Super 7 Ultimates Thread

By the very nature of the game (unless you're playing tabletop), the game is all on paper and verbal communication between friends. It's not even really visual. And about creating your own characters (even though you can play as pre-existing ones). So it seems like a hard thing to merchandise with any particular things to focus on and exploit.

I did get the monster toys (beholder, owlbear, displacer beast) and love those (hey look...my avatar!). I think a lot of monsters from the IP are distinct and can/did make cool toys. But they didn't sell well. But maybe they'd have done better with some good guys to fight.

And yes, the numbers Mythic Legions sells to be successful is a fraction of what Hasbro needs to sell to break even.

MyL already has done some essentially-homage versions of some of the LJN D&D characters. Gideon is basically Strongheart. Thord Ironjaw is Elkhorn. Raygor is Warduke. They're not exact, but the vibe is there. I suppose they could try for the animated D&D characters too. I'm just not sure if it's worth the effort. Certainly, they can do a knight with a red/yellow pattern to their soft goods. Maybe make a barbarian on their goblin or upcoming gnome body.
 
Last edited:
I said way back when these D&D lines kicked up that no one gives a fuck about D&D action figures. By and large, D&D players don't want them, and non-D&D players don't want them. So who are they for? Drizzt, you could argue, has more cross-media appeal as THE main character of an entire book franchise and a video game character.

But why are people surprised that no one cares about characters from a D&D cartoon that most people remember by going 'oh yeah, that existed!' It didn't engender any nostalgia in most people. It didn't carry on and continue to be loved and referenced in the following decades. It wasn't even a toy-based property where a toy revival could be assumed to have some legs. It was just a thing that existed in the '80s, that most people even among those that liked it have already forgotten or don't really care that much about.

Anyone should have been able to see those lines would fail.
 
Damien said:
But why are people surprised that no one cares about characters from a D&D cartoon that most people remember by going 'oh yeah, that existed!' It didn't engender any nostalgia in most people.
Click to expand...
I loved that show and have tons of nostalgia for it. I didn't know I was the only one until the toy line folded.

Hence, the surprise.
 
I personally would think a cartoon DnD line would sell more than every IP in the "Nacelle-a-verse", but that's just a hunch. So many things become figures these days. Apparently Target and other big box retailers thought it was a good enough idea to buy a bunch of stock. And I suppose enough people pre-ordered a $300 plus s&h cartoon specific Tiamat for Super7 to put it in production.
 
I should clarify; when talking about toys and referring to 'people' generally, I am pretty much always referring to the toy community. That is to say, I don't think a new action figure line based on any property is going to convince people that don't buy toys to start. Not never. But near enough to never.
Hell, I would hazard to say most people that don't already collect toys wouldn't even know if a toy came out for a thing they like, because they're just not in that world. It's like asking me if I knew that a famous baseball bat company made a baseball bat with He-Man on it. Why would I know that? How would I know that? Why would I care?

So immediately, when speculating about these toy lines, we have to cut away all the people that just aren't gonna be buying toys. For the D&D cartoon, that means cutting away massive amounts of people that actually remember it and care about it, because a lot of those people are D&D players. And as we've gone over here and elsewhere, most D&D players actually just don't buy action figures and really can't be convinced to start.



AgentHemlock said:
I personally would think a cartoon DnD line would sell more than every IP in the "Nacelle-a-verse",
Click to expand...
I would beg to differ for what I believe is a pretty good reason; most toy collectors seem to collect out of 'toy nostalgia' - not generalized nostalgia. Star Wars, G.I. Joe, TMNT, Transformers, He-Man -- certainly they all had other media, but most people that collect toys of them also have a very strong nostalgic connection to the toys of those properties that they had as kids. I'd even argue that may be the case if you took a poll of Marvel Legends collectors and asked how many collected ToyBiz 5" figures as kids.

That's why I think stuff like Biker Mice or Moo Mesa can be successful where maybe something generally more popular or more important will be less successful. There's a strong 'toy nostalgia' there. Why can Nacelle sell Biker Mice, but no one can seem to get deep into a line of figures based on a modern video game? Mortal Kombat is a MASSIVE game franchise, but always seems to struggle with toy sales - especially anything outside of those first two or three games. Street Fighter as well, once you get past 2 Turbo.
How many people had the G.I. Joe MK and Street Fighter figures that collect the McFarlane or Jada figures now?


I'll argue all day that there's a super strong link here that often gets ignored in favor of people that want to say 'but it's a popular thing' - and that just doesn't always matter. In fact, it probably usually doesn't matter. So then when you get into far far less popular things, with virtually no toy nostalgia behind them, of course they're going to fail.


