Hasbro's Most Baffling MLP Decisions

[Leave a Whisper]

Ponies being Babified versions of themselves do not sell well.  As we have seen with newborn cuties and the g4 baby doll monstrosities. It is common and profitable in animal toylines to have family units either sold separately or together.

Plus some of the babies are slightly different from their parents, either by species, symbol, or color schemes. As seen with Baby Moondancer, Baby Sunbright, and Baby Milky Way. And you can mix n match families that don't have similar looking family members. Or that you don't have matching set to.

That Hasbro has foregone families for a lazy rehash of Pinkie Pie #3,874 is not what ought to be encouraged. It's a Bad Baffling Idea that diminishes creative play.

[Carrehz]

I'll never understand why Hasbro stopped doing family sets after G2. Well no, G3 did have those two big/lil sis sets, but that's about it, right?

What gets me is that they tried doing Baby Main 6 once or twice, but they never did what seems like an obvious idea to me - why not do main 6 family sets??? I remember talking about this with a FiM fan once and we both agreed we'd buy the HECK out of those. Imagine a set of brushables with Pinkie's parents in adult moulds, Pinkie, Maud and the other two sisters (I don't remember their names! ) in baby moulds? I wouldn't mind the constant onslaught of the same few characters over and over if they at least switched them up a bit instead of just being the same. freaking. figure. EVERY TIME.

(which, speaking of, why did they decide that G4 only needed 1 or 2 poses total...?)

[lalalei2001]

Why was G3 the only one without males?

There WAS one male pony in all of G3.

Here he is!

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[Leave a Whisper]

Why was G3 the only one without males?

There WAS one male pony in all of G3.

Here he is!

visitors can't see pics , please register or login

Oh. I stand corrected

[lovesbabysquirmy]

reminds me of Teddy

[Snapdragon]

Why was G3 the only one without males?

There WAS one male pony in all of G3.

Here he is!

visitors can't see pics , please register or login

OMG! Alright, I'll bite, who is this? I'm wildly curious! I recognize Cotton Candy on the left, but that's all I got!

[lalalei2001]

No idea, he was cartoon-only. I call him Propeller Hat.

[Leave a Whisper]

No idea, he was cartoon-only. I call him Propeller Hat.

Did he speak?

[lalalei2001]

No idea, he was cartoon-only. I call him Propeller Hat.

Did he speak?

Nope!

[Kitcatepic]

Why was G3 the only one without males?

There WAS one male pony in all of G3.

Here he is!

visitors can't see pics , please register or login

there were some more male ponies in one of the crowd shots in twinkle wish adventure

[Ponybookworm]

Have to keep my eye on these for G3 Baby Boy Custom ideas

[Leave a Whisper]

Have to keep my eye on these for G3 Baby Boy Custom ideas

Good idea!

[MJNSEIFER]

I also don't get why the Baby Ponies were treated like new characters, rather than just the younger version of the pony they resembled. I don't know if all canons did this (the cartoon did, and there's a comic that has the baby ponies being cloned from a mirror), but I find it strange that they made baby versions of the adult ponies, and made them new/different characters (I'll check what the toyline did, but the cartoon could have easily have had flashbacks to when the adult version of whatever baby pony they wanted to market was younger...)

Because mother-daughter sets / play is cute and endearing.   The babies look identical to the moms so that children can immediately identify which baby pony goes with which mom pony.  Also in the 80s Hasbro was all about collectibility, which meant collecting new characters.  I think their feeling was "If a kid already has Pony XYZ, why would they want a new version of her?"  Like, why would Baby Glory being "Glory as a baby" be any more engaging than "Glory had a baby who looks just like her"?  If they're separate characters, you can have Glory nuzzling her baby, putting on her diaper, and feeding Baby Glory her bottle.  If they're the same character that deletes the mother-daughter play and interactions between the toys wouldn't really make sense.

I mean you could make up a time travel plot, but what about when you don't want to have time travel, what about when you just want the ponies to go to a party?

To answer the last part, I was thinking more of an "episode" created with the toys that takes place when the ponies are younger or something (like the idea of a flashback in the cartoon), but yeah, I see what you're getting at - it does seem pretty cute that way. Good point. 

Ponies being Babified versions of themselves do not sell well.  As we have seen with newborn cuties and the g4 baby doll monstrosities. It is common and profitable in animal toylines to have family units either sold separately or together.

Plus some of the babies are slightly different from their parents, either by species, symbol, or color schemes. As seen with Baby Moondancer, Baby Sunbright, and Baby Milky Way. And you can mix n match families that don't have similar looking family members. Or that you don't have matching set to.

Understandable. As an aside; I'm sure I remember at least one person admitting that they misunderstood the point of the baby ponies, and thought she was the younger version of the pony, even with the symbol being different (they're justification being "I just thought she got more [symbol specific things] as she got older...") b

But yeah, good points all 'round on the G1 baby ponies. Thanks. 

Going back to the Big Brothers, I think the idea was that they were meant to be 'big brother' type figures to 'little girls' collecting them, doing 'boyish' activities. Or something. I don't really know. In the UK the original set is called the Adventure Boy Pony set. We used Big Brothers in the second release in 1989, largely because we defaulted to a lot of US packaging design in 1989, but Adventure Boy seems a bit more logical.

That's a possibility, thanks. I don't think I knew the first set were "Adventure Boys" over here, or I forgot (I'm more familiar with the American terms, despite being English), but I personally feel that is a better term.

the GMs all having wings. None of which comes from development. I don't want to say 'they just made it all up!' but maybe they did. Maybe we're all just overthinking xD.

