I'd actually made a conscious decision to delay my post for today, because I suspected that the folks behind BotCon would reveal pictures of the upcoming Thrust exclusives, having shown Dirge last Thursday and Thundercracker on Monday. However, it appears that other news is taking precedence.
In July, the folks behind BotCon and the official Transformers club will be releasing a comic book, sold via regular comic outlets, set in the same "Classics" storyline that's currently featured in the club comic and BotCon exclusives set. If the image they've given us is any indication, look to find exclusives announced soon based on the Elita-1, Huffer, and Springer characters, either at BotCon or via the club.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Friday, April 13, 2007
"You Should Be On a Game Show"?
When I first arrived in Southern California, I kept a promise to myself that I made a long time ago: I went to see a taping of a game show.
The show in question was The Price is Right. And, yes, the cliché held true: the set looks bigger on TV. Including that time, I've been to about a half dozen tapings, and have enjoyed those experiences immensely.
I've been trying, off-and-on, to fulfill another dream while I've lived here: to actually be a contestant on a game show. That one's still eluding me.
Besides the Price is Right tapings, during which everybody in the audience is a potential contestant, I've tried out for quite a few shows, most of which are no longer on the air: Whammy! (The All New Press Your Luck), Winning Lines, Match Game, Pyramid, Card Sharks. For each one I called the appropriate phone number, made an appointment to go down to the studio, waited with a group of other potential contestants, and auditioned (they actually use that word!) to be on the show. So far, not one has accepted me as a potential contestant. (I almost auditioned for Family Feud as well, but that audition fell through when one of my cousins broke his arm the week before my extended family would have come down to LA to join me in trying out. Ahhhh, well....)
On Wednesday, the Associated Press did an article on Deal or No Deal, giving some insight into the contestant selection process.
If you look at that list of shows I tried out for, they kind of run the gamut in regard to skill or knowledge required to play. Whammy! is fairly random, although like Deal, guts and courage to take risks and press forward certainly matter. Match Game depends a bit on your ability to make appropriate word connections, especially funny ones. Pyramid requires more intelligence: you have to have a good vocabulary and knowledge of definitions. Card Sharks is mostly a game of luck, but also has an element requiring you to know about human nature. The Price is Right requires the contestant to know what items sell for. In some cases more than others, the would-be contestant needs to be able to play a mock-up game well in order to advance. For the Pyramid trials, you really couldn't expect to advance if you didn't nail the practice game (I personally think I did pretty well, but my "partner," another would-be contestant, deep-sixed me by playing poorly. I need to have good definitions given to me in order to guess the words!). But in all cases, contestant coordinators need to find contestants that will attract viewers. Apparently, I haven't been the kind of person that they've been looking for....
I'm pretty sure I'll never be on Deal or No Deal. Besides those odds from the AP article, have you seen the contestants? Those guys are crazy! While I think most people who know me would call me "unique," I don't have that level of just-plain-insanity that most Deal contestants have. Perhaps I'll eventually make it on some other show, although it's harder to try out now that I work full-time than it was when I was still a student (I have taken time off of work, with my supervisor's permission, to try out for a couple of the shows mentioned above, though). Time will tell if I've got what a particular contestant coordinator is looking for....
The show in question was The Price is Right. And, yes, the cliché held true: the set looks bigger on TV. Including that time, I've been to about a half dozen tapings, and have enjoyed those experiences immensely.
I've been trying, off-and-on, to fulfill another dream while I've lived here: to actually be a contestant on a game show. That one's still eluding me.
Besides the Price is Right tapings, during which everybody in the audience is a potential contestant, I've tried out for quite a few shows, most of which are no longer on the air: Whammy! (The All New Press Your Luck), Winning Lines, Match Game, Pyramid, Card Sharks. For each one I called the appropriate phone number, made an appointment to go down to the studio, waited with a group of other potential contestants, and auditioned (they actually use that word!) to be on the show. So far, not one has accepted me as a potential contestant. (I almost auditioned for Family Feud as well, but that audition fell through when one of my cousins broke his arm the week before my extended family would have come down to LA to join me in trying out. Ahhhh, well....)
