Jump to content

mikeszekely

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    12708

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Everything posted by mikeszekely

  1. mikeszekely
    Well, l'll say this for Hasbro Pulse, they're pretty fast! I made my order Friday night. Got my order confirmation, but not a peep Saturday, Sunday, or Monday. Which is fine; Saturday and Sunday aren't business days, and Monday was a holiday. I figured they'd ship today and I'd get my order later this week or next. I woke up this morning to a text from FedEx letting me know that a signature is required for a delivery today. I'm thinking that I'm not expecting anything from FedEx, but I checked my email and saw a ship notification from Hasbro Pulse, and they used FedEx. Now, I don't know when Hasbro actually packaged my order and handed it off to FedEx. But I got the ship notification email just before 8:00am, and FedEx was at my door by 11:15, just over three hours later. My only complaint is that they required a signature. That's not exactly a bad thing in the era of porch pirates and it was a pretty big order. But when I know I'm getting a package that requires a signature I like to make arrangements to be home to receive it. Fortunately I was home today, but if I wasn't the notice was to short to make arrangements. EDIT: And I got an email for my other order this evening. FedEx isn't even in possession of it yet and it's scheduled for delivery tomorrow.
  2. mikeszekely
    Doublecross might be my favorite Monsterbot, but I don't think he's got that certain something that really lets him stand alone the way you can get a Grimlock toy without the other four Dinobots. I need a menagerie of Monsterbots, so yep, I picked up Titans Return Grotusque (although, being some kind of special edition that sold out super quick I had to pay a bit more than @M'Kyuun on the aftermarket). Grotusque is, from the chest down, really a repaint of Twinferno. As such he's missing things like the shins made of beast tails or the beast legs on the sides of his shins. He's got gray feet instead of no feet, and for some reason his hands are white. It's kind of impressive what they managed with the new parts and careful use of paint. His forearms are molded to have the same shape as the monster claws that rested on the G1 toy's arms, and gray lines on his pelvis are kind of evocative of how the G1 toy's thighs kind of ran up into his stomach. His chest is predominantly blue, and a darker purple paint on his crotch and translucent purple plastic match the darker purple chunk in the middle of the G1 toy. Since we did a Siege Deluxe yesterday, here he is with a Siege Voyager. Grotusque comes with the same weapons as Twinferno, just cast in purple plastic and painted a light gray. As I briefly mentioned, Grotusque was some kind of special edition. I'm not sure if he was supposed to be an NYCC thing that went on sale at the Hasbro Toy Shop (as Comic-Con exclusives usually do) or what, but being a special edition means that his Titan Master, Fengul, has a lot more paint than your average Titan Master. It also means he comes with a second Titan Master, Scorponok. Scorponok is kind of interesting. On one hand, his body is kind of a lazy repaint of Titan Master Fangry's- they didn't even bother making a new head that looks more like Zarak's. But on the other hand, he does have a new Scorponok face on his back, he's painted fairly well, and his torso and Scorponok face are actually diecast. So Scorponok is noticeably heavier than your standard Titan Master. Oh, and Fengul? No idea where Hasbro came up with that name, but yes, he's another Battle Beast. That's Platinum Tiger in The Headmasters, or Sabresword Tiger to US Battle Beast fans. Given that his head is still a Titan Master and from the chest down he's basically Twinferno you can probably guess that his articulation is 90% the same as Twinferno's. So I'll let you re-read that if you want, and just talk about what's different, namely his arms. His shoulders can swivel and they can move laterally almost 180 degrees due to flaps that hinge out of the way. He has bicep swivels, and his elbows can bend 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, but they can bend inward for transformation. He actually holds his weapons in his hands, and he lacks the slots to tab them into his shoulders the way Twinferno can. And like any good Titan Master you don't have to use Platinum Tiger for a head. Scorponok's an option, too... but I really want a Titan-class Scorponok. More than the Omega Supreme we're getting. It's pretty easy to say that Doublecross turns into a two-headed dragon... what's Grotusque supposed to be? A chimera? A gargoyle? Whatever he is, he's again mostly Twinferno with the same engineering and articulation, the same pros and cons (while it takes a bit of effort to line everything up and tab it in proper, I don't view the way