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mikeszekely

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  1. mikeszekely
    And speaking of Forager, here he is: FansToys' take on Kickback. I've seen other reviews for Forager, and to be honest the reviewers seemd to struggle with him, and I've heard stories of the clasps on his wings breaking. At that time, in my head, I was ready to write Forager off as being too fiddly and delicate. I remember even thinking at the time if BadCube's Kickbutt would look ok with FT's Grenadier and Mercenary. In hand, while they're both recognizably Kickback, Forager's slightly longer legs, thinner arms, thinner waist, and wider chest a much better proportionally. The painted details on his feet, knees, and left breast are closer to the G1 stickers (not applied on mine). You can't see from this front-on angle, but his torso is also thinner front-to-back. On aesthetics alone, Kickbutt is good but Forager is pretty much spot on. Indeed, my one and only aesthetic complaint is that his translucent chest seems a bit darker than the BadCube ones, or even compared to Grenadier and Mercenary. It's less amber and more orange, I think. Forager comes with another trio of translucent purple energon cubes, his weapon done up in chrome (but, sorry JB0, still doesn't fit around his fist), an alternate solid yellow chest plate, another screwdriver for swapping the chest plate, and a replacement antenna for Grenadier. Forager's head is on a swivel so he can turn his head, but he can't really look up or down. That's because, due to his transformation, his face is on one hinge and the back of his head is on another. You can only tilt his head back a little bit before his head and face aren't aligned anymore. His shoulders can rotate, and a hinge lets them extend laterally over 90 degrees. He has bicep and wrist swivels, double-jointed elbows that curl all the way up, and hands like the other FT Insecticons or the MP cars. He has a waist swivel and thigh swivels. His hips can go 90 degrees forward and backward, and a little less than 90 degrees laterally. His knees are double-jointed and he can bend them until the insect legs in his calves meet the back of his thighs. His toes can fold down a little, mostly for transformation, and the purple part is on a hinge for over 90 degrees of ankle tilt. One big advantage he has over Kickbutt, aside from hinges and swivels instead of ball joints, is that his wings have hinges that you can use to splay them out a bit. It's something that wasn't necessary to have a perfectly good, perfectly accurate Kickback, but really helps him to look more dynamic when you're posing him. As with the other FT Insecticons, Forager's gun has tabs on the handle that fit into slots in his palm. Once again, it fits pretty loosely, and it's mostly the tension of this close hand holding the gun in place. His chest does open, but there's nothing but molded detail behind it. But one thing I want to point out is that, yes, he's got some bug legs showing on his back, and technically Kickbutt doesn't. But, Forager's legs are still much, much tidier than the other FT bugs, and frankly a pretty small price to pay to not have a torso as thick as Kickbutt's. Grasshopper mode. His rear legs seem a bit longer than Kickbutt's, which I don't feet particularly strongly about. What I do feel strongly about his how his torso is, again, much thinner top to bottom and slightly wider between the wings. The proportions feel better. The shoulders and front four bug legs also look more proportionally accurate. Like Kickbutt and the Generations/Titans Return Kickback, Forager seems to have picked up a little non-G1 abdomen, but it's slightly less obtrusive. Getting to this mode wasn't as fiddly as the reviews I watched made it out to be. Indeed, I think he's actually easier to transform than Kickbutt, as long as you know what you're doing. Just be extremely careful of with the rings that connect his wings to his shoulders. They have clasps on them to open and close them so his back can open up and rotate the shoulders around so his bug legs and his bot arms can switch places. Hold the wings near the hinge at the base when you rotate, be aware of when the clasps should be opened and closed, be aware that the wings really can't rotate 360 degrees, make sure that everything is aligned properly before you pull open his back, and be mindful that the claps don't get caught on anything when they're opened. The only other sticking point of the transformation is getting this bug face out. The instructions should you do this by folding back the helmet part of his head, folding his robot face flat so he'd be looking at the top of is head, unfolding the bug face from flat against the top of the inside of his head, then closing it back up. The problem is that it seems like there's no way to do that without working a small, thin tool under the bug face, which is sure to scratch the silver paint. What the instructions don't tell you, however, is that the back of his head can open and fold down, giving you room to stick a little finger behind the bug face and push it out with ease. Like Kickbutt, Forager's gun pegs onto his abdomen for storage. The hinges on his wings allow for some flapping instead of just angling them up or down like the G1 toy or Kickbutt. His front four bug legs have a swivel that can rotate them out away from the body, and three hinges on each leg. His rear legs use his robot hips, then a hinge where the purple connects to he black in his "knee" and another hinge at his bug ankles. Worth mentioning again, without making a value call for or against it, but Forager's got a lot of diecast and weighs significantly more than Kickbutt. Forager turned out to be a very interesting case, at least for me. I could sort of tell, even before I had them in hand, that I liked FT's Grenadier better BC's Hypno, but I liked BC's Claymore better than BC's Mercenary. After actually getting them in hand, it was pretty close but my expectations turned out to be correct. Meanwhile, I fully expected that Kickbutt would be a better Kickback in hand than Forager, despite Forager being somewhat better on an aesthetic level, and in that case I turned out to be totally wrong. With Bombshell and Shrapnel, despite my preferences I could tell you specific things I liked better on the FansToys' version and things I liked better on the BadCube version, but I find myself concluding that Forager is pretty much better all around than Kickbutt. Needless to say, if you're on the hunt for a good Kickback figure Forager is definitely the one I'd recommend as the best. The problem, though, is actually finding one. I can't find a retail store that has him in stock. I can only find two on the whole of ebay, one in China and one in Australia, both with price + shipping at or above US $200, and FansToys has stated they currently have no plans to reissue him. I know people who have decided to sell their copies of Grenadier and Mercenary and buying the BadCube bugs, despite really preferring the FansToys ones, just because they can't get a copy of Forager. I feel supremely fortunate to have bought Forager and Mercenary together from a TFW2005 member for $150 shipped... and as reasonable as that is, that's still $6 more than I paid BBTS for all three BadCube bugs (including their $4 flat rate shipping). So ultimately, I'm recommending FT for Kickback and Bombshell, but BadCube for Shrapnel, or FansToys for all three if you insist that your Insecticons come from the same company. But that's only if you're willing to pay more, and you can even find all three. If you want to save money and avoid some headaches, the BadCube ones are still a good alternative. For now, anyway. Although MMC keeps pushing the release date back their version of the Insecticons are also due out this year, and I'll try to get a look at them and review them for you when they come out.
