rdrunner
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Everything posted by rdrunner
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Ignoring the storyline and judging from the mecha design perspective, it was a very bold move away from the range of VF-25 to VF-31 line, and it features some pretty crazy engineering on Bandai’s part in bringing the design to a real figure. I’m glad that I was able to look past the silly storyline behind this unit, and learned to appreciate a very nice valk design. It is probably the most original transforming valk toy design we have seen in years, since the VF-4G, IMO.
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Actually I would agree with your analysis. Day 1 pricing on the 1J was already at 24-25k yen and the PO wasn’t as crappy as last night’s. Factor that in and all of a sudden a 27.5k price doesn’t seem so bad. Not condoning NY’s practice of deliberately limiting first round stock levels, and I hate their ticketing system with a passion; but their price point of 27.5k given where we are is, shall we say, “understandable”. And I wouldn’t be surprised if they sold out at this price by the end of tonight.
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I laughed when the draken appeared and it was wielding a freaking sword!! Ugh, I thought, this whole knights of the kingdom thing and sword is just so un-Macross. But months after the Sv-262s release I ended up getting an unused one on Mandarake. Simply because of my curiosity in the unorthodox transformation that we have never seen before. (Or probably never will again).
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Hats off sir for the principles. If I hadn’t been lucky, I would admittedly have caved as well. NY’s ticketing system combined with their deliberate stock limitation is bloody ridiculous.
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my best recollection is that it was trading around 24-25k the first couple days, then went up to 28k then 30k fairly quickly in the first week or two.
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Thanks Shizuka that theory actually makes a lot of sense (the idea of lots, and warehousing). While I agree with what your friend said, I do wonder how TWE preorders fit into the model. Maybe these are produced in much smaller lot sizes and warehousing won’t ever be an issue anyway as they’re all prepaid up front.
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I would be curious to know too. What websites would you search for a Japanese Macross forum?? A toy reviewer in HK said none of his friends and him were able to secure a PO for the Max 1A. So it’s not just us American fans who got screwed this time.
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To me it's not a question of if, but when. It would make the most sense to issue that next to complete the Vermillion squadron, but I think we can never predict Bandai...
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Hahahaha! I have been a gundam fan for a long time, as well as a fan of the transformers masterpiece line. While Gundam mecha has beautiful and extremely detailed sculpt and articulation, most of them don't transform and even when they do (zeta/zz/etc) the non-robot mode always look "forced". Transformers on the other hand, feels more like a kids toy and a lot of the transformation gimmicks are needed to account for "anime magic", and the resulting sculpt and lines aren't as refined as Valkyries. To me, valks strike the perfect balance between decent forms (in both fighter and battroid modes, in most cases), great articulation (I'm looking at you, VF-4, with the fixed shoulders, as the only exception), and the pristine finish to them as a figure for grown ups, not just a toy. It's a shame that valks are not more widely appreciated by the market, which could have increased production volumes and our chances of securing these GD preorders...
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Oh right yeah I'm with you. Got up early as well (up since 3:15 Eastern - not as early as the main party here), but a slow day at work for me fortunately.
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Personally I see it the other way round - brand new 31A's are going for upwards of 45-50k yen and as of today, scalper price of a Max PO is around 30k yen. It should be the other party offering the 1A with some other stuff/cash to trade with your 31A IMHO.
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I am hoping that Kakizaki will be a TWE release (less PO madness) but who knows. With the Max 1A being so difficult to come by during preorder, it would have killed of many people's hopes for completing the Vermillion Squadron in this line. Unfortunately the main draw of the Kakizaki TV 1A is really the completion of the squadron and not much else, so if it's not a TWE item, production volume might be even lower than the Max TV 1A.
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Wow I would have thought you could command an asking price with the 31A that's higher than the current scalper's rate for the Max 1A! Or did I misinterpret what you meant (to offer the 31A as part of a trade for the 1/48 DX 1A)?
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I agree but the Yamato 1/48 has the best fighter mode in any of the transforming valks I have seen. But of course the downside is that battroid mode looks weird. Another thing going for the Yammies is the custom paint schemes - woodland, low vis, stealth... all very sexy!
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Thanks David I was very lucky to be at the right place at the right time this morning. Only a few more hours to go...
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Thanks @vlenhoff and I'm sorry to hear about that. I really hope you can get one from somewhere at a reasonable price before the release date. Amazon JP may open up their orders again from time to time, fingers crossed.
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This is all very good from the perspective of maximizing customer satisfaction (in that everybody should be able to get a PO), and I would love it in Bandai did that. However, from what others have mentioned before, Macross only accounts for a very small propotion of Bandai's sales, and so it is unlikely that they will allocate so much resources to managing the supply/demand of this line, and just issue enough to make sure there are no shelf warmers. They don't really care if money is left on the table, because they can more than make up for the losses in other lines. All of this is really, really sad for us hardcore Macross fans, but that's what makes this hobby so addictive - the harder they are to get, the more we want them...
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I was up since 3:15 and maybe got in an hour's sleep after I secured my amazon orders. Fortunately the wife made Hong Kong style milk tea which is like 4 times stronger than espresso, and that has been keeping me awake all morning.
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Nice! NY's ticketing system was a complete joke. It just makes it impossible to order from their site - by the time we got through the queue, it was already sold out. Unless the botters and scalpers found a way to get around that some how, I don't know why it would have sold out so quickly even with this annoying ticketing system in place.
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Good for you sir! May I ask who you placed PO's with? I managed to snag 2 with amazon japan GK in the 5:35-5:41 window. Could have snagged one at 19440+950 shipping with a third party vendor as well, and regretted that I didn't, as I could have helped other members out.
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I hope so too. If the situation we saw last night was ENTIRELY due to scalpers and botters being much more active than the last release (DX 1J), we should see day 1 prices fall back to the levels seen with the 1J on release date (iirc, around 24-25k). But if Bandai had also reduced the production numbers, this will drive up the day 1 prices. I sincerely hope that Bandai will learn the lesson from this release going forward, adjust the production numbers and find a better way to deal with scalpers.
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I agree wholeheartedly. If paying upfront could guarantee at least 1 unit per buyer, I would be very happy to do so. It really is THEIR responsibility to find a better way to match demand with adequate supply and not let the scalpers take away their potential profits.
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Yes, I was surprised that given the popularity of the DX YF-19 FSP, it was very easy to get on PO night and it is still available for a not-crazy after market price today.
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Shhhh, maybe HG doesn't know they can enforce their rights on Mospeada yet...? :D:D
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I don't understand why NONE of these Japanese sites can keep the order in the cart for a few minutes, like how we buy cinema tickets here online with the AMC theatres or something. Surely it can't be THAT hard to do, and if they all demand payment upfront, or at least a sizable deposit, that would surely help remove some of the incentives from scalpers taking advantage, because they have some skin in the game rather than taking no-risk bets and make money out of zero deposit?