the monster hips tab into the robot torso as a con, since it's quite secure). That means his tail isn't white, and he's just got the one. The front of his monster feet are white, and he's missing almost all of the blue that the G1 toy had on his back. Again, though, he does a lot with his new parts. I found the way his chest folds up to make the blue part of his neck and his purple lower jaw to be especially clever. The jaws can open and close, although the head itself can't move. His arms are still his arms, so they have the same articulation save for the claws, which are hinged so they can bend up. Just like Twinferno, Grotusque has the peg holes on his wings for gun storage in beast mode. The translucent part of his torso opens for a Titan Master to sit inside. A Titan Master could also use the tiny pegs on Grotusque's back, or combine the guns and sit in them. The combined guns can still be tabbed into his back. One thing to note... the instructions tell you to rotate the robot shoulder 180 degrees, then bend it laterally nearly 180 degrees to make the monster arms. I'm showing it that way, but I don't really get the purpose because no matter what you still have to rotate the arm at the bicep to get the monster claws on the front of the forearm. And he's got the same basically the same articulation either way. Grotusque was never my favorite Monsterbot, and being mostly Twinferno again should make him kind of boring. But like I said, it's surprising how much he's able to do with his few new parts. At standard Deluxe prices I'd definitely recommend him. Heck, with the extra paint and second diecast Titan Master I'd say he's worth it at $25. His current aftermarket prices are probably pushing it, though, so maybe don't do it unless you're a completionist (like me).
  3. mikeszekely
    Yeah, this was inevitable the minute Disney announced they were working on their own streaming service. I'm less surprised about this announcement than the fact it came so long after the announcements for the other three.
  4. mikeszekely
    Wow. DC couldn't get me to watch these shows if they were on the CW, let alone pay them for (yet another) streaming service over.
  5. mikeszekely
    Almost definitely, yes. In fact, I think ToyWorld is making one. But probably MP-sized, not Studio Series size. Anyways, I don't know if it's all the Siege goodies or what, but lately I've been snatching up some Titans Return stuff that I'd skipped out on before because I swore I wasn't collecting Hasbro stuff anymore. This is Deluxe-class Twinferno, better known as Monsterbot Doublecross. There's a lot that's right here. The face is pretty good, he's got the red shoulders and pelvis, and there's painted yellow triangles on his hips and red trapezoids with some tampoed lines on his chest where the original had stickers. He's got his wings chilling behind him, and most of the molded detail on his chest is correct, if a little high. His arms and torso are mostly gray and his thighs are mostly white. His arms are dragon heads with horns where they should be. There's some stuff that's not so right, though. The dragon necks that make up his biceps are fully of hollow spaces. The dragon horns are white instead of gray. His lower legs and feet are mostly black instead of gray, including the tail kibble on the sides. And his abs translucent plastic that's so dark it's practically black. Still, I think he's close enough that we're in the right ballpark. And size-wise, he's just a little taller than the current crop of Siege Deluxes. Twinferno comes with a pair of rifles. And of course, this being from the Titans Return line, his head, which unfurls into a Titan Master, and the guns can tab together in a configuration that said Titan Master can sit in. And about that Titan Master? The packaging names him as Daburu, which is simple the phonetic spelling for the katakana you'd use to spell the English word "double," and Hasbro simply acts like they're so clever while totally ignoring the why he's got a cat face and clawed feet and an eyepatch. But I'm happy to tell you that "Daburu" is actually White Leo, leader of the Autobot-aligned Beastformers in the Japanese The Headmasters cartoon. And since Beastformers came to the US as Battle Beasts, that's actually White Pirate Lion. 30 years later, and we've got new Battle Beasts! Twinferno's articulation is fair. It's pretty much on par with most of what we were getting at the time, but definitely not as good as what we're getting with Siege. His head's on the usual Titan Master ball joint for swiveling and minimal tilt. