That's a great point about the CommTech Reader. Way ahead of its time and shy of the mark of real interactivity. If they had integrated that technology into the vehicles/playsets, or beyond to any kind of gaming, then maybe. But that was 15 years ago (!!!). The more I think about it, it's the toy industry in general, rather than any particular brand, that is suffering right now.

There was a second generation of CommTech chips in the works.  The figures that were to be offered with that second wave of CommTech technology eventually became what we saw in the POTJ line.  Rumor had it that when you placed multiple second gen CommTech chips on the reader that they would interact with one another.  But from a marketing standpoint the concept fell flat.  Hasbro probably would have been better served by packing a figure with the CommTech reader, but it's all ancient history.

The action figure segment seems to be reaching for SOMETHING to bring it back.  But I think it's really suffering because the market has become oversaturated by properties that THINK they can sustain an action figure line, and a shift towards video games on either console systems, computers and handheld devices.  I suspect that what may help is if we see a game developed by both Hasbro and EA with content that's unlocked by codes with a figure.  Will that happen?  We'll see.

It does seem that play patterns are shifting towards interactivity with gaming consoles and computers.  When I go into TRU these days I'm struck by the enormity of the Skylanders feature display at the front of the store.  Some 30+ feet of shelf space is dedicated to this particular property, and it seems that popularity is due to how the toys interact with video games.

As for the current spate of sales?  We're in the home stretch of the 2013 retail season.  And we always see significant sales this time of year.  It is worth noting that retail sales stats show that spending in 2013 is DOWN from spending during the 2012 holiday season.  That macro statistic indicates a more broad softness at retail than being isolated to any one intellectual property like Star Wars.

As for Star Wars?  I believe I've said this before, but it bears repeating.  I think we're in a transitional stage.  Hasbro is trying to find the next big thing from a play pattern / marketing standpoint.  And Lucasfilm / Disney are still dealing with the new realities of the corporate takeover.  Much of the licensed future of Star Wars is going to depend on how Episode VII shapes up, along with the upcoming Rebels animated series.

So fear not, Chicken Little.  The sky is not falling.  We're just waiting to see where things are going next.

Slave I was 40% off with it's lightning deal.  Basic pricing for the TIE Interceptor is $39.99, so I imagine we're looking at a sale price of something along the lines of $23.99.  We'll just have to wait and see at 4 PM ET.

Quote from: shmashwitdaclub on December  5, 2013, 09:41 AM

this is going to be on a Amazon lightning sale today at 1 pm eastern time

What is a Lightning Sale? Or the real question I have is how cheap are we talking?

We could be looking at a significant savings during the lightning sale.  I'm hoping that it might go as low as $39.99.  I'll definitely be checking it out at 1 PM, because I've been holding off.  Here's the link.

The Helicarrier is on sale at TRU this weekend for $39.99

Heck yeah! I was hoping it would stay at $40 for a while and pick one up but I just placed my order for a set. Came out to $37 after tax and shipping for me in Texas, but still a great, great deal.

They've actually got a special going at Amazon for a free month of Amazon Prime.  That translates to free shipping!

I finally got around to opening the shipping box for my Droid Factory 6-pack.  I'm glad I bought it at the sale price, because when I looked at all of the figures in the set, I was kind of underwhelmed with the character selection.  FA-4 and TC-70 are cool, but otherwise the set seems a little lame.  There's nothing really new about them.  Aside from FA-4 and Jabba's protocol droid, the rest of the figures in the set feel like a bit of a letdown.

As a rule, I tend to find almost ANY list post on a website (that isn't say a wishlist poll) to be an absolutely useless exercise, and totally designed to drive web traffic.  I can't say that this iO9 looks any different.

Move along, move along.