  2. mikeszekely
    When I reviewed BadCube's Evil Bug Corps, I felt compelled to talk about FansToys's Insecticons. Whenever FansToys does a character, it's hard not to; they've built quite a reputation, to a point where many people will declare that the FansToys' version is the best version when all FT has show is a silhouette. The thing is, and I was more careful to be clear about this when I talked about Sovereign in my Tyrant review, is that without hands-on experience with the FT version all I can do is evaluate the aesthetics, that is, how it looks. There are plenty of figures that have looked good, but turned out to be overly complicated, fiddly, fragile, floppy, or kind of a pain. I'm sure that cuts both ways. In any case, you'll remember that I also wound up with FT's Grenadier (their Bombshell), and I had to grudgingly admit that even though I think BadCube was smarter in how they handled the legs and proboscis in robot mode I kind of preferred Grenadier. Grenadier had better proportions in both modes, better paint, and locked together more solidly. He just had more kibble on his back. Ultimately, both were good figures, both looked good, both had advantages and disadvantages over the other, but FansToys felt a little bit better. Would that be the case if I got the other two? Would having a better, less biased look at them change my thoughts on BadCube's? When I found a seller dumping his for a reasonable price, I had to find out. So tonight we're taking a look at FansToys' Mercenary, their version of Shrapnel. I mean, aesthetically, what can I really say? He looks like Shrapnel, all right. Many of the same details are present on both Mercenary and Claymore, the BadCube version. They both have translucent chests, they both have those nipple bumps, they both have the blue sticker detail on the chest, they both have chromed horns and silver paint on the thighs. The most obvious difference is, again, their proportions. Claymore is a little squatter, a little chunkier, and Mercenary is a little leaner and arguably a litle closer to the cartoon. In this case, I think I actually prefer BadCube's. Mercenaries accessories are similar to Grenadier's. He's got his gun, done in chrome, but he's also got a second gun done in the cartoon-style purple. He's got a small screwdriver that's for swapping the chest and legs (I don't think I got one with Grenadier, and I don't know if he should have come with one or not). He's got the same trio of small, translucent purple Energon cubes, and an alternate solid yellow-painted chest. Like Grenadier, he comes with an additional set of legs; the ones on the figure are the bug-style legs, and the ones pictured here are the cartoon/toy style ones. I find them double disappointing; just like Grenadier, the rear legs are purely for leg mode and not the vestigial guns on his forearms, but also that the other four legs are white/light gray. Yes, it's cartoon accurate, and yes, FT is know for their cartoon accuracy, but I prefer the yellow legs on the G1 toy and the premium version of Claymore. I think I showed both sets of legs when I reviewed Grenadier, but I'm not going to bother this time. Mercenary's head is on a ball joint. He's got slight downward and lateral tilt, and under 45 degrees of upward tilt. His shoulders are on swivels for rotation and hinges that get over 90 degrees of lateral movement. He's got bicep swivels, wrist swivels, and double-jointed elbows that put his forearms against his shoulders. His thumb is fixed and his fingers are one piece, pinned at the base knuckle like an MP car. He's got waist and thigh swivels, no ab crunch. His hips are universal joints that can do 90 degrees forward or laterally, and could possibly do 90 degrees backward if there weren't so much kibble in the way. His single-jointed knees are good for 90 degrees. His feet can bend down but not up, and he's got 45 degrees of ankle tilt. Really, if there's one clear advantage that Mercenary has over Claymore, I'd say it's not having ball joints for his hips and shoulders. He holds both guns ok. There's tabs on the handles that fit into slots on the palms, MP-style. They fit pretty loosely, though; it's mostly the tension of the closed hands keeping them in there. The other big advantage is, as I mentioned, how the bug legs store in robot mode. Claymore wasn't as clean as the other BC bugs, since his yellow legs folded over and sat on his back, but they did it in a very G1 way. Whether you have the insect-style legs or the G1-style legs on Mercenary there's not a lot you can do besides ball them up on his back. Insect mode. Again, Mercenary and Claymore have a lot of the same details, like the covers over his robot face, the shape of the horns, and the triangular ridges near his robot feet. Only Claymore has the thrusters that the G1 toy does, but I don't think that was a cartoon detail so I'll let it slide. From this angle, the biggest difference is that Claymore's "face" is a little taller, with the horns on ball joints kind of under his robot head, while Mercenary's horns are simply hinged next to his robot head. That gives his horns less articulation, but a more "correct" appearance. Of course, another difference would be the legs. This one's kind of a wash, though. Yes, they make for more robot kibble, but I'm a big fan of the insect-style legs. The front and rear pairs have two swivels, the middle pair just one. The front legs have three hinges, the middle have one hinge, and the rear have two. The combined articulation gives you options for creepy-crawly poses, and the joints are strong enough to hold him up despite he copious use of diecast on this guy. If insect legs are your thing, the Mercenary gets the win. But if accuracy is more important, Claymore's legs beat Mercenary's G1-style legs. The chest door does open, but there's really nothing in there. One more difference, I think an important one, is that Claymore's robot arms tuck along side his insect body, just like the cartoon, somewhat like the G1 toy (in that the G1 toy didn't due so much tucking). FansToys took a somewhat different approach, with some awkward folding and splitting that tries to put most of his forearms and fists on his underside. Is it cleaner? Perhaps. But the lack of accuracy and the same relatively bug-mode thickness kind of has me preferring Claymore, even with Claymore's side panels that slid back too far. Mercenary does have weapon storage in alt mode, and it's basically the same as Claymore's: stick it underneath. From most angles it's fine, but it's worth noting that from the rear it does stick out farther on Mercenary than on Claymore. One last difference, one you can't see at all in pictures, is materials. If you buy the regular BC bugs, you have all-plastic. If you get the premium ones, like I did, they have some diecast in the feet. Mercenary, though, is probably 30% or more diecast. He's a heavy guy; I don't have a kitchen or postal scale sensetive enough to compare them, but I'd guess that Mercenary weighs as much or more than all three BC bugs combined. I like a little diecast when it's done smartly, but I'm not one of those people that automatically think diecast and "heft" are automatically better. I'm not saying that Mercenary is better or worse for all the diecast, just making you guys aware. So that's that, and what we end up with here is kind of the opposite of what we got with Grenadier and Hypno. Is Mercenary a good figure? Most definitely. Would I recommend him? If you want all your Insecticons from the same company and you already started on FansToys, sure. In a vacuum, sure. But in the head-to-head comparison, I personally think BadCube came out on top this time. As was the case with Grenadier and Hypno, it's pretty close though, and I don't think you're really going wrong with either choice. It's also still worth pointing out that if you live in the States, the premium version of BadCube's bugs can be had as a complete set for $140, and that's $10 less than I paid just for Mercenary and Forager... assuming you can even find a copy of Forager.
  3. mikeszekely
    A part of me is going "Yay, UC!" But a bigger part of me is irked that they're pulling from side stories while I'm still waiting for an RG Alex, ZZ, or Nu... stuff that was actually animated.
  4. mikeszekely
    Speaking of stuff, an MP-ish Rodimus Prime like Carry needs an MP-ish Galvatron, yeah? So I went ahead and picked up Tyrant, DX9's version. Tyrant's a big fella, standing a little taller than Despotron and nearly a head taller than his rival. While DX9 went with a more Studio OX style for Carry, Tyrant's pretty cartoon-accurate. The only major departures are that extra spot of red on his pelvis and the fact that his treads are on his back instead of the backs of his arms. The rest of him, from obvious stuff like his belt, his knee pads, and shoulder kibble to tiny touches like his goatee, the indentation on the top of his chest, to the linework on his cannon is straight form the cartoon. I think in a vacuum I'd have zero complaints; even his curved feet don't bother me. In reality, while I think Tyrant looks totally fine, I think FansToys Sovereign pulls off an even better Galvatron in robot mode (minus the particle cannon). Speaking of cannons, Tyrant comes with two of them. One is painted with a gorgeous metallic bronze, the other in speckled translucent that's very much like the old G1 Galvatron toy. He also comes with a Matrix, which amuses me since Carry didn't, and a chain. The silver and gold parts of the Matrix are fixed to the translucent part on sliders so it can open like MP-01's. I think it would have been cool if he came with a gun like the G1 toy did, but it's not really necessary. With the translucent cannon, what you see is pretty much what you get. If you take the painted one apart, though, what you'll find inside is not simply an LED but a tiny little flashlight with a trio of purple LEDs. That's cool and all, but I'm kind of leaning toward the translucent one. While the painted bronze looks good, it's not quite orange enough. Besides, I had Galvatron as a kid, and the translucent orange speaks to me on a nostalgic level. By now, I have a ton of Matrices. I have so many I'm not even totally sure where they all came from. This one is easily the largest. It's big enough that you can get Carry's hands around the handles. It goes without saying, though, that it doesn't fit into his chest. The chain has jewlrey claps on each end. You can work them through the holes on the handle and Tyrant can wear it around his neck the way Galvatron did in the '86 movie. Tyrant's head is on a hinged swivel. He can look up just a taste but has good range down, which is fine because Galvatron should be looking down on people. His shoulders are on ratchets for rotation, and they can move about 90 degrees laterally. The shoulders are connected to the kibble part on another joint for transformation. That can give him a bit of a shrug, or work in tandem with the shoulder joint to get further than 90 degrees laterally. His biceps swivel just below the shoulder and just above his elbows, which are able to bend 90 degrees. Combined, that gives him a double-jointed elbow that lets him reach up and touch his own shoulder. His wrists are actually ball joints, so in addition to swiveling he has some wrist tilt. That's great for a character with a cannon on his arm like Galvatron, where bending the fist downward a bit feels natural in a firing pose. His hands are perhaps my biggest gripe with him. They're a little like KFC hands, only smaller and unable to straighten all the way. Each finger and thumb is on its own ball joint, and the fingers have an addition hinge at the mid knuckle. From mid knuckle to the tip the fingers are still molded in a curve, so pointing doesn't look too hot, plus the mid knuckle hinges aren't pinned, so they pop off like MP-10 and MP-whatever-number-Soundwave-was. Moving along, he's got a waist swivel. His hips are ratcheted for 90 degrees backward and just a little shy of that forward due to the purple pads on his thighs. They can also soft-ratchet laterally, again a little short of 90 degrees due to his hip pads which can rotate, but not hinge outward. The ratchets, like Carry's, are spaced a bit further apart than I like, so he goes from stock straight to a wide A-stance in one click. It's not too hard to get his legs to sit halfway between clicks, though. His thighs and rotate, and DX9 really blended the cut for the joint into the ridges on his thigh so it never breaks up the sculpt. His knees are ratcheted and good for 90 degrees. His feet don't tilt up or down, but due how they transform you can kind of manipulate his toes and heels. His feet do have some very extreme inward ankle tilts, though. His particle cannon pegs onto his forearm. Although it was always on his right arm in the cartoon, he does have a slot on his left arm as well, if you prefer it there. Or, since you get two whole cannons, Galvatron can show just how much of an upgrade he is from Megatron by dual-wielding. The little purple LED flashlight does a pretty fine job of making the cannon look like it's firing. It kind of makes me wish the translucent one could do the flashlight thing, too, but since it's translucent I guess the flashlight would be super visible in there. As you'd expect, Tyrant turns into space artillery. Getting to this mode isn't particularly difficult once you know what you're doing, but it's definitely a bit more complicated and less intuitive than Carry. Also, while Carry really shrinks himself down to get to Winnebago mode, Tyrant is still pretty huge. I gotta say, DX9 really nailed the alt mode. In fact, while I do think Sovereign had the superior bot mode, Tyrant's definitely got him beat here. Going from his largely purple torso to a largely gray cannon feels like sorcery, and DX9 got the front treads to sit on cartoon-accurate wide, flat legs instead of super obvious robot arms by panels on his torso and jamming is arms up in the gaps. The treads are rubber, and they do work. In theory, there's a wheel in the rear support so he could roll, but in practice the treads take quite a bit of pressure to move. I think even the rear looks pretty good. My gripes are pretty minor. There's the fact that that everything's pretty much locked into place, so he can only point forward, not up. There's also the exposed diecast in his feet/around the middle of the cannon. I'm concered that the diecast will get yellowed, like MP-05's feet, so I kind of wish they'd painted it. On, there's also the fact that the rear support is purple instead of gray, but I can forgive that. Unlike the G1 toy, whose's back kibble made the pointy thing on top of the cannon, Tyrant's back kibble becomes the support and the point thing on top of the cannon is his unfurled crotch. So here's the thing... I really do like this guy a lot. I think he's a prefectly good Galvatron, with probably the best alt mode I've seen done on a Galvatron. But, like I said at the beginning, I think FansToys beats Tyrant in robot mode. Unless you're planning to display a cannon-mode Galvatron blasting Starscream to ash, you're probably going to want to go bot mode. At retail, Tyrant and Sovereign are pretty close in price; in fact, his current retail price of $165 at TFSource and BBTS is actually $10 higher than Sovereign's, so in a perfect world I'd probably tell you to just get Sovereign instead. The catch, though, is that nobody seems to have Sovereign in stock. A quick check on Ebay has Sovereign bidding well over his retail price, with Buy It Nows approaching $300. Meanwhile, I got Tyrant from an ebay seller for around $100 shipped. I don't know about you guys, but even though Galvatron is one of my favorite baddies I'm not willing to pay triple for one that's slightly better in bot mode. Someday, if I see Sovereign for $150 maybe I'll pick one up, but in the mean time I have no regrets about buying Tyrant. So if you have a Galvatron-shaped hole in your MP shelf, short of FT doing a reissue Tyrant's probably your better buy. Well, at least until XTB does theirs.
