Magazine build-up models

big_white_dog84 · 1 Jan 2015 at 21:51

Has anyone ever completed one of the piece by piece models they sell with magazines - like the millennium falcon being advertised at the moment?

It seems a huge waste of money - in this case £899 to build something you could probably buy on eBay for £50 in a few months. What happens if it gets cancelled half way through?

Marmot · 1 Jan 2015 at 21:57

Saw the advert for that the other day. I remember a kid at school building a simplistic robot in a similar fashion, think there was about 40 editions or something. Stupid thing is he got to edition 30 or something having blown a few hundred quid and decided he couldn't justify continuing it, and so he had this half finished robot with most of the electricals missing. Total waste of money.

Malevolence · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:00

Have a mooch about this place. http://www.partworkmodels.co.uk/phpBB3/index.php

dowie · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:10

How much will each issue of Build The Millennium Falcon cost me?

Issue 1 costs only £2.99/€3.50. The regular price of issue 2 onwards is just £8.99/€10.99.

If you have not yet subscribed, please visit www.buildmillenniumfalcon.com.

How many issues are there in the Build The Millennium Falcon series?

100 issues are currently planned for this series. If you have not yet taken out a subscription please visit www.buildmillenniumfalcon.com.

Are there binders for Build The Millennium Falcon series?

The first binder is free to subscribers. Each binder thereafter costs £7.99/€10.99 and there are 5 binders in total.

I think this is pretty exploitative... some parent might well buy issue 1 for their kid without realising that in order to complete the thing they'll be shelling out circa £900 for a cheap plastic model and some magazines a bunch of interns have presumably just knocked up

doofer · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:34

I was buying 'How to build your own magazine Rack' which gave all the parts you needed over 12 Months and the instructions on how to build it, unfortunately I missed the last few issues and was never able to finish the rack, and to make matters worse I had absolutely nowhere to store the issues I did have... So I had to throw everything away.

Destination · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:39

Saw the same ad tonight, even with a sub it would still be 7 or 8 hundred quid, wow!
You'd want a pretty big model for that.

robfosters · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:45

big_white_dog84 said:
Has anyone ever completed one of the piece by piece models they sell with magazines - like the millennium falcon being advertised at the moment?

It seems a huge waste of money - in this case £899 to build something you could probably buy on eBay for £50 in a few months. What happens if it gets cancelled half way through?

If a Deagostini partwork hits the shops nationwide, the full run will be issued. Often they test products in different areas to see the response, but once it goes nationwide, it means it has passed the test and they have allocated the budget to producing all the issues.

The Falcon is not a cheap plastic model as you describe. It is a 1:1 replica of the actual prop used for the movie. It also has moving parts and an electrics system. It's far superior to any Falcon model currently on sale.

I find it more ridiculous that people pay over £3k for a Falcon Lego model than I do paying for this.

VoG · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:48

Well its 2 & a half foot long, 2 foot wide & 8 inches high, so that's pretty damn sizeable, it does look pretty good, not sure it looks good enough to justify £899 mind.

robfosters · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:50

It is massive. When it's done it weighs nearly 2 stone.

HAz · 1 Jan 2015 at 22:57

yea such a con lol, they always do this, i had some dinosaur one and gave up after 10 mags.

robfosters · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:03

Can anyone here actually give me a reason as to why it's a con rather than just shouting it everywhere?

VoG · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:09

I don't think it's a con at all, the only thing that would bother me is the length of time it would take to collect all the parts, & obviously would there be any kind of guarantee that the mag would have a full print run, & not come grinding to a halt mid run due to lack of subscribers.

robfosters · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:15

VoG said:
I don't think it's a con at all, the only thing that would bother me is the length of time it would take to collect all the parts, & obviously would there be any kind of guarantee that the mag would have a full print run, & not come grinding to a halt mid run due to lack of subscribers.

As I said, the fact it's been released nationwide and is being advertised on telly is a guarantee it will run the length. They wouldnt waste all that thousands of pounds advertising it if they were not going to complete it. They actually run at a loss for the first 30-40 issues so cutting it off would make no financial sense.

It does take a long time to collect the model. but having done their partworks myself (got a massive ship going atm), they are very advanced and you would find that you often need a week between issues to get the work done. Nearly every person I know who does them has parts piling up where they are struggling to keep up with the issues.

Caged · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:22

I think everyone would be a lot happier with them if they advertised the cost to complete them up-front, and made available a list of what is going to come with each issue. Otherwise there's the temptation to draw it out to issue 136 and bundle a bag of bolts, and then wait until 137 to give you the nuts.

robfosters · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:27

Caged said:
I think everyone would be a lot happier with them if they advertised the cost to complete them up-front, and made available a list of what is going to come with each issue. Otherwise there's the temptation to draw it out to issue 136 and bundle a bag of bolts, and then wait until 137 to give you the nuts.

On the TV advert it states on the bottom that it's 100 issues at £8.99.

adam98150 · 1 Jan 2015 at 23:44

Osprey said:
Saw the advert for that the other day. I remember a kid at school building a simplistic robot in a similar fashion, think there was about 40 editions or something. Stupid thing is he got to edition 30 or something having blown a few hundred quid and decided he couldn't justify continuing it, and so he had this half finished robot with most of the electricals missing. Total waste of money.

It wasn't a blue-domed thing with 3 wheels and a black rubber bumper was it? Because I built one from a magazine aswell, haha. Followed a line using sensors. Kids buy such crap, can't believe my parents funded it each week.

DaleTheWhale · 2 Jan 2015 at 00:00

adam98150 said:
It wasn't a blue-domed thing with 3 wheels and a black rubber bumper was it? Because I built one from a magazine aswell, haha. Followed a line using sensors. Kids buy such crap, can't believe my parents funded it each week.

We did this one as well, got half way and gave up as it was costing a fortune.

233 · 2 Jan 2015 at 00:02

I cant believe i'm saying this but I really fancy this

ElliorR · 2 Jan 2015 at 00:03

How are they going to fill 100 magazines with info about the Millenium Falcon?

Oh yeah, and one time it flew inside an asteroid that turned out to be a space monster.

robfosters · 2 Jan 2015 at 00:04

I think the robot type things are a waste of money and I wouldn't pay for a kid to do it as they just don't have the attention span.

Ships and things though, are a different story.