Get those ordering fingers warmed up and ready to go, F4Fans! One of the more momentous and anticipated days in First 4 Figures history is finally here: the Spyro the Dragon Exclusive PVC statue (the first ever True Form PVC!) goes up for PO today! But before the tsunami of orders for our favorite little purple boi rolls in—it’s time time for F4F Q&A #88 with Alex and Chocks, where they’ll reveal countless secrets, show off the packaging for TF Spyro and more!
Announcements and the Week in Review:
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- Spyro PVC will be perfectly proportioned to the resin Crystal Dragon Statue
- Next Monday is another public holiday in Hong Kong, so don’t get worried if you don’t hear anything from CS or the club on Monday
- You can still get on the Wait List for the Aku Aku Mask Exclusive statue with a very high chance of conversion
- F4F has a meeting with Nintendo at BLE in just over a week and a half–the first matter of business is to talk to Nintendo about Bowsette [the first part of that statement is true–the second part is, uhh… not]
- Activision wants First 4 Figures to focus on current Spyro products right now–Alex will revisit Legend of Spyro later on when Activision is more open to it
- Spyro PVC Pre-Order Details
- Pre-orders are still open for Cowboy Bebop Spike, the Torch Torch Dark Souls Pendants, the GNF Sonic vs. Chopper, Warp Star Kirby and Psycho Mantis
- Final payment notices for Sonic 25th in the US: Make sure you have money in your accounts when final billing occurs on October 3rd next week!
- Admins don’t go on any Wait Lists since they have their own editions with their names on them
- What would Spyro fans think of companion pieces to add to their Spyro displays?
- The exclusive Spyro with extra goodies will be $99.99 when it goes up for order today on the website–the regular edition with no bonuses will be available at local retail stores for cheaper
- Alex Davis sings “A Whole New Line” to the tune of “A Whole New World” from Aladdin
- Jeffrey Lee has moved on to brighter, greener pastures as of today–he was in charge of wholesale and event planning; all of the best to Jeff and appreciation for all he’s done for Alex over the years
- “Jeff, see you later, so long, and thanks for all the fish!” –Alex Davis
- It’s difficult trying to move at the breakneck speed that First 4 Figures is expanding
- Alex needs to hire a new graphic artist to replace the temporary one for when he leaves
- Alex is still doing a lot of development work himself and he wants to get out of doing that–he wants to be able to travel and work with licensors and such knowing that the team is working hard back at the Hong Kong HQ without him; needs to hire another 1-2 Project Managers to help Chris
- Need to fill Jeff’s role as well (not “replace Jeff”–that makes it sound like he’s dead to Alex)
- Alex hopes he’s not boring us with this transparent discussion
- Thinking of getting a Jr. IT who can do maintenance and a lot of bug testing
- Chock joined as “The Handyman” of First 4 Figures after meeting Alex through the OCC Facebook Group
- The club takes a lot of Chocks’ time, to the point where Chock can’t do what he knows he can do–he wants to be freed up to contact companies and reach out more outside of the Facebook group; wants to get awareness of First 4 Figures out there and interact with the licensor marketing teams more
- Chocks isn’t going to run away from the club, but he will be shifting to more responsibilities away from the club; looking to have someone who works closely with Chock who will handle the club with him–will take a little bit of time, but someone new will be joining to take this responsibility as a new member of the marketing team on the 8th
- Having an actual marketing team is surreal to Alex; maybe we’ll see a Friday Q&A with Chocks and A and Someone Else sometime!
- “It’s definitely Chocks who wears the pants in our relationship.” — Alex Davis
- It’s clear that if the team doesn’t expand, the team will burn out at the current pace they’re moving at, which is Alex’s responsibility; these roles have to be local–tried remote, but it’s difficult; there are certain roles where remote is a good thing, but there are certain roles where you have to be in the office to bounce ideas and workload
- Would love to let Wait Listers jump onto a payment plan as soon as they get converted–working towards this
- The #1 reason people cancel is because of payments–letting people delay payments or add payment plans may stop collectors from having to cancel
- Testing out satellite conventions/”side-quests” at MCM London to see if it’s sustainable when selling only a few different discounted PVC statues at cons
- Alex planned to go see Solaire resin this week, but was never summoned to the factory
- Chocks Snack Review: 5/10 “Meh” for “Look” Brand snacks
- Afro Samurai TT is doing poorly–hopefully more anime fans come into the club for Alphonse and *mumble mumble*
- Binding of Isaac TT Next Week: Rally the Fans outside of the club!
