Arnotts, we beseech you, bring the old Shapes back.

Arnotts Shapes: the ultimate playground bartering tool.

One palm-sized packet could be swapped for half a good sandwich and if you were a keen negotiator, maybe even a banana too.

But playground domination may soon be over for the biscuit brand with changes to the products leaving a bad taste in the mouths of some vocal Australians.

The ‘new and improved’ range of Shapes has been rolled out across all Barbeque, Pizza, Cheddar and Savoury flavours.

The actual shape of the biscuit will stay the same but the visible seasoning has been removed and baked into the product instead.

This has led to a terrible discovery for Shape lovers: There will no longer be yummy bits at the bottom to lick off your fingers.

The Arnotts’ Shapes Facebook page has become inundated by customers bent out-of-shape at the changes.

“If you ain’t got pizza shapes, you ain’t got my business,” wrote Justin Raby.

Shauna Gibney said: “Another customer lost due to your “new improved ” shapes. My kids hated them and couldn’t give them away. I tried one also.foul!”

Eva Thiele said: “Yes the new flavours are awful and Arnotts you will lose sales and profit as a result of this change.”

Comedian Dave Hughes’ son even wrote an open letter to the company expressing his displeasure at the change.

My Pizza Shape loving 6yo son’s open to Arnotts. @hughesyandkate

A photo posted by David Hughes (@dhughesy) on Mar 30, 2016 at 10:25pm PDT

An Arnott’s spokeswoman told News Corp: “We know that not everyone likes change, but we do believe we’ve created the best tasting Shapes we’ve ever made. This change was asked for by and tested with our target consumers.”

“One of the main problems we had was getting the flavour to stick onto the biscuits – it was falling off on the biscuit line due to us removing some oil a few years back.

“We’ve solved this by employing new technology which involves baking the flavour right into the biscuit and applying it to both sides. We also found that making the seasoning sprinkles smaller meant they stuck to the biscuit better.”

The shift away from oil explains why the sprinkles had to go, but surely, if a licked finger can adhere upwards of thirty of those sprinkles then a new sticky substitute shouldn’t be that difficult to create.

How do you feel about the new Shapes?