Amazon Reveals Bizarre "Timed Sale" Strategy For Wave 4 Amiibos

Steven Bogos

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Jan 17, 2013
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Amazon Reveals Bizarre "Timed Sale" Strategy For Wave 4 Amiibos


Each amiibo will only be available to purchase "at a random time" within a specific half-hour window.

Well this is new. In order to combat the amiibo [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/139090-Nintendo-May-Restock-Certain-Sold-Out-Amiibos], Amazon has just announced a bizarre new "timed sale" strategy for the forth wave of collectible NFC toys. Essentially, each of the new wave 4 amibos, including the new Splatoon amiibos, will only be available to purchase "at a random time" within a specific half-hour window. You'll also only be limited to a single amiibo per Amazon account. The times for each amiibo are as follows:

Pac-Man: 2:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. PT
Charizard: 2:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. PT
Inkling Boy: 3:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. PT
Lucina: 3:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. PT
Wario: 4:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. PT
Inkling Girl: 4:30 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. PT
Silver Mario: 5:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. PT
Robin: 5:30 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. PT
Inkling Boy, Girl, and Squid 3-pack: 6:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m. PT

"Quantities of the new characters are extremely limited," Amazon warned customers, adding "we cannot guarantee that every customer who wants an amiibo will be able to purchase one when they become available on May 29th."

So, if you're looking to buy a specific wave 4 amiibo, you better set your alarm and get your F5 key all greased up.

Source: Amazon [http://www.amazon.com/gp/browse.html?node=11603609011]

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RaikuFA

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I fully expect Nintendo to apologize for the whole amiibo situation with it's scarcity but then again it's Nintendo.
 

martyrdrebel27

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firstly, i see a picture of Ness, but no time is listed. secondly, it's not really "random" if there is a schedule...
 

scotth266

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Nintendo is an odd company. They make good first-party titles, and are generally pretty charming, but they don't know how to encourage third-party participation, they're absolutely draconian on Youtube content, and they don't know how to sell physical products. Virtually everything they sell gets scalped to hell and back. It probably works well for Nintendo - but it's annoying for the consumers.
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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Jun 5, 2013
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This is my summation of any and all Amiibos:
"Buy this because its really rare!"
"Why is it really rare, Mr. Nintendo?"
"Because you're a fuck-stupid peasant and I'd poop on your mother's grave and charge you for it if you lived in Japan. As you don't, I hate you and double price please."


Seriously, how are these still okay?! Its DLC not only with an expiration date, but with a limited quantity too! If you didn't order in the first 1,000...well you're a peasant and your mom's grave smells pretty ripe about now!
 

Hairless Mammoth

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Amiibo - They only winning move is not to pay play. (I would have got the Samus one if they didn't use the awkward looking Other M design, or the Link on if he didn't look like he was floating on a jet of piss. Now that Nintendo has spent months mishandling them, I've lost interest.)

Seriously, with methods like this only the scalpers and die hard collectors are going to be able to get their hands on them. The people who want a toy that looks cool and does random crap in their games is shit out of luck unless they are at right at their computer when the time frame comes around for the characters they want.

Nintendo, just make more of them.[footnote]Please tell me Amazon just thinks they won't get too many of them, and Ninty won't pull another "derp, these aren't popularz charactarz so we only make 5 of each" crap.[/footnote] They'll sell. If the NFC toy bubble pops someday and you have to get rid of many at a loss, you will have still made oodles of profit in the long run.
Silentpony said:
This is my summation of any and all Amiibos:
"Buy this because its really rare!"
"Why is it really rare, Mr. Nintendo?"
"Because you're a fuck-stupid peasant and I'd poop on your mother's grave and charge you for it if you lived in Japan. As you don't, I hate you and double price please."


Seriously, how are these still okay?! Its DLC not only with an expiration date, but with a limited quantity too! If you didn't order in the first 1,000...well you're a peasant and your mom's grave smells pretty ripe about now!
You've basically summed up my feelings on them. I'll feel like I'm getting shat on, even though I've never bought any.
 

Steven Bogos

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martyrdrebel27 said:
firstly, i see a picture of Ness, but no time is listed. secondly, it's not really "random" if there is a schedule...
I wrote:

"The amiibos will go on sale "at a random time" within a specific half-hour window."

That means, for example Pac-Man will go on sale some time between 2:00 and 2:30. It could be 2:01, it could be 2:29. That's the random time.

As for Ness, he is a part of Wave 4 (which is why he is in the picture) but is actually exclusive to GameStop in the US.
 

Tyranicus

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Oh look let me buy these collectable plastic figures! oh well no one will give a shit about these in 10 years. Whatever it's Nintendo must buy!

