Opening Transformers

On a recent video about Combiner Wars Devastator and G1 Platinum Edition Trypticon, I was asked if I open my Transformers.

Simple answer is - yes I do.

However back when I started re-collecting Transformers in late 2000, the answer was no and then changed to yes and no. In 2000, money was tight since I didn't have a regular form of income and so when I brought a new Transformer from the stores it was kept sealed in its packet. If I really liked something enough and could save up enough funds I would purchase a second toy in order to open. For the better part of five years, a constant dilemma for my collection was - do I purchase one or two? (along with can I afford to purchase one or two?)

As I got older and I moved from better paying job to slightly better paying job (or maybe the same job with better hours), I was generally able to always by two of the same figure - again, one for the sealed collection and one for the open collection (if I wanted to open one). The major exception came to "vintage figures" - anything that was more than a year old and was no longer to be purchased in stores, or online or in multiples was instantly added only to a sealed collection. If I decided that I wanted to have a open sample of this figure, then I looked for a already opened sample in the best possible condition.

In 2009 I had my first collection purge - re-organising the collection focus (and how they were stored in storage boxes) and selling off the spares in order to fund more purchases. With the surge of popularity around the franchise in most part due to the live action Transformers movies, toys from the 80's and 90's became hard to find or stupidly expensive which in turn restricted my collecting to the modern items.

By 2014, even with the change of collecting focus, I had started to run out of storage space in the storage shed I was renting each month for the collection and without wanting to spend more to upgrade to a larger space I decided to implement a plan that had been brewing for a few years - a complete sell off of the majority of my sealed collection, with a few exceptions (Generation 1, Generation 2, Car Robots (2000) and Masterpiece figures). The expected sale proceeds would be then used to fund one of a few large purchases - and in June 2015 a new car was purchased using those funds.

As 2016 starts, my thoughts are turning towards selling the Generation 2, Car Robots and Masterpiece collections as well ...

In regards to what happens to the open figures - sadly, 90% of the figures are removed from their box and then stored in storage tubs either in the garage or storage shed and never receive a "test" transformation. Display limitations at home do not allow the majority of figures to be displayed and grand plans to regularly rotate what figures are on display go out the window as each week/month/year passes. However, due to the size of both Devastator and Trypticon, specific space was made in order to display them at least for the short term.