1/1 LowViz Lurker

Like the megazone Garland, I didn't buy the first. Might buy the second with light up gimmick. But if a third comes out in a non-canon scheme that I like, (like what I hope for with yf-21 if it eventually gets made) and provided there are no issues with that one, I will get a second. By this time there is not much left over for other toys like MP skywarp. (was so going to buy MP megatron the other day but I want to fill up my TF alt collection before they become annoying to find)

They move frighteningly quick in robot mode. Makes the car mode kinda redundant. I'd rather jump on walls and leap into the air than wait through all the traffic.

Well some people have lots of money and become the early adopters knowing that they may be taking a little risk but are ok with that. That still doesn't mean they have low standard, (they may be aware about the problem beforehand but are making a choice to still buy it. Perhaps as a result of expecting problems from previous releases and applying thier own custom fix?). Just as some bought toynami alpha fighters due to a love of the looks of the alpha and not the durability. They are still not stupid because to them, there is no alternative, so they didn't want to wait. I mention before how 1/48 VF-1 although not perfect, is still one of the best vf-1 out on the market for now but doesn't mean it can't be beat easily by some other company. Me personally? I wait until the early adopter buys it, reviews it, and shows pics or problem areas before jumping. But the loaded guy who knows they've seen better build quality but still wants to buy the less-than-perfect toy is not necessarily condoning the poor quality or mistakes. Tolerating them early on shouldn't be confused with accepting or not caring about the problems in the early release. I only ended up buying a vf-17 from bandai not because I don't care about detail, but because there is no alternative. I'm sure many people who buy are just as pissed as you, but as mentioned, they are just fans of the mecha and still hope the problems get sorted. So they don't want to have a "if it isn't 100% perfect toy, I won't buy it" attitude because they love the mecha design so much. Not because of stupidity, low standards, or ignorance of the problems that others have. For eg many early xbox360 consoles will have heating problems that newer ones won't. But these early ones allow all the eager people to at least play thier games 1.5 years before the patient guy who will gain all the benefits of a more stable system by choosing to wait. Doesn't mean the early adopter loves to have the problem or has a low standard. They are angry, and wish they didn't have to put up with it, (having overheating problems) but they also want to play the latest games now. Not 1-3 years later. So it's like the two forces are pulling at each other. On one hand you could say all the people who bought toynami alphas are stupid for not waiting, on the other you could say "at least they have the best that is currently out for now" despite knowing that it isn't the best it could be. Maybe if people knew there would be other companies going to apply some improvements to the toynami alphas (or just compete by making new mospeada toys) in future they would have held off a purchase of the early release? But you would need to have a crystal ball. They might just feel, "WTF you only live once. I'm not going to wait another 20 odd years and there is no better ones out there.." Maybe in some strange way, the money people are willing to spend on less than perfect attempts to make the mecha, show other companies that this is a lucrative area? They might even start thinking: "if these fanboys are willing to buy this fragile mess for big bucks, think of how much money we can make competing against these guys with our superior versions if we took a slice of the market?" So maybe in some sick way you can thank the fanboy loaded with cash? But in all seriousness, there is a difference between toleration of the flaws (buying something with QC issues grudgingly), and blind loyalty/blissful ignorance (buying stuff without consideration for good build quality, details, what else you could buy for that amount of money). Many people happy with the product, still do complain about the flaws. But it's a case of wanting to see it made anyway and get improved, the same way as the guy who reports bugs to the people who make buggy software which is easy to use or provides strengths in some other areas besides "stability". A program which has great error checking and bug checking, may not crash as much but take longer for a person to use. So it's strong in one area but weak in another. Another example: the nintendo wii has no heating issues, so you could say it's got great quality in terms of stability and durability, (heck it uses less power so you are saving money on the electricity bill) but it's graphics are not up to par with the next generation of games on the more high end systems. Strengths and weaknesses. Yes yes, You could make something both beautiful AND sturdy, but unless more companies compete, the eager fan is buying on the basis that there's no alternative anyway, not out of blind love. If the Wii had as good graphics as the 360, it would be perfect. No heating problems, no sucking up of huge power, no noisy drive, and compact size. But some compromise had to be made: the system isn't as advanced in graphics, support for games with traditional input devices is going to be lower than the others, and support for some popular series will be lacking due to originally being made for a platform that requires high specs to be worth playing on or that makers are more comfortable working on. I see it as being similar to comparing a bandai toy to a yamato one: bandai's are sturdy and tough and you can abuse it, but yamato's added detail and beauty might have come at the expense of being safe to play around with, and instead of being a toy you handle, it may instead make a better "display piece" due to all the problems with parts not locking or pieces gradually scraping and filing away over time and making joints loose or snapping. (self destructing hips on 1/72)

Been looking online to see if I can hunt down an alternator wheeljack. Anyone know where they still sell alts? I was thinking of getting the BT version of him but I get scared of paintchipping when transforming it.