On Wednesday, the Associated Press did an article on Deal or No Deal, giving some insight into the contestant selection process.
It's hard to get on a game show. And especially on a show like Deal or No Deal, it's really not a matter of how well you play the game. One person can pick suitcases from a random assortment just as well as the next person. A contestant coordinator is looking for a particular type of personality to be a contestant. Remember, this is entertainment. If an audience doesn't like a particular player, it won't matter how much that contestant wins, viewers will change the channel, and the show will fail."Originality is everything," said casting producer Neal Konstantini, whose staff of 13 chooses the contestants. "They've got to be fun. They've got to be zany and wild and energetic. I'm not putting on anybody who's going to bore you."
But a good player is hard to find. More than 150,000 audition tapes have been submitted and thousands turned out for casting calls around the country. Just a fraction of the candidates had what it takes, he said: "Somewhere in the neighborhood of one or two percent actually make it on the show."
Konstantini and his team recently began a nationwide contestant search. Traveling to nine cities in the "Deal on Wheels" bus, they'll see as many as 75,000 potential players - and choose maybe 75.
If you look at that list of shows I tried out for, they kind of run the gamut in regard to skill or knowledge required to play. Whammy! is fairly random, although like Deal, guts and courage to take risks and press forward certainly matter. Match Game depends a bit on your ability to make appropriate word connections, especially funny ones. Pyramid requires more intelligence: you have to have a good vocabulary and knowledge of definitions. Card Sharks is mostly a game of luck, but also has an element requiring you to know about human nature. The Price is Right requires the contestant to know what items sell for. In some cases more than others, the would-be contestant needs to be able to play a mock-up game well in order to advance. For the Pyramid trials, you really couldn't expect to advance if you didn't nail the practice game (I personally think I did pretty well, but my "partner," another would-be contestant, deep-sixed me by playing poorly. I need to have good definitions given to me in order to guess the words!). But in all cases, contestant coordinators need to find contestants that will attract viewers. Apparently, I haven't been the kind of person that they've been looking for....
I'm pretty sure I'll never be on Deal or No Deal. Besides those odds from the AP article, have you seen the contestants? Those guys are crazy! While I think most people who know me would call me "unique," I don't have that level of just-plain-insanity that most Deal contestants have. Perhaps I'll eventually make it on some other show, although it's harder to try out now that I work full-time than it was when I was still a student (I have taken time off of work, with my supervisor's permission, to try out for a couple of the shows mentioned above, though). Time will tell if I've got what a particular contestant coordinator is looking for....
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Exclusivity Revisited
In one of my earliest posts, I commented on the high price of the BotCon 2005 exclusives. Now that the 2007 convention set has been revealed (fewer toys at an even higher price, I note, but to be fair, all five of these will be "deluxe" toys or larger), the usual arguments have cropped up again. Many fans are offended at the very fact that some highly desirable toys are exclusives (lots of folks simply can't understand why some of these toys weren't made available at retail), and therefore cannot be purchased without paying large sums of money.
But it's not just that the toys are expensive that people argue about. I'd rather not get into name-calling or finger-pointing here, but in at least one fan's case, the argument is this: his problem isn't that the toys are too expensive (although I believe that he thinks that they are), his problem is that, if he is unable or unwilling to actually go to the convention, he can't get the toys, even if he's willing to shell out the cash for it.
Of course, this isn't technically true, and never has been. Exclusive toys have always been available on eBay after the convention, and they often sell for very high prices. But the argument goes that the fan would like to give the money to Fun Publications, the people that have actually gone to the trouble to create the toys, but that they have made a decision not to take his money by selling these toys to him, simply because he won't be at the convention. (I should at this point make clear that I'm aware that the 5-figure box set is available to non-attendees through FP, and I myself will be getting these toys this way. Non-attendees do have to pay the same price that attendees do, though, which seems high to some considering that they don't get the benefits of the convention itself. Still, there are other toys that will only be given to those who are there.)
