the price hikes have been in the fandom. Naturally, people are going to expect the build quality to be a lot better when they pay a lot more; you're more likely to have people saying "see, there are problems" when problems surface, than "it's just one figure" when the value drops - especially if the price dramatically goes up in the process.
This is why I genuinely believe that the MP line is in the throes of a slow death. It used to be the Classics audience saying "too rich for my blood". Now the price jumps have turned off people who were once avid MP collectors. The next price jump will be a jumping off point for even more people, until eventually the exodus reaches critical mass and the entire line implodes due to lack of demand. At the same time people are going to be less forgiving who are on the cusp of jumping off and so QC issues can be the push which causes them to jump off prior to the next price hike which would have done it.
At the same time, you have figures like Siege Ironhide (ie the forearms) and Siege Jetfire (ie head hatch, hands, etc) which are incorporating Masterpiece level engineering into the transformations, which again, erodes the value of Masterpiece figures again, this time from a bottom up perspetive.
I sympathise that this is the result of Takaratomy drowning and scrambling to stay afloat - in part due to the loss of the Pokemon license, but I really don't see this ending well - I give it maybe 5 years.
Rank 8 - Deluxe Member
The fandom is being ridiculously sensitive to one person breaking a newly released figure.
Old mate either got a dud (which happens irrespective of the line) or used excessive force.
I'll wait until I see 49 more cases of broken MP43's in the same places before commenting any further in regards to QC.
Rank 6 - Dedicated Member
How dare you react rationally.
Looking to buy lucky draw Armada Prime and Diaclone Marlboor Wheeljack.
That's your subjective opinion; you're clearly still at a point where the value is still there for the Masterpiece line and so naturally you're going to be a lot more forgiving and even defensive of it. That's entirely your prerogative and it's neither right or wrong in and of itself.
However the same is equally true of those for whom the value is no longer there. Because the value has lowered on this line, that means that the closer people get to the threshold of the jumping off point, the less forgiving they're going to be.
Value is always subjective and how you perceive as value will always be different to how others perceive value.
You said that the fandom is being "ridiculously sensitive", but as a hypothetical, let's pretend for a minute that the figure cost 3 times what it did at HLJ; let's pretend in this hypothetical situation that the figure didn't cost $373, but rather $1119. Are you saying if you were "still in" in terms of buying Masterpiece figures at that point, that your expectations wouldn't automatically be higher than they are for the figure at the $373 price-point? Are you saying you wouldn't be less forgiving with issues - particularly QC issues - with the figure if it cost $119 than it costing $373? If your answer to both would be "no", I would find that incredibly hard to believe.
Likewise, $373 for large Masterpiece figures might endear itself to a lot of leeway and forgiveness to you, but "to you" is the operative term here.
If I were a multi-billionaire for example, buying houses might be as insignificant for me as buying a cup of coffee is to the average person; for the average person, they could never dream of experiencing that.
Likewise, while your ceiling in terms of a "walkaway point" might be much higher than $373 here, for others, it's right on the boundaries of it - for others, it's well and truly in "too rich for my blood" territory.
The big problem here has been that to say how the price hike has been handled by TT hasn't been the best is a massive understatement.
When the Masterpiece line's performance was flailing, there was the 2.0 reboot which was a smashing success as we're all aware. Excluding exclusives, and taking it from MP-12 to really give some leeway here (although an argument could be made to take it from MP-10 if you wanted to be strictly accurate), that's 29 mainstream releases at a certain price point, engineering and quality expectation in the space of over half a decade. Overall, people have generally been incredibly happy with it.
The problem was what followed; whether it's staples or luxuries, people generally don't like being in a situation where they have a reasonable perception that they're paying more for less - especially when they have an emotional investment in that product. Unfortunately, Takara Tomy simply haven't done enough or approached things in the right way to offset the negative emotions. Don't get me wrong, in the case of MP-44, they've hyped the hell out of it in a reactive move, but I don't think that was the answer.
The upshot of it is that while there are certainly a core group of people who's "jumping off" point is high enough that the price hike has had a minimal impact on how forgiving they are, on the other end of the spectrum are those who are now at that point and have walked away.
In between those you have people who aren't quite at that point yet, but things are close enough to it that their tolerance for issues is all but non-existent. The growth of their patience with issues with the leeway they give the line is inversely proportional to the perceived lowering in value. In fact if the figure was in the mid $200s, I'd almost put money on many of those same voices being a lot more forgiving with issues.
If people are happy paying the higher prices and enjoying what they're getting then more power to them and I'm personally glad they're falling in love with their new figures; it's what you'd expect as the norm when someone buys a luxury item like a premium figure.
However complaining about people complaining, because you see the value here and they don't is simply the counterpart to people who don't see the value in these figures insulting the intelligence of those who bought it, because they don't see the value in the Masterpiece line at this price point.
Last edited by bowspearer; 4th April 2019 at 09:48 PM.
Rank 8 - Deluxe Member
I'll be honest, I just scrolled past that huge sea of text.
I'm sure you had some valid points, shame I'm not in the headspace to read it all and continue my discussion with you.
Rank 6 - Dedicated Member
Anyway, back on topic. Can't wait to get this beast in a couple of weeks. The deco and attention to detail is just astounding!
Looking to buy lucky draw Armada Prime and Diaclone Marlboor Wheeljack.
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