Saw the price. Unwatched the thread. That Menasor thread might get unwatched as well.

 

Oh you bet retailers are in on it. Fanstoys stopped giving a lot of Chinese sites that sell at regular prices units until release, and then force them to up the price to match American retailers.

 

So this is interesting. I already placed a order with TFsource but felt compelled to double up on this guy so I added him again to cart a few minutes later but I didn't go through with it as I saw that he was only limited to 1 per customer so I just clicked off the site. I get a notice email from TFsource 20mins ago saying I left a item in my cart. I go and see that I still have this guy in my cart but he's nowhere to be found on the website anymore. So out of curiosity I clicked on the name of the figure so it could take me to actual listing and the listing said all preorders are sold out.

I was wondering if I cancel this out of my cart will that free up the preorder for someone else? I'm going to delete it anyway but if I could help someone on here secure a preorder I rather find out if that works before I delete from my cart...

 

I still need to get Thomas had the same issue where the preorder was gone before I knew I could order it, but the Prices are crazy. Kept hoping for a reissue. I miss the days when you at least had a day or two to pre-order not a couple hours.

 

Yeah my uncle is the president of FansToys and I just called him and he confirmed this, totally real inside source

 

Just say you married FT already.

 

Capitalism is the best. Until it isn’t

 

Thank you for even thinking about doing this- I keep hitting refresh on TFSource but nothing pulls up but at least you gave me hope.

 

Cool can you ask him why after all the years of support from the fan base the now actively pursue a policy to deliberately and artificially inflate their prices by limiting preorders to suppliers but then releasing more stock later at the a much higher price?

Did they see how XBT treat their fan base and think wait! Hold my beer?

 

FT-46 Tesla 2.0 price in Taobao confirmed to be 770 Yuan/ 119 USD.

 

Sounds like what the price should be; $120-$150.

These are the toys we wanted when we were kids.

I am not sure if this makes me as happy as it once did.

 

Personally I feel like FT should just go ahead and charge 299 out the door. TT wouldn’t hesitate to charge that much if not more if they produced anything that matched FT quality. MP52 is already almost a 300 dollar figure and I can already anticipate creaking, thin plastic everywhere, panels that don’t quite line up, paint scratches and stress breakage all over the place.

All that being said. Having a locked in retail price for FT releases probably wouldn’t stop pre-orders from getting obliterated.

 

It looks much better than 1.0  

 

Damn, stay out the loop for a couple hours and you’ll miss out. This is turning into metal build/macross Chogokin levels of insanity. I can already imagine bandit being so much worse

 

So much space to actually fit an Autobot logo on that chest for a change

 

Ta-daaaa!




Glad they finally fixed those weird bug eyes and pouty lips. V1 looked NOTHING like Perceptor, so big improvement - esp. the smile face which is a lovely Brucie Bonus seeing as it wasn't shown in proto pics. Really nails his animation look.

Now the same V2 treatment for Hoodlum please - the most dated looking FT figure outside Tesla.  

 

Thanks for the comparison. It makes me feel better about missing it. Not 'toon enough. FT seems to still go for the more heroic proportions.

 

To be fair, I think the proportions seem quite off in that animation pic .... makes him look quite squat & dumpy compared to how he is in the movie. Almost Seaspray-like proportions which he doesn't have in TFTM, where his body shape is quite lithe/athletic generally.





Some of the detailing is surprisingly anime accurate - look at the panel lines on the front of the crotch piece for example. I also like the fact they seem to have plumped for translucent yellow plastic in his head crest over flat paint this time out, unless my eyes deceive me - perhaps in homage to this?




No light-piping, based on the shots showing the back of his head but even so .. neat detail. All in all, this gets a solid 8.5/10 from me - even if my gut feeling is still that TT have room to ace this for a likeness .... just.  

 

Everyone is all pissy about the pricing but it's clearly a USD priced store mark up. I'll continue to purchase the same items on Taobao from Australia for what I consider a reasonable price. I've missed this "pre-order window" by a long shot and casually jumped on Taobao to find one within 30 seconds just now.

It only takes 5-10mins to learn how to use Taobao with Google Chrome's built-in translate. After a few goes you know where all the important buttons are and what does what. That short time investment will save you much real money if you want to keep collecting FT. Also worth noting that saving extends to other 3rd parties too, it's not just FT that are astronomically cheaper over there.

And dare I say it... You can even find in-stock FT for a better price than USD stores after their "limited release" if you aren't keen on pre-ordering. If you're quick and in touch with some stores you'll easily be able to get one. Although pre-ordering on Taobao does maximize your saving.

Plenty of Youtube resources to help with the learning curve and a whole thread with helpful fellas over here: Buying Transformers on Taobao

 

Didn't all the Tesla pre-orders go up a year ago though? Do you pre-order or just pick things up after release?