I don't know maybe all the versions of A Christmas Carol in the last days have got to me, but I'm questioning my TF Collecting.

I have about 1000 TF toys (including non-Transforming action figures) now but I wonder do I really need that many?

Taking stock today I have all of these still MIB, most of them MISB. I keep buying more Transformers but if I'm not even bothering to open them then I need to stop and ask why.




I used to be quite happy just buying a handful of toys from each line; the ones that interested me the most (design or character). I was first and foremost a fan of TF fiction not of TF toys.

But starting with the Movie Line I've just been buying all of them! This started because I assumed every toy from the Movie line was in the Movie (Swindle and Wreckage I'm looking at you..) and then when the Movie came out and the stock flew off the shelves it was a matter of buying them while I can and not stopping to think about it. This has continued with Universe and Animated and so now is the point I am thinking about it.

I have maybe at most 50 TFs that I can easily access, the rest are in numerous storage continers (or as above still in their boxes). If I don't have them on display, if I'm not playing with them... do I need them?

Some, particularly the 23-24 year old veterans are of huge sentimental value (and due to disrepair very little financial value). But many others aren't: Real Gear repaints that I opened transformed once and put into storage for instance. Would I miss them? I can't even name most of them!

My collection has expanded incredibly in the past two years and this forum has contributed to that, but am I really getting as much out of the toy collecting as I should or could be? Or am I doing it just for something to do, something to talk to the other TF fans about (since most are toy orientated)?

I've been a TF fan for nearly 25 years of my 30 years so it's not something I think I could ever give up. But you could only call me a "toy collector" for the past two, and maybe that I could stop. It does feel a little like an addiction and I'm someone who does get addicted to things easily if he doesn't watch out.

Obviously collectors come and go, the names on the members list today are very different to the names when Griffin first invited me into Ozformers. Does anyone else ever feel like this? That they are buying toys for the sake of buying and forgetting what and why it is that you kept buying toys long after you left the "target demographic"?