This is late, but at the very least, I can theorize that they were changed for storyline reasons - they needed some ponies who could all fly, so they all had to be pegasus ponies, and they also needed to have one of them fix the balloon with magic, so they made her an alicorn (decades before MLP used that term.) I don't know why these ponies specifically needed to be the Glow 'n Show Ponies, though (sorry if it was said in the thread, I kind of skimmed through) - I'm pleased they were, though, as this was my introduction to them, and I've loved them ever since.

I agree that the toys keep getting worse, but I think some magic must have happened for G1 to be created. Some alignment of talent produced a truly magical thing and that's certainly why I'm here.

Agree completely about G1 - I didn't even grow up with it, but G1 was always the toyline I'd look at back when I was getting into the entire fandom, and imagine how awesome and nostalgic it would have been to collect and play with them (and in a perfect world, be watching the show as well), and it's likely because of how imaginative the G1s are (and for the most part, that's without needing the toys to "do" something.) For the cartoons, I can imagine myself being a fan of pretty much all of them as a kid, and said cartoons tend to give that nostalgic feel for me, but toyline-wise, it's definitely the G1s that say "childhood" despite not being part of mine. 

[Carrehz]

Is that G3.5 pony confirmed male or are we just assuming because of the short hair? He's cute either way, though!

It's so weird seeing the non-core 7 ponies in G3.5 style.

[cola]

What are your thoughts on the Core 7 15 years later, and are there any other decisions made about MLP that make you go "Hmmm"?

  So I am late to the party...haha. I still want to talk about it though !

I never understood the "core cast" that MLP kept pushing for. It happened with Tales (Someone else mentioned this!), it happened in G3.5, and it's still happening as MLP continues. I heard this theory that the "cast" system was pushed to try to market recognizable characters, like in other children's toys and media. It's not completely outrageous to suggest MLP try it again (They have tried it every generation. Megan, G2 Sundance/Sparkle, etc etc.), it never really, truly appeals to me however. I think it has to do with my approach to collecting them.

There's a "cheapness" that comes with it in my mind, I'm not exactly sure how else to describe it. I know it costs less to produce 10 Pinkie Pies with slightly different cutie marks, than 10 different ponies. Ponies don't have an inherent image in my mind like Disney, or "army building" aspects that well, army toys have. I'm sure there's people who like to have 20-30 of the same character, and I like that for them. I don't think I am one of those types of collectors. I can tell they're really trying too, with MLP- different outfits, or themes, maybe a different mane or a gradient. Maybe it worked for G4 because there where a different kind of fanatics are out there, where the FIM design reached that "iconicity" of other "hello kitty"s or "pikachu"s of that era.

I just don't really need 10 of the same pony, with slightly different gimmicks unfortunately. I give them a good pat on the back for adding sick translucent glitter variants and dresses- I sure do love a cute pony in a dress! So, maybe- one or three of the same pony is okay? G3 had a nice sweet spot- some with tinsel, some with big TAF-esc marks- a new pose etc, etc, etc. Re-releases are okay in my book, it's different when there's somewhere close to 2-3 new versions of the same pony every year for me though.

I usually don't like to give pony designs a hard time, but I am starting to realize they rely on certain patterns. Food themed, flower themed, star themed- Pink, white, purple, rinse, lather, repeat unti- I have completely forgot what I'm talking about. There's nothing wrong with these in concept of course, I love all my ponies of the aforementioned adjectives. There is in fact, a limit to how many times you can give the pink haired earth pony with a flower mark, a new name. I'm jaded Don't let me rain on your parade. I still love my fair share of Blossomforths and Cupcakes.

Now that I think about it- I really enjoy my ponies looking similar in some aspects. The collector's pose ponies are quite charming to me, they have an antiquity that some toys few toys meet (In the context of the 80s, and in today's age).  But, I think what Hasbro has missed is variety in some cases. I don't gravitate to newer MLP toys because, they all sort of look the same.

I don't mean to knack G4 and 5 (and even some G3.5/Ponyville), this is more of just an observation I have; They share molds, so the toys look really similar. That's good for building an image and recognition, but it makes me less interested in collecting. In laymens terms, Ponies aren't traditional dolls, I guess? They're inherently novel, and collectable in the same way a postcard or statue is, well at least to me. I liked the LPS comparisons made to MLP too.

I think G5 has made great strides to push MLP towards their ideal, a toy that can continue to be supported with accessories (much like a doll). They've yet to release very many toys outside of the same 4-5 ponies, there is an occasional new one (I think the mini world stuff has more variety). That just isn't my ideal of a pony unfortunately.

For me, it comes off as too corporate, and manufactured. I'm so happy I can walk into a store and get myself a Sunny Starscout or Pipp, because surely there's children who want that too. But that's uh, all I have to pick from. I don't have a reason to collect something that isn't really collectable or appealing to me.

To leave on a less sour note I don't collect G4, but I remember when I saw it's first toy reboot, and was  super shocked. I totally thought they where doing well with the style they had, although I didn't collect them. I'm not sure how to describe the style. "Movie"? 2017 reboot? I don't find the sculpts particularly pretty, but wow do I understand the appeal they where going for. Different poses made me retroactively interested, but kind of suffers from "same mares syndrome".

All of the above is just my hot takes and ramblings Sorry, I didn't mean to make this an entire thesis paper...