  5. mikeszekely
    I think people are just dumping them because they weren't particularly good. I know I've waiting on XTB's. $35 is tempting, but I've got too much on the way already.
  6. mikeszekely
    Unique Toys isn't doing Superion (yet?). That's Zeta, who are also doing Combaticons, but theirs are even bigger than UT's. UT's Combaticons are going for a more streamlined, cartoon look, but Zeta's are chunky bruisers with tons of folded panel kibble and alt modes that are just wrong, which is why I haven't touched them yet despite being $30 cheaper. Supposedly Zeta's Blast Off, the only figure released so far, has diecast in it. I'd think the gestalt's arms are the last place you'd want diecast.. Zeta's only got prototypes for their Brawl and Swindle, but here's a look if you want to compare.
  7. mikeszekely
    That sucks, but I'm really surprised. While some of the designs were kind of cool, I don't know that the Unicron Trilogy was popular enough that many people want to drop $140 on an MP Galaxy Force Starscream. Especially since no one else is doing any Unicron Trilogy MPs, and Maketoys didn't indicate that they were doing any beyond Galaxy Meteor; even the people who might have been interested had to wonder how it'd really fit in their collections. It's a shame, though, because the few that got out were getting pretty rave reviews, and that really was starting to spark some interest. I just hope that they didn't shoot themselves in the foot too badly, because I've really liked the ReMastered line and I have the G1 Howling Meteor preordered. I could definitely use that. Well, Unique Toys is still putting stuff out, at least. And in addition to their Brawl, I also picked up Gahz'ranka, their version of Swindle (who from here on out will just be Swindle). Well, like so many takes on Swindle before him, he's kind of a light tan instead of the mustard yellow that G1 Swindle was. Unique Toys also saw fit to add some extra details to his shins and the tops of his feet, and put black/dark gray bands around his forearms, but holy crap is that a cartoon Swindle! Everyone else, from Fansproject to Warbotron to even Combiner Wars went for the cartoon style, but Unique Toys actually went for the window chest and jeep grill pelvis of the cartoon. Some people have criticized the face sculpt for being too flat or too Animated but I think it's alright. It's the sort of smirk that fits the character. Size-wise, he's a bit taller than his Warbotron counterpart, and a head taller than MP car-sized Gundog. And because their size is the topic of heated debate, he's a head taller than an MP Seeker (at least one based on the MP-3 mold) and chest high to Despotron. I really think that's fine, personally. You can get him maybe half a head taller by turning the inner hip 180 degrees while manipulating the thighs so they're still facing down and forward. Same goes for Brawl, although without Swindle's grill-pelvis it leaves a small gap between his hips and torso. Much like Brawl, UT did a really good job giving Swindle a clean bot mode. I like that they painted some of the details on the backs of his legs, and that spare tire on his back is cartoon-accurate. Moving right along, Swindle comes with the other combined-mode foot and another set of the felt pads for it, a cannon, a missile, and a piece we'll call "the connector thingy" that can be used in a variety of ways, or left off to the side in robot mode. Swindle's head is on a hinged swivel, and unlike Brawl he can turn his head and still look up and down. His shoulders rotate on friction joints and move laterally on more of those weird ratchets. He can get to 90 degrees laterally, but that's just one or two clicks. Meanwhile, friction lets you pose the arms between clicks. His elbows are single-jointed, and both go past 90 degrees, although his right arm goes a bit furter because the left has a tab on it. he has bicep swivels just above the elbow, and his hands are the same as Brawl's. His waist can swivel. His hips can go over 90 degrees backward on a ratchet, but is limited going forward due to the jeep grill. You can get about 45 degrees before the grill blocks it. Alternatively, the grill is on a double hinge and you can work it up onto his belly a little. That'll allow you to get closer to 90 degrees forward on the hips, but it'll block the waist swivel. Laterally, he can get better than 90 degrees on friction joints. His thighs can rotate around the hip job, which like Brawl seems to have a fairly natural range but does prevent you from twisting his legs the whole way around. A transformation joint allows you to rotate his leg just below the knee if you decide you do need more, though. His knees are very strong ratchets that get you 90 degrees of bend. His feet can bend downward, as can his toes, and a hinge gives him 90 degrees of ankle tilt. Swindle's cannon as a tab on it that can either fit into a slot on his forearm, which allows him to wield it like he's going to fire but is too long for him to be able to bend his elbow, or into a slot on the outside of his upper arm for a more relaxed arm cannon pose that doesn't block his elbow. For cartoon accuracy you can just plug the missile into his hand, but that leaves you with the connector thingy left over. Personally, I like to put it on the back of the missile and have him hold that like a gun. It could also fit on the back of the cannon, but the cannon is big enough as it is. Unless you don't want him to wear the cannon as an arm attachment. Then you can plug the connector thingy onto the back of the cannon. That will allow Swindle to carry the cannon like a long rifle. Heck, you can even plug the missile onto the cannon and give him one extra killtastic weapon. Or not, whatever you prefer. As amazing as a cartoon-style Swindle robot is, I think I'm doubly-amazed that Unique toys eschews the trend of making Swindle larger and heavier vehicles like Humvees. They didn't even do the sloped-front larger XR311 that the G1 Swindle toy was based on. Nope, that's Swindle's cartoon jeep, right down to the purple hood. Despite being taller in robot mode, Swindle seems to scale reasonably well with Gundog... not that alt scale matters when we're talking about a jeep and a tank both making legs for a guy with a space shuttle for an arm. Unique Toys even put a steering wheel and gear shift in there, and the seats (which are part of Swindle's feet, actually) have a rubbery, leathery feel. Speaking of rubber, all five tires are rubber, and he rolls pretty good as long as you remember to shift the front tires down and forward. Aesthetically, I think the only thing he's kind of missing is the tow winch on the front, but I don't really miss it and I don't see how they could have fit it given how he transforms. It's in vehicle mode that the connectory thingy really shines. Instead of "where does this go, I guess I'll stick it here" like bot mode the connector thingy plugs into the back of the jeep. A peg on one side fits into a hole on the cannon, and a hole on the other side accepts the peg from the missile. The resulting mounted weapons are very G1 cartoon. All-in-all, the heep mode cleans up very nice. No obvious combiner ports. Honestly, even from the underside there's not much in the way of obvious robot period. Maybe his head, but even that sort of just fills the space between his robot thighs. Swindle gets a definite recommend from me. I mean, Sly Strike was considered the best of the Warbotron Combaticons and UT's Swindle absolutely blows Sly Strike away. Zeta has already shown off prototypes of their Swindle, and he's looking like another toy-style robot that changes into a Humvee. UT's Swindle is the most cartoon, most Swindley Swindle you can get and will probably remain that way for a long time yet. I like him so much that I'd consider double-dipping on this set if UT does Ruination/Baldigus repaints to go with Fans Hobby's Archenemy. That said, Swindle's transformation does require a bit more effort than Brawl's, as you're got to move parts and panels around past other stuff, and everything is kind of loose until then end when you give him a squeeze and hope that eight (not exaggerating, actually eight) different tabs are all lined up correctly.
