The "I never thought they/this would become as successful as they/it did" thread

[Leo656]

Oh, geez, yeah. It went from something I never heard of to something people half my age give me sh*t for not playing. And other than "It's a game", I still kinda have no idea what it is.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by turtle1237

But odds are that you were going to have a water type with at least 1 of the moves. Waterfall and surf are good moves. I really think the HM's went out of hand in gen 4. There you had defog(To deal with Fog) Rock climb(So you can climb mountains?) In all you had 8 HM's you needed on hand to get though gen 4.

Yeah they were good moves. Surf was already the strongest Hm move in Gen I iirc. I remember teaching Surf to Snorlax and Pikachu. The idea of surfing on Pikachu's back is very amusing. Seriously, think about that visual for a second.

I didn't play Gen IV, so I had no idea about that. Sounds like a hassle. But pretty sure Gen III also had a Rock Smash HM?

Originally Posted by Leo656

Oh, geez, yeah. It went from something I never heard of to something people half my age give me sh*t for not playing. And other than "It's a game", I still kinda have no idea what it is.

I honestly don't care for all of those popular free-to-play games. I'd rather spend my time playing games from my backlog. Plus, I don't really care much for online play. I'm not really a big fan of multiplayer.

[Leo656]

Originally Posted by Prowler

I honestly don't care for all of those popular free-to-play games. I'd rather spend my time playing games from my backlog. Plus, I don't really care much for online play. I'm not really a big fan of multiplayer.

We have a lot of that in common, friend.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Leo656

We have a lot of that in common, friend.

I've figured that out at least four years ago, already.

But yeah, I dunno, I just never liked the idea of playing against a bunch of total strangers online much. I'd rather play co-op with people I actually know. Or play against someone I know or a friend. Anyway, online play can sometimes be a pain when there's lag or someone randomly disconnects.

I'm not that old, but grew up in an era where people bought games for their single player content, and playing games with someone else meant inviting a friend from school over and ask him to bring his controller so that we could play Street Fighter or Mario Party together.

[Hamato Yoshi]

Yeah , it "flopped" so much that one yr (1985 ?) the factories couldnt satisfy the enormous demand of MotU figures , yeah it sure was a failure

Later (in '86 or so) kids went on to other things and they had overproduced (more figures than they could sell) but I prolly wouldve done the same myself if I were running Mattel back then , strike while the iron is hot etc

Was Defenders of Earth popular in the US , me and my buddy used to play with them fairly often (he had tons of Thundercats/GI Joe/MotU too but we barely played with em....yeah , he was pretty spoiled lol)

[Hamato Yoshi]

Originally Posted by Leo656

I think it was more like, BraveStarr was SUPPOSED to be a big hit, and Filmation bet the entire farm on it, but in the end, they seriously over-estimated how interested young boys in 1987 were in Outer Space Cowboys, and in the end it kinda killed the whole company.

I'm frankly amazed that a concept like "Outer Space Cowboys" even got a budget, let alone a series AND an animated movie. I do like BraveStarr, though. It's alright. They just seriously over-estimated its potential.

I mean c'mon... kids in the 1980s didn't even care about Regular Cowboys. I kinda wonder who the hell it was in the Filmation office who managed to convince everyone else in the room to put all their eggs in that one specific basket. So bizarre.

I kid, but I do like BraveStarr. I just... never really expected anyone else to. Not even back then.

Maybe Bstarr wouldve been a big hit in the 60s/70s (Leone spaghetti western era)

I noticed TMNT mania was dying down in Norway when movie III came direct to VHS , makes me a bit sad to think about , same thing with MotU Laser figures....it was MotUs "funeral" back then

[Prowler]

What about this one?

K-Pop and K-Dramas: I didn't even know what they were back in 2009 or so. But K-Pop became a big force worldwide this decade. And KBS uploads entire K-Dramas on their youtube channel with subtitles in several different languages entirely for free. No idea how big K-Dramas are overall, but I'd not be surprised if a considerable minority of teenage girls worldwide watched them.

Seems like Korea has done a good job promoting its pop culture worldwide lately.

[MsMarvelDuckie]

Originally Posted by Original TMNT Cartoon Fan

Here is a list

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...dia_franchises

That's interesting, and actually confirms what I have found. MotU peaked in 84 with sales of around 735m$. But it dropped steadily every year after, from 500m$ in 85 to 350m$ in 86, with a STEEP dropoff to only 7m$ the next year. These figures were from articles in the LA and New York Times, from the MotU own site's archives. By late 85, in fact, toy stores could barely move the stuff they had, as Mattel flooded the market with tier 2 and 3 figures, while the ones kids WANTED, were sitting unsent, and by then the series was over, and everyone basically lost interest.

TMNT in contrast, had a much steadier run in sales, from 21m $ in its initial year in 87, up to 115m$ in 88, 450m$ in 89, and around 350-250m$ up until 94. TMNT stayed popular until 96, when Next Mutation squelched the waning interest until the 4kids series revived it much later- but it had what was the highest-grossing independent film EVER for nearly a decade with two direct sequels, while MotU had a single film that flopped BADLY.

