I was looking at the Phenom and was wondering if its a good yoyo because it cost alot.If it is good are there any restrictions to it?
When you pay that much for a yoyo its gonna be pretty darn good! My one problem with a Phenom is the gold. Gold does not belong on a yoyo. If you are just into it for play… get a black one with nickel rims and it will play just as good and it’s allot cheeper. Also look for cheaper ones on the B/S/T. There are plenty of fun yoyos out there though that are just as fun and high quality for much cheeper. Keep that in mind. Still the Phenom is one of the best looking throws i’ve seen.
I have one. I paid the earlier price for it(less than now). Yes, worth it. One of my favorites ever.
Restrictions: It spins forever with aggression. It sounds a bit hollow. It plays like it’s in defiance of gravity, it’s so light on the string. It’s ALL catch zone, designed for stability in any axis, spin, speed and string hits. It can’t grind worth a crap. The rims are kinda sharp and can hurt when coming at you from a hard bind, so ensure you do trick or two or 8 before bringing it back.
I intend to buy 2 more Phenom yoyos when I can, and hopefully someone will cut me a good buddy discount on them as well. The acid washed blue and the blue. These can go by my nickel and gold Phenom. The Chief is ALSO amazing, AND can grind.
I don’t play my better stuff as much because it can sometimes make doing tricks too easy, and I would rather use my DM2 for most of my learning.
As I advise, if you can, try before you buy. If you’re at BAC, you can try mine. If you’re in the Sacramento area, either go to one of my yoyo meets or make an appointment at my house. While you’re at it, you should try other stuff as well.
The Phenom is pretty nice, but I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily worth the extra money over anything you can get for $80-$100. It really can’t grind, and that’s a big deal to me. I would definitely recommend trying one out before you pay full price for a new one.
I’ve owned a phenomizm and it was fantastic, and I’ve thrown a friend’s phenom before and loved it. When someone asks what a fast yoyo is, this is the one I think of. It’s made to match mickey’s insanely fast play style. So it’s great for horizontal, and it spins FOREVER. My friend got the rhodium addition last year at worlds, and it plays pretty much exactly like the gold or nickel one does. I’d say it’s worth every penny.
It can’t grind, but I don’t really think it needs to be able to.
In short…Yes.
The Phenom is a unique yoyo.
I have most of the good, high-end throws and certain yoyos are on my “NO SELL” list. These are the yoyos that are just unlike everything else out there.
The Phenom is one of those throws. It is a rolls Royce type of throw. Almost luxurious.
Mine’s playing like a dog these days. It was great when I first got it. Then I decided to do one of my first ever silli jobs. Wrongo, it’s never played the same so I set it aside for the last six/eight months. After reading this thread I pick it up today and tossed in a new 10 ball. I ripped my inferior silliconce job out of the response ares and went looking through my inventory for response pads. Somewhere along the line I had done a trade with someone who included some bone white unlabelled responses pads that look pretty close to the OG YYJ advertised on this site. I put them in my Phenom and it still flops to the side w/o any spin time. ? who else makes bone-white respnonse pads. Think I have the right ones? This critter is well worth the dough when it’s playing rght.
It plays good but It is not worth 130 or however much they are charging for it now.
Spin time is decent for me but it could not handle my most stressfull combo. The stability is good and it can move pretty fast but since the spin time is lacking I just can’t play it like I want to.
I got a chance to play a phenomizm so I could compare the plasitc to the metal version and honestly there is not much diffrnece if any at all really. Just get the phenomizm and don’t drop that much money for the PHENOM like I did.
Defnitly not worth the 130 when I got the phenom but it is worth 60 some dollars if you get the phenomizm.
I thought that I might like the phenomizm since I am a lot more experienced than when I had my phenom but they play allmost identically and I just am not that impressed. If you want to pay that much then you can get a chief or a YYR if you want to go higher. Or just get a code2, genesis, supernova or avlanche, all of those play better than the phenom and cost less. Hope that helps.
the problem with expensive stuff is that most people who bought it are likely to tell that it’s worth the price rather than admit that they’ve paid too much for something that wasn’t worth it.
I didn’t pay for a phenom, got the chance to try several. and I’m not paying for one. It’s a very good yoyo, but then so is the genesis, so are many other, often cheaper, throws. From a fan point of view, I totally respect the choice for a phenom, if you think it’s beautiful and you want one, by all means, get one.
but if you think that a $130 throw will play $50 better than a $80 throw, you might want to reconsider.
Now is it worth the price? which was the question
- if you’re just after value or performance for money, no, it’s not
- if you’re after a phenom, specifically, and intend to play or even compete with it, yes, it is
- if you are a Mickey fan and you want his high end throw, yes, it is
but will it perform better than your average premium throw? probably not better, the same at best, it doesn’t have outstanding performance, but still more than enough to perform, compete or practice. I’ve played better (for me at least) and unless someone gives one to me or I can get one for $30, I’m not getting a phenom.
so in the end it’s a good collector yoyo that also performs very well. the extra cost is for the “collector” aspect, not the performance one.
Taking what hadoq said a step further:
First, I liked how the yoyo looks.
Second, I like V-shapes, they work good for me.
Third, yes, this was expensive. However, I really liked this one once I got it. It’s one of my favorites. Having said that, it’s NOT perfect. But, what it doesn’t do, I’m currently not doing anyways.
It’s all subjective. It’s been proven price isn’t a factor in determining good or bad, or even championships. At the price of the Phenom, I do recommend trying before buying if at all possible. I’d hate to see someone spend money on this and hate it.