  8. mikeszekely
    Alright, you guys are probably more interested in new stuff than older figures that are awesome like Carry or older figures that suck like Ironwill. So tonight let's look at Archimonde, the Unique Toys version of Brawl And, btw, I'm not going to keep referring to these guys by WoW names I can't spell without a wiki, so from here on out he's just Brawl. Compared to a lot of Season 2 characters, the Combaticons' Sunbow character models were pretty different than their toys. And so far, whether we're talking official or 3P, newer versions of Brawl have gone toy-style, with the front of the tank forming a protruding wedge of a chest and a head done in shades of gray. So when UT's Brawl turned up, my first instict was to look at the much longer, flatter chest and the red mouth plate and think, "Hey, UT's really going 'toon on this one!" And with that face and chest, not to mention the fact that he's more olive than green, he probably is the most cartoon-accurate Brawl you can get... he's just still not that cartoon accurate. Black vented panels sit where the cartoon had circles. His forearms and pelvis are green instead of gray, and his gray thighs are a lot lighter than the gray used in the cartoon. Likewise, although he's an olive color, it's a pale, desaturated olive. The treads don't cover his entire bicep, revealing some red-striped black underneath. And he's lacking the little black APS tubes on his abdomen. Accurate or not, the design is still seems more cohesive and less busy than Warbotron's Heavy Noisy. He also feels a lot more solid and weighs significantly more. Really, it's kind of funny because it seems like not that long ago I was pretty impressed by Heavy Noisy, but UT's Brawl makes it seem like cheap junk. You'll also note that he's a good head taller than Heavy Noisy. There seems to be some debate over whether or not UT's Combaticons are big enough to be considered MP. I find the debate amusing, since the naysayers will usually proclaim allegience to Zeta Toys' super stylized, not-even-close to 'toon or toy Combaticons because they're the size of an MP Seeker. I guess MP has stopped meaning high-quality, cartoon-accurate toys and just means "big" now. In any case, I'll have to remember to toss in a few other figures for size comparisons as we go through this set. Since the Zeta figures are cheap, I might even pick up their Vortex to make a G1-ish Blackout, but don't expect me to do the whole set. Brawl comes with just a couple of accessories. The big one is a foot for combined mode, which we'll talk about more when we get to said combined mode. There's also a pair of adhesive felt pads cut to fit the bottom of the foot. In my very unscientific tests, they do help the foot slide less than the bare plastic, some I'm going to use them, but I feel like a rubber material would have been better. Aside from foot-related stuff, we have a pair of guns done nicely in black, olive, and silver. The rear of the gun is on a hinge. He holds it with the butt folded back and the peg showing, but the peg folds in and the butt folds down for tank mode. Brawl's head is on a hinge swivel that can look up and down a good bit, as well as rotate, but has an odd quirk in that the hinge is at the bottom of his neck. That means that his up/down range is only up/down if he's looking straight ahead; turning his head tilts it laterally instead. The shoulders rotate and have ratcheted hinges for lateral movement, and he can get a little under 90 degrees. It's only two clicks, but the tension is enough that you can use the joint like a friction joing between clicks. He has bicep swivels just above the elbows; if you find that you can't swivel it, make sure that you've extended the arm. It only moves a fraction of a centimeter, but it's necessary to free the swivel. His elbows are single hinges, but he can get a little over 90 degrees. His wrists can swivel. His thumb is fixed and cut with his palm to make a 5mm peg hole. His index finger can move independently and is pinned at the base knuckle. The other three fingers are one solid piece pinned at the base. His waist can swivel, but some of the kibble on his back will prevent you from getting 360 degrees. I think the range you do get is natural, but if you want more you can unfold part of his backpack to clear it out of the way. His hips can move forward about 90 degrees and backwards until his thighs start banging into his tank turret. They're kind of odd, too... when you rotate them, you'll hear some clicking that makes you think they're ratcheted. From straight out to back agains the turret is five clicks... but the five clicks don't in the same spots moving backward as they do forward. And the joint basically works and behaves like a friction joint. Lateral motion is definitely friction, and he can handily do 90 degrees. The gray thighs swivel around the black hip joints, which prevents them from being able to do a full swivel but give you a nice, natural range. If you need a little more, he's got an additional swivel below the knee for transformation. His knees are strong, single-jointed ratchets that get probably around 120 degrees of bend. His heels a fixed, but the front half of his foot can bend down or inward 90 degrees. If it helps, his toes can also bend downward due to his transformation. He holds his guns just fine. No MP slots, tabs, or other gimmicks, just good old 5mm pegs. Before we move on, can we take a minute to appreciate how clean Brawl is? Yes, he's got the tall shoulders, treads jammed up into his shins, and a turret on his back, but there's not a lot of other obvious tank kibble. Even the turret on his back doesn't seem to hang as low or cover as much as Heavy Noisy's, and the main gun retracts instead of hanging way above his head or folding over. Even more impressive, at least to me, is that the combiner ports are hidden away and not super obvious. I feel like this makes for a much more dynamic figure than the more traditional, chunkier Brawl with the big tank chest. Much like his robot mode, Brawl's tank mode isn't entirely toy or 'toon accurate. The black panels on his shins stand out a bit, and he lacks the dual hatches of the toy (or an actual Leopard 1 tank). He also lacks the random boxes, machine gun, and turret lamp of the cartoon. Accuracy aside, Brawl might be one of the best-looking tank alt modes I've seen. There's painted details and translucent lights on the front, and everything fits together snugly to make a flat surface under the turret that hardly looks like it should transform. It really looks a lot better than the poorly-hidden head, large seems, and vaguely sci-fi turret on Heavy Noisy. The front of the tank lines up nicely with the sides and treads, instead of sharply sloping down and sticking out the in an odd way. Although I do like how Heavy Noisy's pistols sit to teh sides more, like machine gun turrets, the way Brawl's guns tab into the back of the turrent and sit closely together is more remincent of both the G1 cartoon and toy. UT's tolerances are a little off, though. The tabs seem a little large for the slots they fit. I put them in once, and you can see one side immediately developed som stress marks in the process. Another odd QC thing, although this one seems to be normal, is that if you open the back of the turrent and peek inside you can see the tip of a screw poking through. Minor blemishes aside, Brawl rolls on four small wheels under the non-functional treads. The turrent can rotate 360 degrees, and the main gun can tilt upward a little bit, although I'd have liked it to be able to tilt more. When it comes to negatives, I really don't have a lot to say that I haven't already. A little more attention to tolerances, a bit more upward range on the main gun, and maybe a touch more cartoon accuracy like a darker olive and ditching the black on his shins would have been nice And I prefer painted eyes to light piping. The positives far outweigh the negatives, though. He's got good articulation. He's got good proportions. His transformation is in that sweet spot that's not too complicated, but involved enough to be fun. He looks fantastic in both modes. The joint tolerances and plastic quality are spot on. He's a great Brawl, but more than that, he's a good transforming toy in general. I definitely recommend him. But more than that, he's so good that I'll say he's worth picking up even if you already have Warbotron, as UT's Brawl is significantly better in pretty much every conceivable way than Heavy Noisy. I think the only real question for some people is whether they should go with this or Zeta's. I'd like to handle a Zeta Combaticon before judging them, but everything I've seen indicates highly-stylized robots covered in kibbly folded panels coupled with extremely inaccurate alt modes that happen to be half-a-head to a head taller. If they were a little shorter, and their combined mode didn't seem to rely on a huge partsforming bit of pelvis and thighs like Constructor's, I don't think anyone would even bother with this conversation. The only reason that I can see why you'd want to go with Zeta instead is because size matters more than aesthetics to you.
  9. mikeszekely
    I really shouldn't care enough to ask, seeing as I hated Skyline and probably wouldn't watch a sequel without being blackout drunk, but it's going to bug me if I don't... Why are Monsters and Skyline sharing a thread? What's the connection, aside from both making significantly more at the box office than they cost to make?
  10. mikeszekely
    You could be right. A quick Google search does show me that a lot of Cherry Vanettes have some sort of off detailing there (although not always black). Plus, I didn't bother looking at the G1 toy because... well, it's kind of crappy as a Transformer (as a Diaclone mecha suit it's pretty boss, but that's another story). Looking at it now, though, I see it had that black line, so... 1 point for accuracy, TFC. Out of a possible 100.
  11. mikeszekely
    Yeah, it's great getting guys like Ironhide and Ratchet, Grapple and Inferno, etc without feeling like you literally bought the same toy twice. BTW, here's my Salus review.
