Celebration VI – Hasbro
If you follow us on Twitter then you probably saw the information from the Hasbro panel live as the presentation unfolded. The bad news is that not a lot of new stuff was shown. Even though Hasbro said during San Diego Comic-Con that they were holding some stuff back for Celebration, they admitted at the top of the panel that they actually showed off enough at SDCC to cause this panel to be light.
But not all was bad. We did get to see wave 2 of the new Droid Factory figures, including the new Mara Jade which won the last Fans’ Choice Poll. There are going to be over 30 figures in the line for 2013 and each wave will build 1 or 2 new droids.
Movie Heroes will continue with a new Battle Droid and Sandtrooper. The Battle Droid will come apart and the Sandtrooper has a light-up blaster. Clone Wars will have brand new Obi-Wan and Anakin figures as well as a Battle Droid, updated Captain Rex and a new 501st Jet Pack Trooper.
Some of the most interesting new items shown come in the two vehicle lines. First up, Class I Vehicles will have a new Jedi Cruiser for Yoda and the set will also have a Super Battle Droid. The MTT Droid Fighter, with Obi-Wan and a Battle Droid, will actually fit on the MTT which is for sale now. Finally, for the Class I vehicles will be a redeco of the Republic Clone Dropship, in blue, with a Clone Pilot and Battle Droid.
The Class II vehicles line will receive an overhaul, reducing some familiar ships to a smaller scale while maintaining their compatibility with the 3.75″ figures. They’ll also be dropping in price, with the new MSRP closer to $20. The first wave will have a Republic Fighter Tank, Jango’s Slave I and Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Jedi Starfighter.
Most of the rest of the panel covered Fighter Pods and exclusives which we already knew about and some of which are already on the shelf. The final tease for the panel was a look at the Slave I for 2013. This should be the rumored update to Boba Fett’s ship but based on the Clone Wars release from last year.
During the panel, the team also announced an exhibit of early Kenner toys up to modern Hasbro releases. It will be held in Paris from October until March of 2013.
There was time for a few questions and it was revealed that the larger scale X-Wing will be coming out as an exclusive in Vintage Collection packaging. It was explained that the reason Jocasta Nu is a Brian’s Toys exclusive is because Hasbro doesn’t think it’s financially viable to take the Hasbro Toy Shop booth to other conventions outside of San Diego Comic-Con. They also said that there won’t be any more waves of figures related to video games so that releases will be mixed in. They also said there will be some The Old Republic figures coming.
We’ll be photographing the booth on Saturday and will have those photos up for you later in the evening.