Maybe the hottest take of all
6 Likes
The location of the factory is irrelevant to this argument, instead this is just the result of the OEM market being dominated by just a handful of players. They’ve priced out a lot of other factories inevitably resulting in most brands going there since it’s just a race to the bottom price-wise for most mainstream yoyo companies.
See.. every yoyo company ever moving their manufacturing to one of just a handful of OEMs.. (topyo, FPM, magicyoyo, yoyoempire are the four that I hear thrown around most often).
to be clear I don’t think these OEMs are bad at their job or bad for the community at all, infact it’s quite the achievement that yoyos are so accessible that anyone can bust out some CAD software and see their design made. hell I’ve done it myself!
I think the main negative affect we see is the one that @kawaii.kaede is pointing out, which is that.. if everything comes from the same source you’re inevitably going to see standardization take over and edge out innovation and creativity. To further this point, there’s more than one OEM out there that will refuse you if you do something that they view that they “own”, I’ve been personally told that a yoyo with anodized with one color in the cup and another on the profile was considered too close to something that company did for their in-house brand, and they refused to do it.
16 Likes
What about red triangles?
Tumbled is the best yoyo finish. A nice visual pop like glossy, but doesn’t stick to your hand like glue.
Bog standard blast and no extra finish can see themselves out the door. Proper polished potentially get to stay if I’m feeling generous.
9 Likes
The average yoyo takes itself way too seriously. There, I said it.
6 Likes
2025 Toyota Camry is not at car shows 1992 Porsche 911 is , this is a universal concept apply to , architecture, guitars, film, watches, art, cars , music, everything created
many people like old things
7 Likes
Pyramatte is supreme
4 Likes
1.) i am only one who bring up old yoyos in this thread, meaning your meme was direct at me
2.) you have argued with me numerous on behalf of new yoyos vs my perspective on old yoyos, invested to point you made some full youtube video to prove me wrong and show me how amazing new yoyos is
3.) since you have established your position many time: that there is nothing special about old yoyos and new yoyos is just as good or superior, it is not classified as ragebait as your meme was genuine and aligns with your consistent position
rules are rules! goodnight everybody
3 Likes
pretty lukewarm take but
one drop yoyos arent better because they made in the usa…
…they are just better machined and finished than others hands down
not that other yoyos are bad, but when you take them appart the axles and bearing seats just arent nearly as smooth or consistent, and sometimes the bearing will get stuck on the post.
it matters 0% to “play” , but if I’m paying for a shiny new toy I dont need it may as well be pleasant to take apart and maintain as well
12 Likes
Gonna give a couple of my own yo-yo hot takes, both related to terminology:
- Meta is not a particularly useful descriptor of a yo-yoing style or type of trick. By definition it is going to be subject to change over time as tricks are further optimised for contests. While you can argue there are some common trends currently between tricks that score well and are often labelled meta, but there is still too much variation there and there is no common defining principle that gives you a clear idea of what someone means when they talk about a “meta” trick. It would be much more useful if we had an expanded vocabulary for different types of tricks and meta was used to refer to specific tricks in those categories when discussing the current meta rather than meta itself being the descriptor/category.
- The yo-yo scene has an issue with a lack of clearly defined and well understood terminology and there seems to be little interest in resolving that. You get people giving all sorts of different (and often seemingly opposite) definitions for stuff like float, tech, h-shape, etc. People complain about these vague terms all the time as well. It’s not unusual for niche scenes to have vague/poorly defined terminology but the yo-yo scene is different from others I’ve been in where if you try and talk about clarifying terms people have 0 interest and usually see no value in trying to make terms more clear, pushing back on even the idea of it.
5 Likes
just wanna point out that the very word meta means that what it’s referring to will change over time. “meta” stands for most effective tactics available. so in terms of yoyo tricks it will refer to the tricks that have the highest scoring potential at any given time. what tricks are meta will therefore change as comps and clicking rules evolve and change
6 Likes
TBF though manufacturing quality began to plummet after the 60’s. With yoyos it’s not nearly as bad of an issue, especially among boutique brands and one man bands. But omitting that, my belief is that large businesses have a target margin of profit, and in order to maintain that margin of profit they will either make a better product that sells well, or will lower the cost of manufacture. Combine that with the effects of inflation and you get companies always wanting more when they are doing less. This applies to cars, digital entertainment, hardware, you name it. It’s no surprise that many people like old things over new things. The quality is generally better.
Emphasis on “generally.” Personal preference is always a factor. And I’ve come to see in this particular hobby, personal preference seems to win over absolute quality.
3 Likes
Yeah, but (at least IMHO, which is what this thread is all about) that’s even worse. It puts it in a subcategory of a top, which it doesn’t have much in common with. Sure, it spins, but you don’t even use a string with many tops. And really, the yoyo doesn’t do much during many tricks. It’s just a spinning weight at the end of a string that you’re doing tricks with. Sure, not all tricks are like that, but many are. So it pisses me off that I ended up being addicted to a hobby that involves playing with string that’s constantly getting tangled 
That’s why a made up name, like yoyo, is a better name - because it doesn’t mean anything and isn’t a “descriptive” name (like ‘fireplace’). But since we’re doing hot takes, I despise the spelling of ‘yo-yo’. It’s probably the trademark aspect of it to some degree, but I always have to change my phone’s spelling to ‘yoyo’ (without the dash) which I feel is more generic and doesn’t exclusively equate to Duncan.
And while I do have a lot of Duncans and appreciate the brand for what they’ve done for the hobby, you wouldn’t believe how many times I’ve heard “Is that a Duncan?”.
3 Likes
Onedrop is meh, way over hyped
6 Likes
Kitty New string is better than kitty old
1 Like
Piggybacking on this: OneDrop’s target market is boomers and hoarders big collectors.
6 Likes
Heres mine, don’t hurt me plz.
- Splashes are just ugly. All of them. Most splashes have colors that clash really bad so when spinning it just looks like poo brown. Also, this goes for splashes with loads of colors.
- 1A yoyos are getting too wide, too fast
At this point with the current comp trickset, 60 mm is overkill. Unless ur hitting insane BTB zontal whips, I find it not needed for the avg comp player - Original throw lowkey isnt that good. It feels like sandpaper until you break it in, which takes too long imo
2 Likes