Toys: War for Cybertron Optimus Prime Reviewed
Posted on : 14-06-2010 | By : Cacophanus | In : Toys/Kits
Hardware: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
3
Over at HK-TF they’ve undertaken a picture review of the new Optimus Prime toy from War for Cybetron. First impressions is that this is a toy done on the cheap and whilst the sculpt looks more or less accurate it’s still very basic. To be fair the price of this toy costs a lot less than most of the Japanese equivalents, so a reduction in quality is to be expected. That said, it does seem odd to aim the game at an older demographic yet pitch the toys beneath that in terms of price bracket/quality. In any case, for those that have a hankering for all Optimus/Convoy type toys then go here and pick one up. Alternatively, you could save those pennies up and get something properly brilliant.
The demographic thing makes sense when you know Hasbro’s policies. Basically they just don’t aim toys at an older demographic. Whenever something resembling that (the masterpieces, alternators) happens it’s because they’re really localizing a product designed by Takara for the collector market in japan, because Takara, on the other hand, does cater to that market too.
The difference in policy between the two companies is simply due to the difference in size: Hasbro’s multinational and even in the US alone the kids demographic dwarfs the collector demographic. On the other hand for Takara, which only handles japan, those two are much more balanced.
So the result is the closest thing hasbro has to a collecotors line is Classics, now renamed Generations, which has characters that aren’t part of the current main brand (ie these days the movies). Used to be G1 toys remakes and now they’ve extended to spinoffs (ie War for Cybertron and characters that were comics-only until now). But they’re still pitching them using the mainstream “deluxe” 10$ price point. They know western transformers collectors will buy them too anyway.
I wouldn’t call the above “deluxe” though, that’s a bit of a sales con really as there’s very little production quality in that range.
Takara deals across Asia as well, not just Japan. Though it definitely has a quality remit over Hasbro’s quantity.
Yeah, Takara handles sales over Asia, but the collector stuff they pitch specifically for the japanese market. Getting it to other zones is purely collateral profit.
For the names of the various price points, sure Deluxe is probably a silly denomination as it’s only deluxe compared to the basic class, but that’s indeed what they’ve been using for the $10 price point for years. Here’s a handy chart:
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Deluxe#Size_class_chart