Maybe by the time they get to wave 3 they will be ultra tight and have GBP for them. Would love to see some enemy mecha as a future wave say Qrau set: Red, Blue and *Green. Yum. The Qrau would look awesome on a stand in the fetal position pose with missile hatch open. Being small also means the back won't make the hip joint too loose from all the weight. Qrau also being more bulky also cancels out the fact they don't transform. So I would feel justified paying a similar price for them as what the valks are at in current prices. *Ok ok purple since this is DYRL. But we all know the tv series one looks cooler.

Ah makes you wonder what would it have been like if SK designed some of the live action movie TF?

But the fishing pole looks dangerous. Could poke someone's eyes out. /joking

In a way being generic car robots, isn't such a bad thing for me as the car robots were my fave. I never liked the other stuff like animals (beast wars) and whole cities turning into robots. (exception being the dinobots. For some reason they remind me of zoids) Maybe what they need to do is make a series of alts that isn't designed to appeal to people who are so caring about the accuracy to the manufacturer and instead make some alts that are of made up cars? (like g1 classics?) Just have the similar level of details and have more fun with varying how they transform from alt mode to car modes. Complex transformations only seem complex the first time you do anything. I remember as a kid trying to transform dinobots how long it took me to figure it out. But once I knew where everything went I actually appreciated the complexity of it as a toy. Do kids really care how easy it is to transform something? I think this is just an assumption because people think kids are dumb and don't want a challenge at trying to figure out anything for themselves. Although the alts are not aimed at kids, I think people should encourage kids to try to solve it like a puzzle and pay attention to the instructions the same way they would need to when building a lego or model. These may be useful skills for them growing up anyway. I consider myself a casual TF fan but at the same time wants good overall appearance of the robots and car mode. Normally I haven't shown that much interest in the TF since the alts. It might be because I had bad memories of TF in the past not being as articulated as I had liked. Not living up to what they should look like in comics and toons. Yep me too. Although we all see him fish in the movie, I would rather go for more weapons over useless stuff. I think all the alts needed more weapons but that is just me.

I just want TF classics thrust to be mass produced. And for hasbro to make alt hotrod. (I'm only going to buy one of each transformation type so I'm thinking of skipping alt mirage)

Well after reading some reviews I'm about to finally get one of these to keep the VB 6 from getting lonely. So hows everyone's wave 2 stand holding up? Has it cracked on you yet? Anything self destruct or go loose? I wonder what would happen if the fast packs (just pretend they had been released) were bolted on to them which added extra weight and what effect that weight might have on the thing?

The key is to state reasons for why you are not buying something vs just making a generic bash against them. If they really take the complaint seriously when seeing the evidence, they are more likely to want to change something, and make effort. Because I think what has happened is they've taken a laid back attitude and assumed there wasn't a problem to begin with, and because they claim no one in japan has made any complaints, "why fix what ain't broke?" It might just be that nobody that bought it, bothered to complain or do anything and the problem went unresolved because the customers just assumed nothing could be done. It would be analogous to fixes for a bug in a piece of software only coming after you send error info to the developers for analysis to find out its cause. The person who doesn't care for the software to be improved will just not use the software at all, and complain about bugs and continue to buy more programs, but the person who is concerned about having it there will get off their butt to let them know so it is noted down and fixed so other people don't have to put up with it. One approach doesn't help as much as the other approach. This is why I never preorder macross stuff for fear there is little support if something goes wrong in early release. It's happening with microsoft and thier early xbox360s and the whole "red ring of light" problems that the early adoptors have had to put up with. So it's not like yamato is the only company that may rush things. If you are the first buyer, an early adopter; often you are the guy taking a risk that later buyers won't be taking since all the problems have been ironed out by then. You just got to be patient.