AgentHemlock said:
And I suppose enough people pre-ordered a $300 plus s&h cartoon specific Tiamat for Super7 to put it in production.
Click to expand...
I'd be willing to bet more people bought that than actually bought any of the regular 7" figures S7 made.
 
Damien said:
I should clarify; when talking about toys and referring to 'people' generally, I am pretty much always referring to the toy community. That is to say, I don't think a new action figure line based on any property is going to convince people that don't buy toys to start. Not never. But near enough to never.
Hell, I would hazard to say most people that don't already collect toys wouldn't even know if a toy came out for a thing they like, because they're just not in that world. It's like asking me if I knew that a famous baseball bat company made a baseball bat with He-Man on it. Why would I know that? How would I know that? Why would I care?
Click to expand...
I would say there is at least sales potential, if not actual significant sales, going to people who aren't toy collectors in the sense that we are—finger on the pulse, large collections, on forums, etc., so to say. GameStop's store real estate is about 1/4 action figures, I just saw the SHF LoTR figures there the other day. Best Buy, Barnes and Noble, collector's sections in the electronics section of Walmart and Target, Box Lunch, Hot Topic, and so on—there's at least 5 places in my local mall where I can buy action figures, but I don't because they're cheaper elsewhere.

The easiest way for companies that just want to service toy collectors is to sell online with cheap or free shipping. It'd be easiest for us, and easiest for them. I imagine the reason they are in all those stores is to sell to people who don't check forums or toy news sites, etc., but for more casual collectors or people who are fans of an IP to actually see a thing they want or want to buy someone as a gift in person. They go in to buy a video game, and come out with an SHF LoTR, and that opens up a world for them. Those stores are where people are exposed to the He-Man baseball bats, but also in the background of their favorite streamers, or on the websites of where they buy their other nerd paraphernalia. Or at conventions, which are getting bigger and more frequent around the US.

I might be biased a bit because I know several people who are in their early 30's/late 20's who got into collecting not because they had figs as a kid, but because they joined the massive influx of folks who came into the nerd world in the 2010's. My wife's best friend sends her pictures of Figma Zelda figures and Mythic Legions she collects. She buys Legions because she's a modern DnD fan and that's her thing. The Zelda figs because she loved the past two games. Now she's looking at other lines cause she has the itch.

I definitely think toy nostalgia helps, though, for sure, and this board, particularly, seems primarily made up of Gen X/Elder Millennials, who collect the big toy brands from the 80's/90's. Outside of that though I think there is a pretty large community of people buying stuff for properties they are actively into as adults.

I still think if NECA had made the toon DnD figs, and they were hanging out at Target, they would have sold well enough. Or if Nacelle had made them. What the Biker Mice figures had over S7 is that they are actually good figures for less than $30 with box store distro, and I think that mattered more than toy nostalgia. And even they hit clearance for around $8 a pop... but Nacelle seems to be chugging along regardless.
 
Damien said:
most toy collectors seem to collect out of 'toy nostalgia'
Click to expand...
I can definitely see this. It's not a motivator for me personally, but I certainly see it in the success of "toy version" paint schemes and the fact that anyone these days would buy a G1 Optimus Prime.

Personally, my nostalgia is for characters, not toys (even when my appreciation for the characters *comes* from the toys). I wouldn't have thought that was a rare motivator, but here we are with "retro" 6-inch GI Joes and o-ring Action Force.
 
We're definitely in an era where anything from the 80s and 90s that is "toyetic" at least has someone sniffing around it. D&D just seems like a bad fit for Hasbro. They have lofty sales goals by the nature of their company that even Power Rangers can't satiate. D&D seemed doomed from the start for them. And Super7 is Super7, their baggage makes it hard to determine what can and what can't work as a toy. The NECA stuff was a little more of a barometer as far as I'm concerned. Decent price, nice sculpts, easy to get, but apparently still not worthwhile for the company. That line's demise tells me more than the rest. And as a Hasbro-owned property, it's possible the licensing fees are high enough that it makes it hard to justify.

There are still some untapped wells in D&D so maybe another shop will give it a try at some point, but I am of the mind the fanbase likely isn't there to support a full line which is unfortunate. That said, I still would love to see DragonLance at least get a chance to fail before the book is closed forever.
 
I liked the NECA D&D figures despite never having played D&D, nor collected D&D vintage toys. I wish NECA got around to at least one female character.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top