Botcon have revealed the first toy for their 2015 convention in St Charles, Illinois. The first of the five to be revealed is “The Thief”, a new version of classic Botcon character Packrat, who was a blue version of Rattrap – and so, in that same vein, this new Packrat is a blue recolor of the Generations Rattrap.
Check out the review video below, and watch this space for future convention reveals as well as the all-important registration, which we hope with less than three months to go until the convention will be posted soon.
Autovolt 127
I can totally see Landshark out of Rodimus. That would have been so cool.
SG Roadbuster
a botcon without exclusives. its been done. it was called auto assembly and charticon. and both are dead.
Matt_M
I'm way too nervous around crowds, even crowds I have tons of stuff in common with, to be comfortable at Botcon.
I went one year and got so uneasy that I would typically leave as soon as the Q&A sections of panels started just so I could get out ahead of time.
Anyway, on topic: It's been more than a week, let's get reveal #2 already!
VictoryLeo19
I'm willing to bet we get a repaint of Rhinox as well. I wouldn't mind it being one of the dinobots with a new "G1'ish" head. Or a new character all together. When are we getting the next reveal?
WishfulThinking
Okay, then let's have a exclusive-less Botcon next year.
Hear that?
That's the fandom rioting in the streets and demanding the heads of Brian and Pete.
People go to Botcon for various reasons but the toys are one of the primary ones. Perhaps it's a souvenir…or for many others, it's a vacay paid for by selling the toys in the after-market. If the fandom does a collective yawn at the toys for reasons I've stated, there's a good chance Botcon becomes less and less appealing to these two segments of the fandom.
Add to the fact that there are more and more smaller regional fan conventions that someone can go to as an alternative and get a similar (or sometimes, even better and more intimate) experience…and the appeal continues to drop.
xZAOx
Hah, I hope so! Beyond that, people often forgot that the (nowadays $400) package also includes, ya know, a multiple-day toy convention.
If people really just want the toys, then just buy that shit on eBay – especially folks like you who have to fly across the ocean.
TM2 Dinobot
The ONLY reason I got to any convention is for the toys. No free swag? No dealers room? Then I won't be there. I go to shop, not meet people.
flux convoy
I absolutely do.
Dragonclaw
Hey I have good friends who I enjoy seeing at Botcon (Pretty much the only time I get to see them) but do I like them ENOUGH for $1500ish in airfare / hotel / dining out / registration expenses to see them? lol
flux convoy
Until tomorrow when we move on to the next reveal.
Grimlockimus
Good point! Heck look at MP Grimlock too, he's way out of scale with the rest of the masterpiece Transformers. Same goes with the original MP Starscream who got an update. Still glad I got them when I did though, updates or not.
Also pfft, wasn't this topic about Packrat once?
xZAOx
See MP-01 vs MP-10 (although I still like MP-01 a lot too, he's just 100% out of place with the current scale of the MP line).
Grimlockimus
Most of those homages Hasbro "apologizes" for are ones of characters they have no plans of making at the time, so when Kup and Thundercracker hit Botcon they weren't planned for retail releases/updates. As someone mentioned earlier that's the risk of collecting, there's always the possibility of a better toy coming out later down the line and that's never really going to change.
Heck I dropped a decent amount of money on TFCC Chromedome, yeah it's a repaint/retool of an existing mold and in all likeliness a better, larger Chromedome will be released later but I enjoy having the exclusive and he's still a great toy one way or another.
Yeeeeeeah the exclusives are a nice bonus and most people do come out of Botcon with some goodies in their bags but the whole point of the convention is to meet with the fans and the people who played a key part of making it what it is today. The plastic is nice, but the people are nicer.
xZAOx
If you go to BotCon and afterwards think "Man, all I have to show for this is the toys, and they're the only reason to go, and after I shelve them, I'll really regret the money" then you're 100% Doing It Wrong.
At this point I could go as general admin, buy no exclusives, and have an amazing time each year and plenty to show for it. Hell, I could even skip the general admin, just hang around outside and sleep later in the hotel.
Lol, BotCon for toys. Silly people.
Bogatan
If I have to suffer, everyone has to suffer.
I started a custom years ago, got fed up painting things white so bought the repaint that was already a lot of white, got distracted and forgot about it. I still want one though.
I really hate Landshark, but I freely admit its because I had TC down as a Landmine repaint before the previews and was a bit annoyed when it didn't happen. And also because the colours or the scheme aren't different enough from Landmine to make it stand out.
Frustratingly I think the Rodimus mould would have made a good Landshark. At least the vehicle mode has a suitable shape to it.
WishfulThinking
I did. For a time.
And back then, we honestly thought they'd be the ONLY chance at getting those figures. Boy, were we wrong.
Understood. Why I said "kinda".
True. But now that Hasbro has made of habit of stealing Botcon's thunder on numerous occasions, when does making homages of popular characters become a larger and larger risk…or a bigger and bigger yawn?
That's a pretty expensive convention experience without much to show for it. It's priced the way it is to entice you into buying the figures.
The issue is cost. If there's a chance Hasbro will do it for a fraction of the cost, what's the real incentive?
Oh, that. Nice for those who have the money for that. But for those who save their pennies every year to go, only to shelve those figures a few years later…it starts looking like an uphill climb to the land of Buyer's Remorse.
Sorry, that was another thread suggestion I got confused with. But my point still stands. Is there less gamble in doing a stealth recon team set or an arctic camo set (both are honestly themes with story potential as well) compared with doing popular homages that will only get "apologized" by Hasbro a few years later?
Autovolt 127
Oh yeah don't remind me that missed potential that was Thunderclash. I don't get me wrong I love Landshark but not at the expense of what could have been an amazing Thunderclash.
xZAOx
Ugh man, stop making me think of that . That'd have been so great. They had a good mold for it, they had the character available. Even a few weeks ago I was thinking (yet again) of maybe seeking out a custom of it.
Bogatan
Certainly wasn't mine, it was god awful from the first preview and only got worse. I assume mine remains in the box, if it isn't I wont waste a second wondering where it is.
Dammit, I'm wondering where it is.
Flak and Scourge (who I still prefer to Gen Scourge, uniboob and all) were the only saving graces from that set*. Even then they would have only made acceptable filler in almost any set since then.
Which is my big issue with the idea of Botcon themes. The characters dont define the set, mix and match any characters and plonk them in to any years set and they probably make as much sense as the actual set.
*Yet Thunderclash from Landmine would have made one of the best botcon toys ever.
flux convoy
What's your point? Did you use either as Classics Arcee?
I'm not a time traveller. Neither are the rest of us, so probably. We got a few years of those as the only updated versions of the G1 characters.
See above answer.
See both answers above.
Notice a theme?
I don't know anyone who uses a Legends Prime figure in their collection as an update to Thunderclash I'd certainly go as far as to say the con figure is better.
That's the collecting game we all play. No one is forcing anyone to buy these figures. You can go to the con and not buy anything at all. I collect all the FunPub figures but if Hasbro does a better version later, yeah I'll put that up instead and store the other. If Botcon did it first and in some cases, better, what's the issue? You got an exclusive for a number of years. It was exclusive for the convention it was produced for and sold at and always will be.
You never mentioned Throttlebots. I've got no problem with them being produced. They're a a team, though. Not a theme.