There's a Hasbro livestream coming at the end of the month, and they plan to reveal the next crowdfunded HasLab toy. The official copy is as follows:

“Get ready to Roll Out a #TransformersTuesday like never before! We’re officially kicking off the Transformers 40th anniversary celebration at 10:00am ET on January 30th with a Fanstream of epic proportions! Join BMac and Evan on Hasbro Pulse’s YouTube channel as they fire up the engines and unveil an all-new Transformers HasLab that is sure to be a must-have in your collection! Make sure you’ve filled up on Energon because you do not want to miss this!”

There appear to be at least a couple of hints buried in there as to the mystery toy's identity. "Fire up your engines" could be a reference to fire engines, which makes me think of Robots in Disguise Optimus Prime. That, combined with the previous Hasbro hint that the new HasLab will be an "Omega-level event" (as in Omega Prime) suggests strongly to me that's what we're going to get. This does fly in the face of Evan Brooks claiming earlier that they would never do an Optimus Prime toy for HasLab, but apparently he rather sheepishly admitted recently that this was an assumption on his part and not a hard-and-fast rule.

So, my thinking is that it will be a redesigned version of RiD Optimus and Ultra Magnus, who will combine together into Omega Prime. It's difficult for me to decide if that's something I want to own. I'm sure it will hover around the $200 mark or more, and right now it's hard for me to justify spending that kind of money, especially for something that feels inessential to my collection. But, I guess I'm getting ahead of myself. We'll see when the times comes for the big reveal.

Zob (of course it would be on a freakin' Tuesday, of all days)

Your sleuthing makes sense, but I can't help but wonder, is there really enough pent-up demand for characters from RID01 to justify the price of a Haslab?

Pro:
- there was media representation in the form of a mildly popular cartoon show.
- perhaps fans want an update to the beloved toys from yesteryear (I'd venture to say that the actual RID Optimus toy is more popular than RID Optimus the character).
- it's an Optimus, and Optimi always sell.
- TF fans have more money than sense.

Cons:
- it's from a nearly 25-year old show that hasn't had any followup or continuation since it aired.
- the memory of RID01 was almost immediately overwritten by the Armada trilogy and the Bay movies.
- Sky Byte is the only character from that continuity that has had any staying power.
- G1 fans likely have the deepest pockets, but will they be willing to spend?
- The original toys had gimmicks + poseability. Any improvements would be marginal, at best. They'd be better off trying for a non-botched reissue:
- This guy is pretty hard to beat: https://youtu.be/MjSVOoAhx64?si=wAIVkuHoHGIwoXCO

On Thursday, January 25, 2024 at 12:20:53 PM UTC-7, CodigoPostal wrote:

> Your sleuthing makes sense, but I can't help but wonder, is there really enough pent-up demand for characters from RID01 to justify the price of a Haslab?

I'm honestly not sure. I really enjoyed everything about RiD when it was originally running—the show, the toy line, all of it. But, it's not something I've ever revisited time and again, as I do with G1. Part of that is the lack of an official DVD release, which seems like a huge oversight.

> - TF fans have more money than sense.

You're not wrong there.

> - it's from a nearly 25-year old show that hasn't had any followup or continuation since it aired.

That's not necessarily a disadvantage. The timing is definitely right for some Robots in Disguise nostalgia. Kids who grew up on that show are young adults now. I just don't know if RiD as a whole was memorable enough. It's become an almost insignificant footnote in Transformers lore overall. It's like Machine Wars.

> - Sky Byte is the only character from that continuity that has had any staying power.

Agreed, he's by far the most memorable character.

> - G1 fans likely have the deepest pockets, but will they be willing to spend?

Eventually, on a long enough timeline, we'll get our first Transformers HasLab toy that fails to successfully crowdfund. It's already happened with Star Wars, arguably a bigger, more popular brand with more fans and even more buying power. I'm not convinced there's enough nostalgia for RiD for this to be a success. I don't ever see fans clamoring for Hasbro to revisit that specific iteration of the franchise. But, maybe I'm way off the mark.

