<3 4 SB personally, this wasn't true for me. my 1st fight figs ever were skullwing&skullbrain.I grew up on secretbase,lol. But my guess is that SB may not have impressed most brandnoobs, compared to everything else thats gettin' so much hype right now, no offense to SB (don't wanna start a riot!).
I started off with SB and it's still my main habit, followed by a lil' Vinyl Fight and RxH Chaos chaser As I've stated before, it may be my location (UK) and lack of 'historic' background (little exposure to the Godzilla movies that most seem to have grown up with) but most everything else kaiju wise does little for me as a collector. (IMO) the RxH vs Base popularity swung RxH's way when news of the Mook hit. That kicked off the interest and I guess a lot of older collectors got into it knowing it was a 'now or never' situation before it got released and blew prices and interest up even more . . . and the hype just built on that. The comment about KR noobs seeing the RxH feeding frenzy and wanting to be part of it over anything else makes sense . . . they love that flipping for a fast buck so why take risks! I ain't an SB completist and admit they've released some sub par stuff over the last 18 months, but accessibilty to new releases has never been better (most of which are hitting the mark), the secondary market is highly active and offering some killer deals on classic old stuff and recent/future collaborations and developments are looking real promising . . . The RxH hype may currently be at an all time high, but the availabiltity of hot new stuff has never been harder (speaking from an International perspective), the secondary market has gone through the roof (primarily due to hard-to-get new releases and everyone chasing the same stuff), and the minis line, whilst being cool and highly profitable is hardly ground-breaking innovation . . . I just wonder where Moris gonna take it next!
I'm regearing and moving away from anything that is monopolized by one US retailer that has a stranglehold on things and now practices tease, denial, and geographical elitism. Its painful but by simply not buying certain things and moving to other sources for the common stuff I remove the power the monopoly has over me and collecting can be fun again. Collecting mad and frustrated doesn't work I buy less and less and less from the retailer who bums me out and I won't explore new lines or toys they put out since if those get hot I'll be kicked to the curb again ... SB kicks ass imho and Hiddy has built up so much good feelings toward him and his line I will continue to support SB. No distro stranglehold there either and its still fun.
me too ls. keep going after your rxh kiddies. i've grabbed some deals in the past month that i never would have thought possible. i agree with rhino as well. people seem to attach to the "rage" that has profit potential. granted when i joined this board i slowly got into rxh, but branched out to anraku and now i'm into a lot of different things which allows me a choice of what to buy. there is more to life than buying every rxh release that comes out. I think of the 5 people i would consider OG rxh collectors, 3 have stopped trying to be complete because it's just too difficult. as for your question kirkland, I think it ties back to rhinomilk's and NT's comments about people selling stuff way below retail price coupled with everyone and their mother (literally these days it seems) latching on to rxh as the main choice. i can recall this whole board frothing at the mouth for anraku about a month and a half ago so it will pass. i'll say this, i wouldn't pay more than $75 for a rxh figure going forward unless it was pre-2006.
I got into RxH in late '06 which I guess is "middle era" at this point. While this may be wrong-headed, I made a conscious choice to not collect SB because I felt that I was so late to that game that it'd be too hard to catch up. What informed this decision is my feeling that SB figures compliment one another ... the more you have, the better the individual pieces look. While this is also true to some extent with RxH I think that those figures are more compelling one-by-one. (I know a lot of OGs are going to disagree with this ... just explaining my thoughts when I made the decision.) I loved the Bees I used to own and still love my Ghostfighters. I have nothing but respect for the serious SB collectors and think in a way they have a cool edge right now specifically because RxH hype, as much as I love RxH the current hyper-hype sort of runs counter to the underground nature of conventional kaiju collecting. I hope that the hype won't turn me off to RxH but in some ways it already is ... a good way. I feel less compelled to get caught up in it and more likely to buy fewer, more truly desired figures. SB collectors are a tad more discreet and low key. I respect that. SB people are cats. RxH people are dogs.
uh oh...touch a nerve? is it really S7's fault? I believe as much was ordered as possible, but the supply just wasn't there. I think Mori has to realize the demand for these minis is off the charts and to produce accordingly. I was told the Minis are not selling well in Japan. this may be due to the store being remote, but what I don't understand is why Mori doesn't believe they are mad popular over here...
