Quote Originally Posted by Pipesqueak View Post
I'll be disappointed if it turns out to be a mostly earth-based series. I was looking forward to a series full of interesting cybertronian designs.
History has shown that more alien/abstract alt modes aren't as popular with the market as more authentic looking alt modes (i.e. "robots in disguise"). If you talk to a lot of people about G1 they tend to remember the early years more fondly than the later ones. Some people started to lose interest in Transformers around 1987 when a lot of them started using Cybertronian/futuristic alt modes (e.g.: Targetmasters & Headmasters). Later on following the immense popularity and success of Beast Wars, quite a few people got turned off by Beast Machines (long before Michael Bay signed on to direct Transformers, many TF fans were accusing BM story editor Bob Skir of "killing my childhood" and making threats against him); one criticism some fans made was that their alt modes didn't look like anything immediately recognisable. Transformers Car Robot came out in Japan around the same time as Beast Machines and was far more popular; and when Hasbro released Car Robot in their markets as Robots In Disguise, the toys were flying off shelves - months before the cartoon ever aired on TV.

Now I'm by no means trying to diminish your opinion or statement in any way - it's perfectly valid and I don't personally disagree with it. I like Cybertronian modes if they're done well as a toy (like Classics Jetfire; even if the jet mode isn't aerodynamically sound; it's a neat toy ) - but in terms of overall market appeal I'm not sure if a line entirely consisting of abstract fantasy modes would sell as well as those consisting of realistic vehicles. You could get away with it in limited numbers, as we saw with Animated (i.e. Cybertron Mode Optimus Prime and Megatron), but I don't know about a whole line of Transformer with fantasy alt modes.

I could be wrong though. <shrug>