From a consumer side, the answer is a hard no. I mean, if the street dates were publicly announced and adhered to everywhere (like video games) so we know when to start checking stores (or preordering) then I guess a very loose yes, but they're not so again, no.

 

It's supposed to keep everything on a fair playing field so that all the little e-tailer fishes don't get eaten up by the big fishes.

 

Who knows! Lol. Some stores seem to get them in waay earlier than the June street date. Lmao.

 

For those who spot GUOP at Target, check his barcode.

I didn't before, but one today had a new barcode printed and stuck over the default one. It looks like the barcode they use for online orders.

Is it possible Hasbro is printing these barcodes at the point of boxing them up, so that's why Target rings it up individually instead of under the DPCI?

 

I mean, what’s the advantage of not having a street date? I like them because it’s clear when the figures will be released. If I preorder on Hasbro Pulse or Amazon, I’m confident they’ll be released on that date.

If retailers break the street date, what do I care? At least I now know when to expect a figure to ship, whereas in the past it was always a nebulous spring/summer/fall period.

 

Street dates across the line applied to waves would possibly make sense (assuming that production was lined up to match and toys weren't needlessly sitting in warehouses for months like is the case here). Street dates applied to random figures in random sizeclasses in random waves of random lines makes zero sense.

According to Target, the street date on Optimus is 7/28. That's a Sunday. According to Hasbro Pulse, it's 7/1. That's a Monday. So which is it? What day of the week is release day? What day of the month? This isn't Japan, Hasbro isn't TakaraTomy, and as usual this is being rolled out without any prior communication to the fans and in a way that obviously isn't even well coordinated or thought out.

So in early May someone was unable to buy Optimus at Target because they are holding it for basically 3 months in the warehouse. Target is expected to take a full case (which has no street date on it by the way - verified) and take the Shockwave out, put him in the shelf, and put the Optimus in a partial case back in the stockroom for some random Sunday in July. That is 100% the opposite of good business sense. This is why I said the production schedule also needs to line up. Otherwise everyone involved is just wasting money on needless inventory costs for a product that has willing buyers, not to mention the fact that at least when I worked retail, partial cases were a big no-no for the inventory system.

We're dealing with a serious level of incompetence here.

 

considering hasbro says its 7/1 id say the 7/28 is entirely an error on targets part, especially since amazons date lines up with hasbros

 

Why are you worried with what happens to Target? Or whether figures are in warehouses or not?

If you want to feel better about it, the street date gives fans a guaranteed date on when retailers everywhere can finally ship their product if you preordered from them.

Some retailers will sell/ship product as soon as it arrives- who cares. Regardless, this new system, even with its bugs/problems, is a hundred times better then the old system that didn’t have preorders with hard release dates.

Hasbro was one of the last companies that produced a mass market product and may or may not have preorders and didn’t have hard dates on release. That was really bad.

Old System
Fan: When is the new Optimus gonna get released?
Hasbro: When it arrives.

New System
Fan: When is the new Optimus gonna get released?
Hasbro: July 1st, 2019.

 

I'm not worried about Target. I'm annoyed that there's product sitting on the shelf I can't buy.

 

That's exactly what it is. It is an error that these toys are coming up street dated at all at the register let alone what date it gives to be sold.

It's something that could easily be fixed in the system, but that's beyond the store level and requires someone to take action to do so (which is unlikely to be a top priority for Target right now so I wouldn't hold your breath waiting for it to be fixed).

The new system will also improve with time and better planning on Hasbro's part, so for now we just have the old system still in place with a splash of new here and there.

 

As per my post above though, the new system isn't working which was just outlined in great detail. You love the idea of street dates, but we're talking about how it is being implemented. I also already said I have no problem with street dates in theory so you're making an argument for street dates against thin air.

Street dating part of a case, with no information on said case, produced far in advance of said date, with different dates at different retailers - that's not a good system for anything. Obviously.

 

Honestly they just need to give repacks a new dpci or whatever so it would count as new product and not something already released

 

Obviously, but if it's a direction that Hasbro wants to go, it's not going to be an overnight change when Hasbro wants to line up all of the release dates for the newest figures but the toys are still produced in case waves meant to be put on physical shelves as soon as they arrive at the stores with repacks and revisions from time to time.

There will probably be more instances of this happening in the future before everything is 100% without issue, but to again be frank about it, it's just not that big of a concern for a retailer like Target right now that will cause them to do anything different than what they've been doing since forever.

 

Does anyone have any comparison pics of Siege Galaxy OP next to the older cyber train figures? I’m curious to see how he would look standing next to my voyager Galaxy Force Starscream.

 

Just got him today. He looks really good with the few Cybertron/Galaxy Force figures I kept from the old line 

 

I preordered this from Amazon ages ago. On the one hand, it’s been amazing not running around trying to find it. On the other, I know some people have had it for months with generally good reviews, so I’m pretty psyched to finally have it next week.

 

I'm selling mine. He just isn't what I hoped for and I no longer have a connection to Leobreaker (if they make one) or Wing Saber, thus making this purchase a completely fruitless one for me. Sadly, it was a kneejerk impulse buy and Ultra Magnus is the far superior figure. If I still had the receipt, I'd just take him back to Walmart. I dislike him that much.

 

Everyone else has him listed as July 1st. Target.com says July 31st. I bought mine (and a couple other figures) through them because of the coupon running a couple months ago. What’s the chance Target will ship them out sooner?

 

That scale is definitely way more accurate to the show than the old toy.

 

Found one yesterday at a Walmart (happy birthday to me). Yeah, he's pretty much everything I'd thought he'd be - and that is much less than the original. I'll keep mine but he's definitely not superior or even on equal footing with the original.