- #F4FSpyro is this week’s hashtag for a chance to win 500 Rewards Points chosen at random next week
On F4F Kickstarter-Like Pre-Orders:
- If F4F “Kickstarters” are going to happen, here’s how it will work:
- 1) the 3-D render will be shown to collectors, who are asked to put their money where their mouth is and pay a deposit of $50 (or whatever) that they receive a code for the amount of
- 2) 300 “Kickstarter” pre-orders are required to go to the next stage;
- 3) 3-D model will go to physical form and put up for PO with a resin prototype–“Backers” will have a code for the amount of the deposit that they paid that they’ll be able to apply to the pre-order at this point
- 4) Those who supported the “Kickstarter” will be eligible for the lowest numbers, as well as getting physical goodies like a coin or whatever as bonuses
- “Backers” won’t get a “discount” on statues–it should be more important to “backers” to see a statue they wanted actually produced than to get a discount on it
The Q&A!:
- Fighter Kirby replacements and end of edition production run starting soon
- Silver and Nightmare end of editions are at the super slow factory and will be produced after Sonic 25th is fully shipped out
- Were aiming to launch the F4F Dracula on October 26th, 2018 to coincide with the premiere date of Netflix Castlevania Season 2, but that’s up in the air now–will have to see if resources allow the pre-order to occur on that date or not
- Alex has seen 7 different “Chockles on Throne” photos so far
- F4F plushies will be something Alex focuses on next year
- No idea how many statues will be up for PO in 2018
- Guts edition size will be around 700
- Can’t see Skull Knight’s pose just yet
- Yakuza DE–have to figure out how to physically make the gate; conversation is paused until F4F talks to Sega at BLE in two weeks
- Crystal Dragon Edition Size: Tentatively around 400? [Unclear]
- Looking for a factory to make the metal figurines
- F4F doesn’t take final payment money until statues are in the warehouse
- Neo-Cortex will have a different base from Crash and Aku Aku
- “Kickstarters” won’t start for a while–need to have a conversation face-to-face; Alex thinks he wants to start them off with Aika
- Next pre-order will be Alphonse if all goes well and as planned
- Definitely want to do an OG Spyro PVC if Activision allows it; RTF for what Spyro fans want to see
- Crash resin won’t ship for a while–Alex has to go and see it in person, and it still needs to be packed even if all of the statues are perfect
- Kingdom Hearts: “Naw. Not at that stage. Would need to get tons more licenses from Disney to get Kingdom Hearts, and don’t have the bandwidth for that at this moment.”
- Alex would tell his past self of 10 years ago: “Don’t fuck up Zero Suit Samus’s face.”
- Oki had his own poll which did very well, which is why Alex is prioritizing him in the Okami line over Ninetails
- Amaterasu Life Size Bust (LSB): No updates yet. Alex saw the box polyfoam recently.
- RTF on Funday for Deadman Wonderland
- Alex needs to look into a character poll for Xenoblade
- Contact has been made regarding Darksiders–need to see what happens next
- Crash PVC is cheaper than the Dark Souls SD PVCs because they were made at different times; the Dark Souls range should be more expensive, but F4F wanted to subsidize it for collectors–you’re getting an amazing deal for the Dark Souls PVCs, rather than paying more for Crash
- Studio Ghibli line is not possible–tried years ago and got nowhere; Alex would love to do some Mononoke
- Spyro PVC is the first piece in the TF line because it was the one that was ready
- Working on Spyro PVC since last year
- Spyro Reignited absolutely has a chance for a resin release–100%
- Snake and Alucard should ship in Q4 2018; Shovel Knight in 2019
- Hopefully Solaire resin will be approved next week and production can wrap up
- Some initial pre-production has already started on Ornstein; unlikely to ship in 2018
- It’s going to be a while before Mimic’s hairy ass goes up for pre-order
- Chocks isn’t sure if he’s seen the My Hero Academia movie yet
- 2 Weeks of Unlimited Spyro Hype begins in the OCC today!
- Spyro will not be available at MCM but the sample will be there
- Coco Bandicoot did really badly in the character poll
- Banjo-Tooie PVC is already in the works
- TF Dark Souls PVCs–Alex would like to, but there’s no plans right now
- Ninetails Okami–“Let’s have a conversation after Oki.”
- Grayfox pre-order likely in Q2 2019
- Solaire will hopefully arrive before Christmas; Bowser and Varia Suit Samus unlikely
- Alphonse will cost about as much as two arms and two legs
- Inuyasha would need to have a lot of votes to get a character poll, after which F4F would look at the license if the character poll went well
- No idea what Modern Amy’s price would be; hard to say
- No idea if Sega will be on-board for “Kickstarter”-like pre-orders
- Maybe Plague Knight and Spector Knight could be Kickstarter-like pre-orders?
- If a line doesn’t do well in resin, it absolutely can’t be continued as PVCs–PVCs need to sell tens of thousands of pieces and lines that can’t sell a few hundred resins will fail as PVCs
- The largest concentration of F4F collectors is in the United States
- US Tariffs: 10% now and 25% in January–will see what’s up when there’s more information; not good news
- Mini Jinjos: “Good point.”
- Bowsette is not official canon; F4F would not make this out of respect to Nintendo
- PVC absolutely requires less QA than resin, which is why PVCs are able to be produced much faster
- Loads of time to order Crystal Dragon regular version still
- No news on companion pieces just yet
Details on the Spyro PVC:
- The F4F Q&A #89 LIVE Recap is now in progress! This section will be filled in as it happens during the livestream! The Spyro PVC pre-order details are scheduled to be discussed at Noon EST!
