Surprise In Store Finds

While out hunting after work looking for new Hot Wheels cars (we are well overdue for a new case assortment or more) I was very surprised to see Matchbox 9 Packs on the store shelves. I have been collecting since 2011 and aside from a few leftover 2010 Hot Wheels 10 packs at Kmart, New Zealand has not received any 9/10 packs until now.

At $20NZ (around $15US), these packs are cheaper than purchasing a single Matchbox at our cheapest retailer ($3NZ) but as the only attraction is the exclusive car with all the other cars being mainline repacks (and unlike Hot Wheels, the selection of cars is the same in every package), I can already for see that the experiment to bring these back to the shelves will fail.

Nice to see while it lasts however, and you never know - a sale may see one of these packs coming home with me.

Further down the "die cast car aisle", some 2015 Cars "Deluxes" were found, the first deluxe sighting since the very limited release around the time of the Cars 2 movie (2011). Unlike the regular cars that migrated from being in USA packaging to European packaging in 2014, these continue to be in USA packaging. Sadly, Cars cars are very expensive here in New Zealand and the deluxes share the same issue at $25NZ (around $19US) so while a couple looked nice, it would take a major sale (50% or more) for one of these to come home.

A couple of steps away, more new product in the form of Maisto Custom Shop and Maisto Elite Transports! Sadly the Custom Shop boxes were mostly full of repackaged 2013 product, but I did find one new car and it was a car I had been wanting for some time. So something actually came home with me. The Elite Transport had a better result, with 5 new models to choose from (along with older product repacked into the new style packaging). Even with a sale, I decided that I didn't really want or need any of the offerings and so left them.

And I didn't find any new Hot Wheels...

Purchase/Trade and RAOK from DCTV

When reports that Retro Entertainment Mix F cars had been found at Countdown Supermarkets, I asked DCTV (Cobra, Eagle and Falcon) if they would be able to have a look in their stores and grab me a set if possible. They let me know very quickly that they had secured a full set of 5 for me and a small parcel was organised to be sent down.

After a few days the parcel arrived, and as expected, the parcel contained the set of 5 Retro Entertainment cars, and also some extras - two items I knew were coming in the next parcel and some that the team have thrown in as surprise extras.

Having already spent two blog posts going on about the Retro Entrainment cars, lets skip those and focus on the rest of the parcel.

First up, a Greenlight Motor World Green Machine. These are Greenlights chase cars, runing about 2% of the total production run. Some feature of the car (normally multiple) will be green, and this Motor World Series 8 Ford Fiesta features green wheels and a green base. The team know that I don't really collect these Green Machines, and use them as trade bait to try and get items I want or else to add as extras into other parcels. Many thanks to the team for finding this and adding it into the parcel.

Next up, three packaged Hot Wheels Cars.
First, the regular E case 69 Ford Mustang Boss 302 - I found the Super but not the regular and have not yet seen any more E case restocks.

Second, the regular Treasure Hunt that I will add into the collection.








And finally, a 1990 Honda Civic EF. This was on the wish list to be opened, but haven't seen any more to purchase. This one is being CRACKED, even though it doesn't fill my requirements of having front and rear decorations.






And then, we have a bunch of loose cars!
The team know I don't open as many cars as I could, and so always seem to add a few already open cars to boost the collection.

First, from a brand I have never heard off before (1baddride) a Dodge Challenger (2008-2012)








Then a couple of Tuner vehicles - the Super Gnat and the Asphalt Assault

















And finally another Honda Civic, this time the Si version from what looks to be a Mystery Model car based on the inclusion of a sticker.







Big thanks to the team of three for this parcel!

Greenlight Vans and Trucks

Arriving with my order of female Transformers from Japan, are some more Greenlights that were part of a spring clearance sale. While Japan sourced Greenlights are often more expensive than the same product sourced from the USA, a good sale and cheap (often free) postage has landed me some good deals.

Don't have too much to say about these items, have wanted the Beverage Truck for a while and I am a sucker for these Vans.

Enjoy the images.

Transformers Combiner Wars Wave 2 - Part 1

Arriving today from the USA, the much anticipated Wave 2 from the Transformers Generations Combiner Wars series - well, at least some of the wave.

First up, the Voyager Motormaster who forms the torso of the combiner Menasor. This figure is a heavy re tooling of the wave 1 Optimus Prime figure, but I like to think that Motormaster was designed first and Optimus Prime was added into the assortment since it was an easy choice and all Transformers collectors need more Optimus Primes in their collection. Based on the online images seen, I am really excited to get Motormaster as I think his design works really well, though so far I am not really "feeling" the combined mode of Menasor but I hope that spending some time with the figure loose and using the Aerialbots as stand ins will change that.

Following on are two Legends, we have a new Decepticon called Blackjack who again looks really fantastic in online images and goes on to combine with Menasor as the chest plate. Unlike Powerglide though, the packaging doesn't really call out this extra feature aside from the tiny sticker on the side of the packaging. From reports of people who do have both figures, this chest plate mode isn't that fantastic as the car just sorta sits there and falls off with ease. Along for the ride is Huffer, a repaint and re tooling of Legends Optimus Prime from 2014 and it works well.

Wave 2 Deluxes can not get here fast enough so I can complete both Superion and Menasor and have them setup in some kind of battle pose, and then the painful wait for Wave 3 begins along with waiting to see how Japan handles the rest of the Combiner Wars line.

