Quick Question Involving AOE First Edition Optimus Prime

[engledogg]

For anyone that had a momentary lapse in judgment and ordered the AOE First Edition Optimus Prime from Amazon...could you please check your and post whether or not the shield and sword had any silver paint apps.

Apparently, some are arriving painted and others unpainted.

Over on the Allspark, a user observed that:

I notice the standard-packaging version (as opposed to "frustration-free") is now listed as Under Review at Amazon, saying "customers have told us there may be something wrong with our inventory of the item, the way we are shipping it, or the way it's described here".

I wonder if that's related to the complaints about unpainted weapons or something else?

I ordered the "Standard Packaging" version (since, at the time, I wasn't quite sure what the heck "Frustration-Free" meant) and, yep, my weapons are unpainted.

Did anyone that ordered the "Standard Packaging" version end up with painted weapons? 

If not, it would seem that the unpainted weapons only showed up with the Standard Packaging and the painted weapons were found only in the "Frustration-Free Packaging".  If this distribution holds true, and is not a random event, I would think this might warrant a variant (as pathetic as that is) in the database.

Thanks for reading!
MIKE
engledogg

[Tripredacus]

If the two were different, wouldn't that indicate there must be a difference on the box? Otherwise how would the people at the factory know which is which?

[engledogg]

Not sure what you mean by "difference on the box".

As I understand it, the "frustration-free" toy packaging is identical to the "standard" version, except that the "frustration-free" also includes the cardboard packing box from the factory.  Sometimes, like with Predaking, Amazon will put this "total package" (box in a box) in another shipping box, but sometimes they'll just send it as-is, using the cardboard box provided by the factory as the shipping box.

Thinking about this, perhaps one "assembly line/production run" cranked out those that were intended for the "standard release" and one did the "frustration-free"?  I can't see that really being feasible - there's no way that Amazon has that kind of relationship with the factories, or even with HasTak. 

More likely, it just happened that one line/run ended up making those destined (without knowing) to end up as "standard releases", while one did the same with the "frustration-free"?  Maybe those destined to be standard releases were created at a different time than the frustration-free releases?

Who knows?  I guess the stamps on the packages would give us some clue, if there are any.

Regardless, I eventually want to track down the painted version as it just looks infinitely better than the unpainted version.  Ideally, I would like some sort of reassurance that the frustration-free version will indeed have the painted weapons.  At this point, though...I don't really feel like dropping $60 on this figure, for numerous reasons.  Ugh.

MIKE
engledogg