So, something I was posting about in a different thread got me thinking... is there any chance that Hasbro could use this model to offer a stripped down and different version of the Engine of Vengeance vehicle at a much more reasonable direct to consumer price.
😜
https://thefwoosh.com/community/marvel_board/2024-general-discussion/paged/160/#post-64234
I know... human thought is weird in that you can have an idea - and then when you continue to think about it, other factors occur to you that impact your thought process and change your outlook. I posted my pollyanna-blue sky thoughts here and then as I thought it through had more sobering (read: depressing) thoughts about the realities of that that I posted in the other thread. :shrug:
Tsi says:
What does the market for a stripped-down Engine of Vengeance even look like? I feel like Ramen Toys beat Hasbro to the punch on that one.As for the market for a stripped down Engine of Vengeance - if you could sell the car without all of the moving gears and lights and sounds and just sell the plastic car with moving plastic wheels and flame effects for $100ish I think there could be a robust market for it.
There certainly seems to be a very healthy market for vehicles in that price range for G.I. Joe. The Ramen Toys offering was still $300. Get out something more affordable, you can get retail partners more onboard and more customers interested. There are reasons it could be more successful done that way.
But as I alluded to in the other thread G.I. Joe has advantages with it's vehicles that Marvel doesn't have - one is no licensing agreement siphoning off part of the profit making the margin tighter and another is built in re-use. Every vehicle the Joe brand has released at retail has already been released with a repaint version and sold again. That is not something that is viable with a Marvel Legends vehicle in the same way. So, it remains unlikely the EoV - even a simplified, cheaper version, will ever see a retail release, unfortunately.
I was just linking that we basically had the exact same thought. I don't need all the bells and whistles. Give me a cool-ass, powered up car with Robbie. I don't need the unpowered parts. Don't need lights. Don't need moving parts inside the car, although I do like a working steering wheel.
I wish Marvel Legends had the same kind of 3rd party support that Transformers has had for so many years. While the quality/fealty on some of those Transformers "knock offs" can be dubious, others can be fantastic. If a 3rd party company were to start making Marvel action figures with articulation at the same level as Jada Toys Street Fighter figures, it would be interesting to see the output, even if it meant buying characters named Arachnoman, Colonel Patriot and Wodenson.
I was just linking that we basically had the exact same thought. I don't need all the bells and whistles. Give me a cool-ass, powered up car with Robbie. I don't need the unpowered parts. Don't need lights. Don't need moving parts inside the car, although I do like a working steering wheel.
See, now that's on me for not actually clicking the link you posted. I just assumed because I had posted a contradictory comment in another thread you were having a laugh at my quick intransigence.
This time my assumption only made an ass out of me, though 😆
The EoV was over-engineered from the start as Legends is not really a bells and whistles line. If the GR cycles had come with lights and sounds, that's a different story, but the EoV was aiming for a higher level (I felt) than what the Legends line normally is.
I think a $100 version that accepts it is toy would sell.
I wish Marvel Legends had the same kind of 3rd party support that Transformers has had for so many years. While the quality/fealty on some of those Transformers "knock offs" can be dubious, others can be fantastic. If a 3rd party company were to start making Marvel action figures with articulation at the same level as Jada Toys Street Fighter figures, it would be interesting to see the output, even if it meant buying characters named Arachnoman, Colonel Patriot and Wodenson.
I’d love it if Marvel got this kind of 3P backup as well. Heck, even more than figures, I want someone to start making the accessories and artifacts we know of from Marvel. I’d ideally like them to start being included regularly with figures, but if not then big ol’ accessory packs like Mattel does from time to time for MOTU.
I think calling Ramen a stolen ideas factory is unfair. I guess I'm biased because I'm just glad someone came through with another option after the EoV failed, but the execution on their version of the Hellcharger is easily as good as Hasbro's would have been - and possibly better in some ways (though not as good of a value without figures, etc). It's definitely infringing on the IP, but not any more than so many other 3rd-party accessory makers. And in a world where you have things like CT Toys that just straight up steal/copy molds, Ramen doing ground-up design and manufacturing seems quite a bit different.
I also had a bad taste in my mouth after the EoV campaign was all said and done, but it certainly wasn't from the party who came through with a backup option. Hasbro was not without fault (I maintain the Early Bird gambit killed the whole thing) but the whole affair was just so, so gross - in some ways I feel a lot of that toxicity never left. There's a reason I'll cling to the Fwoosh until my dying day - even in disagreement here it rarely even comes close to the level of ick on reddit/social media/etc.
It's hard for me to articulate exactly why I feel that way. If they want to make an A-Team van, that's fair game. NBC or whoever could merchandise that but choose not to. Ramen's Hellcharger rising from the ashes of Hasbro's failed campaign felt gross to me. There was something cynical about it. And while Hasbro is a feelingless megacorporation, the people who work on the line have real feelings about what they produce.
Most of the third-party companies feel complementary to the main product, but Ramen strikes me as profiteering. That's probably unfair, but that's how it comes across to me. Their work feels particularly opportunistic.
I think calling Ramen a stolen ideas factory is unfair. I guess I'm biased because I'm just glad someone came through with another option after the EoV failed, but the execution on their version of the Hellcharger is easily as good as Hasbro's would have been - and possibly better in some ways (though not as good of a value without figures, etc). It's definitely infringing on the IP, but not any more than so many other 3rd-party accessory makers. And in a world where you have things like CT Toys that just straight up steal/copy molds, Ramen doing ground-up design and manufacturing seems quite a bit different.