well... to touch on what krudler is saying, S7 is also a physical store. if you're able to show up in person, it's sorta fucked up if you drive your ass all the way over there and can't increase your chances of getting something. even if you show up in person, you can still get assed out... i'd imagine only a small percentage of the figures are sold in-store. you're lucky you can sit in front of your computer nowadays and get anything. with the whole monopoly thing, it's sort of a grey area for me. on one hand, i don't really like the fact that your entire collection is bought from one retailer. on the other hand, it's sorta weird when a store like MPH is selling rumble monsters... because you're not really expanding the brand, you're just selling a product that will be sold to the customer base that S7 created. not sure how S7 can practice tease and denial.. unless you're referring to the dreaded "sorry we oversold" email, but all online stores with 100 people fighting over 3 items have that problem... it's not like they sell X amount and suddenly a local walks in and they sell it to them and then they send the email (although i wish they did that)
In the past six months it's become much harder for SF/S7 locals to pick up the RxH they want, mostly because there are more of us now, and more people appear to be primarily or soley focussed on RxH. We face the same potential disappointments as those who aren't here. As an example you used to be able to wander into the store an hour after it had opened, and the hot new releases would still be there. Now several people line up before opening time, evidently every Saturday. While it's true that there's a slight advantage, generally speaking, that's just a "real world" thing. There's been kaiju fandom in the Bay Area all of my life. It's probably the main nexus of interest outside of Japan, with the possible exception of Hawaii (?) for which there are historical and cultural reasons. The establishment of the distro network was, if anything, anti-elitist ... intended to make things more fair for people elsewhere. I know that some feel it hasn't worked out that way but my point is that the intention was well-intended both business-wise and on behalf of collectors. Anyway, I agree that things have become much more panicky and competitive, but that's for all of us.
hey... i still have the same sleeping patterns as I did in college (except i can't stay up past 3 anymore). not sure how setyourgoals and calavera do it
haha! booska convert! i seriously toted this guy around the house with me all weekend...best figure i've bought this year!
We have no "stranglehold", in fact we are trying to get items flow to as many places and into as many hands as possible. We simply are not getting enough pieces from Japanese toymakers to make everyone happy. As for geographical elitism, the bay area hella rules! (so does texas!)
This is so true. Ever since I've been going to releases, there have always been more people showing up for RxH than anything else. The biggest disappointment was probably Squirm's release. I think I was the only one there for both releases. I wonder what the RxH only fans would do if S7 no longer carried RxH...
dude, he doesn't have to drive to S7! with stuff being sold out faster... I actually go to S7 on saturdays now. before i used to just wake up at 11, buy what i want, and then email isaac to hold it in back
As an "outsider," this is an interesting thread. Personally, I don't collect fight figures because the aesthetic doesn't appeal to me. However, I can understand that when new toys are hard and/or impossible to obtain on a regular basis when they're released, or you have to pay exhorbitant after-market prices for them, the fun of collecting them wears off. The only toy I've ever bought that was anywhere near the level of fight figure difficulty/pricing was the Gargamel SDCC 07/Third Anniversary standard Zagoran. It was frustrating to find someone willing to sell one at the price I was willing to pay, but patience paid off eventually. I'd never do it again, though. I think that kind of time, effort, and especially money is better spent tracking down vintage toys.
people don't even check their watches anymore. They just see me walking down the street and know that it is 5min before opening time.
Yeah, but eventually they'll all become vintage... I actually kinda enjoy the chase for the harder to get new releases... gives me a rush when you get them, and it gives me something to hunt for when I can't get them when they drop. It shouldn't become "work" and stop being fun. And as you said, patience has its own rewards with collectible stuff.
I have nothing against the Bay area or all the happy locals in Chicago, Arizona, etc. I do see the "X marks the spot posts" from Chicago people before they get edited and its a drag. I've been more and more bummed out as this has played out though and its best to figure out whats making me unhappy and deal with it. If you are addicted to something and there is one source then the power is the source's. Break the addiction and they can not reach you anymore plus you save money and there are often other sources for other things.
