hasbro said that they underestimated the popularity of minicons. as a result, energon only got one all new set and a remold. hasbro said they acknowledged the demand for minicons around the time of Energon, yet, GF seems to only have one all new set, a remold, an all new minicon that comes with Vector Prime, and a remold that comes with Metroplex. did hastak already have GF planned out by the time they acknowledge the demand for minicons and as a result, didn't have room to include more new sets into the GF line-up?

Well Takara released a mini-con booster pack

 

Prehaps Hasbro is going to do somthing similar...

i remember when reading in a toy fair mag at the begining of armada the guy in charge said they had lines planned more than five years in advance.

hasbro said that they underestimated the popularity of minicons. as a result, energon only got one all new set and a remold. hasbro said they acknowledged the demand for minicons around the time of Energon, yet, GF seems to only have one all new set, a remold, an all new minicon that comes with Vector Prime, and a remold that comes with Metroplex. did hastak already have GF planned out by the time they acknowledge the demand for minicons and as a result, didn't have room to include more new sets into the GF line-up?

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Hasbro is always one line ahead.  They should be finishing up with Cybertron and most likely are starting to work on the next series.  They have most likely been working on the movie since it was announced (if not before it was publically announced).

ya there are probally movie figures in test shot production now...

 

as for mainstream lines...take a look at some of the cybertron figs...some of them have a 04 copyright

ya there are probally movie figures in test shot production now...

 

as for mainstream lines...take a look at some of the cybertron figs...some of them have a 04 copyright

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The mouds were probably all done last year and maybe some into this year.  But the story and designs have already been made.  I'd say 2004 they were making test shots and stuff of the molds, fixing anything with them.  2003 they were working on the story and designs.

 

This is an excellent question to ask BotCon.  It would be interesting to see what Hasbro says on it.

hasbro said that they underestimated the popularity of minicons. as a result, energon only got one all new set and a remold. ?

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Is that an official statment?  bearing in mind that Armada did pretty well... and that Minicons is what Armada was all about it seems kind of............... silly.

i remember when reading in a toy fair mag at the begining of armada the guy in charge said they had lines planned more than five years in advance.

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If you mean Mr Archer...  he has the ability to see 5 yrs into the future.

 

As do I:  I predict that five years from now he will still be trying to claim credit for other peoples work.

From what i understand, its aproximately an 18 month turn around from concept to shelf. the problem is that sales data adds more time after the orriginal 18 month design period. how do i kn ow this, well i'm currently trying to get into F.I.T.'s toy design program, and a year ago i was able to get a tour of hasbro's design faciliy in Pawtucket, RI. it helps when your firends family friend is one of the presidents of hasbro america's toy group. so last year i saw alot of the designs for the figures for cybertron/gf and many alternators. actually saw the designs for swindle and an wicked alt prototype that unfortunately will never be due to some car company's reluctance to sign the damn release form. Any way, the problem is that by the time the designers relised that the minicons were popular the probably were designing 2 lines in advance. possibley retro fitting the gf/cybertron figs with planet keys was an attempt to give the fans what they want.....or at least half of what they want. it seems that simply designed forec chips can me made faster thant newly designed/tooled minicons.

AT the 2004 OTFCC, while we were seeing the final bits of Energon (combiners, dinos, etc), the TF Team said that were working on wave 2/3 of Cybertron.

 

So as others said, roughly a year, but I'm sure they have preliminary plans for some time (according to insiders, the GI Joe line has MANY new figures sculpted and only need to be fit "into the plan")