I have that pal release from madman. No cracked discs yet for me.

I like to think the PC are like that kid in akira with the TK abilities, (not as angry though) based on what that chic in macross zero did with her barrier shield and levitation. That the PC might even be something like the extinct race that *Superman came from who were generally like us but more evolved and stuff heh. If sara can levitate and the mao girl can communicate telepathically I have no reason to doubt that zentradi weren't in some way witness to some powers like levitation and stuff. So singing to make flowers grow quickly and using TK to lift rocks and fly on them isn't magic but something they accept as normal. So when you see the kid in akira moving rocks with his mind and creating a barrier to fly into space to beat up a satellite like superman, that might be what the zentradi were witness to. I have no evidence, but based on what sara does in macross zero maybe that is where it is heading? (people who could easily fight wars themselves but assigned that task to clone soldiers for convenience?) In that snese maybe the strongest psychic powered guy, was like rare in the way the jedi knights were in the later star wars trilogy and basara is like one of the rare people with a bit of their gift from the PC visitors that visited earth for a while? (but only in the anima spiritua thing, not fully powered like what the zentradi thought they saw in kaifun's movie) *you know what I mean, just people whose powers are seen as normal and natural not magic to them. So maybe they thought Kaifun looked like an asian superman thought to be long extinct and since no one sees them often, it is a forgotten legend only. (like the ancient pop song that they all forgot in DYRL)

You can buy a starcraft 2 statue for that.

I'm still looking at the megahouse stuff, really nice. Maybe toynami should start their robotech ride armor from scratch and base the toys on these things.

Any other character beside prime and brawl as leader class? I think I may hold off on some of the smaller sized stuff based on that. I love the alts. Superior posability to the older toys, great details like steering wheels, gear sticks, doors that open, rubber tyres, etc, complex transformations, and the look of them as a robot and vehicle. Just needs more accessories though. When viewed as a car, it would be very hard for someone to know it transformed. (no head sticking out the back of the rear window like say classics bumblebee) In fact I think the movie should have just gone the alternator route with close ties to the cartoon in terms of story (from the point of view of the autobots escaping from cybertron) and I would be happy.

TV colors seem more eyecatching if you like colorful robots with bright anime type paintschemes. (ie like how in gundam char is the only guy with a red zaku) I'd just go with the tv stuff first. You get both types of hands. Too bad they don't include the side pieces in all yamato 1/48 though. Not to put the recasters out of biz but that is seriously the next step I would love to see for any future vf-1 1/48. Color matched gbp side parts. (and maybe mechanical fixed pose hands as well ) I'm wondering if they will do the green alaska base valk in the tv series?

I'm more a fan of the ivanov scheme.