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps can swivel, as long as the swivel isn't buried in his shoulder pads. His elbows can bend 90 degrees. But, he's got no wrist swivel, and that's where we kind of run into problems because it means that he's kind of stuck posing with his elbows bending outward. His hands can open. No waist swivel. The red flap on his pelvis is hinged so his hips can bend 90 degrees forward, but it's the entire flap. His hips can also bend 90 degrees backward and laterally. His thighs can swivel, and his knees (which are a little loose on mine) bend over 90 degrees. His feet can swivel, but there's no tilt or pivot. With dragon heads for hands you might think it's hard for Twinferno to hold his guns. But actually it's super easy, barely an inconvenience. Both heads have 5mm peg holes molded around the hinge pin in their jaws, and the guns can peg into those. Alternatively, there are slots just inside his shoulders that you can use with tabs on the guns to attach them to his shoulders. Doublecross was always my favorite Monsterbot. I mean, he's a two-headed dragon! What's not to love? And with an excellent color scheme to boot. Again, I feel like we're in the ballpark with the little dragon arms and his dragon legs, complete with tampos in place of G1 stickers. They did opt for black dragon thighs instead of the gray of the cartoon, but that's fair since this is a US release and in the US the toy was the only reference. If you look carefully at his chest he's even got a spikey, wheel-shaped bit where the gear was for activating the spark gimmick on the G1 toy. However, the black robot legs and tail bits make for a black tail instead of gray. And the black translucent plastic actually extends up into black paint in the middle of the dragon's chest where it all should have been gray. Twinferno's necks can swivel at the base, bend up and down at the robot elbow, and there's a hinge at the base of the dragon head that can look up and down or open the jaws. Again, I wish he had a swivel at the wrist. The dragon arms are on ball joints so they can rotate and extend laterally about 90 degrees, but they're solid molded pieces with no other articulation. His hips can rotate, and separate hinges allow them to extend 90 degrees. His knees range from about 45 degrees away from totally straight to nearly folded 180 degrees. His heel claws are fixed, and the front of his feet can tilt down but not up, and he doesn't have ankle pivots. The wings can flap on hinges, but that's the limit of their articulation. Each wing has a peg hole at the top so you can plug his guns into his wings. Meanwhile, the translucent bit on his tummy can open up and reveal a seat for a Titan Master to sit on inside. I don't usually call out the little bumps on these toys that Titan Master feeties can plug onto, but I think it's worth mentioning that there's some on Twinferno's back for riding How to Train Your Dragon-style instead of in his belly. Or, with the guns tabbed together in Titan Master seat mode, you can use the same tabs you used for robot shoulder mounting to stick the combined gun onto Twinferno's back like double-barreled saddle. Twinferno is an ok figure. He's definitely not up to Siege standards, or even one of the better examples of the Titan Returns line. But he's not one of the worse examples either, and I think Titans Return was probably the strongest of the three Prime Wars Trilogy lines. Plus he's a Monsterbot; I'm kind of impressed that Hasbro even went that far into the G1 catalog. I'll give him a soft recommend. He doesn't do anything special, I wish he had wrist swivels, a waist swivel, and ankle pivots, but he's not a half bad figure and his Titan Master is a Battle Beast.
  6. mikeszekely
    I'm just now getting around to playing Super Mario Odyssey. I was abroad when it came out, so I kind of forgot about it. Nice thing is my daughter is old enough that she's kind of interested in it, too.
  7. mikeszekely
    G2-style Siege Megatron. Available now at Hasbro Pulse.
  8. mikeszekely
    I wonder why? The glut of JRPGs? AFAIK, the Vita's problem in the west wasn't necessarily the software, it was the price of the hardware. Especially the proprietary memory cards that cost 5x more than a microSD card of similar capacity. So did all that porting affect Vita sales? Or were developers making the ports because they couldn't move enough units on the Vita? Really? Why? Hardware-wise, best case you end up with something like the Xperia Play (which would be clunky by modern standards. Worst case you end up with all touch screen controls. And either way I expect my gaming hardware to last a lot longer than my phones. I hope not. While I'm not against playing a portable game I'm into while lounging on the couch or in bed, my 3DS has gotten a lot of love from me because it's portable. I live in Pittsburgh, and my wife's family is in Beijing, so we travel every other year or so for weeks at a time. Pretty much all I play on those trips is 3DS. My 3DS library is probably pushing 80 cartridges and maybe 20 digital titles. And while I'm enjoying the Switch it's just not as portable, as durable, and the battery life stinks. Not to mention that my Switch library is maybe a quarter of my 3DS's.
