Tuesday, February 14, 2012

More Failcast...


*Squeek*
...sigh.
Failcast?
FineCost?
Fineshaft?


More examples of poor "Finecast" models come to light. I read an interesting entry over at Scott's Wargaming Blog (great blog!) that had some links to a particularly poor Beast of Gorgoroth model.  Now, I've had bubble issues in the past, but this is In fact, shockingly poor.


Working at a company that sells a physical product, I know that almost any item that is manufactured can have issues. Despite everyone's best efforts, from time to time we have a defective item, and so do all of our competitors. For this reason it is only normal, and reasonable, to accept some small defects in a run of tens of thousands of units being produced. In addition, there is no evidence I have seen of GW not willingly replacing defective items upon request...


...but I also think it is reasonable to question why these same products are being promoted and positioned in the market as:
"incredibly detailed"
"high-quality"
"...the highest quality miniatures the world has ever seen."


The claimed "...new era in wargamingseems to be off to a pretty poor start, especially when it appears to many people that:
- the quality of the product may actually have declined.
- prices have exponentially increased.
- for many people, there is in reality not a great deal of difference in detail between these and metal models.

If a company decides to tout their product as the best in the world, and raises their prices accordingly (despite it being the case that they could pass on some of the reduced manufacturing costs to the consumer, shipping weights being reduced) then the product had better be pretty good.


Whining?
SURE! 


The people who complain the most about products and companies tend to be the ones who love the product and/ or invest a great deal of money and time in them. 


And for people who say it is easy to fix (just "Green Stuff it", "put it in hot water and bend it back into shape" etc) these things might work, but when you are being charged top-dollar, you don't expect to have to try and fix these things yourself.


"Problem with the new Jag sir? Don't worry,
Green Stuff should sort out those holes in no time!"
It would be very interesting to know what the actual % rate of defective products is in a batch of Finecast models, as this would mean we could see if the rate was acceptable, or high. It might very well be entirely acceptable for this kind of production process. In my case, both of the two Finecast models that I have had big enough problems that I would consider the overall quality poor. 


Maybe I was just unlucky, and I don't respond well to overblown marketing hype...


In the final analysis, this hobby has brought me hundreds of hours of enjoyment in painting and gaming. Collecting and painting miniatures can still be called great value for money in the long term when compared to the paltry return on investment (in hours) received from going to the cinema, eating out, or taking the family out for the day.


Happy Valentine's Day!


*Squeek*

8 comments:

  1. Grrrrr. Does anyone know why BLOGGER always seems to make a double line break between paragraphs?
    It is driving me NUTS!!
    :-(

    ReplyDelete
  2. Paragraph settings are hidden away somewhere in there...

    About finecast, here are my suspicions and they're not based on any real world experiences at all - I've only bought two finecast items and they were both in perfect nick.

    I suspect that a lot of the first batches were indeed crapola and that there are still a bucket load of them out there ready to ambush the consumer. As they've gained some experience with the product, they're producing less crap.

    I'm some one who has bought a recent release can say that "I don't know what I'm talking about" or otherwise mind you, in fact I'd be interested to hear.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for the comment. I think your theory is a good one and I too would like to hear from someone "in the know". I also hope that it is true that they have solved these problems! As to the formatting problems there are settings but none of them seem to work...
      ...time to change to WordPress perhaps!
      Cheers!

      Delete
  3. Would certainly be interesting to see what percentage of them are deemed 'flawed'.
    I have had a few fine cast models, all of which have been brilliant.
    But then some people I know have had nothing but trouble. It always seems to be one extreme or the other with people, no one seems to get a mix of good and bad.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah it seems very case by case!
      Not exactly in reply to your post but reading back over my original post it seems as though I woke up with a bad case of sour grapes today...
      ...I think to be fair my anger over this has been exacerbated by a string of recent GW decisions that have annoyed me, including their decision to prohibit overseas trading by webstores!

      Delete
  4. yeah...well thats what we take when a company owes most of the product it sells( wegaming miniatures) they can do anything they want and i have almost no choice but keeping buying them

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks for the referral (and compliment),and I am glad you found the blogpost thought provoking. I agree with your thoughts on this too. Cheers, Scott.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No worries! On rereading this maybe I feel too strongly about it, but perhaps as a "reserved Brit" there is just something about unbridled marketing excess that...gets under my skin?!
      Anyway, I am hoping in the next day or two to take a look at some of the newer terrain releases, as I think there is a lot going on there. Thanks for coming by and please keep up the good work!

      Delete