  12. mikeszekely
    Since the MP line kind of sort of relaunched with MP-10, I've been pretty ok with the releases. I mean, Magnus didn't wow me, I don't really care about Star Saber, and Bee's realistic Beetle mode still strikes me as off, but I get where they were going. Then came MP Ironhide. Ironhide was a shift away from the Hasui-era aesthetics for a look that hewed even closer to the animation. Some people seem to really dig it, but I've always thought it's a tad boring. Those of you who follow my little reviews here probably remember me going with Voodoo's Salus for Ratchet instead of the official. BBTS has recently been clearancing some TFC stuff, so I decided to grab Ironwill, their version of an "MP" Ironhide, for less than even a KO of the official. You'll notice that I put "MP" in quotes, and that's because he's not the most G1 accurate Ironhide. He's got red shoulders and gray biceps instead of the other way around, chromed bumpers decorating his ankles, a van torso that's just not quite right, his shoulders, pelvis and forearms seem much more heavily-armed than they ought to be, and while I've complained that the official MP is lacking some of the detail that a Hasui MP would have the random pain and greebles TFC tossed onto Ironwill are pretty much just that- random. To top it off, he seems a little short. Although I don't have an official MP van to compare with, my impression of Salus was that he's very close to the same size, while Ironwill seems maybe half a head shorter. But he's still a full head taller than the iGear vans, so he's not really suitable for CHUG, either. Despite not pulling off a G1 look as well as Salus, I must confess that I sort of dig the aesthetics. I've said many times in the past that I like getting toys that are traditionally repaints from different companies because I like it when they're visually and transformationally distinct. Ironwill makes for a beefier Ironhide that almost reminds me of IDW (despite not really looking like any IDW version of Ironhide to date), similar to but definitely distinct from Salus. Ironwill comes with three accessories. He's got a small rifle, kind of Gundam-ish if you ask me, done in white with some nice black details. He's got a big sniper rifle, in gray with black and red details. Sadly, there's something that looks a bit like a bipod molded onto the underside, but it doesn't move or make for an actual bipod. Lastly, he's got the a wrist gun from that time that he... wait, did he ever have a wrist blaster like that? Ironwill's head is on a ball joint that has a fairly limited up/down and lateral tilt. His shoulders use a soft ratchet for rotation, and another ratchet for 90 degrees of lateral motion. A transformation joint gives him a bit of a backwards butterfly joint. His elbows bend 90 degrees, and he's got swivels at the biceps and the wrists. His wrists don't really lock in after transforming, which gives them a bit of up/down range. Oddly, his hands aren't the same. The right hand is your standard MP car-style hand with a fixed thumb and four fingers molded together in a curl pinned at the base knuckle. The curl of the fingers and the cut of the palm makes it suited for 5mm pegs. The left hand, meanwhile, has each finger and the thumb molded as individual, curled pieces attached the the hand via ball joints. Again due to transformation, he's got a slight ab crunch.His waist swivels, but you need to be mindful of some folded flaps on his back. His skirt armor is all hinged so it can move out of the way, and his hips can go a little over 90 degrees forward or backward on ratchets, and about 90 degrees on strong ratchets. That's about 4 clicks. His thighs swivel, and he's got ratcheted knees good for 90 degrees of bend. And then we come to his feet, which quite frankly are awful. Due to his transformation they can swivel (which does mean you can display him with his big, windowed heels as his toes instead). Multiple hinges give you a bit of up/down tilt, with independent tilt in the heel. However, his inward ankle tilt is so miniscule I'm going to say it's basically non-functional. One click outward on the hips and you're already balancing him on the inside edges of his feet, and you cannot put his feet flat. That's a huge disappointment, well below 3P standards. Even most Iron Factory and DX9 Legends-scale figures have better ankle tilts. On a Masterpiece-style figure it's inexcusable. Speaking of inexcuseable, Ironwill holds his guns fine... in his right hand. His left hand does have a little tab on the palm, and there are slots on the guns, but the tab is so shallow and the balljoints so weak that whatever you try to put in that hand will fall right back out. Folding in either fist does reveal a little peg, and the wrist gun can fit over either wrist peg. Additionally, he's got a flip out little dish from that one episode (I think MP-27 has somethign similar?), and the other arm opens to reveal a keyboard but no screen or anything. Both are ok as gimmicks, but I wish they'd have painted the back of the little dish red instead of leaving him with a big white upside-down "T" on one arm. Ironwill turns into a van, as he should. He's a similar size to Salus, but you'll notice that he doesn't really have the same silhouette as the Cherry Vanette, having a sort of flatter front end and, and that kind of makes him look a tad undersized. There's no place that I can find to store any of his accessories, despite having a little gap on the underside. Slightly-off proportions aside, he looks fairly good in van mode. He's got rubber tires, chrome bumpers that seem to be the appropriate shape, smoked translucent headlights and taillights that are also fairly accurate, and molded lights under the front bumper that would look better in color but are at least present on MP-27 and real Vanettes. The side mirrors are funky-looking. He's got Ironhide's signature yellow stripe down the side, but for reasons I'm not clear on there's a big black line in the middle of the stripe near the rear. There's also a black stripe going across the front that's a bit out-of-place. You might already be put off by the questionable aesthetics, the fact that this is a TFC product, the useless left hand, or the apalling lack of functional ankle tilts. Unfortunately, that still leaves me to tell you about the transformation, which is a mess of folding panels and tight tolerances. Then there's the panels themselves, which just lay on his collar, the sides of his lower legs, and the backs of his forearms without tabbing in. Not that tabbing would help, because the front of the van that angles down onto his abdomen is supposed to tab but does so ineffectually. The tabs holding his knees in place are only marginally better. Bottom line, I think I've got less for $40, but I still can't recommend Ironwill. He's just not a good figure.
  13. mikeszekely
    Got a few packages (and there's more coming), so I'm going to do the usual and share with you guys. Tonight we'll be looking at DX9's Carry, their version of a Masterpiece Rodimus Prime. I'm not sure if I mean, yeah, that's Rodimus Prime all right. The wheels on the fronts of his biceps, the huge wings, his head, and the shape of his legs give more of a Studio Ox vibe than a Sunbow vibe, but you can see for yourself how well DX9 matched the colors and details with MP-09 (or you could even better if I had the Japanese version, which had black lower legs and the orange and yellow on his forearms, instead of my Hasbro version). The only really noticeable "error" was giving him black hands instead of gray. And, while your mileage may vary, I really dig the Ox notes. Taller Hot Rod with more lines on his face seemed to always be doubting himself. Ox Rodimus looks like a beefcake capable of filling Optimus' shoes. Like the official MP Hot Rodimus Primes, Carry's got a backpack on him, but it's really no worse than MP-09's and probably an improvement from MP-28. The butt flap's probably the biggest strike against it. Well, that and the fact that the back of the wings aren't yellow, but rather red with yellow and orange flames. This is due to his transformation, and in my opinion, not super egregious because wings with flames on them are pretty cool. If the size comparison with MP-09 and MP-28 isn't eneough, here he is with MP-10. Carry's lone accessory is his rifle, which for some reason DX9 decided to make a Targetmaster. I mean, it's a nice homage to Targetmaster Hot Rod, the little robot does look kind of cool with his Hot Rod-ish wings and head, and I'll give credit to DX9 for coming up with a transformation that both gives the little robot a weapon and has a unique tranformation that results in something that kind of looks like Rodimus' weapon instead of the usual curling up and maybe flipping out a barrel. The little robot's head is fixed, and his shoulders, elbows, hips, knees, and ankles are ball joints, so he's got fair articulation. His gun is kind of too big for him, though, so he can kind of only hold it with his arm totally straight. Alternatively, there are holds on the underside of his forearms you can peg the gun into. And for a size comparison, here he is with the Firebolt figure that came with Hasbro MP-09. Unfortunately, I don't have Eligos, Andras, or Buzzing, so I can't compare with their Targetmaster buddies. When I say that's his lone accessory, I mean it. While it seems like I have an abundance of small Matrices because they seem to come with every toy of every character that even looked at the Matrix, Carry doesn't get one. You can open up his chest, and there is a silver and blue panel with a Matrix molded onto it, but that's it. There is a cavity underneath that you might be able to toss MP-09's little Matrix into, but for some reason I can't find mine. The one that comes with MP-10 is much too large. It almost looks like the Matrix that comes with KBB's downsized MP-10 it could fit, if you cut notches into the orange plastic for it. Oh well. Carry's head is on a ball joint that can look down a little before his big chin touches his chest, up only the slightest bit, and a fair amount laterally. His shoulders are ratcheted for lateral movement, and he can actually get 90 degrees of bend, although you'll have to rotate the shoulder a bit so it doesn't hit his head. Speaking of shoulder rotation, that too is ratcheted and he's got just enough clearance that he can get around his wings. He has bicep swivels, but they're just above his elbows, which are single hinges good for 90 degrees. His wrists can swivel. His index finger is pinned at the base and can move independently, with an addition mid-knuckle hinge. The remaining fingers are molded as one curled piece with a single hinge at the base knuckle. His waist swivels. His hips are ratcheted universal joints. Interestingly, the red hip skirt is pinned to the joint and rotates with his leg as it moves forward and backward just shy of 90 degrees on friction joints. Outward movement is ratcheted and good for 90 clicks through 90 degrees. The first click is a tad wide for my tastes, although not as bad as figures like Salus or Calidus, but there's enough play between the detents and enough