Studio Series 86 and War for Cybertron Siege/Earthrise have been a hit after seemingly many years of dry or sparse CHUG collecting. Will Masterpiece slow down now? Will legends slow down? Will 3rd party companies jump on the CHUG momentum? If so, what do you wish to see?: upgrades to CHUG figures like they used to do?...fill in the gaps of characters that fit this new style/scale/etc.?

Do we need to create a new acronym/initialism? ....I know it's still Generations technically....

Anyway, interesting times to collect.
That is all...


for now.

 

3rd parties have been making “chugs” for ages. And still continue to do so.

What they mostly *stopped* doing, was under articulated deluxe and scout sized crackerjack crap.

MMC, SXS, G-Creations, Warbotron/TFM/GT are all making voyager sized and up figures. The scout/deluxe figures that MMC DOES make are properly scaled to their voyager brethren as well.

 

I think we should abandon “chug,” and use “mainline” to differentiate between MP and the, well, main line of HasTak transformers.

but yes, I’m thrilled with this re-energizing of new interpretations after a couple years of boredom. I’ve had no interest in the Toon accurate focus for the last couple years.

What do I want? Something I haven’t thought of yet. I want creativity, whether it be new reinterpretations of the familiar old characters (like the T-Beasts or the Dreamstar Aerialbots), ideas from a as wider range of transformers timelines, or completely new OCs.

 

I think it was necessary for 3P to step in on the MP and Legends markets, because HasTak clearly won't completely fill that niche.

WfC has been a gamechanger for CHUG, though, with a bit of Studio Series 86 to fill in a few blanks. As long as you can accept the Sideswipe and Hound molds as Earth-enough, and as long as you've been able to snag the store-exclusives, most of the season 1 and 2 cast is covered, in-scale and with adequate articulation at that. A lot of the ones that aren't were done in the Prime Wars Trilogy (although I'm open to do-overs on a lot of those).

So what does that actually leave for 3P? Well, a lot, actually. There are those Prime Wars do-overs I mentioned, like Blitzwing and basically all the combiners (at least the torsos). And there are a few gaps in the roster yet, like Skids and Tracks. Even some of the WfC figures could use a do-over *cough cough Astrotrain cough*. There's definitely a market for version 1 IDW, still- I know I'm down for the DJD and the Scavengers, and as much as I love MMC's reformatted stuff it's debatable whether or not it actually scales with WFC. So, yeah, I'm down with 3P tackling CHUG again as long as it's filling the gaps HasTak is leaving in WFC/SS 86.

 

I think the one chug product 3p's or rather ko companies can produce that Hasbro can't is an upscaled voyager gun Megatron.
But I think there are still gaps 3p companies can fill. Pretenders are an example of characters 3p's may be able to do better than Hasbro.

 

I'm quite happy seeing even selected Live Action Movie toys as "Generations" that is what the name means after all - and the spirit of it has not really changed much since 2006, I would say that the Trilogy thing can be a minorpain in the tailpipe though as it leads to things getting skipped that should have been done - before the invevitable reset - if they didn't force the resets quite so enthusiastically as they do and allowed some carry over that might be for the best ; as it means we miss out on a lot of things due to "resets" like the lack of Micromasters in Kingdom, or No Blaster and Autobot Cassettes in Earthrise or Kingdom.

Sort of like how There never was a Titans Returns (Prime Wars) Twincast or Soundblaster despite there being a revised version of the Soundwave mould that could have served in that capacity as Soundblaster. I especially notice that there is only ever a few Weaponizer like figures that get made per year before they have to abandon the idea, and that seems like a bit of the same as the lack of a bit more variety leave gaps and also means the idea doesn't get further adapted to a larger size and it may be gone for good in 2021.. which would be a shame as then you'd only have "some figures" that are compatible - just like Combiner Wars compatability is sort of gone now too.
I think if something makes sense to be done in a previous style it should be - as the Seacons proved.

But I also appreciate originality or at least farming the obscure too. - The fossilizers are therefore a welcome surprise. It is a pleasant change from the same 15 characters over an over again across multiple lines. If they treated Generations actually like the name then perhaps they might think of what they've already made and what might suit further in that style - a good example would be a Titans Returns compatible Deluxe Fangry or even the whole hog and make Squeezeplay and Horribull too.. They'd have really nicely complemented Scorponok too.

 

I think you missed my point, but....ok. If I can, more clearly state it...the 3rd party's focus has been more MP and Legends for some time now...I think that can be supported with the multiple variations of the same characters...but yes, no one really ever "stopped" making CHUG...just kinda slowed to a crawl...when you click on the "3rd Party Talk" tab on this site, more than likely the entire first page is either be MP or legends...if 3rd party starts to supplement or make upgrades for the WFC Siege/Earthrise/Studio Series lines, that may change.

