Unfortunately, I am absolutely in the same boat as the rest of the people you refer to. While it's not just the Smash series I'm interested in, I'm absolutely done after the Smash Ultimate ones. It's not fun anymore. The worry of being able to get them without them selling out is too much, particularly the Zelda and JRPG ones... I've also noticed a definite decline in production quality over the years. For the first few years, there didn't seem to be anywhere near as many flawed units, but latterly I encounter loads of issues in terms of application of paint, and sometimes scratches... It certainly feels like they don't release anywhere near as many amiibo each year that goes by, and I, for one, am mainly just relieved.
I mean, to each their ownāIām not here to put down anyone for where they decide to stop engaging with amiibo, so you do you; itās just that itās such a frequent thing I see that it makes me a bit sad, I guess, if only because I wish there were more amiibo collectors out there who I could relate to better.
As for what you say about a decline in quality, thatās weird, ācause in my experience itās very much the oppositeāamiibo look
much better and are
way more consistent nowadays than they used to be. And, like, I can be a bit obsessive about that, tooāI used to work at Toys āRā Us where I got to personally unbox and stock the new shipments of amiibo, and I always examined them closely and set aside one of the better looking ones for myself because I was really concerned about quality, lol. And despite that, sometimes I didnāt even end up with a particularly great oneāplenty of my amiibo have painting errors or a visible scratch or glob of glue on the base. But over the years Iāve definitely seen a noticeable improvement in overall quality and consistency with new amiibo releases, especially after they increased the price for newer amiibo. I used to handpick my amiibo after combing through the storeās entire stock and
still end up unsatisfied frequently, but now I just preorder them from Best Buy and have no hand in selecting what amiibo I get but despite that I pretty much never have issues nowadays and whatever amiibo I get basically always looks great. Every great once in awhile Iāll get one with a minor painting error or something of the sort, but thatās rare and even when it does happen itās much less apparent than the defects Iād get in the early days of amiibo. Just compare any of the newer Super Smash Bros. Ultimate amiibo to the earlier Smash for 3DS / Wii U amiibo and the difference is
huge. The Zelda amiibo in particulate I feel like have been some of the
best looking ones, too.
Also, Iāve said this a few times before in this thread already, but I feel itās worth repeatingāamiibo are so, so,
so much easier to get ahold of these days than they used to be. Itās still stressful when some are in short supply and itās easy to miss preorders when they go live, sure, I feel that, but itās
way better than having to camp out in front of a store overnight so that you can ensure a good spot in line to guarantee youād get the amiibo at launch (which I had to do even at the store I worked atāwhile I could temporarily set aside amiibo for myself for convenience, if I wasnāt there in line to actually purchase them when the store opens they would be sold to someone else instead because we werenāt allowed to hold stock like that even for employees), so just having to stay on top of when online preorders go live is
so much easier, accessible, and more convenient overall, especially when we have accounts like @amiiboAlerts now that will alert you the moment when new amiibo are available to order. Like, I totally understand that getting ahold of the amiibo you want isnāt always as easy as it should be, and that can be super frustrating for sure, but Iām not sure I understand how itās gotten
worse when, from my perspective (as someone who has literally been through
every single new amiibo release since amiibo first launched) itās only gotten
better over time.