Always easy to spot the fuckheads... Just a stone cold bored look on their face, looks like they are spoilt kids who were just told to go do house chores or something... Get in there, get it done and fuck off. Not a hint of a smile or any excitement about the toys. Faces are always buried in their phones ... Are these the familiar traits you've seen around the world @IronPaw ?
That’s kind of the best way to put it. Or if they are talking to each other, they aren’t joking or smiling with another collector.
Oh yeah that's probably the biggest tell of all! No social enjoyment whatsoever - which is a huge part of this for us.
As someone that's only been to 2 sofubi related shows, I've seen the same Chinese flipper groups that I saw at Dcon last year, and again yesterday. Leosofubi for sure is a known flipper, even though his IG says " toys not for sale " In fact, a easy way to spot flippers is IG filled with the latest and greatest toys, but no pictures of their faces, and all with the " toys not for sale " which I find to be ironic. I don't want to go into too much detail, but I saw at least 2 flipper groups operating, and based on their conversations, they all seem to cover for each other, with one even remaking " I did not stop your guy form buying " With that being said, I'm thankful for the show organizers / staff to give the fans in USA a chance to attend Game of Hope, making it as fair as they could, and I hope the show was successful enough to happen again in the future.
@hellscrape beautiful picks Victor, very glad I got to meet you finally. @IronPaw I hope my thousand-yard stare by the middle of the day didn't hide my happiness at seeing you out there Regarding flippers, I will say the organisers did more to keep em out at this show than previous events I've seen with Punk Drunkers and Skulltoys. It was a pleasure hearing that one who tried to cut in line several times was both stuck at the back and refused at the door. Some definitely made it in, but overall I think organisation and sheer quantity saved the day here. There were so many quality toys on show that I think most folks had some very tough decisions to make, even if they were further back in the line and lost some items to resellers. One thing that's always on my mind at shows is the potential for profiling. Sure, some people are frantically DM-ing photos with red circles drawn on them all show, and we all know what they're up to. But with an overzealous organiser and a bad crowd, policing that can turn into hostility towards new or unknown East Asian collectors. I guess my only saving grace at my first few shows, as an awkward guy in a big coat who made all his friends on Instagram, was being a brown dude Anyway, one hurried change in the airport bathroom later and I'm back at work. Big haul wank shot coming after I sleep for a thousand years.
More pics of toys, please!! I was super bummed to not be able to come down for this, as I also missed the closer-to-me-in-Bay-Area one in Santa Cruz too a few years ago (but it was worth it as I skipped it to see Charles Bradley perform just a year before he lost his battle with cancer)... hopefully they do it again next year and I can pull it off. Was curious to hear how the "no line" deal was going to work and it sounds like it worked about as well as you'd expect that to, ha ha. Still awesome that those guys were into doing another US-based show after burning out on the bigger cons and it looks like they brought a TON of awesome pieces!! Extremely jealous of anyone here who was able to snag something and I would looooooooooove to see some pics!!
Dude I would have taken a picture of what was there for ppl that couldn't make it but there was a strict NO PHOTOGRAPHY rule on the rules sheet of paper we each got. So I didn't want to risk wasting 50 on an ubber coming all the way out for nothing. I can understand why they did it though being flippers were taking photos and passing it around to the organized groups to see what they could get there grubby hands on.
Shame we couldn't take photos of what was inside, but I think that actually did help because flippers could at first only work with what they'd seen in the previews. Some very sought-after toys actually sat longer than I thought they would because some of the shifty folks who were early in line would only buy a RxH adult on their first round.
Well I saw that samurai looking predator one but ultimately the bright colors of the other in the photo won me over. And there was no way i was waiting in line again lol.
Ah, gotcha - thanks for clarifying, guys!! I was genuinely surprised I wasn't seeing more snaps on IG just looking up hashtags or scanning for all the usual dudes who always have a toy or two in their pocket wherever they go. Makes sense and hopefully it did work to at least partially discourage the flippers. Hopefully now that it's over, everyone who scored will post up pics of their gets.
@Dr Dave I'm really hoping we see a small handful of pieces from Mori that weren't at his shop previously. Would have gone to folks earliest in line if that's the case. I think the most pleasant surprise was the variety Neo One brought out considering he's so new. It looked like a couple of new releases plus small numbers from the majority of existing Elemax runs.
The elephant men must have sold out quick cause all I saw was T Shirts and some pins and patches. Bummed I missed out on one but happy for the ppl that were able to pick one up.
Man I’m a bit more bummed that the Goccodo guys with the jackets were available, been wanting one since those were made. Super bummed the Mega Man style shirts were lost, those were amazing.
Awwww YEAH!! Thanks @nicholasfung!! (I suspected you were gonna come through with the pics!) SO MUCH SWEET STUFF!! Wow.
Good call! I never had the pleasure. Was just flipping some sides of his music last night.* * AKA the good sort of flipping!
Such a great looking show. Special shoutout to whichever yanks scored the Megaman Elemax and the black Bearmetal. HUGE.
Credit to one of my best friends who talked me into it when I told him I might bail on it to drive to Santa Cruz for a "toy show"... I'd seen Bradley once before and loved it, but my mentality was "I'll get to see him on tour plenty in the future" (this was before he announced his diagnosis) and maaaaaan was it the right call. Like maybe Top 5 shows for me ever (and I'm in my late 40s so I've seen a more than a few). I still get kinda emotional when I think about it. I wonder if he knew he was sick (or maybe wasn't diagnosed yet, but was suffering from symptoms) but since I'd seen him before, I don't think it actually would've made that much of a difference - that guy poured his heart all the way out for his fans every time he performed. It was really something else. RIP to one of the greats.