HasLab Deathsaurus

[Sabrblade]

Nice to see that he's expected to ship next fall rather than next winter.

Great to hear. That means the big turkey should arrive in time for Thanksgiving.

 

[Superomegaprime]

Great to hear. That means the big turkey should arrive in time for Thanksgiving.

So the Emperor of Destruction, is going to be on the Menu, is he? Does he comes with a side dish of Dinos or is it a side dish of lion?

 

[Darth_Prime]

Let’s hope better quality than Fire and Holi.

 

[Platypus Prime]

"Emperors of DESTRUCTIONnnnn....Doomed to be on the PLAAAAAATEEEEE...This parody's DISFUNCTIOOOOOON....Makes people wish me AWAAAAYYYY.....Oh, look a 'cease and desist' order from the composers from Transformers the Movie...."

 

[The Phazer]

Just think, twenty years of Haslabs and we can maybe get the rest of the Micromaster teams sorted.

 

[Platypus Prime]

I remember the mistranslation of one of the minicon teams years ago as "Hopper, Bumper, Burrito". So at first I wondered if "Boater" was a similar problem, then I looked it up on TFwiki.

This is actually funny to me as I was considering if I could do it with points, getting mini-Ratchet to make a Fixit. This is already there with no extra effort at all, and I will have the rest of a team too that as I kid I kept looking at on store shelves and didn't have the money for (I got the Battle Patrol instead). Neat!

 

[Gizmoboy]

I had skipped the Siege Rescue Patrol guys at the time as I wasn't going to be collecting the micromaster guys. However, now that we are getting these 2, I went out and snagged the Siege set so I'd have all 4 of the team.

 

[Dake]

I'd be surprised if we did not get them loose. They released Yakface separate from the Barge (on a different card back). Though they've not rereleased the various figures that came with the Sentinal or Galactus yet, so who knows?

 

[MrBlud]

I feel like this *explicitly* not being part of the Haslab crowdfunding (it was released as an after-the-fact bonus) means we’ll probably get the toy color ones at some point.

 

[Robogeek1973]

I always love free surprises.

Bring on the Micromasters!

 

[Platypus Prime]

Given how inexact 'color' was in Transformers for anything EXCEPT the physical toys (and sometimes not even then) I'm perfectly happy with just these and Star Saber's and I will call it my Rescue Patrol. I was just telling a friend last night that if I put them on Star Saber's side, and the mini-Dinobot derived Dinoforce on Deathsaurus's side, it will probably work well!

I would like to see a way to get an extra Brainmaster, maybe as part of an accessory pack. One advantage of Titans Return was being able to get extra heads, I'd like a backup for such a tiny, tiny piece.

 

[Powered Convoy]

Boater being cartoon colors makes me think one in toy colors may be likely.

I'd prefer them to remain exclusive to the HasLab Deathsaurus campaign, but not at the expense of those who didn't back completely missing out.

 

[Platypus Prime]

I wonder how hard it would be to make a 'homage' G1 package set. Back when the four-pack was a thing, I took out the mirrored reflective parts and used them as toys all on their own. The packaging then was REALLY complicated. I know Hasbro is on the whole 'no plastic' kick but I'd love to see a retro-style package like they did with Ectotron or Gigawatt, except as a Micromaster four-pack for Selects or something.

 

[G.B.Blackrock]

I guess no one was going to be pushed over the brink to order because of BOATER but super weird they did this *after* the sales closed.

It IS a bit weird. But this is also why I'm keen to emphasize that this was a "thank you bonus" (to paraphrase the words from the e-mail) and not a "tier" (hidden, secret, "3rd." or otherwise). To me, a "tier" is designed to incentivize additional backers. Since this did come after the campaign ended, it cannot be said to provide such an incentive, and thus isn't a "tier."

 

[G.B.Blackrock]

It maybe weird but it kind of feels like they were very uncertain Deathsaurus would be fully funded or not and they might of extended the backing window and put these in as Tier 3, but it turns out, Tier 1 & 2 were enough to get people to back this and with the edition of those two, it more than covers the cost and come to think of it, its been a while since we seen a boat Transformer, offically, most of the time its been cars, planes, or creatures, thou resent we had a tape deck, a boom box, a train that doubles as a shuttle, plus Motor bikes are making an appearance, so what have we NOT had as a alt mode resently, about the only thing coming to my mind is farm vehicles and standard cars you see on the street, not racing cars or sports cars

Leaving aside my comments above on "tier," I do wonder what was in Hasbro's mind, and wonder if we'll ever know for certain. To create new transformable toy molds (however small) for a HasLab (outside of the main feature itself) is unprecedented, and Hasbro doesn't stand to make any profit on the investment as it stands (for this reason, many assume we'll see some form of retail release that includes these two). Clearly, someone had already put the design work in beforehand. Was this done back in the time when Micromasters were still a thing (possible, but unlikely, IMHO)? Were these always intended to go with Deathsaurus (a bit more probable, IMHO, although I'm still leaning towards "no")? Were these planned to drop into some larger set at an unspecified point in time (either before now or later)? It's fascinating, really.

 

[Superomegaprime]

It IS a bit weird. But this is also why I'm keen to emphasize that this was a "thank you bonus" (to paraphrase the words from the e-mail) and not a "tier" (hidden, secret, "3rd." or otherwise). To me, a "tier" is designed to incentivize additional backers. Since this did come after the campaign ended, it cannot be said to provide such an incentive, and thus isn't a "tier."

It could of been planned as a Tier if the backers weren't growing as fast as they hoped and trying to avoid the fate that befell the Star Wars Rancor, thou that I believe had other problems connected to the project, such as the broken fan base that left because of how badly Lucasfilm handles public relations and lack of general respect for their customers, but that is a different subject. best avoid due to how toxic it is! Anyway, I'm glad to see this nice surprise of the Micro masters, so I wonder if we are going to see more Victory characters get new toys going forwards?

 

[G.B.Blackrock]

It could of been planned as a Tier if the backers weren't growing as fast as they hoped and trying to avoid the fate that befell the Star Wars Rancor (snip)....

It's possible, and I won't argue that it isn't.

But that explanation strikes me as unlikely. It's a lot of effort for a "maybe" option. I could sooner believe that it was intended for retail a few years ago, but plans changed after the designs were completed.

 

[unluckiness]

Given how chaotic the middle through tail end of Earthrise was, it was probably planned as a retail release but was shelved due to the difficulties with retail at the time and micromasters ultimately getting nixed

 

[Dake]

That seems the most reasonable to me. They had all the assets for them (including tooling maybe), and sales went over by enough they figured they could sneak them in after the fact.

That being said, I see no reason that Hasbro wouldn't tell someone who asks how they came to be.

 

[Superomegaprime]

It's possible, and I won't argue that it isn't.

But that explanation strikes me as unlikely. It's a lot of effort for a "maybe" option. I could sooner believe that it was intended for retail a few years ago, but plans changed after the designs were completed.

I expect it was likely both, the Covid criss and they got put on hold and with the sucess of Victory Saber and the creation of his rival as a prototype, they decided to have these two as a possible third tier if the number of backers wasn't growing as quickly as they hoped for and Hasbro may of been a bit worried after the failure of the Rancor project and how lackluster the tiers were for that project, I believe it came VERY close to being funded but fell just short, I recall people complaining about not having the slave character who ended up in the pit during the ROTJ, thou I think there were other reasons as well