F4F Q&A #119 Recap: "Don't Call Us a Toy Company!" Mario Kart!

I had an emergency last week and missed out on F4F Q&A #118, but it’s business as usual for this week’s Q&A #119 with First 4 Figures CEO Alex Davis and King Chockles! In this week’s action-packed episode, get the answers to such questions as:

WHAT form would Eggman take if First 4 Figures ever did another statue of him?

DID somebody say “Mario Kart TT Poll”?

COULD we see Persona 5 pre-orders in 2019?

DO the delays on Amaterasu PVC and Ornstein SD make Alex want to put PVCs up for order earlier before the tooling is ready?

WILL Alex sing the Poke-Rap for us?

HOW likely is a Kid Icarus Pit statue in the next two years?

WHO looks solely to be the sole entrant to survive through to King of the Ring IV next week?

…And more!

Announcements and the Week in Review:

Mini Aku Aku Masks EX will be available until at least May 24th
Jet Black EX available until June 7th
Mario on Yoshi, Snake SD, Warp Star Kirby, Meta-Ridley, Mimic, Conker, Psycho Mantis EXs all still up for order
Polls will be posted in the Facebook group today for the two Crystal Dragon Signature Edition cards
Web team is implementing an E-Mail notice that will be sent to notify you when a new CS ticket has been submitted by you on the website; not sure exactly when this will go live yet
Alex could see Eggman again as part of a Modern Sonic vs. Eggman diorama rather than another giant statue of Eggman/Robotnik by himself
Will review Xenoblade, Captain Falcon, Starfox, Pikmin and other polls before Nintendo meeting at Las Vegas next month
Alex isn’t sure how Nito is going to go; “really tough”
Alex is going to E3 2019! Peggy applied for Alex because he “was too lazy as hell to figure it out”. John is going too!
This is Alex’s first time going to E3 since many years ago in 2006 when he went around giving out fliers to get 10% off Skull Kid or Varia Suit Samus; he’s going because it’s the week after the Las Vegas Licensing Expo that he’s attending anyway
“Call us a ‘high-end collectible figurines from licensed properties company’, not a ‘toy company'”
A crazy article was posted online speculating that Rare was going to announce new Banjo-Kazooie and Conker video games at E3 solely because Rare invited Alex to their keynote at E3 next month
Alex has no self-respect whatsoever now and will have no problems prostrating himself at E3 to beg licenses
There have been a bunch of Tee-Hees lately; including a red jacket with a yellow shirt [Faye] and a side-profile pet; do you know what they are?
Sneak Peek of All Might in Suit AF shown in the club this week
Size/Scale Comparison of Dark Souls Grand Scale Bust (GSB) and Life Size Bust (LSB) shown this week
Poll posted this week for the base for Kiryu from Yakuza was posted this week–despite the poll results, the base won’t be the gate, as Alex knows what we don’t
Behind the scenes, F4F has been working on adding some teeth to Pride on Alphonse, and the licensors asked for the transmutation circle could be put on Alphonse’s base instead of the blood seal
Some new updates were done on Edward Elric this week, and it’s looking amazing; Alex turns off the audio during the stream to discuss Ed with Chocks for several minutes; Alex wasn’t in love with the initial designs for Dark Magician or Edward so he went back to the drawing board and now he loves both
Still not sure if Roy Mustang or Edward Elric will be up for order first–they’re at similar stages right now

Temptation Thursdays (TT Polls) and the King of the Ring IV:

TT 150 Rusty from Steamworld Dig: 212 Votes, 14 Yes, 198 No
TT 151 Soul Eater: 308 Votes, 106 Yes, 202 No
Mario Kart TT Next Week!
PsychoNauts TT in 2 Weeks!
Slayers TT in 3 Weeks!
This week’s hashtag for a chance to win Rewards Points next week is #F4FORNY
KOTR IV Week 4: All Might defeated Saitama last week; 36 entrants remain and 118 have been eliminated
King of the Ring IV Round 1 Battle 4 is now underway between Link on King of Red Lions and Alucard; currently has many less votes than the previous battle did at this point; 3PM Christian Hernandez is on-track to be the sole participant to advance to the next round the way things are looking right now
Majora’s Mask vs. Shiranui is next week’s matchup
Alex has become hyper-aggressive after his years in China after being so calm in his younger days; “This isn’t even my final form!”

