>>10177668Writing was on the wall back in the late 00s.
Hasbro took over the Marvel license, cut the budget on MLs and increased prices. Staving off the decline for 5 more years, they then did a sidestep by putting 1:18 front and center. Once those costs started increasing and sales started declining, they switched back to 1:12 and were hailed as heroes, despite the budget still being shit for MLs and figures costing 2x what they did 5 years earlier.
Collector companies were able to handle it by just increasing prices. NECA, DCD, Mezco, Diamond, etc went from costing $10-15 to being $20 and then $25, and are now going over $35 per figure. At first they started including more articulation and accessories, but they basically havent improved since they became $25. Then they started cutting the paint budgets, sidestepping that by using cheaper methods like prints instead of shading.
The future is only going to be much more expensive.
