I think you're kind of missing the fun in these. They are show accurate, but I love playing around with them, customizing so to speak and looking forward to building the universe and cities going forward. Maybe the play patterns Hasbro is making are actually also geared in part to the adults who played with them as a kid. Not a crazy thought since a lot of us dig playing with these and they are quite versatile.

 

Grapple, Hoist and Ironworks are the only definite buys I've listed from ER's Wave 1.

The other Deluxe, Voyager or Leader class from that wave would have to change my mind by looking better in person or popping up on sale somewhere.

If not then lets see if the Wave 2 rumors are true and how they look.

 

I wanted to strike Hoist from my list....but How can I?


Wheeljack is a must for me, and
that Cliffjumper is everything I want Bumblebee to be.

Optimus.... I'll know as soon as we see for sure final colors. At this point Hasbro should say something because even though several copies are in the wild with blue eyes and hands Takara has posted several recent high res shots with gray hands and blue elbows. Why would Takara still be taking new photos when the final copies are filtering out. I have a sneeky suspicion that the Blue handed copies might be an aberration.

I don't know, if it's Blue eyes though I'll probably cancel, the Siege Prime has the exact same head and Blue on Blue just disappears.

 

Looking at those pictures Hoist is a 8/10 as far as Dlx's go. I wish Wheeljack looked better. Considering how great most of the quality is with the SIEGE Dlx's he should've been better, especially since the QC played a huge deal in justifying the price increase last year.

I just bought another TR Legends class Bumble on eBay so I'm swapping my current TR Bee's head with TR Roadburn after painting Bee's head red and silver so that upcoming Dlx ER Cliffjumper can forget it (unless HasTak makes another version or Bugbite out of the mold).

Huffer and Gears(only because he could also be retooled as Crankcase) might be able to pass as small Deluxe's but that might be it for me. I'm pretty content with the other Legends I already have (Brawn, Bee, Cosmos, Wheelie, Pipes, Beachcomber, Powerglide, etc.).

 

I want to say first that I don't mean anything I'm about to say as confrontational or that you're wrong.
Sometimes text comes across that way.
We're around the same age, we love Transformers, and you're Rated X and it's been my experience that Rated X things are kinda cool.

Now for the criticisms.  
I would argue that Hasbro has not accepted that adult collectors are the primary target audience -because we're not.
But they have accepted that we're a portion of the target audience.
That's one of the reasons why we have so many homages in Siege and Earthrise.
That's one of the reasons that Siege figures have the unadvertised ports for the Tamashi display stands.
That's one of the reasons for the Studio Series, the actual marketing of Masterpieces, and the Unicron fundraiser.

I would also argue that you seem to be missing the point on some of these items you listed as things you enjoy.
Siege has given us a Reflector (Refraktor) that merges into a camera.
Hasbro managed to ship enough of them that most people who wanted three of them could get three.
Siege has given us Cybertronian Seekers that look like the MTME cartoon in both modes.
Siege has given us the best Jetfire ever -better than any third party offering.
Siege has given us a Soundwave that turns into the lamp post if you want.

You say you want what you thought was cool in the cartoon, but in this conversation at least, you're missing all the cool stuff I just listed and are lamenting the fact that Sixgun and Brunt are "compromised" by a gimmick.
These are characters that were essentially accessories for other figures.
They are given new life. New features. For Brunt -a robot mode for the first time.

If that is not taking the heritage of the brand and doing something new with it then what is?

 

Well I understand the things you say. Im not against getting these figures like Brunt as is. Im just saying get rid of the gimmick and thry would be better. You would probably argue that without the gimmick these guys would be boring. But then we would hard on the disagreement on whos actually buying these toys ? Whether or not Hasbro is in denial about who their target audience is for the Generations line. The way I see it, in Hasbros eyes, every figure sold is assumed to be owned by a happy, playful kid. Unfortunately that includes online retailers warehouse stock and scalpers basements that sit in storage bins for years. Thats the problem in my opinion. Theres no real way to gauge whos actually buying the figures and how old they are. Would less gimmicks hurt sales ? Thats a matter of opinion. Currently Brunt is the biggest shelfwarmer in Miami. That doesnt say much for a figure thats supposed to be such a cool accessory for the more popular figures. I would just call it like I see it. If its not selling, the gimmick must suck. Cog was another shelfwarmer in its early run. Not everyones gonna agree with me. Im inclined to believe the amount of adult generations collectors that care about gimmicks is fairly small. Im not saying they dont exist. By the way thanks for the compliment on my screen name. Its just an old nickname I go by.

 

Well the way i look at it YES PLEASE i want them all. So basically that equals Hasbro is staying on my payroll for another year or so. I'm gonna love Earthrise just as much as Siege. I really hope we get a Snapdragon SOMEWHERE in the waves. Please Hasbro i really don't want to be left hanging with just Apeface with modern transformers line now.

 

There was a missed opportunity to create Autobot/Decepticon cities with voyager bases (real bases like these, not Soundwave-spread-eagle-with-cassette-door-open "bases").

 

So the Takara Earthrise Wheeljack is exactly the same as the Hasbro version? (As in "We're not getting a pure-white Wheekjack.")

 

Takara-offered toys have been identical to their Hasbro counterparts since Power of the Primes; it's part of a cost-cutting "brand unity" push, partly because of how bad "Transformers: Prime" tanked the brand, especially overseas. With the exception of a few exclusives, such as the Big Powered box set. All of their former exclusives are now being imported via Hasbro as "Generations: Selects" releases, notably the Seacons, Star Convoy, and Super/Ultra Megatron.