Wrists have basically gone back to where they were before combiner wars. Hardhead, Blurr and Skullcruncher all definitely have wrists.

 

I can't really vote from the options because my feeling is '5 Stars' but I'm 'Being selective' due to my collection focus. Definitely in for Astrotrain and Fort Max (he'll take Metroplex's slot as Bot Titan), plus possibly new iterations of the core movie cast (Galvatron, Blurr, Wheelie, etc.) but I don't want to go G1 Headmaster cast completist, though I still think all of the redesigns look great and pretty tempting (I may cave and grab a Mindwipe, who doesn't love a shabby, slightly deluded hypnotist?). The shelves already crammed with S1/2 CHUG/CW bots!

 

3*'s. I was never a huge -Master fan, outside of Nightbeat, Mindwipe, and Point Blank.

 

Do they? That's really good to hear. Everything I've been seeing looked a lot like Combiner Wars articulation (Which I was mostly fine with due to the robots being Combiner components as well).

 

I'm basicly buying everything except Prime, Trion, Soundwave and Blaster and their minions and Fort Max. Not sure about Astrotrain yet.
But everything else is bought. Just the fact the Headmasters are Deluxes... Sorry can't let that one go.
But apart from that i'm very happy with what i saw even the stuff i'm not getting, so more like 4,5 for me.

 

Literally only looking forward to MP Primal. Didn't see anything else that caught my attention.

 

I'm worried about pricing. Like the $20 CW Deluxe at Toys R Us was a trial balloon.

I go back and look at the deluxe figures I bought for $9.88 at Walmart a few years ago and put them next to the CW deluxes I paid $14.88 for and there really isn't any comparison. The older deluxe figures have better paint, articulation, and feel. CW Wheeljack is just a sad figure.

I can see Hasbro using the headmaster gimmick to give a reason for a $20 deluxe price point. The legends figures were $10 with a minicon and then they went to $10 with nothign else added. I do think they are good figures but when you look at Transformers Prime Commander class figures, again bought for $8, there isn't any comparison.

I feel like Deluxe figures are going to $20 and Voyager to $30. The leader class will probably stick to $50. Labor costs, mold cost, and raw material cost have all gone down with the move to Vietnam. With the TPP signed import duties will also decline, so there is no reason for price increases. If the prices go up, my purchases will go down.

I bought nearly every single Combiner Wars toy. I skipped the leader class seekers and a few legends, but that was it. I have all of the limb bots and Voyager class minus Scattershot. I don't want to stop collecting but at a certain price I will say no. I know too much about manufacturing and pricing to pay more markup than I believe to be fair.

I'll probably buy Soundwave but he will go with my Masterpiece figures because Leader class is just way out of scale with the rest of the line. I'm not really a fan of most of the figures that were announced. My son will have to get Galvatron and Power Master Prime though.

 

Nice to see posts like this.

 

I expect another gouging. If it is I'm out.

I really miss those days when my actual grocery bill was higher than my toy purchases after unloading all of it at the cash.

But hey if they want to risk alienating price savy adults/parents from purchasing, it's their prerogative.

And I swear for every time someone blaming solely oil prices...

 

I'm probably at a 3.5, but rounded up as I usually get more than I plan for.

Given Takara's tendency to 'bump up' figures and tooling for more G1 (cartoon) accuracy and 'collector friendliness' in recent lines, I'll be very curious to see what they do with the Titans Return figures, especially the ones that were not traditionally Headmaster characters before. Will they ignore them, release them as they are, or will they retool them with integrated heads?

I'm assuming Headmasters with anime-accurate coloring across the board, and Fort Max gets a new non-Rebirth-style head guy.

- at least.

 

I'll get em all. Which reminds me, I still need two of the LC seekers and White Optimus from CW

 

At the same time, it looks like Chromedome, Scourge , Galvatron, Sentinel Prime/Astrotrain, Soundwave/Blaster, PMOP, and Mindwipe don't, so...kind of weird that isn't standard again.

Well, the CW deluxes also came with a comic book each, which usually retail for $4 or $5 by themselves, so while forced to be purchased with the toy, the combined value actually is reasonably priced at $15 or thereabouts. Plus, take into consideration each TR toy truthfully has four modes - the standard vehicle and robot forms, but also leg and arm forms for combiners, even if the former of that pairing usually is just the vehicle with its hood flipped back.