Battles have been waged on the message boards between people with this attitude and those who argue that such people don't understand what the meaning of the word "exclusive" is. And there is something to this: an "exclusive" is something that's available only through a particular source. If a convention offers an exclusive, it stands to reason that attending the convention is the only way to get it.
However, I find myself wondering if the apparent misconception of the word "exclusive:" being taken to mean "something that is special or rare" as opposed to "something only available through a particular source," is a wider problem. Take, for example, one of Slacktivist's criticisms of the Left Behind series of Christian novels (for those wondering about the acronyms, "L&J" are "LaHaye and Jenkins," the authors of Left Behind, and "GIRAT" means "Greatest Investigative Reporter of All Time," which is intended to refer to Buck Williams, one of the lead characters, who in a previous scene survived an car bomb intended for him, and who has supposedly been operating under an alias since then, although no one, including the authors, seems to have noticed):
But even if we grant that people are undereducated or misinformed, the sheer intensity of the arguments on the fan boards seems to indicate a greater problem. It seems to me that it's not just that people get really touchy when you put them behind a wall of anonymity. It looks a lot to me like people are actively trying to get into fights. That's just not healthy.
Life's not fair. Either deal with it, or leave us alone. We've got better things to talk about.
But it's not just that the toys are expensive that people argue about. I'd rather not get into name-calling or finger-pointing here, but in at least one fan's case, the argument is this: his problem isn't that the toys are too expensive (although I believe that he thinks that they are), his problem is that, if he is unable or unwilling to actually go to the convention, he can't get the toys, even if he's willing to shell out the cash for it.
Of course, this isn't technically true, and never has been. Exclusive toys have always been available on eBay after the convention, and they often sell for very high prices. But the argument goes that the fan would like to give the money to Fun Publications, the people that have actually gone to the trouble to create the toys, but that they have made a decision not to take his money by selling these toys to him, simply because he won't be at the convention. (I should at this point make clear that I'm aware that the 5-figure box set is available to non-attendees through FP, and I myself will be getting these toys this way. Non-attendees do have to pay the same price that attendees do, though, which seems high to some considering that they don't get the benefits of the convention itself. Still, there are other toys that will only be given to those who are there.)
Battles have been waged on the message boards between people with this attitude and those who argue that such people don't understand what the meaning of the word "exclusive" is. And there is something to this: an "exclusive" is something that's available only through a particular source. If a convention offers an exclusive, it stands to reason that attending the convention is the only way to get it.
However, I find myself wondering if the apparent misconception of the word "exclusive:" being taken to mean "something that is special or rare" as opposed to "something only available through a particular source," is a wider problem. Take, for example, one of Slacktivist's criticisms of the Left Behind series of Christian novels (for those wondering about the acronyms, "L&J" are "LaHaye and Jenkins," the authors of Left Behind, and "GIRAT" means "Greatest Investigative Reporter of All Time," which is intended to refer to Buck Williams, one of the lead characters, who in a previous scene survived an car bomb intended for him, and who has supposedly been operating under an alias since then, although no one, including the authors, seems to have noticed):
If the wider culture (of course, one wonders how much conservative Christian writers can be said to represent the wider culture, but the kind of mistake they make here seems to indicate something wider), let alone Transformers fans, has started to think of the word "exclusive" as synonymous with "special," rather than meaning "only one way you can get it," perhaps we can understand why people are miffed that FP won't take their money.Rosenzweig doesn't ask what happened. He doesn't ask how Buck survived the car bombing, or if he was its intended target, or why it seems someone is trying to kill him. Instead, he says: "[Carpathia] had so wanted to meet you and had agreed to an exclusive interview."
"Can we still do that?" Buck whispered, to the boos and catcalls of the competition."You'll do anything to get a scoop," someone groused. "Even have yourself blown up."