- The Spyro & Sparx Exclusive PVC will go up for order exclusively on the F4F website immediately after they’re discussed on the livestream. Stay tuned!
- Alex and Chock each have a bag of unassembled Spyro PVC “puzzle pieces”
- The fewer number of molds uses, the cheaper the figure can be–each single mold costs at least $5,000
- Spyro came separated into about six molds; it would be a nightmare to paint his eyes if he came in one piece
- Tinted the base color of the Spyro PVC body purple, but there’s also a paint spray covering that so that it’s not just injection color–not all PVCs do that, which means that those PVCs are cheaper to make and don’t look as good (although it does help to meet SRP)
- There’s nothing wrong with not doing the separations, but luxury PVCs have more separations so that they can be painted better and look better (but consequently cost more)
- Beautiful, clean lines on Spyro’s horns and mohawk are possible because the pieces were separated out for mass production; if the pieces weren’t separated, they’d have to be painted by workers by hand, and the paint wouldn’t be done as perfectly
Spyro Regular PVC Box Revealed!- Spyro is TF001 since it’s the very first True Form PVC F4F has ever made officially; Amaterasu is likely to be TF002
- Spyro has the secondary designation SPY001 since it’s the first Spyro PVC; future Spyro PVC characters would be designated SPY002 and so on
- “Then you have the legal bullshit on the bottom of the box… I mean–the important stuff!” –Alex Davis
- Hidden gems printed on the inside flaps of the box in shiny gloss
Spyro PVC Backdrop and Pamphlet Revealed!
Spyro & Sparx EXclusive Statue Details–And Collector’s Edition!:
- Sparx came in a number of separated pieces to allow for a high level of sculpting and paint detailing
- You can only get the Spyro & Sparx statue via the F4F website–it won’t be available at local retailers like the standard PVC
- The exclusive will be priced at $99.99 on the First 4 Figures website–the only place it will be available
- The non-exclusive/standard version of Spyro is unlimited, and will be produced for as long as people want them and until the cows come home–these PVCs are so very important to spreading the word of First4Figures so that new people know about the company; the ~$80 PVCs have been absolutely key as brand ambassadors
- Ubisoft contacted First 4 Figures for the first time because they saw Crash PVC at Best Buy
- The chances of walking into a local store and seeing an unboxed resin F4F statue are very slim compared to 5 years ago, so it’s hard for new collectors to be introduced via the resins
- The exclusive is there to celebrate the collectors buying directly from First4Figures by making the statues limited and adding extras to it
- Tweaking the formula for EX statue edition sizes for PVCs to accommodate selling at conventions: standard edition will be in stores like Best Buy and such; the exclusive will be sold only on the F4F website as always and will have an edition size of at least 3000 units (will only go over 3000 if more than 3000 are sold in first 4 weeks); and then there’s the Collector’s Edition–will come in the standard packaging but with a sleeve on top exclusive to the convention it’s sold at
- The Collector’s Edition will be sold at full price and not discounted at conventions, and in Spyro’s case will be Spyro and Sparx in the regular packaging and not the EX packaging; this is tied to the fact that Alex wants to do more conventions
- Could also be called the “convention edition” instead of “Collector’s Edition”–the name hasn’t been finalized yet
- There are a lot of PVCs in the works–F4F won’t stop making resins, but is concerned about increasing prices due to Trump’s tariffs and other factors
- Having four pillars to the company (resin, PVC, plush, and mini items) will make it far stronger than just relying on resin; allowing F4F to be safe and stable; the last thing Alex ever wants to see is the company in financial trouble–PVCs are incredibly important as stable products to have available
Spyro EX Packaging Prototype Revealed!
- EX Packaging will have a beautiful gold foil on it
- The exclusive edition also includes an authentication card, a limited numbered logo base (with foam risers on the bottom) and a Day One card (only for those who order or validate on Day One)
- You can authenticate your Spyro PVC in order to retain the same number for future releases in the TF SPY Series (if there are any)
- Pre-orders open today, but Validation will occur for 24 hours starting on Friday, October 5th at 11AM EST–hit the ‘Validate’ button on orders placed this week at that time to lock in your low number and extra goodies (including bonus Rewards points, a holographic sticker and Day One card)!
- Alex strongly recommends ordering three: “one for play, one for display, and one for a rainy day!”
- NRD will be a 20% ($20) deposit and the total price will be $99.99
- 3-month and 6-month payment plans will be available; $13/month payments on the 6-month plan and $27/month on the 3-month plan
- Estimated release date is December 2018 if all goes smoothly, and Q1 2019 on the website to be on the safe side; want this to be out well before Chinese New Year to avoid shipping delays
- Shipping costs: US — $23 USD; EU — $26 USD; AUS/NZ — $45 USD; Canada — $26 USD; South Korea/Phillipines/Singapore — $35 USD; Russia/Saudi Arabia/Costa Rica — $65 USD; Other zones on the website–max cost is $65 USD
Size Comparison of Crash Classic Resin, Reignited PVC and Crystal Dragon Resin!