Zob (watch Hasbro surprise everybody with an update of Rescue Roy or something)

I bought the original Car Robot toys when I was living in Japan. I'm
satisfied with them.

I feel like by the time of Beast Wars, the toy engineering was perfected
for transformation and posability. I don't see why any of these "modern"
toys need to be redone.

CodigoPostal wrote:

> Your sleuthing makes sense, but I can't help but wonder, is there really enough pent-up demand for characters from RID01 to justify the price of a Haslab?

> Pro:
> - there was media representation in the form of a mildly popular cartoon show.
> - perhaps fans want an update to the beloved toys from yesteryear (I'd venture to say that the actual RID Optimus toy is more popular than RID Optimus the character).
> - it's an Optimus, and Optimi always sell.
> - TF fans have more money than sense.

> Cons:
> - it's from a nearly 25-year old show that hasn't had any followup or continuation since it aired.

I would have thought that a Japanese TV show that shared no toys with American toys and was never shown in the US would have even less appeal.

> - the memory of RID01 was almost immediately overwritten by the Armada trilogy and the Bay movies.

I don't think so. It was such a different show from what came before or after that it still sparks warm memories for a lot of people.

> - Sky Byte is the only character from that continuity that has had any staying power.

Scourge would beg to differ. Or Nemesis Prime, as he has basically been renamed. In fact, the sales of Velocitron Scourge and the complaints of inaccuracies might have been part of why Hasbro thinks there is a market for this.

There was also the recentish botched reissue, which would have helped gauge interest in Japan, and the fine folks of Japan may also be encouraged to give Hasbro and Takara money. (I would assume that there has been some way for them to get Star Saber and Deathsaurus)

> - The original toys had gimmicks + poseability. Any improvements would be marginal, at best. They'd be better off trying for a non-botched reissue

RID Ultra Magnus kind of sucks as a toy. I think that if they designed Magnus to have shins that could be transformed either in a screen/toy accurate mega-shins, or a smaller more human proportioned set of legs, that could be a huge improvement.

And Optimus's "cab mode" isn't a cab. Add in some wheels for the back of the cab, so plain Optimus has a vehicle mode (similar to how they reworked the non-super-mode WFC Cybertron Optimus Prime's alt-mode) and you could have something very special.

The trick would be making the toys so they can *also* be accurate to the originals, rather than just being inaccurate.

On Thursday, January 25, 2024 at 4:04:08 PM UTC-8, Zobovor wrote:
> On Thursday, January 25, 2024 at 12:20:53 PM UTC-7, CodigoPostal wrote:
> > - it's from a nearly 25-year old show that hasn't had any followup or continuation since it aired.
> That's not necessarily a disadvantage. The timing is definitely right for some Robots in Disguise nostalgia. Kids who grew up on that show are young adults now. I just don't know if RiD as a whole was memorable enough. It's become an almost insignificant footnote in Transformers lore overall. It's like Machine Wars.

It's funny, because I've been thinking about Machine Wars lately, too. I have this vivid memory of thinking about that particular line as some kind of cool, niche, obscure set of toys I simply had to have, mostly because they were never available in Canada. I traded a loose, complete, and good-condition G1 Shockwave for a set of all 12 toys with thanks to Lillith Rael / Razormoon, formerly of ATT, back in 1997.

Are MW and RID comparable, though? If you asked an average collector today, would they even know what they were? Have the toys had any staying power at all? To my mind, RID, with its supporting media and better-engineered toys, fared better. But, overall, how are people feeling about MW these days? Does the line even register in discussions like this? It would be interesting to see what collectors circa 2024 - so spoiled by where we're at now - think.

JB

Travoltron wrote:

> I feel like by the time of Beast Wars, the toy engineering was perfected
> for transformation and posability. I don't see why any of these "modern"
> toys need to be redone.

