Stop making figs and accessories from rubber Hasbro!!!

[DarthMaulSithLord]

It stinks!!! The weapons are so floppy you can't get them in the hands of the figs and there are figs that can't even stand or perform their actions due to this cheapness! It took me forever to get the small guns into Jango Fett's Kamino Escape hands!!!

[Beast]

The softer plastic used for weapons are there for two reasons. The first one is safety. Hasbro would still be making oversized weapons like the POTF2 days, so that kids can't swallow them and pose a choking hazard or cause some internal damage. With the new materials they can get around the size issues, as the more rubberized weapons slip down throats easier, and dizzolve in stomachs better then the old plastics.

The second one is detail. Not just on weapons, but cloaks and other pieces as well. The rubbery plastic they are using now actually holds detail better in such a small size. The harder plastics don't accept paint or details as easily either, as the new softer plastics do. It's just a case of Hasbro trying to go to a more detailed and correct scale. If you've ever done any molding, you would discover the softer plastics hold more detail.

MTFBWY and HH!!

Jar Jar Binks

[DarthMaulSithLord]

But at what cost? I want my figs to stand without support!

[Jargo]

JarJar that's poopy. The more brittle the substance the better the detail it can hold and there's more integrity to the detail too. Softer stuff warps in the mold and isn't easier to paint either. With softer plastics, the paint is far more likely to flake off. As the plastics bend the paint cracks and seperates from the base. The most detail in a sculpt of any description comes in the form of hard resin castings. So to say that softer plastic is better is just complete bunkum I'm afraid. The main reason for the softer plastics is safety but it's also easier to get bendy plastics out of a hard mold than it is to get hard stuff out. It speeds up the job using soft plastic which means more units per day can be shifted. Pure economics basically. Cheap and cheerful rather than quality. have you noticed how the newer figures aren't finished as well as the older ones? rushed through the factories that's why. more units per day......

I'm not just arguing for the sake of it here either but you're definately way off with your statements on paint and detail. Also, plastic doesn't dissolve in the stomach, it passes through or sticks there. (Any parent who's spent the day in a casualty department of a hospital while their kid has emergency surgery to remove some plastic soldier that's bent them double because the molded on gun has ripped their stomach lining will tell you that). But you are right on the safety element and the reason the weapons are soft is to limit the choking hazard as they will bend and slip down the throat rather than wedge and pass through the system easily. Also the size helps with this.
The size is nothing new though. Endor Leia and the B-wing pilot from the vintage line had a gun as small if not smaller than the rebel fleet troopers tiny gun. If it was possible back then it was possible in '95. It was just the fashion for toys to have large weapons and accessories that weren't necessarily to scale. tastes have changed and require more detail and better scaling so that's what we're getting mostly.

Soft plastic used for limbs is problematic when the weight of the figure is too much for the plastic to support and the plastic warps under the weight. Even worse if you live in a hot climate which softens the plastic even more. Those super battle droids are made of such cheap plastic that come the summer they'll be like jelly. the weight of the bazooka arm will make the thing bend in two practically. Those Jedi with the wide leg stances will startto do the splits. Arm joints wil simply fall apart in your hands as you try to pose the arms, some of those saber hilts will be like butter. Guns will just get all floppy and the blast effects will slip off. Temporary remedy is to chill the figures in the refridgerator for a couple of minutes then pose them. The colder the plastic the less it bends.

There are two types of plastics most commonly used, polystyrene plastics and vinyl plastics. Polystyrene plastics are the most expensive because they can be melted down again and remolded. Vinyl plastics can't be re-used so they are cheaper one use plastics. you can tell the two apart by the opacity. Vinyl is more transluscent than polystyrene. Polystyrene plastic is almost completely solid and has richer colours but vinyl is almost see through at the edgesand the colours although possibly brighter also appear more washed out and watery.

[Beast]

Good points Jargo, but if you do any molding work Jargo, you'll find that paint adheres better to softer plastics. If you've ever done vinyl model kits, that is proof there. Softer plastics also look more cloth-like when they are molded with a cloth pattern, since they do hold detail better. Just compare Nikto: Jedi Knights cloak with E1 or older figures.

You're right about the dizzolving in the stomache thing, the guns won't dizzolve totally in the stomache. But like you said they will do less damage if they are swallowed, and should pass easily thru the system. It all comes down choice, would you prefer large out of scale hard plastic accessories, or in scale soft plastic ones.

MTFBWY and HH!!