  9. mikeszekely
    So you've never owned or even wanted another Grimlock since?
  10. mikeszekely
    Amazon's got pre-orders for some of the new Siege stuff. I put orders in for Jetfire (scheduled for July) and Omega Supreme (August). My local stores are pretty good at stocking Deluxes and Voyagers, but I don't think I can count on them for bigger figured. I'd never seen a Titan anywhere but TRU, and they're gone.
  11. mikeszekely
    Oh, definitely. And a Party Wagon (Turtle Van). TMNT is even another IDW license. Then again, TMNT isn't a Hasbro one...
  12. mikeszekely
    Anyone else play the demo for Daemon Ex Machina yet? Still feels a bit rough, and even the demo was pretty grindy. I kind of dig it, though. Most of the enemies are tanks and drones and what not that just drop ammo, but sometimes you'll run into another Arsenal. When they're defeated you can loot them for parts or weapons. I found myself less interested in completing the boss mission in the demo than I was in replaying the middle two missions to farm for gear.
  13. mikeszekely
    No kidding! I missed out last time because I just didn't have the funds available, but this time just point me to a preorder.
  14. mikeszekely
    Last one. This is MechFansToys' Grmlock, an OS KO of DX9's Rager, and a Deluxe/Legends-scale Grimlock. Not that you'd ever guess from MFT's oh-so-clever name. At least I don't have to say that he makes his Power of the Primes counterpart look scrawny for a change, right? Grmlock is much more proportional with a broad chest but a narrower waist and arms that don't come down to his knees... and in that sense, he might not be the most cartoon accurate of the five. The Sunbow model actually has a barrel chest and long, almost thin arms, while Grmlock looks like someone took the Sunbow model and changed the proportions to make it more heroic. Honestly, I think Grmlock is all the better for it. That's not to say he looks perfect, though. For whatever reason, DX9 decided to eschew the more traditional Grimlock transformation, where the dinosaur head lies on his robot back, for one that stuffs the dinosaur head into his torso. And from some angles that looks fine, but if his neck is below your eyeline you start to see how far back his "wings" are and how gappy the torso is between his chest and his wings. Grmlock doesn't have any cards like Sonarl, or the Diaclone guys that came with the first three, but he still manages to have the most accessories. There's his gun, which is looking appropriately G1, his translucent red sword, and a silver-painted sword. He's also got his crown, technically from the Marvel comics but more likely copied from one of the MP-08 releases. There's the cap he used to transfer his intelligence to the Technobots and the fish he caught at the end of "Grimlock's New Brain." And there's a second set of dinosaur arms. Technically, the ones in this picture are the ones he came with. They have no articulation aside from the ball joint at the base. The second set, which I've already attached, have some added articulation that I'll cover when we get to dino mode. But first, robot articulation. His head can swivel, and while it can't really look up or tilt sideways he can look down a bit. Shoulders rotate and extend just about 90 degrees laterally. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend just under 90 degrees. No articulation in the hands, no waist swivel, no ab crunch. His hips are ball joints that can go 90 degrees forward, backward, or laterally. He's got thigh swivels, 90 degrees of knee bend, and although is feet can't tilt up or down he does have 90 degrees of ankle pivots. His weapons fit into his hands with no problems, and his crown has notches on the inside to fit around his ears. It's pretty secure on his head, but I do think it should have come down a little lower. His joint tolerances are pretty good on the whole. Grmlock's alt mode does a pretty good job of evoking the tail-dragging, upright version of a T-Rex that Grimlock was apparently based off of. Aesthetically I don't have a lot to complain about, aside from maybe pointing out that in the cartoon Grimlock's tail, arms, and teeth were a little lighter in the cartoon than the rest of his body, but MFT used the same silver paint for everything that isn't gold paint, red paint, or blue paint, but that's a pretty small complaint. In dino mode Grmlock can look up a little and down a fair amount, but he can't turn his head. His jaws