Legends seems to have become the successor to the old Scout class - compare the newer guys to the venerable ROTF scouts not named Scalpel, they're about similar in size, though the older figures will be bigger.

Then blame the retailers, not Hasbro. In truth, Transformer toy MSRP has always been about the level we are paying for them now, but back in the early 2000's the big retailers like Target, Walmart, and such places undersold Toy-dedicated retailers like Toys R Us by selling TFs below MSRP, making up the loss through the wholesale profits of produce in the same store.

Seems kind of weird you'd go for Leader Soundwave since MP Soundwave has been around for a while now.

 

Autobot burnout: not every country got those comics and we all know which ones are kicked in the nuts in regards to gouging.

Given the change in retail prices, TRU NOW sells higher AND carries more than every retailer should tell you already how the base prices changes the game. You can't just blame retailers and not give a red card to the manufacturer. Check out how we now have "thicker" bacon on the aisles. Brilliant really but fucking underhanded. It started by thinning out every bacon on the aisles. Slightly increasing price. And now we're paying for what we had, normal sized bacon marketed as "thick bacon", an even higher price.

It's a common practice and sadly we all allow it.

I'd laugh if fort max doesn't have knee articulation and the fandom again blames/believes it's safety standards.

I think Hastak started testing out this new strategy with Takara generations metroplex extra gun. No other toy before that. Nothing alarming or no patterns involved before anyway.

 

I'll get some of the figures (Chromedome, Rewind, PM Prime, Fortress Maximus), but I'm getting really tired of the Sunbow/Marvel Comic designs.
I LOVE Headmasters, so I'm more excited than I was for Combiner Wars. I've been waiting for new Headmasters so long.
I think Blurr and Chromedome look like beautiful masterpieces. Powermaster Prime is the first Optimus Prime figure in a long time that I actually really want. Fortress Maximus looks so much better than Metroplex, so I'll definantly be planning to get him. Hopefully he comes out during the Christmas season. Sentinel Prime... had good colors. I'll be planning to get Rewind, Frenzy (Rumble? blasphemy!), and Wheelie as well.
Now on to the bad...
Mindwipe looks like a fucking mess, so no thanks, Hasbro. The colors, the weird grimace on the Headmaster, and too much detailing throw me off. Plus, I've never been a fan of the character, so I really don't care about him either. Blaster still looks uninteresting, and the FOC voyager is so much better, so I'll be keeping him as my Blaster.

 

Assuming the prices don't go up (which they probably will -- the press release for Leader Soundwave said the MSRP for leaders is now $49.99), I'm darn close to all-in. Easier to list what I won't be buying:

•Fort Max (too big, was never into the base mode stuff as a kid anyway)
•Most of the TitanMasters
•The animal cassette molds
•Sentinel Prime (because Astrotrain)

And a big "maybe, maybe not" to:

•Leader Prime
•Leaders Soundwave and Blaster
•Blurr

But...that's really it. I'm 100% sold on everything else so far. And that's inclusive of the leaks, not just Toy Fair.

 

I'm feeling great about Titans Returns and I'll be buying selectively. (But that'll probably change)

I'll be getting Soundwave and his crew for sure.

 

I'm probably closer to a 4 than a 3 in the poll, but I'm going to be selective. There are definitely figures I'm all-in for and some I'll definitely pass on. The few maybes will probably end up as purchases.

The easy passes include Soundwave & tapes, Blaster & tapes, Sentinel Prime and Alpha Trion.

Must-haves include Wheelie, PMOP, Galvatron, Chromedome, Hardhead, Mindwipe and Skullcruncher.

Looks nice but I'll wait and see includes Astrotrain, Scourge, Blurr, head packs, and Fort Max. Still, I'll likely pick these up if budget allows.

Not sure I can justify the pricing and space requirements needed to obtain Fort Max this time around, but I'll probably cave and enjoy the dickens out of that big fella.

 

At this point I'll be getting everything revealed so far except for Sentinel Prime and the extra Titanmaster heads. I'll probably skip Mindwipe too.

 

Three stars, but only because 1. I'm old enough where headmasters aren't firmly seated within my nostalgia bag, and 2. Some of the characters I already have. But it all looks really great. Hasbro has been doing awesome work!