I have unbridled envy for anyone who owns any of those vintage sofubi. One of these days I'll find some. In the meantime, there are always the pics in the TF Wiki: https://tfwiki.net/wiki/File:Optimus_Prime_Vinyl_Figure_set.jpg https://tfwiki.net/wiki/File:Vinyl_magnus.jpg https://tfwiki.net/wiki/File:Tfjr_rodimus_vinyl_figure.jpg https://tfwiki.net/wiki/File:Metroplex_soft_robo.jpg https://tfwiki.net/wiki/File:Tfjr_vinyl_galvatron.jpg Botcon was in New Jersey this year, so I went, because it was something to do. That show definitely isn't what it used to be. I went to the one in Rhode Island in 2007 and the dealer's room was incredible, not just rare Transformers and pre-Transformers for sale but many hard-to-find toys from other 70s and 80s Japanese robot lines. This Botcon was very different. There was a huge space for the dealers but there couldn't have been more than a dozen or so of them throughout the entire room, because the majority of the space was taken up by the convention organizers' area, a big vendor that had a lot of non-Hasbro, non-third party stuff for sale. I am guessing that they just couldn't find enough vendors to fill the room so they brought a bunch of toys that had nothing to do with Transformers. I hope someone bought at least one of those Robot Spirits Gundams or SH Figuarts Kamen Riders. It seems to me like the third party brands have really changed things. At least half of the vendor tables seemed to be stateside representatives of the various companies, so you would see the Magic Square table, and they had maybe four or five of their recent toys, and that was it. No other brands, no Hasbro stuff, nothing. And with a couple of notable exceptions, most of the dealers selling vintage and used toys there just had it piled up in boxes or sealed in sandwich bags and thrown in crates that you had to dig through. It was like people just dragged their collections in from their basements. The ticket for the day was $45, and I found zero loose vintage sofubi (grr), but I figured I should just get something cheap so I didn't leave empty handed and completely broken hearted, so I grabbed a G2 Brawl for $10: Exquisitely camouflaged! Anyway, this probably turned out to be a questionable decision, because it reminded me of how fun those combiner teams were, and after a flurry of eBay activity a small army of Combaticons was en route to my house. The last Hasbro iteration of Bruticus is on my kitchen table right now: The paint job on this is fantastic and it was super cheap. This may be a trend. I'm starting to look at those bootleg combiner sets now.
So I saw that Btocon was in NJ this year and I considered it for about 30 minutes, but skipped it. Sounds like I dodged a bullet. I did go to Zolocon over the last weekend and it wasn’t bad for vintage robots. The spring time Zolocon is better I think (more vendors) but it was good. And there waa some soft vinyl here and there. That urban Combaticon looks great, there are a lot of options with scramble style combiners.
Thanks to @hellopike, Optimus Prime now defends freedom for all sentient beings in my house: View this post on Instagram
https://news.tfw2005.com/2023/10/05...-blaster-and-soundwave-official-images-495996 And I just bought one of those eBay bootleg Soundwaves earlier this year. Who am I kidding, though, I'll be buying both.
Big Bad Toy Store still has this reissue in stock, too: https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/219152?o=4 Fugly or not?
I think Hasbro miscalculated on what transformers fans will buy, and what kind of crossover appeal Balvin or whoever the artist who had a hand in this deco. I think it’s a bit too radically different than what the average 40-50 year old fan of vintage transformers is willing to accept… I think however if this had been a Metallica deco soundwave for instance, or any group that had a bit more vintage appeal it would have sold out. But I don’t know who this artist is, what his/her/their music sounds like, and as such this weirdly decorated soundwave doesn’t do anything for me. It was ambitious to try, but miscalculated.
Go-Bots vs. Transformers! https://play.history.com/shows/the-toys-that-built-america/season-3/episode-1
While not transformers specifically, apparently Machine Robo in Japan has a line of transforming toys whose premise is two (or sometimes three) unrelated objects that combine into a super robot… there’s a lot to look at, and some work better than others, but it’s worth a look. I just bought this one “CrocodileBananajuice”: https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/241811?o=4
It is by a Colombian artist who calls himself J. Balvin and his musical genre would be; Reggaeton, Latin urban pop or Latin trap. Whether those are good or not is no longer up to me to decide, but I understand that they have made this collaboration based on a more commercial aspect than what this singer could contribute to the franchise.
Yeah, it would have made sense if he had a song in one of the Transformers movies but I don't see anything like that. I got one of those bootleg Abominus sets off of eBay and it's pretty damn good, quality-wise. I might grab a Computron, too. I always liked those later Scramble City combiners that didn't map to any real-world vehicles or creatures, and some of the Terrorcon designs are pretty loony. I also completed my all-tank Bruticus/Ruination:
An all-tank Ruination. That’s dedication. I always liked in the Japanese version of Robots in Disguise, that Ruination/Baldigus (along with Nemesis Prime) were called “Combatrons” and used the inverted G2 Autobot insignia rather then a typical Decepticon symbol.
So I just got a bootleg “Dino-Saur Robot” in the mail today. Which is basically a bootleg of the Diaclone toy that became Grimlock. Which, is basically just Grimlock with a blue waist piece instead of red and a chrome sword instead of red plastic. It was in pretty decent shape for being 40+ years old and complete with unapplied stickers! It did have a broken tail, but I used a junker grimlock to restore it. I’ll try to snap some pictures of it next to my Chinese KO Grimlock (which is identical to the original G1 version) and my other Dinobots. It’s one more Diaclone style Dinobot in my collection and one I didn’t think I’d ever own.
I remember those "Dino-Saurs," I had a couple of them. They were also branded as "Ancient Animals" and some of them had embellishments like wings and extra horns. I got my first third party Transformer, Space Disk from Dr. Wu. I love it. This could be the start of something expensive... View this post on Instagram