L&J's image of the press corps seems to be based on the City Hall boys from His Girl Friday, which I guess means Buck is Rosalind Russell. Rosenzweig assures him that he can still get his exclusive interview and in doing so demonstrates that neither he nor Buck (nor L&J) knows what "exclusive" means:
"It will probably not be possible until late tonight," Rosenzweig said. His hand swept the room, crowded with TV cameras, lights, microphones and the press. "His schedule is full all day, and he has a photo shoot at People magazine early this evening. Perhaps following that. I'll speak to him."So, yes, after Carpathia speaks to the entire gathered press corps, and after a jam-packed day of interviews and press events, then Buck can have his "exclusive." This is like those "exclusive" interviews that local reporters claim when they take their last-in-line seat opposite an exhausted and distracted film star at the tail end of a three-day press junket. Even People gets to talk to Carpathia before the GIRAT does....
But even if we grant that people are undereducated or misinformed, the sheer intensity of the arguments on the fan boards seems to indicate a greater problem. It seems to me that it's not just that people get really touchy when you put them behind a wall of anonymity. It looks a lot to me like people are actively trying to get into fights. That's just not healthy.
Life's not fair. Either deal with it, or leave us alone. We've got better things to talk about.
Monday, April 2, 2007
BotCon 2007 Registration Forms Are Up!
If you're reading this, and are a Transformers fan, then you probably already know that the BotCon 2007 registration forms went up on Saturday. You can find them at www.botcon.com.
Since there was a lot of information released on the brochure that came out at the same time, I've made a fairly extensive update to the Unofficial BotCon 2007 FAQ. If that link's helpful, I'm glad, but I should note that the best information can almost always be found directly at www.botcon.com.
Registration is a little more expensive this year (at $279 for club members), but indications are that this will be the most heavily attended BotCon ever, so you may not want to wait before sending in your registration form if you want to attend and/or get the box set of exclusive toys!
Since there was a lot of information released on the brochure that came out at the same time, I've made a fairly extensive update to the Unofficial BotCon 2007 FAQ. If that link's helpful, I'm glad, but I should note that the best information can almost always be found directly at www.botcon.com.
Registration is a little more expensive this year (at $279 for club members), but indications are that this will be the most heavily attended BotCon ever, so you may not want to wait before sending in your registration form if you want to attend and/or get the box set of exclusive toys!
Friday, March 23, 2007
Astrotrain and Airazor: Here at Last!
After two full years of the Official Transformer Club's existence, the first exclusive toys (not counting the freebies automatically sent with your membership) have finally arrived! I will now attempt to review them in my own peculiar fashion....
The first thing that simply has to be discussed is the packaging. It's certainly nice packaging. Sturdy. Attractive. Possibly as much a display item as the toys themselves. Modeled here with the assistance of my cat, Turtle, I'm sure that they'll make a nice addition to any Transformer collection.
But, to be honest, I'm a bit annoyed that these toys come with packaging at all. To judge from the posts on the club forums, I seem to be of a minority opinion on this matter. But I'm convinced that these nice packages add a considerable amount to what I had to pay to get these toys in the first place. Since Fun Publications, as a rule, never releases actual costs and figures for pretty much anything, we can really only guess how much this packaging costs, but back in the days of the former convention holder, packaging was said to make up as much as half of the expense of an exclusive toy (see question 9 at the old Transformers FAQ for my source). Now, there are several differences between these boxes and the ones that FP would create. For example, these are simple boxes with no window. Adding a transparent window is an extra expense in creating a box. However, the material here is much sturdier than some of the old boxes were (the packaging on the OTFCC 2003 exclusive set was apparently particularly bad). I don't know how all that shakes out, but I'm willing to guess that we paid at least an extra $20 in order to get these boxes (I figure guessing almost 20% of the total cost of toys is being generous, given that the old figure was 50%. I certainly assume FP is more efficient). I could have gotten two deluxe-sized retail Transformers for that money!
And I don't really care about having a nice package to add to my Transformers collection. I care about a nice Transformer to add to my Transformers collection! They provide nice storage for the toys, but they take up so much room! I have to figure out where in our apartment I can actually keep this stuff!
But, enough of that rant. Pete Sinclair says that the boxes are pretty much guaranteed to be a part of every club exclusive for the foreseeable future, so it doesn't sound like my attempts to make these things moderately affordable for fans is going to do any good. Let's move on to the toys themselves.
