It'd be a cool little set. Backgrounds from the show. Scale. Show accuracy. Maybe even some... chrome.

 

I remember those days as well, and G1 fans never had to fight to be noticed. When G1 fans were getting the early MP toys, reissues, Heroes of Cybertron, Robot Masters, Machine Wars (actual G1 molds with odd character choices.). G1 fans were never ignored to the degree fans of everything else have been until Legacy.

In those days, the G1 stuff was special. It was an event. Now, I'm so burned out on G1 that IDGAF. I'm not saying G1 needs to stop entirely, but with 40 years of franchises to choose from, there's no excuse for not cycling though and revisiting different points in that history to keep CHUG novel.

Legacy will serve as the indicator of how much support non-G1 has. Which is a problem because some of the non-G1 has been poorly done. As I've said before, it's hard to gauge how non-G1 will do when there's so little of it, and it's so often done far worse than the G1.

And honestly, after 17 years, there's not much G1 left to milk apart from rehashes. SO yeah, trickle out those last characters, but otherwise shift the focus. We're good on G1 Optimus, Megatron, Starscream, Bumblebee, Ironhide etc. for the immediate future. Give people, especially the fans like me who are burned out on G1, a chance to miss it, and then bring G1 back in a big way.

And as I said in my last post, around here it's the G1 stuff that tends to linger, especially SS86. I'm actually hoping for Starscream to go on clearance so I can get the chair (don't care about the bot). So I'm not the only one around Delco who desperately wants a change.

 

@Stryker055 addressed this question earlier in post #197. It's a simple business decision. It's not difficult to understand.

 

Let me start this by saying that I haven't read through this thread yet so some of these thoughts may be a repeat of others.

SS86 is 100% unmistakably, unequivocally, absolutely not a mistake.

It's my favorite Transformers line of all time. It has yielded some of the absolute best individual transformers figures that Hasbro/Takara has ever released.

SS86 should not be viewed as mutually exclusive w/other transformers lines in that we think of it as "here we go again with yet another Ironhide figure".

SS86 should be viewed as it's own completely separate entity that doesn't preclude Hasbro from making toys of characters that still desperately need figures in other lines like they're still currently doing with toys of Devcon, Toxictron, and the Cybertron trilogy figures that have been and will be released etc. etc etc.

If anything, SS86 has proven to be the opposite, a detour for us G1 fans. A sleight of hand by Hasbro that says "look over here while I do this". A carrot waved in the faces of us older guys and gals as a distraction so that other characters from Cybertron, Transformers Animated, and G2 can now be released in the mainline simultaneously.

I agree with this. Hasbro is a business first and foremost. The almighty consumer dollar is what dictates what they do and don't sell.

If we're getting saturated with G1 figures and it seems like the rest is lacking, it's probably because they're selling more G1 product than toys based on other Transformers media and want to continue to make money as businesses do.

And before anyone starts the chicken before the egg debate by saying "they sell more G1 because that's all they make" there has been a fair amount of live action figures selling concurrently with the G1 figures.

If McDonald's sells alot more Big Macs than McCrispy Chicken sandwiches, why on earth would they shift their main focus off of the Big Mac and onto the chicken sandwich?

Hasbro also is a giant corporation like McDonald's. It's highly likely that G1 continues to be Hasbro's Transformers bread and butter and making less money by focusing on other things makes little business sense.

It's simple. See my response to @Seanprime above.

The insensitive cultural appropriation is what prevents those from existing.

 

I still wish they'd give SS86 Jazz another try, one WITHOUT the translucent plastic.

 

Bruh you have no idea how many latin American tf fans want SS skids and mudflap

 

I've read this whole thread, it's been a lot to digest.

I get what people are saying, however I don't think it was a mistake. I have no bias against any of the TF Generations. I collect them all.

I will say that I am rather over constant G1 rehashes though, I only buy new mold G1s now and only if it's not someone we already have or is an improvement.

I am really excited for the Armada figures coming out, but was not impressed with the Prime figures.

I also remember back during the time when the 1st three Bay movies came out that the Classics/Generations (G1) lines always went on hiatus until AFTER the movie toys. Which is why it took so long to get all those "Original" Classics figures in the 1st place.

 

No, SS86 is the only good thing to come out of Studio Series as far as I'm concerned.

 

I don't think anyone is arguing that the individual figures we've gotten from SS86 have generally been inherently bad or should have never been made, but I do think that the way SS86 has been marketed has put Hasbro in a box over time. SS86 Hot Rod, for instance, was not a mistake. By all accounts that's a pretty nifty figure. But did that particular toy really have to be made in SS86? Conceptually speaking, is there still a need for the SS86 branding? These are fair questions to ask.

At this point all it seems to be doing is limiting possible character choices to that one movie. I really love a lot of the figures that have come out in SS86, they're bangers on their own, but that does not in and of itself mean the line needs to keep going down that same path now that we're a couple years down the road.

I guess what I'm saying is you can appreciate something while still questioning it.

 

I agree, there really is no need to keep it around much longer. Finish the Dinobots, give us Ratchet and Red Rumble and I would be good with it ending.

They would feel more Special, or at least celebratory of the movie if it ended instead of just keep on dragging out.

 

Disagree - the rumored commander Ultra Magnus and the celebration of the 40th anniversary sound like they'll take SS86 to the next level!

 

I think there is still an audience for a line of G1 figures supplemental to the main line, but the 86 movie branding is completely arbitrary now that the major players from that movie have all been made.

SS86 has become really funny to me, they're actively exploiting their own rules by including characters like Snarl who was only in the movie for about 2 seconds by mistake. It makes sense to include him because he's one of the Dinobots, but if you're going to go that far to justify the inclusion of a character, why not just give up on the "only characters from the 86 movie" thing altogether? Like, Hasbro are the ones who decided this had to just be characters from that movie, and now they're including characters who basically weren't in that movie.

Hasbro designers, I love you, but if you want to make a toy of a guy just make a toy of that guy. It's silly to keep these self-imposed restrictions when you clearly want to subvert them anyways.

 

No, but the name was. It's wildly inconsistent. They ADDED detail to the Dinobots that made them LESS accurate to the movie, while others have a smoother cartoon look to them.

 

I forgot about him, I'll take him because the Kingdom one is pretty craptastic. Pretty much then I'm good though. Most of the other major characters have been done in WFC/Legacy and they are already pretty good.

 

SS86 should be rebranded SS84/SSSunbow and all the Sunbow G1 stuff can be shifted there. Regular Generations can then give solid attention to as yet untouched characters from Marvel G1, JG1, Beast Era, RiD, etc.

Everybody wins.

 

This is the way.

 

Oh hell yeah. Admittedly I'm not really into the Sunbow accuracy stuff... but Generations becoming focused on Marvel G1, JG1, Beast Wars, RiD and so on... that sounds great.

 

Yeah I'd be down for a general Studio Series "Cartoon" line encompassing the S1-S3 plus TFTM, but I don't ever see them removing G1 from their mainline (currently Legacy) but they could definitely release far fewer G1 mans and then use those free slots for more random universe figures. Great idea!

 

I think they should just call it Classics so we can come full circle.

 

Pft, that'd be a cute callback.

Keep Studio Series for movie stuff, Classics to focus on Sunbow / animation stuff and then Generations can go off in its own direction.