This yoyo has been praised for the past 15 years without many good reasons as to why. Love it's undersized profile and shape but it doesn't perform very good at all. Yes, it's rather underwhelming.

Gotta be hard on this cuz I love the 888 so so much.

Quality control is just not all too great, pains me to say. I have two 07 888s and three of these new ones, red, black, and aqua all in the og engraving style (don’t judge me, or do, whatever). The laser engraving around the hubstacks is visibly not perfectly round on every one of them on the exact same spot (it dips inwards at 7 o’ clock on all of them) and the rim doesn’t have the iconic one-sided “eight|eight|eight” rim engraving on the og engraving colorways, which I think is just a shame. Engravings overall are just a mess and I am left confused. I have a LOT of yyf yoyos and engraving quality has never been an issue til this model.

Play is still fine enough to enjoy, not glass smooth but not awful either. Hubstacks are old (but fun!) tech and I think knocking it for not holding up to modern play is silly, but the hubstacks are clearly less smooth on these than my 888s from 15 years ago which is certainly interesting. This is also an undersized throw, even when it came out. It’s the yoyo that always seems smaller than you remember it being, so realize what you’re buying.

A very “just okay” re-release for a model that was way more than just okay. I wish this model had a higher price point release that bumped up the quality control and better captured the feeling of the 07 model. For now the best option is the Legendary 888.

I started throwing when hubstacks were considered cool with the Grind Machine 2 being my first unresponsive yoyo. Always heard good things about the 888 and it's certainly a smooth throw. Nice shape and design. But it's not very forgiving and limits my experience. Nowadays, the hubstack technology is too outdated. Most throws can do talon grinds and dnas no problem and are bead blasted. Not fond of this throw at all. Sorry.