Hell, the complaints are not so bad so long as we know they are getting somewhere and reaching yamato who will try to get as much right in first release as possible. In the end, the feedback is only going to result in the improvements in the long run. (I never bought any of the 1/60 vf-1 thankfully) "The squeaky wheel gets the oil". But given their past releases, it should go without saying that if you buy an early release beware of any problems beforehand. When you buy pc games or console games for example, sometimes they are improved or fixed with patch fixes only AFTER they've been released due to the feedback that can be received when thousands of people have had a chance to playtest the thing over time. It's not like the company intentionally wants to rip people off and make their customer angry, so much as "we were not aware at the time of release of the problem. Had we known at the time we would have already made plans to do something". Now whining and complaining about it won't have changed the past, because its past. The company is going to do something about it once you've complained about it once and they've let us know that they are aware that it IS a problem and are doing something about it. But whining again and again out of emotion won't add extra speed is all I'm saying. Its more the repetition that some people don't want to see. If it adds noise it will only make it harder for any reps to sift through the customer complaints if it is not straight to the point in easy format. (ie you have one post, detailing everything wrong with yours, and pics to show which pieces are at fault etc) Logic vs emotion. 1st: We need to calm down first. Be angry, but let them know why in details. 2nd: state the prob while being polite 3rd: show what the problem is, what you want to be done Then.. wait. But just ranting and complaining and bashing yamato (whilst still buying their flawed things) isn't by itself helping as it will just create noise. If I believed it leads to faster response I wouldn't have a problem, but if you must complain try to do it in a way where it can be seen and heard and leads to something being done. You want only the most relevent information to be presented and not the bashing rant to be seen. Otherwise it will come off as just a random insult from someone who doesn't necesarily want to see something done. ie Actually leading to an action which will benefit all the future customers who may also suffer too if the flaw and complaint is not addressed. Fine line between being insulting, and helping them to find the problem. I still use many flawed products but put up with it. Doesn't mean I am an ass kisser who doesn't want to see the fixes applied like the next pissed off guy. Just means it is within tolerance level where I can say "meh, I won't lose too much sleep over it if the problem isn't fixed instantly". This is what some mean by black and white: You are either a yamato fanboy or a troll. Lots of people just fit somewhere in between the two extremes, not at opposite ends of the extreme. We middle people just don't appreciate being painted as an extremist, (fanboy or troll) but people who can see both sides of the argument and want a solution that makes both happy. On one hand: yamato making a better product. And the other hand: a customer who doesn't have to put up with these flaws like shoulder breakages, that only puts them off buying anymore in future. Instead of one side being angry and the other side being happy and igrnorant. Both sides should be happy. But lets do stuff that actually works to get a solution for both, not just create more noise that only angers one side. Logical method vs emotional method. Sometimes a flaw is discovered after it is released, and only becomes known after we complain. But there has to be some time between the early flawed ones, and the fixed ones, before we can get that perfect product. Instead of being angry and bitter, which doesn't actually do anything, how about we wait first, see what they do, then make a decision once it is known and can be confirmed to be fixed. The shoulder of the garland is one good example. Many people who want it, still want to buy it but only after yamato does something to address it. Doesn't mean they are asskisser for having taking the chance to buy the garland. They might love the garland mecha, and see only yamato as the alternative so they take the risk. Things are not as black and white; "us vs them", in the real world. Some just love the macross toys themselves not fanboys of the company that make them. If say the only company that make a vf-17 toy is bandai and the fighter looks chunky and barely has any posability, you might still buy the thing and tolerate those flaws, only because its the only alternative out there. Would you appreciate some guy labelling you as a bandai fanboy who is weak for caving in and buying a toy with 80s style poseability and bending over to be assraped by them for it? Of course not. You would try to explain that although it is not perfect, you can live with it for now (and state the positives and negatives and weigh them against each other) so it is wrong to assume people are belonging in one of two big groups (us vs them) when there shouldn't be "groups", but individuals with different priorities. So sure, maybe the build quality of the bandai vf-17 might be at levels near indestructible but the priority of the complainer might be for looks and beauty and accuracy of sculpt. Where are all these guys attacking bandai for making an overpriced toy that needs updating to the level of the gundam toys? So instead of being bitter why not turn it into something that gets done? Lets complain about bandai for not doing any good macross 7 toys so we can have some competition between them and yamato. Problem is, yamato is the only one doing anything so we don't have much choice, meaning many just tolerate and buy the flawed stuff. BoB makes some good points, but like what happened with the 1/72 line, I see them only acknowledging these problems later on, once they've released the thing first, the same way a game developer will allow a piece of software with a few bugs to slip by on release: unknowing about the problem despite going through whatever bugtests they usually do, with still a chance of something slipping through the cracks. (and then having a updated release with fixes to these problems detailed in a document for you to see the fixes being applied and explanations on what it fixed)

For me it's the non-locking chest. heh. I know I won't ever put it upside down in bot mode but it seems so important to have a robot whose parts lock.

Great to see these improvements for the yf-19+FB release. Would love to see reviews of the booster and how it lights up.

Well just the dinobots being individual would be ok. They can save combiners for classics predaking. I always felt the dinobots were better as a team who had to use "tactics" by splitting tasks up (even though they are supposed to be dumb in the cartoon version) to beat opponents that were bigger and tougher than themselves. Like the x-men when they had to fight juggernaut in the 90s cartoon, lest they failed trying to fight him individually one by one. Or the Aquarion when Fudo gen decides 3 arrows together are weak but three individual arrows doing what they do best going off in seperate directions as a team makes a much stronger "fighting whole" (stronger than the sum of its parts?) than one big thing made up of weak things joined together trying to all co-ordinate their attacks despite being physically and mentally different. Why should all the dinobots go in the same direction when they can just fight in different ways that they are naturally good at all at once? And besides grimlock is already done right, so he won't be able to combine.