do open and close. There's what appears to be a tab slot inside his mouth, but none of his accessories seem to fit in there. His arms can move around in the ball sockets, and if you put the articulated arms on him his elbows can bend from nearly 90 degrees the wrong way to nearly 90 degrees the right way, plus his wrists can swivel. The very tip of his tail can move up and down, and one other part of his tail can move down but it badly breaks the sculpt. Then there's his legs. So they're technically his arms, and you'd think they'd have all the articulation that his arms do, which is technically correct... except we have to remember that his elbow bend is now his dino knee, and it bends the wrong way. No big deal if you could also bend his elbow the wrong way (or the right way for his dino knee)... but it can't. The joint is shaped with a rounded edge on one side so he's got clearance to bend his elbow, but the other corner is hard and unyielding. As far as accessories for this mode goes, the cap fits pretty snugly onto his dino head (enough that I was worried about scratching paint)... and that's about it. I posed him holding the fish, and you can make him bite it, but jaws nor hands are holding the fish very securely. He can't wear the crown in this mode- not that I expected him to. And there's no place to store his weapons. About that, you might have noticed in the second picture that he does have a peg hole on his back, and apparently it is possible to plug his gun into that peg hole in dino mode on the DX9 version. But when MFT was rescaling things for this size they apparently didn't do it right, because the handle on Grmlock's gun is far too large for the hole on his back. If I were an emotionless, totally objective computer I might make an argument that, while Grmlock is definitely better than Swooper, Slagus, and Slurdge, Sonarl is perhaps the best of MFT/DX9's Dinobots. And I'm going to tell you that it's partly because DX9 was reinventing the wheel again, needlessly spinning and flipping the chest and arms in a way that kept his back hinged to his butt and negated the possibility of a waist swivel and left some pretty unsightly gaps in his robot torso. But the fact is, for his size I think he actually looks pretty good. And I don't know if I'm just not as attached to Snarl or what, but I have more fun transforming and posing Grmlock in both modes. Push comes to shove, Grmlock is my favorite of the set. He's not perfect, but he's a fun tiny Tyrano, and I'm giving him a recommend.
  15. mikeszekely
    Yeah, I got Ditka at a discount, I posed him with the football, and I'm not touching him. He's a definite placeholder until something better comes along.
  16. mikeszekely
    I'm down for pretty much everything Siege; that Springer looks amazing. And I'll grab Ectotron, sure. Not a fan of the new MPs, though. And I'm losing interest in the Studio Series, too. I'll still try to finish the movie 1 cast, but beyond that I might buy some if I see them but if not I'm not bothered. EDIT: Although Hasbro Pulse is taking preorders, all of the Deluxes for the Siege Wave 2 are listed as sold out and the link in the press release for Ectotron doesn't work. Don't know what wave it's supposed to be, but I managed to get preorders for Siege Thundercracker and Springer at Amazon. Just got an email today the shipping date was moved from next week (which no one ever believed would actually happen) to July. Oh well, I'm a patient man.
  17. mikeszekely
    Another day, another Dinobot. This time it's Sonarl, MFT's version of DX9's Thorner, aka Snarl. I feel like I'm starting to sound like a broken record when I tell you that he looks good, that he's pretty cartoon accurate, and that he makes his similarly-sized Power of the Primes counterpart look like atrophied or malformed, but it is what it is. He even hides his dino legs, which is more than Gigapower managed. Maybe his biceps could have been silver, maybe the visible hinges in his wrists are a little unsightly, maybe his head sculpt isn't the best, but I kind of feel like this is is fine for a Legends (or Deluxe) figure. After the last three, Sonarl's accessories are a bit odd. I mean, sure, he's still got his gun and his translucent red sword, so no worries there. And he's got a little black part that apparently is a display stand connector for Swooper (but I have no idea what display stand it's supposed to connect to). But instead of a silver sword he's got a gold one. And, while