Quote Originally Posted by bowspearer View Post
Which is entirely TT's fault. The Masterpiece line has been going for more than 15 years now, believe it or not, and TT have priced it at a certain point, with a certain expectation. Even MP-43 didn't exceed the price point of MP-04, which I recall going for the $400 mark. Now, the line suddenly jumps 150% on its highest price point, while giving us engineering we had on MP-36, which still fell in that price structure.

No one, least of all TT, can be surprised at people balking at the price, when they set the expectation and then soured the deal with a shock worsening of things from the perspective of the expectations they had set in the minds of fans.

It's like how Paramount were somehow "surprised" when they offered Chris Pine and Christ Hemsworth a particular amount to reprise their roles for the sequel to Star Trek Beyond, but then wondered why both walked, when after being promised that amount, they were then told the amount would be way less than it was.
I would look at yen price only, and the pre-order price with discount isn’t actually all that bad. Not sure how the MP 44 pre-orders are going right now but people had similar reaction when MP Dinobot was announced (then again with BW Megatron). As far as I could tell, Dinobot already sold out (aka made their initial sales target) and there’s still demand on the market so TT are making a second run. Yes the QC issue wasn’t ideal (that’s why I said TT need to up their QC game), and yes Dinobot might’ve been a smaller production run but still..good sales number is good.

Comparing MP04 and MP44 prices isn’t really fair since so many years have passed. People can say it’s expensive all they want, but I personally would refrain from comment like “it’s not worth the price” until I have it in my hand.
Weve already had a sneak peak at the engineering and it was much more involved than I’d imagined for a G1 Optimus Prime.

Even then it’s all subjective. I am happy to pay this kind of money to get a new MP Prime that matches aesthetically with my awesome MP 36 Megatron, and that could well be the “definitive” cartoon Prime for a long time coming.