Thought I'd start a new thread before it gets lost in there somewhere... As Franco Villa from the Trans-Europe-Express group confirmed, Alternators Swindle has FINALLY been released in Italy. Note that Italy has so far gotten every Alternator that was released in European (six language) packaging, including Meister who was never available anywhere else in Europe. With Swindle having already been available in half a dozen other European countries, it was only a matter of time before Italy would get him. NOTE that the Italian release of Swindle still comes in the red box. He does NOT ship in the new bubble style box with the weird "2 in 1" arrow on it that was seen recently. So we still don't know where that packaging is headed for. According to an Italian store owner, the next Alternator to be released in Italy will be Decepticharge. Thanks again to Franco Villa for the news.
From what I could gather, Transformers in general are doing comparably well in Italy as compared to the rest of Europe. Italy also tends to gets many toys first (they were the first in Europe to get Cybertron, and are currently still the only country to my knowledge where Cybertron Megatron is available). It's not like the European release schedule for Alternators ever really made any sense to begin with, though...
Italy has a long history of getting TFs that other places in Europe didn't get.. Sixshot (the first one of course) Predaking, Trypticon, Swoop. Plus an Abomimus and Bruticus giftset (not even released in North America it seems) Plus the Italians as a nation are (admittedly it's a stereotype) seen as rather passionate about cars in general..... Plus they have a lot of Mecha/Chogokin collectors. So it's a no brainer. As for Hasbro UK... we've all been there a thousand times already.
Always had trouble wrapping my head around that one I wonder why Italy of all places, does Italy have any sort of TF fanbase? Still, gotta feel for the UK fans as you guys seem to get screwed over every which way and here Canadians complain about Hasbro Canada’s distribution.
Italy has a great TF fanbase it seems....... Could be worse. (Ireland is at the mercy of Hasbro UK - too small for a Hasbro Ireland) When you're at the mercy of Hasbro UK, you just give up and find import stores,or start importing. Either way the price ends up about the same. Spare a thought for the 'No more toys until the movie' countries.
We do Autorobot.it We also have Guido Guidi By the way, I did not mention that credits for the news about Alternators go to Shima and LoneWolf
But has "Martini" written on everywhere (I'm the one in Italy that found Swindle and Decepticharge in the shop )
When I went to the shop only Swindle was on the shelves. But Decepticharge was on order and will be out in a matter of days, because was part of the same order Swindle was. This on monday 16.