The numbers are there, and they tell of two very different franchises. One was allowed to grow organically, and had multiple variants of the main characters, the other was essentially killed by its own creators through oversaturation of the market by peripheral characters in too short a time, with a cartoon that didn't last long enough to support such growth. They literally killed it by shipping out too many second and third string figs, rather than main wave ones that would have beought in more fans.

More to the point, at it's height, MotU made just a little over a billion, while TMNT has CLEARLY made far more- and still IS!

[Prowler]

I've never thought Hello Kitty and Winnie Pooh would be top 3 in such a list. Interesting.

[triplexxx]

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in terms of Hollywood, Will Ferrell back when I first noticed him in the 1990s, several Macintosh games I used to play in the 1990s whose abandonware has been uploaded and made available and playable online & is shown all over YouTube.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by triplexxx

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in terms of Hollywood, Will Ferrell back when I first noticed him in the 1990s, several Macintosh games I used to play in the 1990s whose abandonware has been uploaded and made available and playable online & is shown all over YouTube.

I feel like Rock's acting career took a while to fully take off. He seems bigger now than he was in the previous decade

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by Prowler

I feel like Rock's acting career took a while to fully take off. He seems bigger now than he was in the previous decade

It took way long. He had baaaarely a success with "The Scorpion King" and "The Rundown," and only very meager hits with a LOT of box office bombs. Like "Doom" and "Be Cool" and such. He also slimmed way down from his WWE days, trying to be "more like an actor."

He didn't really "arrive" and consistently make money until he showed up in "Fast 5," after he got big and ripped again.

[Papenbrook]

With all of my honesty, I could never actually comprehend, or even grasp, why Sonic The Hedgehog became so popular.

He always had a few hits, but with so many misses, you would think that he would be less ... well-known.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Papenbrook

With all of my honesty, I could never actually comprehend, or even grasp, why Sonic The Hedgehog became so popular.

He always had a few hits, but with so misses, you would think that he would be less ... well-known.

Well, you're like 20 years old. By the time you were old enough to play video games Sonic was WAY past his peak already. Sonic basically still lives off being Sega's mascot and having been Mario's biggest rival in the early 90s. A lot of people still have nostalgia for him and his classic games.

[Papenbrook]

If Sonic didn't manage to waste away then, he'll surely manage to waste away now.

I hate Hollywood, man.

[Leo656]

The first Alvin & the Chipmunks movie made $361 million in 2007. The third one still made a "respectable" $235 million in 2015.

The Chipmunks brand doesn't carry half as much weight as Sonic does. Like the Chipmunks movies, the Sonic movie promises to be a Great Disaster so epic that an entire team of Ray Palmers couldn't avert it. BUT. Kids are going to love it and it's going to make at least $300 million and probably more, especially with all the plush dolls and such. My current guess is $450 million-ish.

I'd love to be wrong; I'd love for the Sonic film to tank, and for people to finally, FINALLY realize that video game movies don't work, and for people to stop trying long before they inevitably ruin "Metal Gear Solid". But that's not realistic thinking. Nobody ever went broke aiming at the lowest common denominator, and the Sonic film is aiming very low indeed. Kids are stupid, kids love movies based on things they recognize, and they love dragging their poor parents to see the same thing eight times.

It's guaranteed to be lousy, BUT it's also guaranteed to make lots of money.

You may wish to stock up on wine in the interim. I recommend Night Train if you can find it.

[Papenbrook]

I've said it before, but I'll say it again:

Spoiler:

Zero bucks. No exceptions.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Leo656

The first Alvin & the Chipmunks movie made $361 million in 2007. The third one still made a "respectable" $235 million in 2015.

The Chipmunks brand doesn't carry half as much weight as Sonic does. Like the Chipmunks movies, the Sonic movie promises to be a Great Disaster so epic that an entire team of Ray Palmers couldn't avert it. BUT. Kids are going to love it and it's going to make at least $300 million and probably more, especially with all the plush dolls and such. My current guess is $450 million-ish.

I'd love to be wrong; I'd love for the Sonic film to tank, and for people to finally, FINALLY realize that video game movies don't work, and for people to stop trying long before they inevitably ruin "Metal Gear Solid". But that's not realistic thinking. Nobody ever went broke aiming at the lowest common denominator, and the Sonic film is aiming very low indeed. Kids are stupid, kids love movies based on things they recognize, and they love dragging their poor parents to see the same thing eight times.

It's guaranteed to be lousy, BUT it's also guaranteed to make lots of money.

You may wish to stock up on wine in the interim. I recommend Night Train if you can find it.

Alvin and the Chipmunks is a property that I have no idea what to think about. I know my brother(born in 1983) was into it when he was a kid). But it seems like one of those properties that was never able to get a proper revival.

I think I watched one animated movie of it when I was a kid. I barely remember anything about it, however.

[Papenbrook]

I still can't comprehend the sheer amount of popularity that My Hero Academia has managed to garner.

It seems like it would be too "comicbook-like" for Eastern tastes, while also being too "manga-centric" for Western audiences. Somehow, the author/creator managed to make it work.

That's unbelievably awesome.

[MsMarvelDuckie]

Guardians of the Galaxy. Never would have thought a bunch of obscure third tier heroes would be so huge. Makes me wish that Aloha Flight or X Factor would get some love, because those two teams have some amazing characters!