weight in the figure that you can spread a little before you get to that first click. He's got thigh swivels, and soft-ratcheted knees that get just over 90 degrees. His feet can tilt up but not downward, and he's got hinges that provide for some nice deep ankle tilts. He holds the rifle that comes with MP-09 pretty good. This is fortunate... ...because he sucks at holding his own rifle. The grip is just a 5mm peg, but his hands aren't really cut for 5mm pegs. Plus, the peg is a little short and the barrel so long that gravity alone is enough to start tipping it out of his grasp. It doesn't help at all that the stock his much longer than his forearms, so just like his Targetmaster he's kind of stuck holding it with his arm straight. I've seen alternate fan transformations for the gun that helps him hold it better, but you're much better off giving him MP-09's gun if you can. Heck, he can even hold Firebolt better than his actual gun. When Hasbro released their MP-09 without the trailer, I think a lot of people were thinking "big deal, the car is cooler and I was just going to display it in bot mode anyway." I was pretty disappointed, though, as I might be in the minority that thinks Space Winnebagos are kind of cool. Carry does indeed turn into a Rodimus Prime-style Space Winnebago. It's a pretty good match, too. The cab is on spot, the pipes bend around to the top the right way, it's got the orange skirt aroudn he bottom, the yellow and orange stripe near the back, and the flames doen the sides (flames that aren't just painted, but molded into the sides. The front of the trailer is angled, although perhaps not as aggresively as it could be, and has the orange and yellow coloring of the cartoon and MP-09. Two things are a bit off, though. For one, the rims are all a gunmetal color instead of silver. Two, the spoiler is missing. The first thing is just odd, but the second can be forgiven due to the fact that, unlike the G1 toy or MP-09, Carry transforms without removing the trailer. Large portions of the sides make his wings, the orange skirts fold around themselves to form the bulk of his lower legs, and the rest (along with his canopy) fold into his backpack. It's a simple, clever transformation that is largely very effective despite leaving him with a backpack of obviously-stacked panels. It also goes a long way to explain how we go from a robot that's roughly MP-10-sized to an alt mode that's actually very similar in size to the original G1 toy. This does beg the question of whether or not Carry is large enough in alt mode, but honestly I think he's fine. He's maybe a little too small, but less too small than MP-09 is too big. Carry does have rubber tires and he rolls pretty well. A peg hole on the top of the trailer allows you to peg his Targetmaster buddy up there (alas, MP-09's gun doesn't work there). In a nice but uncessary touch you can see DX9 even used some silver paint on bits of the rear. Back in the day, when I got my Hasbro MP-09, I remember being kind of happy with him despite him being a fidgety mess. I think a lot of collectors have since replaced MP-09 with MP-28 and have been pretty satisfied that they have a much better MP version of Hot Rod. If you want a Rodimus Prime, though, you don't have a lot of options. Fortunately, one of the few options you have is really good (and it isn't MP-09). DX9 did an amazing job crafting a Rodimus Prime that has a presence that MP-09 never did. I love the way he incorporates the trailer into his transformation, and I love that the transformation is pretty intuitive. My complaints are few, fairly minor, and mostly forgiven as necessities of the engineering that gives him that great transformation and trailer incorporation in the first place. His accessory is really my only big complaint, but if you've got MP-09 you can always steal his weapon. If you don't, you can always check out Shapeways. Carry's a little on the pricey side, but if you can track down a reasonably-priced one on the second-hand market (I got mine for $130), I definitely recommend him.
  14. mikeszekely
    I put in a preorder. A lot of people are picking at certain details, and while I don't mean to dismiss the criticism entirely the fact remains that I don't have any MP Seekers, save for an Walmart Skywarp based on MP-3, and Howling Meteor looks a lot better than that. In fact, I'll say I'm probably in for Skywarp and Thundercracker repaints, but I'm not sure if I'll do the coneheads too. Speaking of Meteors, Galaxy Meteor (Maketoys' Cybertron/Galaxy Force Starscream) have been extremely positive. I couldn't be bothered to finish Cybertron, and I've got zero attachment to the character or the design, but I might just check him out after all.
  15. mikeszekely
    Well, cheer up. I've got Leonidas and Gunfighter II on the way now. Gonna save up for Alpha Pack and Spartacus. I think GT's Megatron to go with their Optimus is next month... so now I kind of want a 3P to do a Beast Wars II Galvatron and a G2 Megatron.
  16. mikeszekely
    Are you asking about toys, or are you asking about fiction? If the former, I'd guess because G1 is what sells for 3P. Original designs haven't fared super well... while Maketoys' Cross Dimension line has been getting some good buzz, MMC's Cyclonus was basically trashed for not being IDW enough. That said, both Maketoys and Fans Hobby are doing Super Ginrai. Maketoys' will be part of their Cross Dimension line, and looks to be maybe Ultra-sized with a Legends-sized cab robot. Fans Hobby's Ginrai will be roughly the size of MP-10, and Super Ginrai will be... big (like the top of MP-10's head will come up to the bottom of the windows on Super Ginrai's chest). As for fiction... Armada Prime could combine with his trailer. And although they weren't box trailers, Energon and Cybertron Prime also combined with their trailers. And most recently, in Robots in Disguise (the new one, not the old one) Optimus's trailer is part of his body by default, not a "super mode". So... Why not IDW? As different as IDW's designs have become, IDW began as a G1-ish series. Guess they don't want to stray too far from a classic design. PS~ I want MP-ish figures of ALL the Optimusses. Not sure how to work it into my budget, but I've got eyes on Gunfighter II (Laser Optimus Prime), Alpha Pack (War Within Optimus Prime) and Leonidas (Lio Convoy). Plus I'm following the development of Fans Hobby's Super Ginrai, and Generation Toy is working on an Optimus Primal based on this design: So yeah, if 3P gets tired of doing straight up G1, I'll happily take a Big Convoy, Fire Convoy, Armada Optimus, Energon Optimus (please make the base robot suck less than Tubbimus), Galaxy Convoy, Prime Prime, Star Convoy, Hero Optimus... just about any Optimus.
  17. mikeszekely
    Oh, I see the problem. You want an Astrotrain that looks like an actual shuttle, I'm happy to have one that looks like the cartoon. (I'm the same way with Blitzwing... I don't like Gewalt's attempt to make the plane mode look like the actual plane it was supposed to be, I prefer Ditka's attempt to recreate the funky biplane from the cartoon.) In that case... Evil Star? His engines look weird, but other than that he's probably your best bet for a shuttle that looks like a shuttle.
  18. mikeszekely
    With a Megatron, a Shockwave, Constructicons, my US-releases of Starscream and Skywarp based on the old MP-3 mold (although Starscream has a busted wing), and Insecticons I feel like I've gone from someone who wasn't collecting MPs to someone having MP-style releases of nearly all the Season 1 Decepticons (kinda regretting selling off my Hasbro Soundwave now...). Let's finish filling my fodder with Maketoys Visualizers, their version of an MP Reflector. There are a couple different sets out there, and I'm not really going to touch on the FansToys or KFC versions. I'll just say that, aside from the white on their feet, they're very animation-accurate (not that FT and KFC aren't). The purple helmets are a shade too thin, but I think they have the best face sculpts of the three options and they have the most cartoonish pelvises. There are also some interesting details; the two end guys are basically the same toy, but the middle is very different, yet they molded fake panels and hinges on the middle's legs and feet and fake slots on the end guys' crotches to keep them visually cohesive. It's not fair to keep referring to them as "end guys" and "middle guy." Like the G1 toy, Maketoys did give them individual names. On the left is Analyzer (Spectro), the middle is Lensfinder (Viewfinder), and the one on the right is Monocular (Spyglass). Lensfinder is easy to tell apart, due to being a different figure and having the shutter in his belly. From the front, Analyzer and Moncular are nearly identical. It's a lot easier to tell them apart from behind, though. Unlike FT and KFC's efforts, the lens is not detachable. It actually splits apart and integrates into their backpacks. Analyzer is the one with just the purple backpack, while Monocular's got the big green lense on his back. A quick size comparison. These guys are much taller than MP Bumblebee or any of the MP-style Insecticons. They're just a little shorter than an MP car. I really don't know and don't care how accurate that is to the Sunbow scale chart, but it works fine for me. The Visualizers come with a good amount of accessories. The black part and the gray part are for camera mode, and we'll talk about them later. We've also got a small camera to represent them mass-shifted, three very G1-style guns, three alternate faces, and a camera flash. The flash isn't just for alt mode; there's a handle on it so any of the Visualizers can hold it, and the front flips open to reveal some molded missiles inside. I like that there's no goofy accessories that transform into the lense. The extra faces aren't really working for me, though. On the left is the default stoic face, which is fine. There's an evil grinning face which I dig. The others, though, are "worried pooping" and "about to cry," neither of which are really what I want on even my cannon fodder Decepticons. It's a shame, too, because I'd have liked them all to have different faces. As it stands, Lensfinder gets the grin and the other two will have to remain stoic. All of their heads are on ball joints that can look up a bit, down until their chins touch their torsos, sideways a bit, and rotate. Their shoulders are on ball joints with the shoulder armor snapped over the peg like a Gundam model. They can rotate and move 90 degrees laterally. They have bicep swivels, and double-jointed elbows that don't quite get the full curl. Their hands are like MP cars with wrist swivels and all their fingers molded as a single piece pinned at the base knuckle. They have waist swivels. All three of them are limited by their backpacks, but Lensfinder does have a bit more swivel than the others due to his waist joint sitting a little lower. They have friction universal joints for hips. They all get get about 90 degrees forward and backward (although, again, Lensfinder slightly exceeds the other two), but only a little over 45 degrees laterally. They have thigh swivels. Lensfinder's