Repackaged Universe Spychangers at Family Dollar

So, were these NEW spychangers, or repacked old ones?

i dont know abt new universe, but over here we did recently get those g1 schemed spy changers, which include, besides those mentioned, prime, jazz and prowl, with family dollar stickers (wtf?).

are these new? i thought this was some ways back?

Apparently the KB exclusive clear decos, just in new packaging.

Similar to the old KB exclusive "G1" Spychangers in new Universe packaging at Dollar General and Family Dollar last year.

I googled it:
Here

Apparently, repacked KB exclusive WARS, Ironhide and Mirage named Camshaft, Hoist, and Mirage, still can't get the images to work though

there ya go.

ive actually had these for at least 2 weeks. thought they were old stuff.





from the back of box pics i can confirm that at least mirage and hoist are clear versions.

Boo green Mirage

Hooray Camshaft!

They ARE old. Well, some of them. The cardback is new, oddly.

Once again:

1. G1 homage Spychangers (RiD Scourge as "Optimus Prime", RiD X-Brawn as "Hoist", RiD Prowl 2 as "Prowl", RiD Side Swipe as "Silverstreak", RiD Side Burn as "Autobot Jazz", RiD Daytonus as "Wheeljack") in generic "Transformers" packaging were available from US KB stores since August 2004.

2. The same "G1" homage Spychangers with the same decos and the same names, but now in "Universe" packaging, were available from Dollar General stores since February 2005, and from Family Dollar stores since March or April.

3. Okay, so it appears the new wave (the second dollar stores exclusive one) includes Prime, Jazz and Prowl again, plus, as new additions, the KB Toys exclusive clear repaints of RiD Mirage, Ironhide and W.A.R.S. as "Mirage", "Hoist" and "Autobot Camshaft", again in "Universe" packaging and available from Family Dollar stores.

I should pick up that Prime.

i still need that dang Prime spychanger.

i should pick up that prime too...

the hell?! i just took the pics!

*plays with spychanger prime*

i wished they painted the non moving fake tires

Do you have photos of the other ones too? Considering Prime is old (other than the new back of the card), whereas "Camshaft", Mirage and "Hoist" are new. Well, in "Universe" packaging, at least.

no. i did not buy the rest. in hindsight, i should, if only to get prime's bio - you'll notice that the figures bio is only available on the rest of the wave/line.

Was the same with the previous Dollar Stores wave.

Incidentally, how much precedent is there for Hasbro (as opposed to Takara or Hasbro UK) releasing the exact same toy as more than one character. That's gotta be pretty unusual, doesn't it?

(Oh, and as a total aside, these are the second KB clear versions. KB did clear Spychangers that were much more closely related to the RiD versions.)

I want that green Mirage.

Dinobots Terranotron/Swoop? But then, that was more of a trademark issue rather than a deliberate choice to make the toy a different character.

You are correct. The first batch was later also available from Target, too.

The images have been fixed from the moving to the new server over the past weekend. The images of these new products are now working at the link below. I apologize for the inconvenience.

http://www.seibertron.com/news/view.php?id=8273

Will the real HOIST please stand up?!?!

Oooo...cheap toy goodness....somehow I've never seen that Prime and I've got tons of Spychangers...how odd...me want!

Surprised they didn't call Hoist Ironhide instead, since almost every previous incarnation of that pickup mold has been Ironhide.

Too bad they didn't give Mirage the G1 paint job treatment, but it's looking like we're just clearing out inventory rather than making new stuff here.

Can anyone read/post the bios? They're just a little to small for me to read.

I too was wondering if Prime's bio changed from this release from his previous Spychanger release.

I'd love to add the bios for Mirage, Hoist & Autobot Camshaft to my site...anyone have larger pics of those 3 card backs?

Courtesy of Scaleface from Seibertron:

I saw this months ago at a Family Dollar down the block from me.

Interesting that they kept Camshaft's previous function of "scout" but other than that the bio is completely new and nothing like his japanese bio or his DW MTMTE profile. Should we chalk that up to this being a Universe alt-reality version?

Optimus, Jazz and Prowl or Camshaft, "Hoist" and Mirage?

I just found the original G1 Spychangers today at Dollar General after Family Dollar didn't have anything but Prowl.

Prime, Jazz, Wheeljack, Hoist, Prowl, Bluestreak.

With Prime, it's like they couldn't make up their mind if he was Optimus or Scourge since he's still got Scourge's teal on parts of him. Odd and kinda lazy.

camshafts bio is badass btw. i'm actually thinking of picking him just for the awsum bio.

WhooHoo after I get paid Friday I'll half to hit the Family Dollar near me.I already picked up Op and and Prowl from there past spring they had a jazz I passed on upper corner was bent.

cool...ill have to look.

