173 replies to this topic

[tcl]

I just get the line from a friend in Taiwan..... Yes! It is VFC again....

They shown the coming new products --- MK43 Mod0 in the show last weekend at Taipei.

Next release will be HK416 and AKS-74, AK-74, GP-30 and more.... OMG.....




You can find the large size picture at:
WHG2006 Taipei

Edited by tcl, 19 July 2006 - 09:46 AM.

[Angry]

Pics and link don't work mate.

[IronWolf]

They work for me

[Trasher]

Pics chopped in half, not displayed correctly.

[n00b3r]

They work just fine for me, you need to wait a few seconds for it to load...

[Prolific]

Very nice, although its a shame that still manufacturers are pissing about with the same sorry old designs. I can imagine it right now in the Tokyo Marui R&D labs:

Q. "Hey I've got an Idea...why don't we make a new gun like an FN2000 or OICW?!"

A. "I've got a better Idea...lets just put some more rails and lasers that people will never actually use on an armalite and sell it for £50 more than the stock version!"


Sorry to be so deeply cynical every time a new gun comes out. But does anyone else thing the market is now saturated with AKs, Armalites and Armalite carbines and G3 variants. So much so that when a company brings out a new I can't tell the difference between the last (and i'm an M4 owner!)

Edited by HampshireAirsoftNick, 19 July 2006 - 11:39 AM.

[snorkelman]

Sorry to be so deeply cynical every time a new gun comes out. But does anyone else thing the market is now saturated with AKs, Armalites and Armalite carbines and G3 variants.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

to an extent yes but Id rate the VFC AK line as a little different from the run of the mill ie aisde from guarder kits (at twice the price and then some when you add in cost of a donor AK) no one else offers full steel AKs

stevie

[Robot 2000]

I wouldn't say the market is "saturated" with anything other than Armalites and MP5's.

With any other gun (G36, AK, etc) there are generally two or three manufacturers to choose from but they each bring something different to the table. (e.g. STAR vs. CA G36 series). Particularly in the case of the AK series it's only really this year that we're starting to see large numbers of more affordable AK variants from different manufacturers. You can hardly call the situation that used to exist with TM making the AK47 then people having to buy expensive conversion kits "market saturation".

[Maple-Leaf]

Wasn't there talk of them doing a Galil as well?

[Psaldorn]

Re: People making same old stuff.
Consideringn airsofters don't mind buying real steelparts or bodging other airsoft parts into their gun for their desired look it seems like they release new gun varients to satisfy a very small number of people. Seeling parts to make the intended gun would be more economical, surely?

It would be nice to have a company do a small test batch of new guns and seein how they sell abroad, most are geared to the Japanese market I hear.. seems strange when there's a whole world begging for newer guns and it's almost completely untapped.

Re: These VFC
The quality is meant to be good and construction materials provide a level of authenticity.. so in this case fair enough. It's what should have been done by someone long ago instead of just "different company, slightly different price, same old guns"

[Prolific]

As I said its just my opinion but it seems like theres a lot of conversion kits to change say an M4 into an M733 A1D740.23 "as used in the film black hawk down by mr. such and such!!!"

It'd be nice to see more complete conversion kits like the Alien Pulse Rifle conversion kit. Say an FN2000 conversion kit to make a FAMAS into an FN2000, I imagine thats a very practically do-able kind of kit. Better yet they could stop fannying about with conversion kits and actually just make the rifle.

I mean a lot of these modern 'conversion kits' consist of a rail unit and a laser or something small that doesn't really 'convert' your gun in as much as it minutely changes it to a slightly different variant. Although you say making a new gun only satisys a small niche of the market, I wouldn't burn my money on one of these conversion kits. But I would spend money on an FN2000. A lot of money. So I'd say they're losing out. I suspect maybe the atmosphere for guns in the orient is different perhaps to the west, maybe we are a market niche wanting newer more modern guns but still.

[snorkelman]

think the other issue is need to squeeze every penny out of a product line

A gun that can be sold as four five or umpteen varients is always going to be more attractive to tool up for mass production for than a gun that can only sell as one maybe two variants

to turn it on its head a gun that only ships as one variant would probably ship with a higher price tag than one that a manufac could supply in x different configs to catch a wider range of sales (upto and including folks who'd buy three variants of effectively the same base gun) the market would probably want them wether they'd pay for them is a different matter

[Maple-Leaf]

But its cheaper, easier and faster to make "bolt-on" parts than it is to make a complete conversion kit - and thus more economical and profitable.

Sad as it is - there are a lot more Armalite fans out there than there are FN2000 fans.

Personally, I'm not a fan of either.

[Psaldorn]

I meant conversion kits for M4 varients rather than a whole range of whole guns for such a minute change.

I'd like to think that the success of the G36Xes would lead more manufacturers to start making newer (or more airsoft-rare) guns.

I'd happily add a FN2000 or T/SAR-21 or something like that (OK, they all happen to be bullpups, I have a bullpup 'thing' at the moment)

Hell I'm just looking forward to an affordable, skirmishable L85. Pre-VCRB. C'mon G&G! *Hopes self-destruct*

Edit: I took far too long to reply it seems

think the other issue is need to squeeze every penny out of a product line

A gun that can be sold as four five or umpteen varients is always going to be more attractive to tool up for mass production for than a gun that can only sell as one maybe two variants

to turn it on its head a gun that only ships as one variant would probably ship with a higher price tag than one that a manufac could supply in x different configs to catch a wider range of sales (upto and including folks who'd buy three variants  of effectively the same base gun) the market would probably want them wether they'd pay for them is a different matter

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I can see that being so, in which case, I'd be happy with more Aug A1/2/3s blowing around, with varying amounts of sticklebrik stuck all over them

I think we need to get more non-M4 using films shown in Japan.