knees are double-jointed, ratcheted at both ends, and allow him to get all the way to heel-to-butt. The other two have soft ratcheted knees, with friction transformation joints that kind of act like a double-jointed knee, but can only manage 90 degrees of bend regardless. Their ankles are ball joints that give them a little up/down tilt, at least 45 degrees of inward ankle tilt, and a bit of a swivel. Their guns fit into their hands via a tab on the back of the handle that fits into slots between the thumb and the palm. The connection is a little loose, but with their hands closed around the handles they're not going to fall out or anything. As is tradition, the Visualizers each transform into a chunk of camera, and those chunks combine to make the whole camera. It's a mix of cartoon and toy details (interesting, based on the screenshot I'm looking at, none of the three MP Reflectors are 100% cartoon-accurate in camera mode). White and purple, though, it seems good enough. I'd have maybe liked the lense to white or gray instead of black, but on the whole I think it's fine. Again, I very much like that you can get to this cartoon-style two-shutter button look without any accessory attachments. Those shutter buttons have springs so you can push them, but they don't make any sounds. Maketoys put some nice detaisl on the top of the camera, including a little tampoed LED display, some molded siwtches and buttons, and a molded film winder thing. You can pop one of the shutter buttons out and put the gray part in. The bottom is a bit unfinished, with obvious robot legs and hips. The black part fits between Lensfinder's legs and then slides into the slot on his crotch. You can use it to mount the visualizers onto a tripod (not included). From there, it's just a matter of sliding the flash into the gray part if you want a more toy-style look. Personally, I'm content to leave all those bits in the box with the extra faces and just go with their G1-style guns. There is no place to put the guns in camera mode, though. I have to be honest, I'm a little disappointed with the Visualizers. In hand, with a lot of thin plastic and ball joints, they feel a little cheap for "Masterpiece" figures. I do like that they make a pretty good camera without a lot of accessories, though, and to be honest, the price was right You can currently buy this set for just $80 ($96 after shipping) directly from Maketoys. That easily makes Maketoys the cheapest option for an MP Reflector, and Reflector is exactly the kind of character that you buy because he was on the show a lot as cannon fodder but don't really want to spend a ton on because he's just cannon fodder. For the integration and the price, I think he's worth it and I'd recommend him unless you have strong feelings about one of the other sets. Me, I'm kind of curious about the KFC set, but good luck finding it. As for the FansToys version, despite their reputation I think they have the worst faces and entirely too many screw holes on the back, so they'd be my last choice.
  19. mikeszekely
    Not to derail the official thread with 3P talk, but the Captain is pretty good. The plastic quality and joint tolerances could be better, but for the only product (that I know of) from an unknown Chinese 3P and the $60-$80 he can be had for on evil bay I've got no complaints. Well, except for the fact that he's a little shorter than the MP-3/MP-11 Seekers.
  20. mikeszekely
    Yeah, so I guess the question now is do I get the Season 1 Autobots, or skip ahead to Season 2 Decepticons? Wait, were there any Season 2 Decepticons that weren't combiners besides the triple changers and the Coneheads? He's a little short, but I'd stick with my Transportation Captain for Astrotrain, and we've got at least two MP-ish versions of both Menasor and Bruticus coming. Maybe I'm closer to Season 3 than I thought...
  21. mikeszekely
    Huh. Seems I accidently went from "I'm not collecting MPs!" to having MP (or MP-ish) versions of nearly all of the Season 1 Decepticons in a relatively short time.
  22. mikeszekely
    Robots In Disguise is, perhaps, my least favorite Transformers fiction (that'd be the 2001 American version of Car Robots, not the current one cartoon, although I'm not real fond of that one either). It was corny, and half the villains were repainted Beast Wars characters. It was kind of nice to see some realistic cars turning into robots again, but characters like Prowl and X-Brawn were basically horrible shellformers. There were a few things I liked about it, though. Super Optimus Prime (Fire Convoy), Railracer, Ruination, and Scourge. I was especially fond of Scourge because, although he wasn't the really the first black repaint of a Optimus/Convoy, he was my first exposure to the idea of an evil version of Optimus and probably the character who really cemented the idea of that black repaints of Optimus are Black Convoy/Nemesis Prime and not the real Optimus with new paint (like Nucleon Quest Super Convoy). After hearing some good things about it, then, I decided to check out Archenemy, an MP-style Scourge/Black Convoy from new kids on the block Fans Hobby. Archenemy is maybe a shade taller than MP-10, and is definitely a pretty good Scourge likeness. Differences from the cartoon, like the blue on the edges of his "helmet" and the grill that isn't just a black rectangle is toy-accurate, if not cartoon accurate. Some extra detail, like the vents and panels on the teal part under his chest or the grooves in his mouth plate, seem to be a deliberate attempt to give Archenemy an aesthetic style very similar to MP-10, a move I approve of. The teap on him is all a gorgeous metallic paint. It all comes across as using MP-10 as a model making an MP of Scourge's cartoon appearance then tossing in a little extra toy details. I'm not really able to come up with much of anything to complain about aesthetically in this mode. I can, however, complain about the lack of accessories, because that sword is it. Granted, it's not a bad sword, with a nice translucent red blade and a black hilt that, although not entirely cartoon or toy accurate, I prefer to having a whole red/pink sword. But, c'mon, no gun? (Apparently Fans Hobby is working on a trailer for Archenemy that will include a gun for him.) Archenemy's head is on a hinge swivel. He can look up probably about 30 degrees and rotate his head, but that's it. His shoulders rotate on ratchets, but the angle of the truck kibble can cause his shoulders to get caught up on his backpack. A friction hinge inside his shoulder armor can move his arm laterally a little less than 90 degrees, but the armor itself can swivel inward a bit to get him just past 90 degrees, and ratcheted transformation joints can let you manipulate the shoulders even higher. Like MP-10, the arms also can slide outward from his torso a little to give you a little extra clearance. He has a bicep swivel a just above his elbow, which is a single-jointed friction hinge that does go past 90 degrees. His wrists can swivel. His thumb is fixed and his fingers are pinned at the base knuckle. The index finger is separate, with an addition hinged knuckle, while the other three are a single molded piece. Although his index finger can move independently and has a little extra articulation, he can't open any of his fingers very far so he can't even manage MP-10's droopy pointing. He has a small ab crunch, and his waist can swivel. His hips are ratcheted in every direction, and whichever way they move they get more than 45 degrees but less than 90. His thighs swivel just below the hips. His knees are double-jointed, both ratchets, and he can get some pretty deep bends before his calves start banging his thighs. His feet can point down a little, nothing really upward, with incredible 90 degree inward ankle tilts. Plus, his heels and toes can wiggle slightly up or, due to transformation, bend very far down. He holds is lone accessory very well, using a notch on the handle that fits into a groove in his palm very similar to newer Maketoys figures. If for some reason carrying his sole accessory in his hand is too much of a burden for him, there are panels on the backs of his shoulders that can be rotated around to reveal peg holes. A peg can be folded out from the middle of the sword's hilt, and from there it's a simple matter to plug it onto the back of his shoulder in a way that just looks awkward. I'm not one who usually criticizes toys for being too easy to transform, but Fans Hobby didn't add a lot to what was already a super simple transformation. The result is... fair. It does have rubber tires, and I like that they painted the lights above the cab as well as the headlights. They really should have molded another vertical line where the front of the truck splits, because that gap is pretty unsightly, and he's missing some of the teal stripes. Due to some differences in engineering, his forearms still form a step but it's too far forward and sticks out ridiculously far. Then, instead of being a black fuel tank, the rest of his forearm is a diamond-plate box, with silver fold out fuel tanks instead. He's completely missing the black and teal air breathers... and his trailer. Speaking of trailers, no, this guy is NOT compatible with MP-10's trailer. I don't have a problem with that, though, as Scourge shouldn't be pulling anything but an oil tanker. The step isn't even under the door. Even if I was fine with that, and fine with it sticking out so far, and fine with the missing air breathers, would it have killed then to have some kind of folding ladder or something to fill that ugly gap between the step and the fuel tank? As long as we're talking lazy, look at the way the feet just hang out from the back. I think even the original toy did better than that. How hard would it have been to make the front of the foot, which is already pretty hollow, two pieces instead of one? If they'd done that, with a hinge between them, the toe could have folded in against the back of the truck. Also, super lazy for them to have molded tail lights but leave them unpainted. Finally, MP-10 gets a lot of flack forhaving really obvious robot legs on the back, but half of Archenemy's thighs are still showing. As part of his transformation, panels from the backs of this legs fold to the insides, like MP-10, but Archenemy would have been much better off with slightly thicker legs and panels that folded up to hide his butt and thighs instead. So where does that leave us, then? We have a robot, wtih nearly perfect robot aesthetics and very good articulation with nice paint and even a little diecast, which is great. But that robot has a transformation that makes some of Hasbro's current Deluxes seem complicated that makes for a more mediocre truck mode that might have really benefitted from a little more engineering, next to nothing in the way of accessories, and he's not a G1 character. All-in-all, Archenemy is a good toy, but one that I'm not sure is worth the asking price. If he were $100 I'd not only recommend him I'd probably be buying the Laser Optimus repaint, but as it stands I feel like I got a lot more bang for my buck even with more expensive figures like Op Ex.