If only we knew if the yamato people viewed the boards, then all the complaints wouldn't be so bad imo. We could organise a special thread for all the current complaints with pics, and then have the thread stickied and the issues are addressed one by one like an FAQ. You click to the link from the first post to get the answer which is a link to the relevant post id. And that answer (in the post within the the thread) will get updated as time goes on. This way the issue can't be forgotten about or ignored, and everything goes to one thread rather than turns into a huge rant thread with emotion or just sinks to the bottom where noobs who want new info or an update on the issue create a new thread asking for info which only clutters up the forum with the same stuff. It might make gathering the pics/evidence easier and get yamato to respond more quickly and in real time. (as opposed to waiting for graham to visit the rep) Problem is we don't really know if the complaints are even being known or acknowledged as real complaints by yamato since nobody knows if yamato visits a board like this. So we are forced to wait, not knowing anything. At least with the garland thread, some people are able to get the shoulders done and happy about the fix. Macross stuff just seems that much more risky to be an early adopter. I can sympathise with those who genuinely had some breakage through no fault of their own, and also those who are happy and sick of complaint threads. My thing is to prevent emotional complaints that repeat themselves we need: a) official thread for complaints stickied with url links to answers which are in the same thread so you can get the answer. And the answer is updated as new info emerges. If no new info is given have an "expected update" date typed there for those who intend to come back to the board to revisit that thread the next time b) all the pics of the people with issues gathered up as attached pic files so it can be easily observed by any rep who might lurk on the board one day when graham brings it up in the meeting. He can just refer the rep to the complaint thread which is stickied for easy access. It would be too hard to sift through the rants and emotional complaints but if you have one that just talks 1) about what the complaint is, and 2) pics of the problem to show the evidence, then it can get straight to the point. No need to be rude or insulting or anything. Just show us what you are refferring to through the pics. (possibly draw some arrows where you have a problem or see a stress mark or something wrong that shouldn't be that way) Do that for yf-19, vf0 etc Maybe even SV-51 (if in future people get angry at breakages for it) and that way graham won't have to sift through the repetition. From my POV it is dangerous to just assume that it is being blown out of proportion as opposed to a guy who genuinely has a damaged product that they can't seem to get support for like the garlands due to these early probs on the first release stuff. That can tick future customers off who may have just had an isolated experience and was unlucky. For me personally I check the complaint threads very often for updates and find it not annoying to read through the rants, but informative. But what I think would be better is instead of rants about poor QC we need an "official complaint with evidence thread" where you just talk only about your complaint, point to the complaint in the pic, and then make it easy for someone to see through a mouseclick. No need to read say a 50 page thread of just rants and anger and fights. I think the problem is the angry rants started creating more noise, and it gets harder for someone looking for info about the issue to find those posts that just want to show the problems with pics and who harbor no anger in them. Just focus on the info you want to provide to help them address that particular problem so that in future we all benefit. Here is an example of what I mean: http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=310239 It is a guide (containing cheats, spoilers, walkthroughs, lists etc) to "Elder Scrolls: Oblivion" that has a "contents" of the guide which, when you click on the section in the contents are links jumping you to the relevant info so you don't have to overwork your mouse wheel by scrolling through all the irrelevant crap. For each complaint you could just click on that link which leads to the post with the answer and that post get updated in time by graham or something. Perhaps have it so that each member is given their own post within the official thread that they must edit themselves and provide the pics for their complaint. You can jump to your post through the post id to get to it quickly. If stickied, a noob won't have to read through everything in the thread to find the relevent "complaint type", but just the bits he wants to see. If a yamato rep wants to view the complaint he doesn't have to read the Ranting within the 50000page thread, just the relevent bits, by accessing the "contents" at the start which is sorted under relevant topics like an FAQ or help document. I think when threads are made they end up turning into these really noisy rant threads and get derailed. If you had just entered into the forum and see a 400 page thread and had to sift through it all to find the complaint, that would just discourage anyone to read through it. But by having a sticky, and having each complaint in a contents at the start of the thread, you can just jump. This can cut down the irrelevant "noise" created by the ranters and allow a person to jump directly to your individual complaint quicker.

I hope one day classics is revisited. I want all the dinobots reimagined.

Ah, I forgot I need to get that book. I only have the macross design works which isn't new enough to have any macross zero stuff in it. That transforming car looks like a bubble gum crisis suit. Hehe. Or Aibo the robot dog got recyled and made into a transformer.