How are you coping with the lack of EII AF toys?

[toyguy]

Hi, I'm new so greetings everyone. Its hard to find a group of people who are real Action Fleet fans but I knew there must be a forum some where.

Anyway, my question to y'all is how the heck are you coping with the fact that there's no AOTC AF vehicles up to this point. I mean, its been really great collecting the OT stuff in the 90's and TPM yeilded a very healthy selection of AF toys (distribution of the last couple of waves leaves littel to be desired, but another story). So as AOTC came around, I am suffering from AF withdraw symtoms if you will. As many have already pointed out in these forums, few people want to pay big bucks for things they basically have already. And the release of the AT-TE and Solar Sailor might get muddled with distribution problems again if the rehash don't sell well (Hope I'm wrong).

Have you folks tried to fill the gap with something else? For eg. I got the Tiger Electronic Jedi fighter game and dis-assembled the handle portion. Yes the toy no longer has the lights and sounds now, but it looks great beside my old Slave I (its about the length of the Naboo N-1). I also heard there's a Japanese model kit that comes with the Hyperdrive Ring but I haven't seen it on retail (I assume it'd be 1:72 scale which should work). Also, the "Force Link" Vehicles again from Tiger are possibilities. I got the Zam and Anakin speeders which make a great AF scale chase scene. When I put the yellow speeder against say Luke's Landspeeder, its about the same size and you could even fit the TPM Obi-wan in the passenger seat. The other two Force Link ships (Jedi Fighter and Slave I) sadly, are too small to be displayed with the AF vehicles. I thought I saw a Lego version of the Hailfire Droid which looked really cool. Normally I find Lego too unrealistic and whimsical looking but the Hailfire droid might work.

Has anyone else found any alternatives? I'm just not sure if Hasbro will come through for us for ATOC AF. For me its a double whammy cause I live in Canada. Can you belive it? We got only the original 4 shelf warmers (N-1 wave) during TPM and nothing else. I spent a fortune on ebay.

 

[Guest]

I, too, am an Action Fleet fan. I can only hope that the new ones sell so they will continue putting them out (and they do seem to be selling, my local Wal-Mart and Target sold out in no time).
As for "replacement" or "stand-in" ships for Ep. II until they release official AF ships, I cannot think of any. Your idea to use the Tiger Jedi Starfighter was a good one. We can only hope that they do release one WITH the ring.

The AF ships are my son's toy of choice recently as they are easier for him to fly around the house. The new Falcon is quite cool, he bought it with accumulated allowance without my input (we have the old one WITH figures) but I admit the appearance is much better than the old one. I have drawn the line on purchasing the other 2 new ones as we have all of the previous X-wings and DV Tie's (including battle-damaged). I will be buying a new AT-AT or 2 when they come out for a diorama we are building - the new ones look great with the new paint deco.

 

[Another_Galaxy]

I bought the pair of Force Link Speeders (they are about the right scale) when they came down to $2 at Target, but (SIGH) it's just not the same, is it?

 

[toyguy]

Fruedguy, thanks for your input. I'd love to see a Jedi Fighter with a Hyperdrive Ring in any scale. I think its a potentially a really cool toy that Hasbro totally ignored so far. Again, leads me to think that Hasbro only cares about action figs and occasionally releases 1 or 2 vehicles in that scale. Action Fleet (in Galoob's) time was great as they exhausively released every imaginable vehicle so most ships saw plastic.

Tooshort4astormtrooper, thanks also for your comments. You're right, Force Link really isn't the same but when you place it along with your other prequel vehicles, it at least fills a void for the time being. BTW did you disassemble your Force Links to remove the keyring? It bothered me a bit so I removed mine. Any, the Anakin speeder looks reasonably OK as you can see the seat and steering control details. Zam's speeder is basically a block of plastic.