1988 Minibot Equivalents

[ZacWilliam1]

Folks who were around during G1.

1984 to 1986 we had the classic Autobot minicar/minivehicle assortments.

1987 we had the Throttlebots which while a different style were very clearly the minicar assortment equivalent toys for the year.

Then there's 1988. I think the Sparkabots are definitely in the same category as "minibot equivalents". But my thought was... do the Triggerbots count too? They're almost as small but just a hair larger than a minibot, Throttlebot or Sparkabot. Are they too big? More equivalent to Combiner Limbs?

-ZacWilliam, just wondering if other folks had an opinion on their "lineage" as latter day minibots or something close but unrelated.

 

[Haywire]

I was around during G1, but I'm probably not that qualified to answer because most of my collection was Gobots, and by 1988, we were living in places where Transformers weren't readily available. I watched the cartoon regularly, but it didn't continue beyond the 87 assortments, and the comic was no more available than the toys.

I'll take a stab at an answer, though: Minibots and Throttlebots were the cheapest price point Transformers offered (along with the Decepticon Minicassettes). 1988 had a couple more cassette offerings, and the Sparkabots/Firecons. Were the Triggerbots/cons priced at a similar level? Or were they definitely higher-priced than the Sparkabots?
If the former, then, yeah, they should fall within the minibot lineage. If the latter, then I would probably place them more within the scope of the small Targetmasters or similar figures.

Ultimately, though, I organize my figures by how well they scale with Gobots, so in that respect, they might fall within the "close enough" range to be Minibots regardless.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

Someone out there has a record of the original prices, right?

 

[Sabrblade]

Someone out there has a record of the original prices, right?

According to Unicron.com's instructions archive, Mini Vehicles, Cassette 2-packs, Constructicons, Scramble City Combiner limbs, Throttlebots, Triggerbots, Triggercons, Sparkabots, and Firecons were all $5.00 USD.

 

[Princess Viola]

so the seacon limbs were the 1988 minibot equivalent, got it

 

[CoffeeHorse]

We need to keep Unicron.com online forever. It's an institution.

 

[Sciflyer]

Their Golden Disk / Reader accessory pack was - and still is - a thing of beauty.

Tbh, I never really conceived of anything else in the Transformers lineup of the era as approximations for Minibots. By 1988, I was pretty squarely moving away from Transformers in general, because as a 12-year-old, they weren't "my Transformers". I bought a few here and there, but in that year, the majority of my available income went to the Nintendo Entertainment System and its itenerant peripherals.

 

[LBD "Nytetrayn"]

Folks who were around during G1.

1984 to 1986 we had the classic Autobot minicar/minivehicle assortments.

1987 we had the Throttlebots which while a different style were very clearly the minicar assortment equivalent toys for the year.

Then there's 1988. I think the Sparkabots are definitely in the same category as "minibot equivalents". But my thought was... do the Triggerbots count too? They're almost as small but just a hair larger than a minibot, Throttlebot or Sparkabot. Are they too big? More equivalent to Combiner Limbs?

-ZacWilliam, just wondering if other folks had an opinion on their "lineage" as latter day minibots or something close but unrelated.

From the ones I had back in the day, yeah, I'd say they were the closest thing to Minibots those years. Definitely a little beefier and more gimmicky than the first couple of years, but that's just following on from the Throttlebots.

 

[The Predaking]

just wondering if other folks had an opinion on their "lineage" as latter day minibots or something close but unrelated.

Hmmn, if we are talking about the idea of cheap small transformers that have simple transformations then:

G2 had minibots, like Beachcomber, as well as the hotwheels size cars that would be repurposed as Spychangers later on in RID2000. Beast Wars had some neat basic sized figurees that would fill that niche for it as well Beast Machines (But less so). RID had the afore mentioned Spychangers. Later on they got miniaturized versions of larger toys like the car bros, Optimus, Ultra Magnus, and Scourge. Back in the early 2000s, Armada had the minicons which is the very incarnation of the small cheap toys for kids model. Energon had some too, but they were mostly repaints from Armada. Energon also had some of the best basics ever made with the Terrorcons (I still have my horde) and the Omnicons. I will have to look up what we had for Cybertron, as I honestly don't remember much about the basics for that line.

 

[Sciflyer]

Cybertron had Armorhide, among other Scouts. But he remains a tiny god.

 

[Andrusi]

Cybertron also introduced Legends of Cybertron, which turned into just Legends (not that one), which turned into Cyberverse (not that one).

 

[Stepwise]

According to Unicron.com's instructions archive, Mini Vehicles, Cassette 2-packs, Constructicons, Scramble City Combiner limbs, Throttlebots, Triggerbots, Triggercons, Sparkabots, and Firecons were all $5.00 USD.

Mini vehicles were $5. To be fair, I've made up for it since, but I should've asked for so many more of those when I was growing up . . .

 

[ZacWilliam1]

Actually a quick search of the Internet strongly suggests that's wrong.

It looks like the Mini Cars ran like $2.50 to $3

-ZacWilliam, Which makes sense as the big Autobot cars seem to have been around $6ish

 

[The Predaking]

Well, in 1984, according to the Sears' Wishbook, Deluxe Autobots were $10, Soundwave was $16, Seekers were $13, and Optimus and Megatron were both $23.

So with these prices, I can imagine that the little ones could have been $5 at times. 1985 prices at Sears weren't any lower:

In 1986, prices were going up a bit:

Sadly, we don't have any prices on the G1 minibots or even the Scramble city bots in any of these.

 

[The Predaking]

I did find another price stickered G1 toy, this time from Kmart, and it was $2.97.

The problem is that we don't know if that was a regular price or a sale price. However, given tha all the things we have seen so far, I am inclined to believe that they were around $3 usd.

 

[The Predaking]

I did find some interesting pics though of the prices. This ad has the Scramble city limbs on sale for $3.33. Maybe that meant that they were closer to $5 back in the day?

It looks like the cassette packs were on sale for $5 in this ad from later on in the line.


There is also this UK ad that shows the Battlecharger for 3.5 pounds:

Then again we have the Windcharger later release with a minibot for under $3 again:

And here we have a Construticon, on sale for $3, but normally $7.

 

[Sabrblade]

It's almost as if the prices were determined by each individual store.

 

[The Predaking]

lol. Yeah, some stores were always more expensive than others.

 

[ZacWilliam1]

I mean they always are, SRP (Suggested Retail Price) is a thing for a reason though, even in the 80s.

Given all the examples here are consistent, it seems very likely the Minibots were consistently $3-ish in the US.

I couldn't find as many pics of Throttlebot cards with price tags online.

 

[Sabrblade]

Those pics are such huge image files they're taking forever to finish loading.