Edited by Psaldorn, 19 July 2006 - 02:02 PM.

[mig_eater]

for a blissful moment i thought that they had a USAS-12 from the little pic. Now thats one armalite version i wouldn't mind a little market saturation of.

Cheers
Mig

[Prolific]

Personally the 'its cheaper' arguement doesn't hold water to me. The only feasable excuse I can think of is that designing new guns is risky.

Look at the Steyer AUG and P90. Now you can't tell me bringing those out wasn't a huge risk? Potentially no one would buy them. But here we are a few years on and they're both very popular pieces. Look also at the STAR L85, in teh UK ok its not such a big risk but with a £400 price tag everywhere else it was very haphazard to bring out that gun. But they did it and look where we are now.

Personally I think the manufacturers are being cowardly, staying with armalite variants, AK 'strap-ons' , G3 and MP5 variants because they know they can sell them, rather than taking a risk and trying to get a bigger share of the market. I'd say there is definately a western market for newer more modern guns. The joke is aswell that the FN2000 and OICW have a great deal to offer airsoft as they're both grenadier rifles, the first ever rifles in the real world to be designed from the ground up to incorporate a launcher or canon, both accessories very readily available to airsoft. Theres another idea how about - a BB gun that could fire 8mm pellets like a canon whilst still having a 6mm high RoF 300fps gun in one package. If I can sit here and come up with these ideas then so can they, one can only wonder why they havent at least tried to release small sample batches to gauge popularity.

"OMFG!!! SHALL I HAVE T3H NAVY HANDGRIP OR T3H STANDARD!?!?!?!"

[Psaldorn]

It's times like these that newer companies willing to take the risk reap the benefits of established companies becoming stagnant. Shame the VCRB may/will prevent us Brits from seeing the rewards

[Crazy_Harry]

actually guys, its sort of a combination of all your arguments.

A manufacturer is going to look at any number of factors before releasing models. VFC may be thinking "ok, whats NOT out there but is nonetheless heavily supported by companies and bought by airsofters? Aks and m4s. Job done, thats what we'll build. Moreover, our factory and R&D depts are already geared up for these models, so thats an even bigger reason."

finally, it all depends on what sort of role VFC want to take in the airsoft world- its arguable that CA have, for example, taken an agressive stance against TMs international orders, realising that, outside of Japan, metal bodies and solidity are valued perhaps more highly than excellent internals, and they have pursued this international airsoft market to the point now where, in the US at least, its actually quite hard to find US retailers offering TM stuff at a reasonable price, but you can get CA stuff, once you action in shipping and taxes, at about the same price or even cheaper than if you ordered it from Japan- as such, there's every reason to buy CA, and few to buy TM in the US, unless you're after a specific model that TM does and CA doesn't

Star's role is a little unclear- I think they hope to be offering middle-to-high-end stuff (like G&G, their externals are REALLY nice) probably more for the collector market than for the 4 times a month skirmish community. Not saying Star stuff isn't skirmishable, but that, for a skirmish piece, TM and CA do this so much better. As such, it makes more sense for Star to focus in on guns that haven't been really made yet- obviously, they have the g36 range, but remember these came out just ahead of CAs CA36 range.

VFC, I dunno their motivations, but I'm suspecting they are somewhere between Star and CA- want to offer something a bit special, but also want to sell them in reasonable numbers. Hence, they go for AKs.

And frankly, the presence of three ak47s and three ak74 models on the market doesn't really constitute a "saturation" given how popular AKs actually are.

Myself, I'm still amazed TM and CA haven't made MORE ak varients than they have already, as the offerings out their are decidedly pedestrian...hence all the conversion kits, I suppose...

[Prolific]

Yeah very true Psaldorn. I hear someone is now releasing a WA2000, I imagine in no small part as the result of Ryan Coombes (Candyman's) custom build. They've let him do the 'risk evaluation' and expensive prototyping and market evaluation stage. Watch as they reap the benefits of people flocking to buy cheap WA2000's off the back of his hard work.

I took a break from airsofting just before coming to uni and when I came back I was stunned to see how many new retailers there were. Many of us will remember that 3-4 years ago if you wanted a good AEG it was Tokyo Marui or to a lesser extent and mainly in the United states, Classic Army. I was amazed to see this 'STAR' on the scene, and then ICS. And in both cases they got on the scene by filling the gaps in Marui's line, namely the lack of full metal guns as stock. The days of the soggy plastic AEG are all but passed now I think. It seems in marui's new type89 release they have finally accepted they just cant sell a plastic gun for £200 whilst ICS, CA and STAR are selling metal ones at the same price. If they carry on doing it then they're likely to lose the bulk of their market share, and its a slippery downhill slope from there.

But its been good for us as consumers I think because to a certain extent its had a bit of a 'price wars' effect. Although the price of the guns isn't going down as such what you get for your money is going up and up. A few years back a turd plasticy FA-MAS SV cost me £200 from airsoft dynamics (now insolvent and long gone). Today for £200 you can get a full metal M4/M16 from ICS.

[snorkelman]

I think another motivation for a shift over to metal (in particular pressed-steel SA80s and AKs) is it puts some light between themselves and the chinese mainland clones that are starting to significantly up their QC (and time to market) on the low end price range.

Moving over to metal constructions acheives that differentiation Marui is probably coming round to the idea now with their mechbox patents startng to get a bit old and smelly (I got the impression from soemwhere that those were due to expire soon, which would open up the japanese home market a lot more to clones etc?)

stevie