With all the money people piss away on these they could buy a PC.
 

martyrdrebel27

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Steven Bogos said:
martyrdrebel27 said:
firstly, i see a picture of Ness, but no time is listed. secondly, it's not really "random" if there is a schedule...
I wrote:

"The amiibos will go on sale "at a random time" within a specific half-hour window."

That means, for example Pac-Man will go on sale some time between 2:00 and 2:30. It could be 2:01, it could be 2:29. That's the random time.

As for Ness, he is a part of Wave 4 (which is why he is in the picture) but is actually exclusive to GameStop in the US.
hey, i wasn't trying to be rude to you, i was saying that amazon was being stupid. but that was actually my bad also, because i misunderstood, i thought the items would be on sale from say 2:00-2:30 and the next one from 2:30-3:00, etc. i misunderstood. but as you've described it here, yea, that's random.

but still, i wasn't saying your reporting or facts were stupid or poorly presented, i was strictly judging amazon there.

as for ness, thanks for informing me. kinda sucks that anyone who wants ness, the best rpg character ever in my not so humble opinion, is forced to go to gamestop.
 

Lightspeaker

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You know I don't have a Wii U but this article reminded me that there's a Lucina amiibo coming out so I thought I'd poke about on amazon to see. Maybe if they're cheap enough I'd get one.

Price on the item on amazon's main page? £50. Cheapest under "more buying choices"? £30.

Bahahahahaha no. That scalping...
 

karkashan

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May 4, 2009
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Just throwing this out there for ya'll -

Nintendo only makes as many amiibo as retailers demand. If the retailers don't want to have an excess in amiibo stock (and I can't wholly blame them, either) then there's no reason to make that excess. Under normal circumstances, the amounts the retailers purchase would be completely and utterly normal when compared to similar products on the market, but since it's Nintendo related - and in most cases nostalgia and Smash related - the speculative market takes an interest and screws things up for the little person.
 

MonsterCrit

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Masterfully done nintendo. Masterfully done. No really, I can see the plan you've been working on for the past 20+ years has finally come to fruition.

Step 1:
Create a bunch of games that stress collection as either the main focus or as an annoyingly grating optioonal sidequest thusly promoting a completionist complex in your core audience. (Pokemon, Castlevania, Metroid, )

Step 2:
Create a line of figures based around your popular characters but only release them in quantities that you know only accounts for 1/10th the actual audience size.

Step 3:
After the limited supply sells out, sneakily place the supply you held back up on various internet auction sites and 10x the retail cost.

Step 4:
Twirl Moustache and laugh.
 

Zaeseled

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I don't see the appeal either. I'm starting to think that if Nintendo released limited quantity digital DLC wallpapers for your desktop people would buy that too.
 

Worgen

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Whatever, just wash your hands.
When the hell are they releasing a, Lady Paulitina amiibo? That's the only one I want.
 

Eclipse Dragon

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Zaeseled said:
I don't see the appeal either. I'm starting to think that if Nintendo released limited quantity digital DLC wallpapers for your desktop people would buy that too.
In my case, I only go for the figures I like, particularly the Fire Emblem characters, because that series hasn't gotten much love from Nintendo in the past (though that seems to be changing now) and I would like to have a figure of my favorite FE characters.

I'm also not the only one who feels this way, because the Fire Emblem amiibos regularly sell out the fastest.
 

Snotnarok

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Zaeseled said:
I don't see the appeal either. I'm starting to think that if Nintendo released limited quantity digital DLC wallpapers for your desktop people would buy that too.
They basically are, they sell themes on the 3DS that are glorified wallpapers. Granted they're 1.50 or so but I wouldn't pay for such a thing. I know other platforms have it too but usually they're dynamic or something.

OT: Surprised the sale isn't in 10 second intervals considering how fast these buggers sell out.
I nabbed the only Samus one I saw, ever and I wound up getting my Sonic one from a friend who nabbed a bunch for himself from Germany.
 

ccggenius12

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Lightspeaker said:
You know I don't have a Wii U but this article reminded me that there's a Lucina amiibo coming out so I thought I'd poke about on amazon to see. Maybe if they're cheap enough I'd get one.

Price on the item on amazon's main page? £50. Cheapest under "more buying choices"? £30.

Bahahahahaha no. That scalping...
That's the scalpers. Presumably when the time hits for these today, Amazon itself will be listing them at MSRP.
 

Scarim Coral

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That kinda suck for anyone that want to buy a specific character but are at work or school when the sales happeened.
 

FoolKiller

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Actually, not making enough means that nintendo loses money. I would have collected them all (at $15 a piece) if I could get them. But to pay 50 to 200 dollars and up for one because someone bought it to resell it is just ludicrous. And so I bought a couple of Zelda ones that I like and left it at that.
 

OldNewNewOld

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I'm still waiting for the Link, Zelda and Ganondorf Amiibo based of Hyrule Warriors. Come on Nintendo. Do it. I know you want it, you know we want it. Just do it already!