Astrotrain is the larger of the two items, and is a repaint of Armada Jetfire. This is a very attractive recolor, with one of the nicest remolded heads I've ever seen on an exclusive. While I agree with the people who have commented that, not being a triple-changer with a locomotive engine as one of his alternate modes, Astrotrain is not an especially accurate name for this toy, the colors, head, and space shuttle mode all combine to create a toy that homages the original G1 character very well, while having enough distinctives to be a character all his own.
Astrotrain comes with four Mini-Cons. All with less than terrific names: Starcatcher (and the powers-that-be really wanted to call it "Cowcatcher," which would have been a hundred times worse! Starcatcher's actually not so bad), Astro-Hook, Astro-Line, and Astro-Sinker. The last three were named as an homage to minor characters (named simply "Hook," "Line" and "Sinker") from the original Marvel comic. Although these toys have pretty much nothing in common with the original characters they are intended to homage, and the "Astro-" added to each name is pretty dippy, it's kind of cool that the club remembers such obscure names enough to homage them in the first place.
The other club exclusive just released is a pre-Beast Wars Airazor. This toy is a remold of Energon Slugslinger with a new head and an attractive orange-and-brown color scheme. The transformation for this figure is one of the most original I've ever seen, causing me to wonder if I'd be able to figure it out without the instructions when I first tried it. However, it's actually fairly intuitive. It does have some stability issues in both modes, though, which definitely detracts from the toy's playability. But I suppose that I'm supposed to just put these toys on display, rather than play with them. Both Astrotrain and Airazor have "Adult collectible, not intended for use by children" on the packages. I find this particularly odd given that, aside from the remolded heads, these are exactly the same molds as toys available for children only a few years ago. Not only that, but both packages have an extra "Ages 5+" sticker on them. But we move on....
Airazor is intended to compliment the BotCon 2006 set, which was also comprised of "pre-Beast Wars" characters. Hmmm.... Now I may need to figure out a way to fit Airazor into the Family Feud comic I did a couple of weeks back. ;)
Anyway, all in all, the toys are quite nice. Unfortunately, I'm not yet convinced that they're worth the price I paid for them, nor worth the many, many delays. Technically, these are to be considered the 2006 club exclusives. At one point in time, we were promised two club exclusives per year. Since these are the first, and they actually came out in 2007, it can safely be assumed that FP has not yet been able to set up a pattern of two toys per year yet in the two full years of their ownership of the club. Time will tell if FP can make good on 2007 exclusives this year. They're already pushing the limit on getting pre-registration forms up for BotCon 2007, which happens in just over three months. This is the make-it-or-break-it time for FP, and I wish I could say that I was more encouraged. I guess I'll have some time to think about it, though. I'll be out of town next week, and won't be making any further updates here until April 2nd. I do expect updates to my podcast, The Reflectionary, to continue preparations for Holy Week without interruption, however.
The first thing that simply has to be discussed is the packaging. It's certainly nice packaging. Sturdy. Attractive. Possibly as much a display item as the toys themselves. Modeled here with the assistance of my cat, Turtle, I'm sure that they'll make a nice addition to any Transformer collection.But, to be honest, I'm a bit annoyed that these toys come with packaging at all. To judge from the posts on the club forums, I seem to be of a minority opinion on this matter. But I'm convinced that these nice packages add a considerable amount to what I had to pay to get these toys in the first place. Since Fun Publications, as a rule, never releases actual costs and figures for pretty much anything, we can really only guess how much this packaging costs, but back in the days of the former convention holder, packaging was said to make up as much as half of the expense of an exclusive toy (see question 9 at the old Transformers FAQ for my source). Now, there are several differences between these boxes and the ones that FP would create. For example, these are simple boxes with no window. Adding a transparent window is an extra expense in creating a box. However, the material here is much sturdier than some of the old boxes were (the packaging on the OTFCC 2003 exclusive set was apparently particularly bad). I don't know how all that shakes out, but I'm willing to guess that we paid at least an extra $20 in order to get these boxes (I figure guessing almost 20% of the total cost of toys is being generous, given that the old figure was 50%. I certainly assume FP is more efficient). I could have gotten two deluxe-sized retail Transformers for that money!
