TFARCHIVE FORUMS

Chinese G1 toys from the Mid-Nineties.

Here's the backstory:
http://www.geocities.com/futuristgroup/vchina.html

Apparently originally licensed, but then continued being produced without permission.

Last year, P.Prime brought the Beachcomber from that list to our attention (again):
http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/thread47551.html

Notice there's several misspellings on the packaging that don't appear on the original 1985 Hasbro US release.

I quickly drew the connection, but then forgot about the thread.

A while later, a TFW 2005 member told me he had purchased ten MOSC Beachcombers on eBay, and I dug out the thread and the link to Fred's site. Hagetaka then revived the thread, and the "news" spread all over the boards.
Especially since there were still huge caselots of them being sold on eBay YEARS after they supposedly came out in China.

The same sellers also had some Seasprays and Backstreets, which are also known as having surfaced with those Chinese stickers.

Now, since the AFA had graded several of those "G1" Beachcombers, someone contacted them about it. Here's their response:

http://forums.transfandom.com/invboard/ ... opic=27917

Apparently, the AFA is now going to label them as "China variants".

However, I also got some semi-pissed off feedback from some of the know-it-alls who insisted those might not necessarily be bootlegs, but could very well be licensed Chinese versions which just happened to surface in one of those legendary warehouse finds.

Meanwhile, the people over at Seibertron also debated over the authenticity of these Beachcombers, but also discussed about how to distinguish a "Chinese" Beachcomber from a legit 1985 US Beachcomber.
http://www.seibertron.com/energonpub/vi ... hp?t=66053

And then, recently, BBTS put up a huge lot of MISB G1 Cyclonus toys for sale which apparently also surfaced in one of those warehouse finds.

Soon enough, though, someone noticed the Chinese stickers and instantly contacted BBTS. Here's the reaction:
http://www.seibertron.com/news/view.php?id=5207

And GetterDragun also gave us more information about more "Chinese" G1/G2 toys:
http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/showpost1018043-p20.html

Here's a list of what I currently know to be G1 Bootlegs:

SqualkTalk and BeastBox
BackStreet
Ruckus
Cyclonus
IronHide
BeachComber
Seaspray
and Two of the double boxes of the Japanese Victory Combiner LandCross.

It's STILL being debated whether those are bootlegs or leftover licensed Chinese releases.
In fact, it's not even sure whether these are actually leftover toys from the Nineties or are STILL being produced to this day.

http://www.tfans.com/talk/index.php?showtopic=25739

TFans member Tripredacus mailed Hasbro and got a really... enlightening response:

Thank you for contacting Hasbro, Inc.

In response to your inquiry, Hasbro is licensed through Takara to make Transformers. We do not distribute the product overseas. It is only shipped in the U.S. The only information I can provide you is if the box the product is in says Hasbro, then it is a genuine product.

Thanks for your interest.

In other words, Hasbro don't distribute Transformers in Hong Kong, New Zealand, Australia or Canada. Or in Europe, for that matter.

And if someone makes a custom G1 box and puts a "Hasbro" logo on it, that'll automatically make it a real Hasbro toy then. :rolleyes:

Sounds like someone's been propping up the help desk for too long.

The latest one: Optimus Prime.

See here for a comparison between the fake and the original.

As ever, it's great if they're released onto the market by honest sellers who're knowledgeable about what they've got...

If it looks too new or good a deal, it probably is.

Okay, this one's kinda obvious:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 6033159192

Black Optimus Prime bootleg...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 6033457311

Looks pretty good.

I find the prices people are willing to pay for these things hilarious.

Bootleg G1 Prime based on old European "Red Foot" variant mold?

http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/showthread.php?t=92001

Compare:

http://www.tfsource.com/articles/Redfoot.html

Moved the thread to "news" because it's an ongoing development.

Yeah, it's a little known feature of vB that staff can do that to their own threads regardless of which forum the thread is in... by default, anyway.

Redfoot Optimus? I'm surprised there hasn't been an all-red or all-blue version of him, actually... "hate-plague Optimus" or something similar.

What other moulds might the bootleggers be likely to have, then?