At the HasLab level, or just in general?

In general, I often enjoy seeing different takes on the same character. One of the most interesting parts of the Movieverse was seeing dozens of iterations on Optimus Prime, often having wildly different ways of getting roughly the same robot out of the same vehicle. Or how they shoved a Movie Optimus robot into a G1 Optimus alt-mode.

And the same thing happens (although with far fewer instances) when they are doing new characters for BW and later toys. There are different design priorities (Armada Megatron is a platform for gimmicks, Legacy Armada Megatron can walk forwards), different approaches (BW Airazor and Kingdom Airazor are wildly different), and sometimes an adequate toy where the original failed (Kingdom Inferno is an adequate toy, while BW Inferno is a floppy mess that cannot stand, but does look nicer)

I'd rather Hasbro feel confident enough to go in new directions (what if the cartoon had a kids line, and entries into either Studio Series or Generations aimed more at collectors and older kids?), or focused on the characters whose toys were either poor or didn't last, but sometimes its fun to see a new take on an old character design that is beloved.

I have no idea how they can improve Cybertron Starscream over the original Voyager mold though. I expect nothing good when they attempt to redo a toy that is beloved. But if they wanted to do a new Cybershark? That would be great. Maybe this time it will be good.

On Saturday, January 27, 2024 at 4:21:23 AM UTC-7, Joseph Bardsley wrote:
> Are MW and RID comparable, though? If you asked an average collector today, would they even know what they were? Have the toys had any staying power at all? To my mind, RID, with its supporting media and better-engineered toys, fared better.

Robots in Disguise was pretty significant when it first came out. But, now there are adult Transformers fans who are in their early 20's who were born after it came out, and have no living memory of it. It's not important enough for them to seek out. A big chunk of the toy line was just Beast Wars and G2 toys in the wrong colors, and it was quickly supplanted by Armada after like one year. And, as I said, the lack of an official DVD release makes it a lot less accessible to modern fans. (I think I probably have episodes recorded on VHS somewhere, but...)

> But, overall, how are people feeling about MW these days? Does the line even register in discussions like this?

The climate of Transformers collecting was very, very different when Machine Wars came out. There had been an exclusive focus on Beast Wars for like two years, and the fans were starting to ask, "Hey, what about vehicles? Are we ever going to get vehicles again?" and so Hasbro sort of threw together Machine Wars based on whatever European toys and aborted G2 toys they had laying about. It was a small token effort, but one that I rather appreciated at the time.

Robots in Disguise was basically Machine Wars with extra steps. More recycled toys thrown at the fans to answer the demand for realistic vehicle-based Transformers (and this was after five straight years of Beast Wars/Beast Machines) and some fun Easter eggs thrown into the English-language translation to turn the cartoon into sort of a G1 Lite (various throwaway references to the Insecticons, Auggie Cahnay, etc.) Back then, I think a lot of fans were hungry for just about *any* connection to G1, even if it meant selectively ignoring canon and contorting RiD to fit the G1 narrative. But, that was during a time when Hasbro was far less willing to throw a bone to the longtime fans. ("Oh, you like G1 Prowl? Well, here's an owl, now shut up.") Nowadays we get lovingly-crafted updates that are specifically designed to look like the G1 characters—and specifically their media incarnations from the G1 cartoon. This level of effort would have been unthinkable in 2001.

We're not at the point now where we're starving like we used to be. Not only does Hasbro acknowledge the longtime fans now, but they cater to us specifically. That's huge. Nowadays, if they threw a random G1 reference into Earthspark or whatever the current show is, people would be like, "So what? We get that all the time now."

Zob (with that said, I honestly wouldn't mind seeing updated Deluxe-scale toys for all the G2 Go-Bots and RiD Spychangers)

Wasn't there a quote from the G1 cartoon where an Autobot says "you were right and I was wrong?" Or am I misremembering?