I don't usually talk about things like collectors cards that figures may or may not come with, I want to point that Sonarl comes with a card with some artwork of Volcanicus ripped off from Matt Moylan (of Lil'formers). And it's not the ripping off of artists that I find unusual (these are KOs, after all), it's that the card is for Volcanicus even though these Dinobots don't combine, that there's no card for Snarl or any other individual Dinobot, and that Sonarl is the only one to come with any card. Anyway, articulation isn't too dissimilar to Slurdge or Slagus. The head seems to be on a swivel, but the transformation hinge gives him a little up/down tilt. Shoulders swivel and extend laterally about 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, his elbows bend 90 degrees, and although his wrists don't swivel they can bend up and down due to transformation, and that does help with sword poses. In a first for this set he's also got a waist swivel. Hips are ball joints that get about 60 degrees forward, 60 degrees backward, and just under 90 degrees laterally. His thighs have dedicated swivels and his knees bend 90 degrees. He doesn't have any actual foot or ankle articulation, but due to his transformation you can keep his feet flat by bowing his legs out at the knees a little. Generally speaking the joint tolerances, at least for robot mode, are also much better, as nothing felt too snug or too loose. And just like the others his weapons fit into his hands just fine. Now this is the point in the review where I start complaining about some odd decision DX9 made in the engineering that either limited the robot articulation (Slagus, Slurdge), made the transformation kind of a pain (Slagus), or left some really awkward kibble in one of the modes (Slurdge, Swooper). Except that's really not the case here. Things are actually pretty familiar and reminded me so much of Gigapower's Snarl that I had to grab Gutter off the shelf and play with him to remind me how they're actually different. In the end the only thing that really seemed new were some red panels that are folded up on his robot back at the base of the tail haves that unfold and fill in some of the space between his butt and his tail. And the result looks good. Much like the others, though, he doesn't have a ton of dino articulation. His mouth can open and close, but there's really no other articulation of the head. The front shoulder/hips are ball joints that can rotate and wiggle out a little bit laterally. His front dino elbow/knees can bend from a little under 90 degrees forward to about 45 degrees backward, and his paw can also tilt up and down but not pivot. His rear hips work the same as his robot shoulders (because that's what they are). The rear knees (where the gold meets the silver) can bend backward about 90 degrees, and the back paws can also move up and down but not pivot. No tail articulation. And in this mode we're back to having some tolerances that are a little too tight, namely his jaw and his front leg knee/elbows. Up to this point I think I've been a little cool on this set. I mean, I liked Swooper but he definitely had issues in dino mode. Slagus looked good but the engineering wasn't particularly fun. And Slurdge was flat out disappointing. So it kind of surprises me to say it, but I really like Sonarl. He brings the same sort of good that the others do, namely that he looks great in both modes, but he missed out on DX9's detrimental need to come up with crazy new ways to transform a dinobot and escaped with better articulation and the kind of no-nonsense transformation that makes him easy to pick up and mess around with. Solid recommend from me.
  18. mikeszekely
    Right? When Siege was announced I was all, "no thanks, I'm done with the CHUG stuff." Then I had to revise that to "well, I'll at least get Prime and Megatron." Now I've bought the entire first wave except the Battle Patrol Micromasters and Lionizer out of the Battle Masters. And not only am I down for everything Deluxe or bigger that's been announced, I probably will buy three copies of Refraktor to make the camera mode.
  19. mikeszekely
    The oft-rumored Metroid Prime Trilogy for Switch. I never did finish 2 or even play the third one. Yeah, I knew it was the Gameboy one. Just came out wrong when I typed it. I'll edit my original post.
  20. mikeszekely
    KOs of the DX9 ones? How big are they? Can you take a picture with Magic Square's Blaster or Sideswipe?
