HardlyNever

3 minutes ago, Shizuka the Cat said:

My order used SAL Small Packet Registered, costing 1490 yen in shipping fee.

Too bad it then got lost somewhere after it was handed off to USPS.

Yeah, I used SAL small packet registered for this.  

The tracking just now updated (while I type this), so maybe it is ok.  But it took 4 days to go from New York to New Jersey.

10 minutes ago, Shizuka the Cat said:

Well.... I think I might have to put AmiAmi on my no-shop list moving forward.

Back in early April, I ordered from them an HMR toy.... a toy that never arrived.

Both JapanPost and USPS tracking showed the toy ending up at a USPS distribution facility, but never leaving it. To this day, tracking still says the package never left the facility.

After my package showed no signs of movement for a couple of weeks, I contacted USPS to do a search. No luck there. I then contacted AmiAmi, who told me to wait another month. Still nothing. So AmiAmi said they would contact JapanPost and told me to wait another month or 2. 

Finally, a week ago, almost 4 months after I placed my order, AmiAmi said they would send me a refund.... about 7,000 yen of my nearly 14,000 yen purchase.... which I find frustrating. Why they can't send me a replacement order, or fully refund me, I have no idea, nor will they explain it to me.

AmiAmi told me they would be sending out the refund last Wednesday. Well, now it is a week later and the refund still has not appeared in my PayPal account... which is just making me more frustrated with them. And the email I sent asking them about the refund has gone unanswered.

 

I have ordered a lot of stuff from AmiAmi these past 5 months. This particular HMR order is the only time I have been disappointed with the store. But geez, this experience dealing with AmiAmi's customer support... or lack of it... has been quite off-putting, enough so that I question if I ever want to shop from them again. I now consider AmiAmi as shopping at your own risk. You may never receive what you paid for, and yet still lose money. 

*sigh* 

Now I am very concerned about my existing pre-orders I already have at AmiAmi.

Uh oh... I have something from them sitting at a USPS facility right now (and it has been there for 4 days).  Do you mind if I ask what kind of you shipping you used for the HMR item that got lost (perhaps SAL small package...)?

I also have several of the upcoming DX Chogokin releases pre-ordered with them.  I hope they turn out to be ok.

5 minutes ago, Slave IV said:

Yeah, it will protect from either side but it’s designed to be on the inside to protect the film from scratches and whatever else, plus it usually looks cleaner that way. 

Have you considered putting the film on the windows of the room the detolf is in? It would be easier to do and protect everything in the room from UV instead of just the detolf. 

Yeah, but I'm only going to be in my currently place for about a year.  So I don't want to use film on a rental place.  

I went ahead and moved the detolfs out of any direct sunlight (I just moved in, they were empty), so I'm not 100% sure I even need the UV film now.  But it is on the way already.  Maybe I'll just keep it and use it for the next place I move to (which we should be buying).

I do like the idea of having it on the detolfs, though.

For those of you that have put UV film on their display cases (specifically detolfs, if you have them) did you put it on the inside of the glass or outside?  It seems like if I'm going to do it "right" I should put it on the inside, but I really don't feel like taking everything out and partially disassembling the defolfs.

Would putting it on the outside be reasonable?  I've never worked with the UV film before.

1 hour ago, Sanity is Optional said:

I'll be honest, I care more about pulling stuff out of the box than I do about detaching/reattaching things while transforming.

Yup, I'm the same.  I don't really care about perfect transformation for any kind of "purist" sake; I'll take whatever works.  But when I want to repose something, and think "Well I have to go get those other parts..." that's when I start to care about how much parts swapping needs to happen.

I accept the HMR valks for what they are, but for something this size I want to be able to go through modes and different poses without having to get any parts out of the box; and I would like for it to look good without any part swapping.

Ok, I'm less worried now.  I'll just be patient, thanks guys.

So my VF-31S exists somewhere between Japan and my house, but I have no idea where.  I had it sent SAL small package and it has been "Dispatch from outward office of exchange" since 7/27.  Has this happened to anyone else before?  I've had a day lapse, maybe two, between leaving Japan and showing up in the USPS tracking system, but never this long.

1 hour ago, Daedalus said:

Tho while I do agree that we should support smaller shops, they have to stay competitive and price within certain realities of the consumer.  I donno if I was able to follow Arcadia's pricing upwards while innovations left them a bit behind.  

Agreed.  In order for the companies to compete, they both need to be... competitive.  Arcadia is slipping away on the value front.

I do want them to stick around, but they need to do a better job of finding their niche where their prices aren't insane.  I know they won't ever have Bandai's resources, but they need to find an edge somewhere.

1 hour ago, jenius said:

So Wonderfest is done right? Arcadia seems to have hit this convention with a thud (from a Macross perspective at least).

Well, we got an update (albeit a pretty lackluster one) on the sv-51.  I wasn't expecting much from them in the vf-1 department; nothing they currently have can match the Bandai announcement.

I would have loved to see the rumored vf-0 ghost booster, but I guess that's why its a rumor.  Beyond that, I'm not really sure what else we could expect from them. 

44 minutes ago, Sanity is Optional said:

I had one of those little covers break off on my VF-1S Roy. Before you reassemble and glue them back on, take a look at the flap pegs for rough areas, mine had some leftover nubs that were stressing the covers. Sand the rough spots, or trim with a hobby knife to help prevent re-breakage.

This.  I had the exact same issue.  I suffered several re-breaks after gluing,  before I realized what was causing it.

I did the "double click got 2" with Ami Ami but had no problem changing the quantity to 1 during check out. In my experience with Ami Ami at least, once something is in your cart you pretty much have it reserved.