And I don't really care about having a nice package to add to my Transformers collection. I care about a nice Transformer to add to my Transformers collection! They provide nice storage for the toys, but they take up so much room! I have to figure out where in our apartment I can actually keep this stuff!
But, enough of that rant. Pete Sinclair says that the boxes are pretty much guaranteed to be a part of every club exclusive for the foreseeable future, so it doesn't sound like my attempts to make these things moderately affordable for fans is going to do any good. Let's move on to the toys themselves.
Astrotrain is the larger of the two items, and is a repaint of Armada Jetfire. This is a very attractive recolor, with one of the nicest remolded heads I've ever seen on an exclusive. While I agree with the people who have commented that, not being a triple-changer with a locomotive engine as one of his alternate modes, Astrotrain is not an especially accurate name for this toy, the colors, head, and space shuttle mode all combine to create a toy that homages the original G1 character very well, while having enough distinctives to be a character all his own.
Astrotrain comes with four Mini-Cons. All with less than terrific names: Starcatcher (and the powers-that-be really wanted to call it "Cowcatcher," which would have been a hundred times worse! Starcatcher's actually not so bad), Astro-Hook, Astro-Line, and Astro-Sinker. The last three were named as an homage to minor characters (named simply "Hook," "Line" and "Sinker") from the original Marvel comic. Although these toys have pretty much nothing in common with the original characters they are intended to homage, and the "Astro-" added to each name is pretty dippy, it's kind of cool that the club remembers such obscure names enough to homage them in the first place.
The other club exclusive just released is a pre-Beast Wars Airazor. This toy is a remold of Energon Slugslinger with a new head and an attractive orange-and-brown color scheme. The transformation for this figure is one of the most original I've ever seen, causing me to wonder if I'd be able to figure it out without the instructions when I first tried it. However, it's actually fairly intuitive. It does have some stability issues in both modes, though, which definitely detracts from the toy's playability. But I suppose that I'm supposed to just put these toys on display, rather than play with them. Both Astrotrain and Airazor have "Adult collectible, not intended for use by children" on the packages. I find this particularly odd given that, aside from the remolded heads, these are exactly the same molds as toys available for children only a few years ago. Not only that, but both packages have an extra "Ages 5+" sticker on them. But we move on....Airazor is intended to compliment the BotCon 2006 set, which was also comprised of "pre-Beast Wars" characters. Hmmm.... Now I may need to figure out a way to fit Airazor into the Family Feud comic I did a couple of weeks back. ;)
Anyway, all in all, the toys are quite nice. Unfortunately, I'm not yet convinced that they're worth the price I paid for them, nor worth the many, many delays. Technically, these are to be considered the 2006 club exclusives. At one point in time, we were promised two club exclusives per year. Since these are the first, and they actually came out in 2007, it can safely be assumed that FP has not yet been able to set up a pattern of two toys per year yet in the two full years of their ownership of the club. Time will tell if FP can make good on 2007 exclusives this year. They're already pushing the limit on getting pre-registration forms up for BotCon 2007, which happens in just over three months. This is the make-it-or-break-it time for FP, and I wish I could say that I was more encouraged. I guess I'll have some time to think about it, though. I'll be out of town next week, and won't be making any further updates here until April 2nd. I do expect updates to my podcast, The Reflectionary, to continue preparations for Holy Week without interruption, however.
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Custom Action Master Power Plans: G2 Breakdown, "Diaclone" Bluestreak, and Stepper
A few years ago, I used to have a web site dedicated to archiving Action Master Power Plans. I did a few "custom" Power Plans during that time, inspired by some customs that I got from www.custommasters.com, but also including a few customs of my own. Although I took the site down, I still have the Plans, and will post a few of them here from time to time. Here are Plans for G2 Breakdown (the 2004 BotCon exclusive), "Diaclone" Bluestreak and Stepper (both my own customs). Click on the thumbnails for a better look.
Monday, March 5, 2007
Pre-Beast Wars Family Feud
Well, here it is! My first attempt at a photocomic, starring (most of) the 2006 BotCon exclusives. Enjoy!
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