Outrider, YES I singled you out. But not so much in a bad way. I don't know how the Swamp Rats are in your verse. If they are genetically enhanced hew-mons, cool. If not, cool. Just as long as they aren't rats w/ human DNA!!! Seriously tho, they are a good figure. I don't mind the concept of Venomization; mixing of animal dna and humans. Didn't the Germans try that in WWII?

Whatever your use of the Swamp Rats, I know you are cool with them. Your shots always look good. Question is, are they good character/army builders in regard to the topic at hand?

Because we all know that there are differences between
Concept/Idea
Design
Execution

Blackout's concept was great.
Blackout's design was so-so
Blackout's execution was crap (all cuz of the arms and cross-eyedness)

Therefore, WAS Blackout worth bringing in? Was he worth making a crappy figure of? That's what it really comes down to. New character? that's nice, too bad the execution of figure and to a degree, the comic, it SUCKED!

I agree, a new character is fine, as long as they really think and follow thru with it till the end. Some of these characters it seems they created this great concept for and then someone in production sneezed at the last minute and now look what we got.

Both points are uniquely true,
when hasbro comes up with a good idea, they often lack the 3 things needed to pull it off, which again comes back to what I said earlier about them.

"Why put the effort into new characters when fans wont buy them, we'll just rehash what we had out already and change the colours slightly, it's a character they know and we wont have to redesign or explain his background"

In the last 5-6 years they've released some very good characters that should of been replacements directly for the original 13, but without the effort behind it and correct execution their sales wont be as good.
But hasbro either doesn't see it, or continues to ignore it because they are stupid.

They should just admit that people wont buy their new characters because the product isn't that great and not because fans 'dont back the line'
it's quite clever what they have done to the fanbase really, why tackle the issue when you can just avoid it all together?

The characters they are releasing have been done in a previous wave, for the most part they seem to have the same issues as before. They recoloured them and slapped a new series title on them.. they'll sell.. because theres enough of a fanbase out there now to support the series.

Two things will kill their line.
1. Fans will become f'cked off with their price gouging and hiking up or lack of availability. It's still happening in some areas and I know some of my friends in the UK have had to get assists from friends in the Usa to keep up.

2. They will run out of ideas. Potentially this could go two ways..
i) they will turn to the subteams idea, sky patrol, python patrol (already seen this in the line ) they might even re-release movie intergrated stuff as a result, and or Eco Warriors/Ninja force.
ii) they will cancel the line, blame the fan base for non-backing of the line but put it in a way that it's because of the economic climate problems the world has i.e
"The line isn't working out as an economical profit like we hoped, fans dont have the financial resources to back the line because of the current economic crisis"

Again totally avoiding the two issues, they got greedy and overpriced.. and didnt have any backroom ideas when the nostalgia wears off. For the most part the 25th has been nothing but rereleases and repaints of everything we had in the 80s and 90s. Which is fantastic if you dont have those 1st versions.

Not so great if you spent hundreds of $ker-ching$ already on your vintage stuff.

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Or if you think the new versions are superior in nearly every way...

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is on indefinite hiatus...

Yes yes that as well..

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Hasbro has been doing repaints, re-using molds since 1982. I doubt they'll ever stop.

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Yeah.. it's just a shame they dont follow Master Collectors example and do a good job of it

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Cool G, I didn't have a problem with being mentioned, I do like the Swamp Rats - as figures. For me they are just regular grunts who's specialty is swamp fighting. The venomization concept and what's written on the file card mean nothing to me; their place in my Joeverse is determined by me. If I don't like their backstory I completely ignore it, which is how everyone's Joeverse probably works.

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"The future's uncertain and the end is always near." - The Doors "Roadhouse Blues".

Believe me, Craig. I'm the same way. Forget the filecard (or movie or comic stuff) and do what you want with them. Which is why my Sand Vipers (when i had them) were in powered suits and had cool optical stuff akin to a Predator's. I always liked the Swamp Rats, wish I really built them but alas, cash was a problem and I chose Razor Troopers. But my Razor Troopers are genetically enhanced but not so much like a tiger, y'know?