Retro Entertainment Mix F - Part 2

After finding 3 Retro Entertainment cars, I decided to head into the city to check all the other Countdown Supermarkets to see if they had received their stock. Sadly, none had and I decided that I needed to continue to check every day until I found more stock to complete the set. Armed with several photographs including the store tag from my local store, I set of at lunch from work to the closest store and began the task of walking up and down every single aisle checking every random clip strip and bin just in case.

Eventually I made my way to the small toy section and looked over the pegs, at first everything looked as it did on my earlier visit but then I spotted the 1963 Aston Martin DB5 and then the Ford Super De Lux. Grabbing those, I began hunting for any other cars eventually finding an Ecto 1A, 3 Thunder Rollers and 1 Batmobile. At this point I called "my good mate from the capital city" since he was still looking for a set (normally securing one from me) and let him know that I had a couple of cars for him. As I stood their talking, I continued to flip over random items in the rather messy toy section and found another Ecto 1A and Batmobile, allowing me to purchase a full set for "my good mate" and allowing me to complete my second set of openers - the Ecto 1A, Thunder Roller and Batmobile.

Some more close ups

With side tampo's this time 

And the set of five together

Just waiting for the next set of five to arrive so I can leave the best cards sealed and open the rest. Let the ripping commence!

Transformers Fembots

February saw the release in Japan of three more toys under the Legends line - Arcee, Chromia and Windblade who are all female Transformers and were highly anticipated by some collectors for their more accurate G1 decorations compared to the Hasbro Generations releases. 

As I said last month, having a known release date for Transformers in Japan, makes organising the pre orders that I run through a New Zealand Transformer forum very easy. Depending on what I think interest will be, I order a bunch of toys from the Japanese supplier and then adjust closer to release date as orders are confirmed and deposits paid. Early in February, I locked in the adjusted order and several days before release I double checked and saw that I still had my large number of items ordered. I re-adjusted back to what I needed and then checked 12 hours later to find that for whatever reason I still had many items on order and that the changes made earlier in the day had not been saved. Contacting the support line of the web based store was a breeze as they came back and said they could see the adjustments made and could not explain why the system was misbehaving. A quick manual adjustment later and everything was again back on track ...

Until the next day when checking again I saw that I only had one of each on order, when I needed multiples off certain items to cover my pre orders. Again I fired of an email and several hours later received what looked like a bulk email - the store in Japan was not going to receive its full order of items and has decided to reduce all orders to one of each item to ensure every order is filled.

I quickly checked other online stores and made a new order at a slightly higher price to secure the items and then advised those with open pre orders what the trouble was. Friday (release day) came and went without any request from payment for the items from Japan, but thankfully a payment request was received on Saturday but sadly only for one of the three fembots. Knowing how this store works I found another store in Hong Kong that had what I was missing from my own order and purchased what I needed. Settling back, thinking the saga was finally completed I waited for parcels to ship and arrive ... Only it was not over, as on Tuesday I received a payment request from the online store in Japan for the rest of the order. I paid and then sat back and waited for items to arrive and today they did - the order from Japan and the now spare items from Hong Kong

Acree since first appearing in the 1986 Transformers Movie has been in desperate need of a toy and now after 29 years, we finally have a G1 accurate toy.

Chromia appeared in season two of the original Transformers cartoon (1985) as part of a group of female Transformers. Just like Arcee, we have had to wait 30 years to receive a toy form, and just like Arcee this is more than likely due to comic appearances.

Windblade is the 30th anniversary fan built Transformer - as fans we decided we wanted an Autobot Female VTOL jet, and that is what we received. Featuring heavily in the IDW comics, comics that I am quite a few number of years behind on reading.

Retro Entertainment Mix F

The Retro Entertainment series has been a must collect series for me, and as a result of wanting one for the sealed collection and generally one to open, I order sealed cases from the USA. New Zealand distribution has been average, some cases missed and others only seeing limited distribution in parts of the country. In 2014 I switched over to a case subscription to guarantee I would get at least one case of Retro Entertainment for the collection (which is then spilt with two other collectors).

Sadly the Mix F case was under delivered to the supplier I had my order with and as a result, no case for me. Looking around online, I settled with a pre order at another company I have used in the past - communication with the owner of the store revealed that the order wasn't yet secured and several days after ordering, the first report of Mix F was reported in New Zealand - being found in a couple of Toyworld stores in Auckland. My local Toyworld didn't have any thing on order, so I asked them if they could.

Then reports started appearing of Retro Entertainment Mix F appearing at Countdown stores (a local supermarket chain) - some got Mix E in just before Christmas, but a restock was defiantly not expected. Checking two stores on the way home from work yielded no results, and while the car was in the shop getting a service I checked out the small Countdown I have locally and SUCCESS. Only three cars on the shelf and the Ecto 1A looked a little odd, but I purchased them all

It wasn't until I got home, took some pictures and then looked at other examples that I saw what was wrong with the Ecto 1A, it was missing the side tampo. No way in package to figure out what the other side is like, but it is the first time I have seen any errors on the Retro Entertainment cars.

Thanks to the team of three (DCTV) I have a full set secured, and now just have to track down the Batmobile and the Ecto 1A in order to open them along with the DB5 and the Ford Super Deluxe shown above.