I also had a bad taste in my mouth after the EoV campaign was all said and done, but it certainly wasn't from the party who came through with a backup option. Hasbro was not without fault (I maintain the Early Bird gambit killed the whole thing) but the whole affair was just so, so gross - in some ways I feel a lot of that toxicity never left. There's a reason I'll cling to the Fwoosh until my dying day - even in disagreement here it rarely even comes close to the level of ick on reddit/social media/etc.
It's hard for me to articulate exactly why I feel that way. If they want to make an A-Team van, that's fair game. NBC or whoever could merchandise that but choose not to. Ramen's Hellcharger rising from the ashes of Hasbro's failed campaign felt gross to me. There was something cynical about it. And while Hasbro is a feelingless megacorporation, the people who work on the line have real feelings about what they produce.
Most of the third-party companies feel complementary to the main product, but Ramen strikes me as profiteering. That's probably unfair, but that's how it comes across to me. Their work feels particularly opportunistic.
I'd get that if they had, say, announced it during the Haslab, for a cheaper price, and tried to undercut Hasbro's sales. As-is it feels (to me) exactly like the A-Team van example in that there is no official merchandise they're competing with. As far as I can tell Ramen only makes things no one else is making - including the Hellcharger, once the Haslab tanked. I was so eager and excited to get the Hellcharger, and so disappointed in its failure, that it felt more like a savior swooping in for a second chance rather than a vulture picking at the pieces. I'm assuming you don't follow Ramen on instagram or anything like that - to me he feels anything but cynical, the main guy (Ace) seems really invested in making a good product, incorporating feedback, and filling in the gaps of what the big players aren't making.
I'm totally with you on the ML team being invested in their product - I really appreciate that about them, and felt their pain in the EoV backlash. I guess I just don't imagine them being particularly offended by the fact that someone came in and gave a second chance to the folks who really, really wanted the thing enough to go third party, and instead they're angry that their soulless corporate overlords made them shoot for such high margins that they weren't able to make the badass car they designed.
I’d love it if Marvel got this kind of 3P backup as well. Heck, even more than figures, I want someone to start making the accessories and artifacts we know of from Marvel. I’d ideally like them to start being included regularly with figures, but if not then big ol’ accessory packs like Mattel does from time to time for MOTU.
This is something I'd love too. Especially now that my collecting is shifting from figures proper to dio pieces to help display with them. There are some decent accessories in the line already, they're just spread out. The biggest concentration is probably with that one Dr Doom figure that had the Ultimate Nullifier, the Book of the Vishanti, *and* the Darkhold all in one shot. I wasn't into the look of that figure enough to grab it, but for the accessories alone I was tempted.
But I feel like they could do a couple of accessory sets just using stuff already released and then use that to spin into newer stuff down the line. Group all the above mentioned (minus the Nullifier) with the Wand of Watoomb from the previous Dr Strange release, and add in maybe Excalibur/Muramasa Blade or some newer artifacts and you'd have a nice little magic accessory set.
Pack away the Nullifier with some similar scifi stuff (a Cerebro helmet, Cosmic Cube, maybe Iron Man's Photon Canon for those that didn't get that release, some others) and that's another set right off the bat with hardly any new tooling needed.
I'd get that if they had, say, announced it during the Haslab, for a cheaper price, and tried to undercut Hasbro's sales.
Which is exactly what they did to Neca when the first sewer lair was funding.
I'd get that if they had, say, announced it during the Haslab, for a cheaper price, and tried to undercut Hasbro's sales.
Which is exactly what they did to Neca when the first sewer lair was funding.
I'm glad you brought that up. For the most part I consider Ramen more of a dumpster diver than idea stealer (okay, they're both), but the sewer lair and Silverhawks were in straight competition. I'm also not a fan of them basically stealing actor likenesses for their Aces of Aviation line.
For the most part I like Ramen scavenging properties nobody's using despite the legalities, but those feel a little across the line.
I'd get that if they had, say, announced it during the Haslab, for a cheaper price, and tried to undercut Hasbro's sales.
Which is exactly what they did to Neca when the first sewer lair was funding.
I'm glad you brought that up. For the most part I consider Ramen more of a dumpster diver than idea stealer (okay, they're both), but the sewer lair and Silverhawks were in straight competition. I'm also not a fan of them basically stealing actor likenesses for their Aces of Aviation line.
For the most part I like Ramen scavenging properties nobody's using despite the legalities, but those feel a little across the line.
Fair enough on the sewer lair. They were definitely trying to take advantage of the corporate greed backlash hate train that surrounded the EoV and the NECA sewer - people were all up in arms about the price of both. I can't say I'm upset that someone is trying to bring diorama pieces to market for less than what NECA is charging, but this is a good counterexample where they are directly undercutting someone else who had the idea/product first.
Also, trying to keep myself honest here, I tried to find when they first announced/teased the Hellcharger - I remember it being immediately after the EoV campaign ended, but they might have been testing the waters before it was over. Still a little different since the writing was on the wall for most of the campaign, but it does suggest they might have tried to move forward on it regardless of if the Haslab folded.
@tsi Dan did say "something xciting" earlier today so you might be on the right track.
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