Hasbro Q&A round 12

[JediTricks]

I'm going with 1 and 4 based on the votes in this thread and just a need for variety. I could have gone with 1 and 3, but they're sort of the same tone and I don't want to get hung up on that.

I'll start a new voting thread in a minute.

[Onslaught Six]

Yeah, I meant to vouch that those are what I'd go with too. I'm just throwing spaghetti at the walls and seeing if it sticks a lot of the time.

[JediTricks]

Questions are in. I can't believe I postpone breakfast to get them up, I don't feel they were worth it.

[andersonh1]

Very generic answers. Very uninformative. Seriously, we could have written the script for these ourselves. I hate to be so negative, but we may as well have not even asked these two questions. We haven't learned a thing.

This statement:

Hasbro: There are a lot of characters that the team considers every year due to the huge library of characters that we have established over the past 26 years. So of course a few characters that have not had the chance to be released yet, but since there is always a chance that they might come out at some point in time, we do not want to spoil any surprises!

...is not an answer to this question:

Has there been a figure that someone on the team really wanted to do a redeco/retool of, but it never made it to market, that is especially noteworthy, and why it didn’t end up coming out?

The question doesn't ask what might be coming out, the question asks "What would you like to have produced that you weren't able to?" We're asking about the interests of designers, not forthcoming product. Any character in the line might appear at some point. I don't see why that stops some designer from saying "I'd like to have produced Tracks, but wasn't able to." No future plans are given away with a statement like that, because it's not a production question. It's a designer interest question.

This is frustrating. I appreciate the opportunity (in theory) to pick the designers' brains, but it's not actually happening.

[Dominic]

-post redacted-

[JediTricks]

Very generic answers. Very uninformative. Seriously, we could have written the script for these ourselves. I hate to be so negative, but we may as well have not even asked these two questions. We haven't learned a thing.

This statement:

Hasbro: There are a lot of characters that the team considers every year due to the huge library of characters that we have established over the past 26 years. So of course a few characters that have not had the chance to be released yet, but since there is always a chance that they might come out at some point in time, we do not want to spoil any surprises!

...is not an answer to this question:

Has there been a figure that someone on the team really wanted to do a redeco/retool of, but it never made it to market, that is especially noteworthy, and why it didn’t end up coming out?

The question doesn't ask what might be coming out, the question asks "What would you like to have produced that you weren't able to?" We're asking about the interests of designers, not forthcoming product. Any character in the line might appear at some point. I don't see why that stops some designer from saying "I'd like to have produced Tracks, but wasn't able to." No future plans are given away with a statement like that, because it's not a production question. It's a designer interest question.

This is frustrating. I appreciate the opportunity (in theory) to pick the designers' brains, but it's not actually happening.

Excellent post. The idea that "we don't wanna tell you because we might someday use it in the future" is ludicrous, there are plenty of molds from the past 10 years they know they won't be releasing again that could have fit the bill here. It seems like the individual answering these is not concerned with answers so much as with the corporate philosophies of management, even when it's not in their favor by casting them in a bad light. The problem is, it's just too easy for them to say "no" and pass the buck rather than use this as a tool to connect to their customers.

I just figured out the problem.

Hasbro is not answering these damned questions. They out-source the friggin' Q and A(nus) to a PR firm.

See where this is going?

The kinds of questions we are asking require actual legwork and communication between the two. So, the bland question we asked, (after 2 rounds of getting burned), got us a completely non-sensical (and still more bland) answer because a real (likely still bland) answer would take work.

JT, I vote that our next batch of questions be about the submission guidelines for questions. We have a copy of them here somewhere.....

Dom
-is not being sarcastic.

This is not the case. Hasbro is answering the questions, Hunter generally just handles organization - on occasion they have to polish up an answer when it comes in without a full format, but the answers come from Hasbro's mouthpiece on the Transformers team. The problem is not Hunter, the problem is at the source, whomever is answering questions on the TF team is not trying to communicate with the fanbase, not trying to bridge the gulf between fans and the company.

We already asked a question about their submission guidelines and how we weren't getting quality answers even within that framework. You can see the response was fairly underwhelming... http://www.tfviews.com/news/main/hasbro-q-and-a/568
Honestly, I loathe to think that fans might take what you're saying as gospel, it is totally incorrect and placing blame on the wrong shoulders.

[Shockwave]

TFW has them rigidly posted in their Q&A thread.

[JediTricks]

TFW has them rigidly posted in their Q&A thread.

I honestly don't care about the guidelines at this point, it feels like Hasbro doesn't respect us enough to give us answers to the questions we break our backs to keep in those guidelines. All I'm looking to do with Q&A is help bridge the gulf between fans and Hasbro with this brand, and Hasbro TF cannot return the favor, cannot help explain their brand to their loyal customers.

[Dominic]

JT, I stand corrected. I will not blame Hunter. I will blame Hasbro.

My mistake. You accounted for my concern.

Okay, my next question: Will there be any meaningful penalty for ignoring their submission guidelines? If not, I vote we chuck 'em.

Dom
-gonna redact the post.

[Shockwave]

I suspect that we inadvertantly adhere to them anyway on account of the fact that we already know what kind of BS answers we're gonna get and mostly are able to word our questions in a way that doesn't fall into that trap.