 

CHUG: Rechugged

 

The CHUGenning

 

The thing about 3P is they do what TT and Hasbro don't due. This has worked out great for legends as they are ignored by Hastak and G1 MPs only get release 2-4 times a year, so there is 3p's market.

By contrast to Legends and MP, Hasbro has been relentless for the last 6 years to give us an update on every G1 character under the sun.

 

CHUG 2: CHUG HARDER

 

I don't care about the main line now... Hasbro make very good toys back in 2007 when the Bayverse began... Nowadays it's mostly a shadow of what it once was...

3p "CHUG" will evolve into "stylized masterpieces" , which look better than their G1 counterparts and have all the benefits of a bigger size and budget.

 

I think it's the opposite. If the main line keeps pumping out stuff, it's unlikely that any 3p would want to directly compete with them. Heck, the only reason g1 mp ever got so prolific was because Takara only makes 3-4 original moulds per year with constant redos of characters the have already done, giving 3p plenty of room to fill in the blanks. They don't have that luxury for chug.

 

CHUGified

 

You're certainly entitled to your opinion, but I don't know that I could disagree harder if you'd said "Age of Extinction is a better movie than Transformers '86." I still have most of the original '07 movie toys, and they're pretty trash compared to the Studio Series versions. The only one I think is even close to holding up is the old Voyager Ratchet. Not as accurate as the Studio Series toy, but it has a sort of simple, chunky charm.

 

3P has continued with upgrades since they started. Even POTP figure upgrades are getting reissued. Kits have never stopped being produced, and now quite a few things are available from one-person operations. The Nonnef thread is bumped and discussed more than quite a few 3P toys.

The MP and Legends crowd just have more companies making the same characters, with a few exceptions, but mainline-fitting 3P has never stopped. MMC and FT are the top 2 companies. And MMC devotes what, 70% of their products to a scale that basically works right into mainline sizes, while also maintaining its own "scale."

I guess if you compare trends and forum activity just by looking at some pages here, you could think chug scale died off - but if you look at the big picture, it's only gotten better as Hasbro has given mainline figures articulation previously only available on their MP line, or were almost accidental by design lol. (looking at you, classics Wheeljack and Skids, and your ankle tilts!) - Plus, tons of the 3P available products have been bottlenecked into a smaller number of threads (Nonnef, Matrix Workshop, etc.) so it gives a certain appearance in that instance. But it also means you didn't watch much when quite a bit was being released.

Also, some of the most revered figures in the last few years have come in the mainline scaling - Striker Manus mold, almost anything MMC has done, Omega and Scorponok are absolute home runs and cheap as hell compared to anything else their size, and the Titans Return line (and the corresponding LG figures) had been one of the most insane markets I have ever seen in 20 years, and it was a wildfire on almost every new wave release. CW/POTP spawned like 4 billion kits and upgrades, and since TR and Siege introduced TMs and then Battle Masters, 3P couldn't do much to upgrade or replace anything. Siege got mainline to a point where unless you want something somewhat retired at this point (WFC/FOC, etc) they had us covered, and not as many were missing much that 3P needed to produce. Specific weapons sets aside, what else do you need from a line that gives you toon and toy G1 options, and with Siege adding in ankle tilts and all that, 3P just went where needed, and they could compete and profit, and nobody could step into MMC's territory, but you have Planet X pumping out stuff for years now.

It's a bit subjective if you only use 1-2 visual cues to gauge liveliness of a series type, but mainline has never gone anywhere. If anything, recently it has just built up into a frenzy due to the popularity of what's been popping off for so long - we've been getting amazing stuff in these scales for years, so alot of the excitement now is because many people are finishing up certain specific areas (Cybertronian versions, DJD, Wreckers, Titans, etc) so it's not a slow burn anymore, it's a riot lol

 

Mainline 2: Electric CHUGaloo

 

All I know is that there are some darn fine legends sized 3P figures that I would love to see OSKO’d into Deluxe and Voyager sized figures.

 

I am talking about the era, not the line specifically, the toys were better made, less hollowness, cool mechanisms, they even had ratchet joints! Nowadays Generations is quite bad... The Studio Series is good, but from a construction point of view, they are not that great when compared to the older toys.

 

It may be an unpopular opinion, but I'd welcome the return of 3P CHUG in the sense of deluxe figures.

MMC's been doing voyager stuff, sort of, at least it blends in with my Generations collection. Iron Factory's stuff has filled some mini-bot niches, but I'd really love to see 3P companies cover some figures we're unlikely to get, like Nautica, Velocity, Skids, Strafe (the IDW female dinobot), Jihaxus, or maybe even a Menasor that doesn't suck (we can dream).

Not to mention there's a widely untapped market of non-G1 that 3P companies could try tackling, Fanshobby seems to be taking a risk with it.