A simple question, alot of talk has gone around over the years about the lost molds.. And how we then see KO's of molds thought lost, and assume its reverse engineering to get these KO's.. So simply put, why is TakaraTommy and Hasbro "It seems" against doing this.. You gotta think they could do a better job of it quality wise with more money and better technology, then the KO makers are able to do.. So whats the problem? Thunder97
Well look at it like this ..... Alot of toy collectors nowadays are the type that love "Articulation" infact alot of people complain when there's not enough ..... G1 Molds aren't really know for having alot of Articulation.....so perhaps Hasbro took that , and said to themselves , we better just make new versions of old characters ....... That's one reason why they may not want to re-release old molds..... In addition there's always the whole Safety issue thing aswell.......
It's just not cost affective to engineer molds for figs they wont sell that many of. Engineers are expensive, and casting (or whatever the process is) new molds is also very expensive. Think of how many figures they would need to sell to offset the cost of producing one mold. Unfortunately collectors are not a huge market compared to actual kid consumers. It just makes a ton of sense to spend that money on making NEW molds that will have a better chance of turning a profit.
Because reissues dont sell well!!!! Almost all of the recent encore editions are slowly getting marked down or put on sale. Takara cant have the extra cost of redoing molds when this market is so small. People just dont realize how small the market is for say reissue wheeljack OUTSIDE of the fan community.
How much does one mold cost? I mean, from the idea of a brand-new toy, to having a finished figure in hand?
The problem is no one buys them. Look at the commemorative series by Hasbro. Look at classics Soundwave. Look at many of the book style reissues by Takara, and even now with the Encore line. Hell even the 25th anniversary Prime will be on clearance too. So many people whine and whine and whine, and then when it finally happens and gets reissued, everyone bails.
Its not that they dont sell, its that they release figures no one wants lol Or they over do it and release the good ones over and over and over and over like G1 Prime and peple get sick of seeing him lol and with each reissuethe price gets higher lol .. In a way im glad they dont reissue them because look at what hasbro has done to reissues like the Seacons and the 25th Ann Prime. They slaped a huge price tag on them and then wonder why they are not selling lol. Plus using cheaper plastics and makingthem just feel so brakable in your hands when you are transforming them. I just recently opened my hasbro reissue tracks and couldnt believe how crappy he felt in my hands compared to my G1 80's issue of him.. Because of the price tag they stick on them.. I was shocked when the hasbro reissues first came out and they were 30$ each for a 10$ toy lol.. And like i said above , look at there Over priced seacon sets costing more then the orginal 80's set almost, Prime costing a lung to buy lol.. That so called collectors clube and its insainly priced figures. I think they would sell a ton more figures if they just stop being greedy and lower the prices.
I can understand the problem of the reissues not making enough money in sales to justify not doing the reverse engineering to bring back a mold that has been lost/broken.. But I just wonder if thats the whole/main reason, or if theres another reason TakaraTommy/Hasbro havent done reverse engineering.. Something we are just missing/dont know about.. Thunder97
Additionally, I believe the molds Hasbro would use would be far more durable than the ones the KO makers use. KOs are fly by night by their nature. You know if Hasbro reverse engineered something, it would be built to last.
On the ebay completed listings a 100% Piranacon sold for $370. A MISB giftset was over $1000. The fun pub set was just over $100 and was a limited run. It sucks that they are expensive sometimes, but thats life. When Hasbro did the Toysrus Commemorative series, sure they were a little costly compared to other figures, but I challenge anyone to find an original G1 figure MISB for less. I have every Toysrus reissue and about 85% of all the Takara reissues and I find the build quality to be just as good as the originals. At the end of the day, if no one wants to pay what Hasbro or Takara charge for them, and they can't make a profit, they are not going to do it.
Remember how Brave Max failed the drop-test? When I first heard about that, I thought the drop-test was actually dropping the figure on a baby. It made perfect sense at the time.