But I still hesistated on changing it.  Of course that early in the morning I'm often just wondering why I'm still doing this to myself... So my judgement might not be the greatest.

Got through at AmiAmi.  One is enough for me, good luck everyone.

1 minute ago, orindlt said:

Well 17:00 Oz Eastern would be 4pm Japan time, so could be an attempt to be helpful for us.

Yeah that's what I'm thinking, it just fails by leaving the "Japan Time" on there.

2 minutes ago, orindlt said:

Weird. This is what I see 

This is what I'm getting: 

Maybe their converter is messed up and it really means 3:00 my time, but still says Japan Time?

1 minute ago, MacrossJoe said:

anyone know what's wrong with amiami.com (their global site)?

 

amiami.jp seems to work fine.

amiami.com shows the items but when you click on it, it says "item not found" for everything.

I'm using this link fine:

https://www.amiami.com/eng/detail/?gcode=FIGURE-041234

1 minute ago, orindlt said:

Showing 17:00 JPN time on my listing

I'm seeing 15:00 japan time.  Which is an hour earlier than predicted?

I feel like this is relevant here.  Always good to reassess every once in a while (don't judge a book by its cover, watch the video):

After sitting around at the Tokyo airport for 4 days, mine is finally en route.  This is my first vf-31, I'm excited.

35 minutes ago, Ridden001 said:

It also has barrels molded into the cannons alongside the intakes.  This thing rocks.

Ah, the old "what are those things."  I've seen those called laser guns, or sensors.  Same thing with the red dots on the front of the nose cone (some say guns, some say sensors).

I just rewatched SDMF, and I can say that 100% they shoot lasers out of the red dots on the front of the nose cone, multiple times (in different episodes).  Not so sure about the things on the intakes, but it is possible (the animation is pretty rough sometimes).

Or you could chalk it all up to animation errors.  But it is the 80s, everything that could be a weapon, is a weapon.  And some things that couldn't be weapons, are still weapons.

4 minutes ago, MikeRoz said:

SLT Hikaru Ichijo?

Second Lieutenant.  But that definitely seems like an odd way to abbreviate it. 

5 hours ago, DewPoint said:

I just had a thought. Since the current VF-1s are largely a 9 year old version of a 36 year old design, how much more innovation are we expecting from these toys? At what point does "better" become simply "different"? I know that with the varying opinions, we could nit-pick anything to death.

I brought this up in the 1/48 thread.  I agree, we are quickly hitting the place where obvious improvements aren't possible; more like stylistic choices about what to emphasize on the vf-1.  Which, like you said, will always be subjective about who did it "better."  I'm glad to see a waist swivel, better articulated hands, and the gerwalk antenna back on the bandai 1/48, but these are pretty minor improvements in the grand scheme of things.

We could always go bigger and try to cram in more gimmicks ("magic hands," internal lights, sounds, things like that) but there isn't much economic incentive for a company to make a single, giant vf-1.  The money is in milking the mold for multiple releases, not making a single "definitive" release.  

15 minutes ago, Slave IV said:

Or...you know, they can keep doing what they are doing which is selling out every Macross product they release? That has to be good for their business.

Eh... that's being a bit selective.  HLJ still has several of their newer releases in stock, as does NY (especially the sdf-1).

And this is when they had, undoubtedly, the best vf-1 on the market.  That won't be true after the Bandai 1/48 is out.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think it is all doom-and-gloom for Arcadia.  But I doubt they can just keep doing what they are doing with their vf-1s and be fine.  There is a new kid on the vf-1 block, and they need to acknowledge that.  I think their non vf-1 lines will be the way to go, for the immediate future. 

6 minutes ago, ScrambledValkyrie said:

 I might wait and see if they do a TV VF-1S.

I didn't see a clear answer on whether or not this comes with missiles for the hard points. It would appear that it doesn't, since they aren't shown anywhere in the pics?

Yeah, I might only get this release and the VF-1S and get the super parts after.  I mean, I have both of those in 1/60, but my 1/60 vf-1j has a gray visor and GBP, and the vf-1s is the dyrl version.

So I can justify getting a white visor vf-1j and tv vf-1s, because they are technically different, right?  Right? 

And we might be getting scammed on the missiles.  They are suspiciously absent.

15 minutes ago, derex3592 said:

I've gotta find a yardstick and make SURE this thing in battroid mode will stand up in a Detolf! Assuming I get in in pre-order hell..which I have a sinking feeling is going to be nigh-impossible.

I literally just did this (well, not a yard stick).  If it does come in at 27 cm, there is plenty of room at least on the top shelf.

The way I see it, Arcadia's options are:

1) Abandon the vf-1 completely (for the foreseeable future), and focus their efforts where there is little/no competition like their Macross Zero line.  Maybe move into Macross 7, or other less-common valk designs (from video games, etc.).

2) Keep making their (soon to be outdated) vf-1s, but focus on the rarer birds.  Things like the vt-1, ve-1, vf-1d.  Maybe go back to custom/weathering versions.  But even with that, I think they would need something to sweeten the deal, whether it is premium finish at current non-PF prices, or some really killer bundles.

3) Try to beat Bandai to the punch with a v3 1/60 that incorporates a lot of the improvements of the upcoming Bandai 1/48, and maybe more.  I personally don't think Arcadia has the resources to do this, but it would be great to see.

I do think Arcadia has seen this coming for quite some time (even before November 2017, when the Bandai 1/48 was first announced), so I imagine they have a plan internally.  I'm sure they will still release the Max VF-1J PF, and the anniversary valk (that no one wants).  But what comes after that will definitely be interesting to see.