Jar Jar Binks

[JediTricks]

Tut tut, I think there's absolutely no reason to make the limbs out of this soft material except for cost-cutting measures. The paint doesn't stay on these softer limbs better than the older materials used, much of it seems to come off of my figures easier now than it did 2 years ago.

As for weapons, I don't buy it, Hasbro is releasing the new 3 3/4" GI Joe line with accessories that are hard plastic and many as small as the Star Wars toys. LEGO is certainly able to get small, hard (not to mention somewhat sharp) SW toys aimed at 4 year old kids onto the market today, yet we don't see the Fed jumping down their throats.

[evenflow]

They really have to stop using the soft material, basically it just sucks.

[Taichi]

Originally posted by EMPEROR JARGO
tastes have changed

yes they certainly have.....

when I used to eat vintage weapons, they had a sweet, almost sour flavor to them.....these newer softer weapons simply don't have the same pep to them, as the vintage ones do.......

I have almost 40 vintage figures, and not a single one has any weapons anymore, because they all taste so damn good.....

the only modern figure I have, that no longer has his weapons is the '95 Chewbacca......

[Jargo]

Now that's funny.


Actually i completely forgot to mention the other cheap plastic, Polythene. In the same category as vynil but even cheaper and nastier and bendier. The torsos of the figures used to be made from polystyrene plastic which is why it snaps if you try to prise the body parts apart. Now they make it from a hard vynil instead mostly.

In my opinion there is an acceptible use of soft vynil plastic and that's for the capes robes and cloth parts of the figure so you can actully pose the arms andlegs and they won't just get pushed back into the factory pose. The POTF cloaks were mostly hard plastic and totally useless but these new ones like on the royal guard are quite cool. However, using the same material to make the limbs and the heads and the weapons is unacceptable. With so many figures having bicep cut articulation it's making it very easy to pop the arm off the minute you try to rotate the joint or move the arm. With a stiffer plastic or more rigid plastic they would stay in place and not pop off the pegs that hold the limbs in place wouldn't stretch and get loose quite so easily. I was comparing my Ree Yees figure to some of these new ones and he's as solid as a rock at the joints. The new figures are sort of springy at the joints so I'm scared to move the arms in case they just sever at the peg or simply pop out of the joint. Accessories made of vynil doesn't work. trying to put a bendy blaster handle in the hand of a bendy vynil figure is nigh on impossible for an experienced collector so how are kids supposed to manage it? The handle of the blaster bends one way and the hand bends another way and then the whole arm bends a different way before finally popping off at the elbow andthe blaster goes pinging away into the depths of the carpet never to be seen again exept by either the dog or the hoover. More solid arms would mean even if the weapons were sfter they would be easier to get into the hands of figures but the ideal situation would be more solid weapons and accessories too. And that goes for removable helmets too. That helmet on Jango is really rubbery and his nose pushes the visor out of shape . I don't want bone rigid helmets but not jelly soft definately. Whatever you used for the POTF helmets is great and if it means compromising a little detail here or there I don't mind.

And Taichi is dead right, they don't taste so good either. And the vynil smells absolutely awful. I unpacked my royal guards and had to open the window because the smell of the vynil was overwhelmingly chemical. I actually felt sick after being around it. Thankfully the smell has diminished to an acceptable level now but what would you do if a kid was asthmatic and had an attack because the smell got on their chest and then they died? The smell of the vynil is too strong. Seriously nausea inducingly strong. You should think about putting a couple of tiny air holes in the bubble so that the smell can dissipate and isn't released in one big rush of offensiveness. This is a very serious issue to me, I' not simply trying to pick fault I'm trying to protect others like me who have a sensitivity to odours like this. Who get no warning about what materials have been used.

[Beast]

Thank you to Hasbro for confirming as I said, about the softer plastic holding more detail. This is from an interview Hasbro did at Celebration 2. You can read more of it on the front page.

Softer Plastics on Accessories: When asked why the guns and other accessories are now made out of such flimsy material when compared to the vintage lines or early POTF2, Hasbro provided a couple of eye-opening explanations: (1) When realism is the goal, especially with skinnier weapons, harder plastic can’t be used because the thickness hinders realism, and (2) Safety issues are raised with certain accessories (e.g., producing a stiff version of Aurra Sing’s long rifle wouldn’t meet government safety standards). I was under the impression that the flimsy plastic was just a cost-cutting move; go figure (no pun intended).

MTFBWY and HH!!

Jar Jar Binks