Board Thread:General Nerf discussion/@comment-27306930-20200116003211/@comment-44011273-20200119015019

I think ULTRA has a much more complicated story than many in the hobby might know. While we might never know the true background of the why and how the line came into being, some educated guesses and assumptions can be made.

The arguement that ULTRA sucks because its nothing like the DZP is a flawed one. ULTRA has no indication of being a "professional" or hobby-grade product/blaster/line. The DZP is a special promotional run of not many more than 1000 units by a relatively small company of a hobby product.

While DZP is a performance, hobby grade special product, ULTRA is a 'premium' blaster line, under mass production and set to revieve several more products. It's not a fair comparison.

We know that the Hasbro R&D for Nerf is over a period of several years, we can't honestly argue that ULTRA was a direct response to DZP. I do believe, however, that the announcement and release of DZP interfeered with the the release of ULTRA. Hasbro got spooked by a smaller rival (that had already been gouging their market space for years before i. e. Alpha Strike) and green lit the early, ill prepared ULTRA line. The line opened with only one blaster, lacking in typical flagship glamor, bogged down by poor quality and performace control. The marketing was HEAVY, a symptom of Hasbro insecurities over the last several quarters, that paired over the top brand name reliance, and false advertising. The recent trade war and issue if tariffs meant that many store fornts lacked the products that were advertised, meaning that early marketing was showing off a product you couldn;t reliably obtain, followed by the final arriva of the blaster after the majority of the ads trailed off.

Now that we have had some time to breath and understand the ONE, we know that for the most part, the blaster is kinda meh for most people, not really doing anything original or different, and not meeting the advertised ranges. Now those ranges, could be argued, (as well as the whole of the advertising plan) to be a symptom of this early release. THe 120ft ranges could be based of a later blaster still to come in the months ahead, that would have abeen the marker of the lies abilities, while the ONE wouldn't have had that role as a flagship. As we have seen in recent reviews and analysis, newer runs of ULTRA ammo is of higher quality control than those that came with the first run of ONEs. I like to think that hasbro is trying to right their wrongs (to some degree) in the ill fated roll out of the ULTRA line.

As I said on the reddit post showing off the TWO: In all honesty tho, this is what I’ve been talking about when it comes to ULTRA. We have only ever gotten our hands on the first blaster, but everyone is drawing conclusions about the whole line and ammo type. Our problem lies with what the line represents, and how Hasbro is reacting to the toy blaster market. I am very optimistic for what is to come out of the ULTRA line. With this blaster showing new and innovative looks and mechanics, a far cry from the unoriginal ONE. We still have 6 more ULTRA blasters yet to come and I only hope they get better as we go, and Hasbro improves the quality control on the darts. There is a place in the hobby for the new ammo type, just like there has been for all other ammo types to come. Here’s to optimism, and just having plain old fun.

We've now seen the TWO, and the FOUR, will more leaks rumored on their way. The ULTRA line and blasters (maybe not so much the ONE) have a future. Yes the marketing and lying sucks. The tournament is just a cheesy, corporate event on showmanship and marketablity. (and yes, oh noooo, people might do things for money, good god no get the pitch forks out) Everyone needs to remember that Hasbro is a corporation, their sole goal is MONEY. Not good blasters, honest marketing, or hobby friendly choices. Its Money MONEY money.

Chill, relax, and wait. Theres more to come.