The Q&A!:

Not quite ready to update the Trello Pre-Orders schedule
Dracula “soon”; reprinting the head now
Alex can’t wait to discuss Grayfox when the time comes, because there have been lots of issues
Amaterasu PVC won’t be up for order in May
Edward Elric’s arm and leg will be a sort of medium between the Silver and Grey Alphonse armor color
Alex wants to see 600-800 votes to get Samurai Champloo Jin made
Edition size on Cowboy Bebop Spike statue is 1000; “Good luck with your Wait Lists!”
No updates on getting Alphonse into one box for shipping yet; will be looked at when he’s in production
F4F studies anything and everything from the biggest and smallest companies for inspiration and ideas when creating new concepts; look at everybody and everything–you have to look at what’s trending and going on in the industry; you can also learn quite a lot through bad stuff happening to other companies; look at toys and techniques and other licenses–everything
Head sculpts are all the same across the All Might AFs, although they’re hand-made on the prototypes so the protos have subtle differences
Would run a TT poll to see if people wanted original or current Kratos if F4F ever got God of War license
Fox McCloud when? When the TT gets a ton more votes.
Yakuza Red Gate isn’t on the table right now for a potential DE
No updates on Midna DE case
Alex speaks English and Mandarin; Chockles speaks English and Cantonese
Most exhausting part of running a statue company is inefficiencies and things taking so long; would like there to be more peaks and troughs between launches; predicts we won’t be able to handle the number of pre-orders next year
Alex most relates to All Might from My Hero Academia
Shout-out for the Priscilla Claymore TT! Alex would love to get his hands on her… from a purely manufacturing point of view.
Have been approached by at least one licensor in the past about making statues but had to turn them down
Nothing to report on trying to get in touch with Nickelodeon about Avatar; Alex is a little shaky on the character poll seeing that no one wants Korra
Who do we want to see next in the Soul Calibur II line after Ivy? Should do a poll.
If First4Figures gets to do another Collector’s Edition (a la Wind Waker Ganondorf), they’ll let us know
Only the open-mouthed Guts will have the bleeding brand, since Guts only has it when he’s raging
Nothing to report on MHA license for Europe
Alex will not sing the Poke-rap for us
Nothing to say regarding US tariffs right now–will have to see what happens
Monday was a holiday in Hong Kong for Buddha’s birthday
Want to see much higher TT numbers for Earthworm Jim to approach the licensor: 800-1000
Artorias Busts will be part of a Dark Souls bust line–won’t force people to buy it to continue their Dark Souls statue numbering
Nothing to say about Zelda Wind Waker
Alex can tell us that he doesn’t have the Persona 5 license and if he got it today, there still wouldn’t be anything ready for order in 2019
Bayonetta guns will definitely go up for order before the statue
No news on Banjo companion pieces; maybe Jinjos?
Maybe time for a general character poll for modern Sonic?
Always thinking about the SD line and what could be in it
Nothing to report on Alucard forms right now–focusing on Dracula
Probability of Kid Icarus Pit in the next 2 years is very low since he hasn’t even had a TT yet
Alex loved Flaming Hot and Pickled Onion Monster Munch growing up as far as chips/crisps go; has upgraded to classy Kettle Chips brand now
Still waiting for a shout-out from pewdiepie
Haven’t played the Spider-Man PS4 game yet; like that there’s no webbing on the Iron Spider costume which makes it easier from a sculpting standpoint
There’ll always be people who don’t like the character selected for a TT
No word on Crystal Cloak Alucard
Probably end of 2019 for Ornstein SD PVC
Pre-orders will be sped up toward the back end of 2019; don’t want to speed up until it can be sustained; confident there will be many more statue POs in a year’s time–calm before the storm
Do the delays on Amaterasu PVC and Ornstein SD being ready for PO make Alex want to open pre-orders based on the prototypes rather than waiting for the tooling to be ready many months later? “120 Gazillion Percent. Really need to think about it.”; Alex might like to open pre-orders based on the resin proto and re-open POs once the PVC prototype is ready; definitely thinking about this, as it’s frustrating waiting for the PVC prototypes to come in
Nintendo has zero to do with King Dedede since Kirby characters are licensed through Warpstar
Alex wishes he could give us what we want with regards to Aika, Fuu, Genos, Jin and Reala
No updates on rainbow Spyros
Someone contacted Alex today that he hasn’t heard from in 4 years (who used to work for Alex), who’s unhappy with his manager at work; Alex suggested he do some freelance
No updates on Ivy PO or Midna production
Ornstein Terracotta Army video shown at the factory! Rows and rows of Ornsteins–what a sight to see! Looking incredibly shiny and great under the bright lights at the factory. Production is about 80% complete. On pause until they get final confirmation on the spear from the licensor.
Video also shown of Shiranui EX at the factory with the light-up feature
Amaterasu PVC EX price will likely have to be increased because of the complexity of the piece, although the GamesCom orders will of course be honored at the original $99.99
Not sure about NYCC or what cons could be done toward the end of the year; will try to do Anime Expo next year
“Oh my god, I’m out of Red Bull” — Chockles
Nobody wins any points in Who Dat Who Dat this week because all of the players are completely rubbish
Let’s PlaySearch Sekiro #6 streams this Sunday! Don’t miss it!