  21. mikeszekely
    I guess we're going to keep rolling with MFT Dinobots. Tonight we'll do Slurdge, an OS KO of DX9's Quaker, aka Sludge. Now, these guys have been out for a while in both their DX9 and MFT incarnations, so I actually had trouble finding this guy. First I bought him from ebay, but the seller turned scammer (still waiting for PayPal to get back to me on that), then ebay dried up. I managed to find one from GCI Toys, where he not only cost a bit more but the shipping was over a third again the price of the figure. Ouch. Well, that's a right proper looking Sludge, at least. His torso has a proper T-shape, so he's not looking all shrunken like Power of the Primes Sludge, and the black and blue stripes on his shins and the blue rectangles on his hips are nice touches. If I were picky I might point out that the dino toes on his wrists should really be silver, and that even the cartoon model had some of the dino legs on the outside of his legs. Maybe I should be impressed that they're not? Actually, keeping them on the outside might have been a an improvement. Once again, we have DX9 reinventing the wheel, and this this time they kind of inverted him so it's his tail on his back and his dinosaur head that has to fold up into his leg, which it kind of does. The halves of his neck fit pretty neatly, anyway, but the head doesn't split. The whole thing sits on his left leg. So on his right the dinosaur legs tucks in just fine, but on the left the dino head is really in the way. Let me see if I can adjust it so it's not quite so messy... ...well crap. At least I can tuck that dino foot in... *sighs* So Slurdge comes with the usual stuff: translucent red sword, matching silver-painted sword, black cartoon-style gun, and a little Diaclone guy. And a busted dino head. Slurdge's articulation is similar to, but slightly worse than, Slagus'. I can't tell if his head is a ball joint or a mushroom swivel, but it pretty much just swivels. You can get a very small amount of downward tilt, but that's off of a transformation hinge. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally about 90 degrees. I'll note that the hinge on on left shoulder is very loose on my copy- the opposite of his bicep swivels, which are "oh geez I'm gonna break this!" tight. His elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist or waist swivels, but he can arch his back. The front of his pelvis is one hinged flap, giving way for his ball-jointed hips to move just over 90 degrees forward, just under 90 degrees backward, and 90 degrees laterally. He's got thigh swivels, and his knees can bend 90 degrees. He's got no feet or ankle articulation. The peg handles on his weapons fit fine in his peg hole fists. Well, the base of his neck seems a little small, and he's got stripes that should properly be on his butt. If we're being picky again I'll point out how the toe bump on his back is backward, his dino toes (again) should be silver, or that even in the cartoon the front of his dino body (where the toy was chrome) was lighter than the rest of him, but this guy is pretty much all silver. But the truth is, for a Deluxe/big Legends figure this is pretty good. Much better than PotP Sludge. Not a ton of dino articulation, though. His mouth can open and close, and there is a swivel so he can look left or right (but not up and down). His rear legs are his robot arms, so they can swivel, extend laterally, and bend at the knee, but only about 45 degrees the correct way. The front legs can swivel at the hip/shoulder and bend just a little at the knee. Nothing on the tail. Happily, the broken head isn't a huge deal. It's broken at the ball joint where it's connected to that side of the neck, but it pegs onto the other side of the the neck. It'd be totally fine if that pegged connection weren't so loose. And... wait a minute... *looks at dino shoulder* looks like he's missing the translucent cover on his right dino shoulder. Apparently "QC" is too hard for Sludge to spell. Well, overpaying for a toy with so many QC issues definitely leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but I'm going to try to be objective. And objectively, Slurdge/Quaker is still the worst of the MFT/DX9 Dinobots. He's got the worst articulation, and while all of them have some questionable joint tolerances Slurdge's are the worst. The way the dino head is supposed to hide in the leg is lazy and half finished. It's a design than looks good (from most angles), but Slurdge is the only one that really makes me want to not recommend him, and I wouldn't if there was an alternative. For now, though, if you want a G1 Sludge for your Legends collection it's this or the smaller DX9 version, that's it.
  22. mikeszekely
    Amazon has listings for Voyager-class Siege Thundercracker (no surprise there, I just hope they don't make us wait too long for Skywarp) and Springer. Hope it's a new mold and not a reissue/repaint of the older Generations Voyager-class.
  23. mikeszekely
    Was hoping (against hope) for some Metroid news, and that the new Zelda would be a new Zelda. But a Link's Awakening remake and Super Mario Maker 2 should be fun. EDIT: not that I was expecting it, but how about Switch ports of Super Mario 3D World and Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE? Those are basically the last two Wii U games I own that haven't been ported yet.
  24. mikeszekely
    Do you need a PSTV, @JetJockey? Or were you able to find one reasonably priced? I'll have to look to find all the hook-ups, but I could definitely live without my PSTV. I bought one when they first came out, thinking it'd only be a matter of time before they got Netflix and that a box that could do Netflix, Vita games, and PS4 streaming would be ideal on my bedroom TV. Turns out they made maybe three Vita games total that I actually cared for, it never got Netflix, and it was easy enough to just move my PS4 from the living room to the bedroom when I wanted to play it there. So aside from a short period where I was playing Gundam SEED Battle Destiny on it I've barely used it.
  25. mikeszekely
    Vertical.
×
×
  • Create New...