So, I can totally see and appreciate Hadoq’s position. Preferences.
I am not sure I completely agree with your characterizing this as a “collector’s” yoyo. I think that the Phenom has a unique feel that has no peer that I am aware of in the industry. Is it “better” than another? That is subjective. But what high-end throws are “better” than the Phenom? Again, subjective.
As for the price - have you bought any CLYW lately? I think YYJ has a much higher price of manufacture than a solid-metal yoyo and charges less than some.
I think its completely unique feel is worth the price alone. But that is in a world where you can have more than one yoyo. Many of these comments seem to assume that the Phenom has to be all things for a rock-bottom price. That is a different question altogether.
define “better”
- “more stable”?
- “longer spintimes”?
- “more valuable”?
- “rarer”?
in pure performance, my opinion is that it’s hard to beat a genesis
in “pound for pound”, I believe that the Werrd Pacquiao is probably the most impressive due to its specs (49g undersize 50mm) at least out of all those I’ve tried (and I’ve tried quite a lot of throws)
the phenom is definitely built to perform and in the end, the reason why I do not like it is because of it’s shape, looks and feel, I just don’t like either looking at it or holding it in my hand. Others will feel that way about the genesis.
And while it’s certainly not a “collector” in the most noble sense, it’s still definitely worth collecting as it’s a high end signature throw that uses precious metal plating.
to me, it isn’t worth the cost because it doesn’t deliver what I expect from said cost. and I strongly believe that when you pass the $70 bar, performance is (or should be) equivalent. I have $200 throws that are outperformed by $20 chinese stuff, and I have more than one. are they worth the cost? to me, yes, to others probably not. the best example is my SPYY Gold Pure. It performs alright, a little oldschool, but it’s jon rob most significant signature throw and for that reason alone I had to have it.
But seeing how it plays, I wouldn’t be surprised if others wouldn’t offer more than fifty bucks for it, and it’s alright.
So the phenom is not a bad throw, it does perform, and if you like the shape, specs and whatnot, by all means, go for it. But if you expect it to perform better than your regular high end $90 metal and if that’s the reason you want to spend extra, don’t because it doesn’t. I have yet to see an expensive metal that does indeed perform better than your average competition spec metal. From my experience, after $150 the higher you pay the less you want to expect performance wise.
The genesis is such a reference for a reason and if cost would be related to performance, it would cost at least three times its actual price and the SPYY Gold would be $50. But it isn’t and it doesn’t.
I actually like that about yoyoing because if someone wants a performer, he doesn’t have to spend insane amount of money in a throw and you can get awesome performers for as little as $20 or $30.
What’s vicious about high prices is that they trigger a self manipulating attitude and very few people would actually admit that they spent too much on something that wasn’t worth it. instead, most will find excuses and arguments to justify the cost. Which is why it can be challenging to find good and objective reviews on the most expensive throws.
We could argue about this, but when you actually look into manipulative techniques, you find out that self manipulation is extremely common and could lead to life-devastating decisions and stances (best example is in a couple, but it can be observed in any part of everyday life). And this is also used a lot by marketing. it’s clearly admitted today (in the business at least, your lambda consumer will probably never recognize it, which is also why it works so well) that a high price tag is a valid sales argument. But even further, a low price tag can even be counter-productive in terms of sales and send the wrong message.
the yoyoing business is well built within modern consumerism, and I believe it is one of the reasons why it expands so well nowadays. It doesn’t have to be a bad thing either, and I don’t think it is. But it doesn’t hurt to be educated about what takes place beyond a sale and what mechanics also take place after it. And after that, it is our choice to decide whether or not to “play along” and just be a consumer.
So in the end, is the phenom worth its cost? this is a question only the buyer can answer, and most buyers (not necessarily all, which is the tricky part, we are not all equals before manipulation) will probably answer “yes” to that question.
there are millions of arguments to answer “no” as well as there are millions arguments in favor of the “yes” answer. You could probably feed a family for a month with that kind of money in some parts of the world, not doing it won’t make you a bad person either, although it’s sometimes nice to be aware of stuff like that because it puts things in perspective and makes us realize that if we’re in a point in our life when we can consider spending a fairly big amount of money on a toy, we’re not doing as bad as we’d like to believe.
but that is another debate.
^^ No arguments from me.
Your comments are apprecitiated and well stated. I would agree with most of what you said. I just am not so absolute about any single yoyo. I guess I am a marketers dream. I like trying out and using lots of different throws.
No doubt though; marketers stink!
Any specifics?
nah not necessarily, I mean the important thing is to be educated about marketing techniques. But many of them take advantage of the target’s ego, which is why they’re sometimes hard to recognize/admit (stuff like “price is a sales argument” for example)
I’m myself a marketing victim, loving my ipod and whatnot, it goes up to some point, like you’ll never see me walk around with a set of beats by dre, these headphones are plain nonsense for that price. But a good friend has them and he admits that it’s for the style rather than the sound, which I can respect)
for the specific cheap throws, some chinese stuff is incredibly cheap and performs incredibly well. Now I’m not that much into chinese stuff because I like collectors and “premium” throws, but if you’re after value for money, that’s where it’s at.
And they’re also doing the best KK bearings by far (and I’ve tried them all, or close. I have yet to try that 100% ceramic bearing but I believe that’s it)
protostar.
I really like the phenom, I don’t have my own but I play with my friend’s when ever I can. If I had the $130 I would totally buy one.