Anyway, as we all now presumably know, the new Haslab is indeed Omega Prime. Happy for those that want it, but I don't feel the need to upgrade...

...After all, I still have Titanium RID Optimus.

CodigoPostal wrote:

> Wasn't there a quote from the G1 cartoon where an Autobot says "you were right and I was wrong?" Or am I misremembering?

> Anyway, as we all now presumably know, the new Haslab is indeed Omega Prime. Happy for those that want it, but I don't feel the need to upgrade...

What they've shown so far looks good, but just a very modest upgrade/downgrade from the originals. They are the right size relative to each other, and Optimus's super mode doesn't need to have the ladder folded to avoid dragging on the ground, but no electronic fun. (I would have loved a soundbox that said "I am a goldfish" like the Car Robots version had)

The Bluebolt weaponizer looks neat.

They are also more cartoon accurate, and have Ultra Magnus's hips hidden away inside Omega Prime, with a painted piece that looks like how UM hips were animated on Omega Prime. I'm not sure I like that. Actually, I'm sure that I don't like it, but I'm not sure if I dislike it -- depends on how complicated things like that made the toy. I like when parts have to find a purpose in both modes.

With the previous HasLab exclusives, they would reveal more details during the ordering period to keep it in the Transformers news sites. If they found a decent and stable way to use both sets of armor simultaneously, that might make it an actual upgrade. Or maybe there will be something else that will excite me.

On 1/31/2024 2:25 AM, GustavoWombat wrote:
> just a very modest upgrade/downgrade from the originals.

Indeed. I don't have an extra $250 laying around these days to justify
the expense.

But I'm happy for people that weren't able to get the original back in
the day.

Could they have done this at retail? $200 for a Titan vs $250 for the Haslab; lose the Bluebolts, simplify/shrink slightly? Maybe not; psychologically, perhaps it's easier to justify $200 for a LARGE Transformer than for two smaller Commanders? Separating them might not work - RID Magnus would likely languish.

On Wednesday, January 31, 2024 at 12:55:28 PM UTC-7, CodigoPostal wrote:

> Could they have done this at retail? $200 for a Titan vs $250 for the Haslab; lose the Bluebolts, simplify/shrink slightly? Maybe not; psychologically, perhaps it's easier to justify $200 for a LARGE Transformer than for two smaller Commanders? Separating them might not work - RID Magnus would likely languish.

Somebody pointed out on the message boards that if they'd sold these toys at retail, they would have likely taken up the Commander-class price points for two years running. I think that would have been a bad move. Some people might have felt obligated to buy RiD Ultra Magnus just to go with RiD Optimus, but not everybody would nibble. At least doing it as a HasLab toy doesn't take up slots for other toys.

It's been like two days and they've already surpassed the 5000 mark, so from the looks of it, they'll absolutely hit the required 10,000 supporters. I was unsure whether there would have been a lot of interest in Omega Prime, but evidently there are a lot more fans out there supporting this project than I would have expected. I really though this was going to be the first Transformers HasLab that didn't reach fruition.

I'm kind of divided, to be honest. I absolutely loved RiD when it first came out, but it's not something that I continue to revisit or celebrate. I haven't dug through my RiD toys in ages, and although I have episodes on VHS somewhere around here, I haven't rewatched them in many years. $250 is a lot to drop on a toy that I'm not really that excited about. I would spend that kind of cash without thinking on, say, a Takara Masterpiece Blitzwing or something, but that's a whole different story. Except for that one weird Sky-Byte redo we got around 2014, I don't really have a neo-RiD collection to speak of. Though, I guess Sideburn is coming later for United, so they're working on growing the collection, albeit rather slowly.

It's weird that I bought both HasLab Star Saber and Deathsaurus and they're still in the box. I never even transformed them.

I dunno. I guess I've got until mid-March to figure it out.

Zob (indecisive... well, I mean, not really... okay, on second thought, I guess I kind of am...)