Bah! You can find THESE pieces generally at ALL retail shelves in Singapore & they'd been there for the last 3 WEEKS!! It's nothing new, at least to me. (Yawn!)

Well, the first run of the G1-deco toys were relatively difficult to find in the US, as I understood, or nobody really cared back then, but DO care now because everything is all G1-nostalgia.

Plus, Hasbro has learned in recent years that a good bio can sell toys they've already sold to people.

I got my Prime 2 years ago.

*yawn*

All of us are obviously aware of which toys are available at Singaporean stores so no-one ever has to inform us.

I bet the movie crew also thinks "All this fuzz over the movie characters' designs - I've known them for MONTHS! Yawn!"

I don't know about the rest of you folks but I'm getting a bit tired of this "REPAINTING A FIGURE TO GEN 1'S COLORS THUS PAYING HOMAGE TO THEM" thing that's ongoing. Is that the TFs trend that's throbbing across the globe now?? WHY aren't we getting NEW figures anymore?? Everything else nowadays is just slapping a new coat of paint over & giving 'em Gen 1 identities accordingly. These days, we're almost certain to see an "A" character being REPAINTED several times down the road whereby we get "B", "C" or even MORE than that. (Sigh!) WHEN is all these going to end??

its hasbro.

have you seen their SW toys?

deal with it.

Well, repainting a figure into a different character is just a different way of reusing a mold. Japanese companies seem to do 'Black Napalm [character name]' or 'Burning Fire [character name]' or 'Golden Shower [character name]' variations of the same character or machine.

Every company does it to maximize the usage out of the tooling.

That's your opinion, and then you have fans insisting "Hasbro so MUST repaint toy X into an homage to random G1 character Y!"

Who should Hasbro listen to? The guy who says he doesn't want to buy repaints, or the people asking for repaints?

Bottom line is - if you don't like a toy, don't buy it. But don't blame Hasbro for releasing toys which people who aren't you might actually interested in buying.

We are. Plenty.

When releasing one version of a mold is profitable enough for Hasbro so they don't have to re-release the same toy in different colors in order to recoup the expenses for developing and producing new molds.

yes. yes! bludgeon him with cold hard logic!

dun-dun-dun-dun-NAAAAAHHH!!!!!

You must be confusing Hasbro with Takara. Last I checked, Hasbro released stuff non-stop, and follow up the end of a current line with a new mainline, almost immediately. Takara has slowed down to a crawl this year.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming Hasbro ALONE for this situation. I was thinking of the whole situation as a way to milk us, the collectors, dry. Just look at the Armada STD Optimus Prime alone & see how many variations we're getting from there. Then again, we're also getting 3 ver. of GF Rumble from Takara too.

Of course, you have your point when you're saying that let the people who are interested in getting REPAINTS decide what/which to buy. Yes, I agree, I'm not stopping 'em all, please go ahead & be my guest. What I'm saying is: Don't give us COUNTLESS repaints from a PARTICULAR mold. (eg: Armada's STD Optimus>Nemesis Prime>Universe Ultra Magnus>Cybertron Optimus Prime.) Who knows?? This can go on for AGES & before we know it, the mold had ALREADY become Fortress Maximus after being repainted for the past 30 times.

I do not have the ability to stop toy makers from coming up with countless repaints. What I'm saying is: PLEASE DO NOT USE 1 MOLD & GIVE US A-Z REPAINTS SIMPLY BY RENAMING IT AGAIN/GIVING IT A NEW IDENTITY FROM THERE.

Again, please don't get me wrong. I'm NOT referring to Hasbro but Takara & I meant to use the term "GENERALLY." In the other thread, I'd mentioned that it's been a LOOOOOooooooogggggg time eversince we gotten a Takara Reissue Blaster/Broadcast, isn't it?

I picked up prime, jazz, prowl, mirage, camshaft and new hoist today atm y family dollar. I was sad that they did nto have the wheeljack, old hoist and silverstreak though. I never was able to find those G1esque spychangers in KBs.

If you collect Star Wars figures, you're used to the repaints. At least with Armada Prime, we're not seeing the same mold with the same color scheme released 3-4x in the same year. Well, at least this year.

In the case of the Spychangers and even Armada Prime, Hasbro is doing it for the kids, not collectors. It's a way for them to get Optimus Prime without having to shell out $40. Will I buy Armada Prime again? Heck no. Will the 7 year old kid who's never seen Armada but wants Prime? Probably..

Anyway, time to go and try to find some Spychangers. For $2, they're hard to pass up.

Found green Mirage yesterday!! Woo-hoo! Also bought camshaft and Hoist. I like my new green Mirage.. might even pick up a second one.