  23. mikeszekely
    There were a bunch of Autobot cars and minibots, but the Season 1 Decepticons were basically Megatron and Shockwave, the (non-Conehead) Seekers, Soundwave and his tapes (pre-Ratbat), Reflector, the Insecticons, and the Constructicons. That's it, right? Everyone else is Season 2 or later?
  24. mikeszekely
    For a long time I've been saying that I'm not really doing MPs, that my head-canon is a comic-bookish land where Transformers are similar more similar in size than the Sunbow chart would indicate and that Voyagers work best for me. But I have an MP-10. And a couple of MP cars (regular and 3P), because they were sort of Voyagerish. And lately, other more MP-ish figures have been sneaking into my collection, like Despotron (Megatron), Salus (Ratchet), Op Ex (IDW Optimus), and Powertrain (IDW Motormaster) at the MP-10 range or stuff like Brawny and the Insecticons I've picked up that are smaller but still meant to go in an MP collection. Logic dictates I get an MP Shockwave. In this case, I went with Cloud 9's Quakeblast. Takara's official toy is, perhaps, a more cartoon-accurate Shockwave, but I'm not really sure why anyone would actually want a cartoon Shockwave outside of completionist reasons. He was rarely in the cartoon, chilling on Cybertron while the rest of the Decepticons did stuff, and on the occasions when the action would come to Cybertron he proved to be an incompentent sychophant. No, friends, a Seeker-sized, skinny-legged lickspittle who can't aim for jack despite being a guy with a gun for a hand that turns into a gun isn't for me. When I was a kid, I didn't just watch the cartoon, I also read the Marvel comics. That'd be the comics where Shockwave single-handedly takes out all of the Autobots before beating the tar out of Megatron and taking over as leader of the Decepticons just because he decided it was the logical thing to do. I wanted a darker purple, beefier, taller Shockwave, and man does Quakeblast ever fit the bill. The head, the ears, the protruding hexagonal chest, the ridges on top of his chest, the protrusions on his shoulders, the knee pads, the feet, the rounded silver sides on the lower legs, all Shockwave. The vent under his chest is a little exaggerated, but I'm cool with that. The purple may be too dark for some people's taste, but again, I'm pretty cool with that too. Seriously, my one and only complaint is the toy-accurate translucent pink hand and hand-gun. I've heard that some runs of Quakeblast came with a solid hand (or at least additional translucent hands and gun-hands), but the secondhand copy I received didn't have much in the way of accessories. And sweet baby Primus, the paint. All that silver you see? Paint. The metallic purple? That's either paint, or a really paint-like finish on the plastic. He definitely looks like a premium figure. Since we're talking aesthetics, let's address something upfront. Quakeblast has been called a knock off of FansToys Quakewave. It's even rumored that stores like BBTS and TFSource didn't carry Quakeblast because of pressure from FansToys. Whether or not you think Quakeblast is a KO depends on where you think the line is. Cloud 9 clearly didn't copy FT's mold. They're aesthetically similar in the way that Hypno and Grenadier are, because they're meant to be the same character, but the sculpt is entirely original. They definitely aped FT's engineering, though. I've heard people say, "well, there's only so many ways you can do Shockwave" and to an extent, to the way the upper body transforms, that's true. But the differences in transformation across the entire figure, including the way the legs and backpack work, have only the most minor of differences. Is that enough to make it a KO? If so, would that make ACE toys Cliffjumper a KO of MP Bumblebee? Or does borrowing another company's method of transformation but doing an entirely different sculpt make for an original toy? Well, that's a call you guys can make for yourselves. All I'm saying is that I picked the one that is aesthetically the closest to my mental picture of Shockwave. Because Quakeblast didn't come with much of any accessories, we're going to skip them for now and just talk about them later, when we get to alt mode. For now, we'll go right to articulation. I think his head is on a ball joint, but both his up/down and sideways tilt is fairly limited but it rotates fine. His shoulders are ratcheted in the round part that's in his torso, then ratcheted again inside the shoulder armor itself, with a rotational joint in between them. Between the two joints his lateral motion greatly exceeds 90 degrees. The only thing to watch out for is that, due to the shape of his shoulder armor, there's a small range using the joint in his shoulder for lateral movement inhibits the rotation, but it's pretty easy to just use the joint in his chest instead. His biceps swivel, and his elbows can bend a little over 90 degrees. His right hand can swivel at the wrist, then each finger is individually articulated. The thumb is on a ball joint with two additional hinges, and the fingers are ball-jointed at the base with one additional hinge. His waist is on a ratcheted swivel that can be slightly hindered by his backpack rubbing the scope on his butt, but the scope can be moved or the backpack removed. The armor on the sides of his hips are hinged to give him clearance. The hips themselves ratchet forward about 45 degrees and backward a bit less than that due to the fixed front and rear waist armor not giving enough clearance for one or two more clicks. They can move laterally a little short of 90 degrees on friction joints that hold great despite the diecast in his feet (so there was no reason for the crappy ratchets with too much gap between teeth in Calidus' hips, MMC, and yes I'm still sore about that!). He has soft-ratcheted thigh swivels just below the hips, but if you want a finer control over the angle of his lower legs there's a friction swivel below his knee as well. The knees themselves are ratcheted and good for 90 degrees. His heels and the front silver part of his feet can bend up a little and down a lot. He's also got about 45 degrees of inward ankle tilt, but be aware that if he's standing stock straight the armor on the sides of his legs may tab into the purple part of his feet. Cloud 9 included a few LEDs... as far as I know, there's one in his head, one in his chest, and one in each hand/wrist. I can't show them all off, due to the lack of batteries, but I found enough to light up his eye. Under bright lights it looks good, but in dimmer lighting you can't see his face with the light on. It's like staring into the sun. Now, about that backpack of his... it works ok as a backpack, although it doesn't hug close to his back and the hinge for the scope seems inadequate to pretend to be the backpack hinge. If you like, though, you can remove it to give him a cleaner (if less accurate) look. As with FT's Quakewave, the backpack can split down the middle of one side then wrap backward around itself to form the alt-mode barrel. Unlike Quakewave, Quakeblast includes a second, more G1 gun barrel as one of the few accessories. So here he is with the backpack barrel (left) and the G1 barrel (right). The G1 barrel is longer and definitely looks better on him, but there's something to be said for the all-in-oneness of the backpack barrel. Like the G1 toy, the G1-style barrel has no purpose in bot mode. I've also heard stories of some people (notably Youtube personality peaugh) breaking the gun hand due to how it sits in the G1 barrel. I've been ok so far, but I also sanded the clips down a bit and cut out some of the plastic inside where the gun hand sits. The only other accessoy I have with my Quakeblast is a second hose. The idea is that the first hose is longer for robot mode, so it doesn't interfere with his articulation, while the second hose is a little shorter for alt mode. Honestly, it takes a bit of effort to remove the hose from his back, so I don't think it's really worth switching them out. I've also heard that the connection to his arm is a loose. It is, but not so loose that it comes out while posing him or anything. And finally, there he is with another MP gun-bot. He's much longer, but much shorter than Despotron. The trigger is more for show than function, as there's no spring or anything to move it back into place. The entire handle feels small and he's not very comofortable to hold. The butt of the gun doesn't quite have that tapered G1 shape, either, but it's close enough for me. I mean, it's just a little off in a couple of areas, but those seem to be concessions to making his robot mode look as good as possible, and I'm generally ok with that. Concessions aside, it's still very obviously a Shockwave space-gun. This is one of those times when I say that it's just great that we as a fandom have so many great options for so many characters. Like I said at the beginning, the official version is definitely more Sunbow G1, and if that's what you want or if you just prefer to go official when possible then MP Laserwave is a legitimate choice. If you're like me, though, and craving a more imposing Shockwave I really can't recommend this guy enough. For a company's first (and, aside from some upcoming repaints, only) figure it's very polished with excellent paint, copious ratchet joints, and excellently-toleranced friction joints in places that aren't ratcheted. He's a fantastic figure, and relatively cheap to boot (ebay prices range from around $60-$80, and TF-Direct sells him for $80 with free shipping).
  25. mikeszekely
    That's true, but the FT cubes are just a hollow, translucent purple that feels like your usual translucent plastic. The BadCube ones are solid and have a different feel that's hard to describe. I think I like the BC ones better, although they're both smaller than the clear cubes that come with MP Soundwave or the cubes that came with Despotron.
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