Sentinel Prime, initial thoughts.

I like the concept of Sentinel Prime and so I was looking forward to this figure.  He has cool weapons and is a pretty awesome vehicle mode.  Much in the same vein as Animated Ultra Magnus.  That is, a big ass truck of some description.  Sorry, but there is a lack of robot mode pics, again, using just my camera in my phone, and I didn’t think of doing this until after I had transformed him to vehicle mode.

Is it christmas?!?!??

A pal came by and dropped off some long awaited goodies.

Lupin III, Christmas jack Skellington and a Skeleton Warrior from Jason and the Argonauts.  All Revoltechs.  Adn another TF Generations book! What the heck?????

Plus I picked up a DOTM Starscream playset for cheap as well.  It isn’t bad, reminds me a lot of the Micromasters and the vehicle sets back in days of yore.

Powerglide, Same toy. New Pics.

My thoughts are still much the same as in my initial thoughts post about this guy.  I have just managed to get my camera batteries charged and have taken some better quality pictures.

Massive awesome figma find!

Thanks to a hot tip from a mate, I found my most longed for figma.

BRRREEEEoooooooowww! Braka Braka Braka!

Yes! that’s right!  In case you couldn’t tell, this is a little gallery and review of the figma version of Yoshika Miyafuji from the awesome, possibly asinine, definitely ridiculous Strike Witches.  This story has a funny(ish) way of coming about.  One day while perusing DVDs, I saw the cover for the box set of season 1 of Strike Witches, and it’s tag line was “Winning the war on pants!”  which immediately got my interest.  What does that even mean??

Dark Of the Moon figure price RIPOFF!

 

Ok, I know for a fact that in Australia we get gipped on prices for pretty much everything, games, toys, lately food.  It’s all seriously priced up over other countries, but I have to say that I was shocked when I saw the pricing for the Dark Of the Moon figure assortments.

 

Let’s compare with our friends in the U.S.A (which is nice and easy due to the Aus Dollar being so close next to it). 

 

US $ and Australian $ Price Comparison of ‘Dark of the Moon’ toys.

Class size:	Legion	Commander	HA Basic	Action Playsets	Deluxe	Voyager	Leader
US  Dollars	5	8	10	16	13	24	50
Aus Dollars	8	18	19	19	29	50	89

 

So bearing that in mind, and the fact that the Aussie dollar has only (!) been about equal to the US dollar for the last 5 or so months, I will convert the Australian Prices into American using the current rate of $1 Aus gets you $1.06 US.

Australian Prices Converted into US dollars and compared with US prices.

Class size:	Legion	Commander	HA Basic	Action Playsets	Deluxe	Voyager	Leader
US  Price	5	8	10	16	13	24	50
Aus Price changed to US dollars	8.50	19.17	20.23	20.23	30.87	53.22	94.76

 

So in essence, although the Legion and Playsets are pretty close in price scale, the HA Basics, Voyager and Leader sizes are pretty much double what those lucky chaps in America pay.  I should also add that as a standard price, $89 Aus is deemed cheap for a leader as they usually retail for $99 Australian (equivalent to $105.40 US).  I believe there are a number of stores that intend to charge that price as well.

 

Really it seems ironic that with the stronger Aus dollar, retailers have been whinging that they are losing sales to online/overseas stores.  Well here’s an idea BE MORE COMPETETIVE!   The service is bad, the range is bad and the prices are bad.  No wonder people are buying online.  I know that if I want more DOTM figures (of which there are only about 5), I will be going online.  So far the ones I am after I can get for about $150 including postage I suspect.  And yet here in Australia they expect me to pay that for a leader size and a voyager alone!

 

That my friends, in the words of Penn & Teller, is Bull S**t!!

 

Size comparison and a examples of toys follow:

 

 

Commander Class Powerglide intial impressions

Commander Class Powerglide is the first of my Dark of the Moon Toys which will probably be a small collections.  Why?  The prices on these things are expensive!!  I did get a little 3-d flickery card doohicky as part of a competition, but even so…

I apologise for low quality pics.  I spontaneously bought this as I objected to the ripoff price.  But then I caved and thought that this will be the only one.  So I had to uses my phone camera for the shots.  I might get around to whipping out the good camera and do some proper shots and review later on.

*Update: Pics with my good camera here*