[bracketed comments by eas179@psu.edu (Eric Sansoni)]

From: sdprince@mindspring.com (Scottie Prince)
Subject: Hasbro Chat 2/9/98: A Recap
Date: Mon, 09 Feb 1998 23:34:15 -0500
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.starwars.collecting.misc
Lines: 125
Organization: MindSpring Enterprises
Message-ID: 

And so the Great Toy Fair Internet Chat of 1998 is over. Jen from Hasbro
and Steve Sansweet were ever so exciting! Uh, yeah, right. Anyway, here is
what I learned from it, in the order the info came out:

No more EU vehicles other than the three already announced.

No "locked" exclusives for '98. I have no idea what this refers to, as we
alrady know the ROTJ band figs are a Wal Mart exclusive. Perhaps Mr.
Sansweet was talking about the 12" line.

[That question only referred to the 12".]

Hasbro Interactive has a CD-ROM title coming out called "Star Wars
Explorer". According to Steve, it has "playset" that fits on your keyboard
(must be one hell of a small playset) and come with a figure. What figure?
No answer to that, as of now.

There will be no more ships other than what's been announced for the year.

The Mynock Hunt 3-Pack comes with a mynock "stuck to the background". So
is it a play-with-me mynock, or a look-but-do-nothing mynock? Steve? Jen?
At least we now know the figures will have removable masks.

The Death Star Trooper's helmet is removable. Cool.

Mon Mothma's cape is removable as well. Hopefully that means she isn't
suffering from Royal Guard One Leg Disease.

[I think Jen meant the 2nd-piece that goes over Mon's shoulders.  The figure 
looks like a unileg to me.  Wouldn't bother me if only it had the same style 
joint as the Jawas, so it could sit.]

Sansweet mentioned there would be TWO removable helmet Vaders. The one
we've seen shows the face, while the other  only shows the back of his
head. Meditation Chamber Vader?

[I thought he meant the Complete Galaxies Vader (shortly before this 
statement I asked whether that Vader would have a removable helmet).  But 
then later he mentioned the board game Vader would have a removable helmet 
back.]

The AT-AT Commander will be available on a cardback "later this year."

Another oddity - the Intergalactic Battle Game. It's some sort of board
game, but it comes with two figures. Only one was described, and it wasn't
described very well.

[I think they said the 2nd fig is Vader later on.  I could be confusing it 
with Paul Barr's report, which says that both the Galaxies and the board 
game Vader have the top part of the helmet removable.  So looks like Steve 
got that wrong, and there are 3, not 2.  I got the impression that Steve 
was briefed on nothing about the line, and was just looking around the Toy 
Fair display area commenting on stuff he was seeing for the first time that 
day.]

According to ace observationalist Sansweet, one of them is Luke with his 
hair slicked back after the garbage masher incident.  So would that be Luke 
in Trooper gear, or back to the farmer look? I'm assuming it must be AFTER 
they're out of the masher, from his so-so description.

[The real figures are getting as silly as the parody variations people have 
posted.]

The Jabba band 2-pack will be at selected Wal Marts. What do they mean by
"selected"? Most WMs will have them by June. So "selected" means "most".
Ooookay.

There won't be and ROTJ style Jabba this year. Ah poo.

Jen mentioned that Salacious would be seen soon. Shortly thereafter,
Sansweet mentioned the Star Wars Insider exclusive would be announced in
March, and and available in April. They also said to watch for Oola. I'm
puttin' my money on the Insider exclusive for this pair. Comments, Adam?
:-)

Wedge will be released in a package other than the Falcon case. Jen said
"a unique place".  Rebel Pilot 3-Pack, anyone?

[Some people suggested a new Gunner Station.  Who knows.]

Aunt Beru is being "considered" for the "near future".

[She also said they were aware of the extreme popularity of the character.  
Wow, I wasn't even aware of that.]

Star Wars Trivial Pursuit is coming. Now I can spend countless hours
annoying my wife with useless knowledge while I kick her ass in friendly
competition!

[Thankfully they said it's all MOVIE-BASED trivia!  That was another question 
I asked on the fly.]

There will be a 12" Probe Droid! Now that's pretty good to hear!

12" Wedge and Biggs!!! Sansweet said they were "in the works".

The next QVC show will be at the end of May, and there are three shows
planned this year. They're still trying to work out a mutually beneficial
situation between QVC and Kenner. How about selling some damn toys to
people who want them? What a novel idea.

The Beast series Han with Tauntaun will feature Han with his hood up, and
the Taun with a full tusk. Unfortunately, no open belly for Luke.

12" Han/Taun? There will be "many more sets available in the next couple
of months". So sayeth Sansweet.

The 12" Cantina Band will ship again to Wal Mart, and remain in their old
style door package. What joy, more late nights at stinky Wal Mart waiting
in vain.

They're looking into "another way" to release the Scanning Crew Tech in
additon to the Falcon case. How about like all the other damn figures on
cards?

The EU cardbacks will have a "pop-up scene" in place of the slide.
According to Steve, it will "fit several figures". It was at this point in
my notes I wrote SANSWEET IS VERY BAD AT DESCRIBING ITEMS FOR ANYONE TO
GET A DECENT UNDERSTANDING OF THEM. Having taken some time to reflect on
this, I still agree with myself.

Thrawn will have a removable Ysalimari around his neck.

The Millenium Coin figures will be either "re-painted or re-posed". The
only ones mentioned by name were Endor Luke and Leia. They're going to
have "added deco on their ponchos". So do they still have bendy knees?
Steve? Ah, never mind.

The whole shebang wrapped up with Jen and Steve being asked what their
favorite SW figures of all time were (Jen: Slave Leia; Steve: too tough to
answer). One of the final comments was this: "I just wanted to say I think
Hasbro is doing an excellent job. You make it worthwhile to go into a toy
store. Keep up the good work." See, I told you they didn't screen the
chat.

The only way for people to type anything that anyone other than the
moderator could see was by creating a chat room. The first few I saw were:

This is better than Star Wars (Star Wars being the name of the main chat)
Star Wars Sucks
ARRRRRRRRRGH
This is just a PR stunt
I am asking questions in vain

....and so on. It got to the point where most of the text scrolling by was
from folks communicating via room names. I think this happened because
most of the questions people really wanted answered never saw the light of
the chat room. What you see in this post is what there was. Not one of the
hard hitting questions got touched. If you weren't there, you didn't miss
much.

[They ended the chat about 10 minutes early, despite all the unanswered 
questions.  They did say they would try to answer more through the web site 
FAQ in the upcoming weeks.  They also spoke of "technical difficulties" from 
the huge traffic, that kept them from seeing all the questions.  The 
population of the room seemed to hover around 325.  I wouldn't be surprised 
if they got 1000s of questions within the 90 minutes.  Next time maybe they 
should limit each person to one question, or start hiring more reps and 
more employees to deal with just about every aspect of Hasbro's SW 
Universe.  If the factories are as understaffed as this chat session no 
wonder they can't get anything produced in time.]

Regards,
Scottie

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