mikeszekely

I also finally received a copy of NewAge's Romulus. Romulus is the first 3P Megatron that turns into a gun and is meant to scale with Hasbro's mainline figures instead of the usual 3P Legends and MP offerings. As you can see, he's smaller than ToyWorld/Zeta's Hegemon, barely equal in height to Hasbro's official Siege/Earthrise Megatron. And that's in height; he's a fairly lean figure. While I do think I prefer the proportions on Romulus overall more than the somewhat awkward Siege/Earthrise, I do like a chunkier Megatron overall. It's a bit better or worse when you compare Romulus to his main rival... depending on the figure you're using. His overall proportions match extremely well with Earthrise Optimus. However, not only is he nearly a head shorter than SS86 Optimus, he loses quite a bit of bulk against him as well. Looking at them like that, I can't help but point out a number of other things about Romulus. He's actually got a lot of paint, but the paint is that flat gray color on most of his body, with a weird gray for the face that has an almost greenish tinge. There's diecast in his feet and parts of his legs. Romulus is trying too hard to get that Sunbow look, which makes him a little out-of-place with Earthrise Prime. And the diecast and paint make him a little more "premium" than SS86. These complaints may seem petty... a toy is too good? I'll elaborate on that in a minute. But first, enjoy the back and side views! NewAge's previous attempt at a Megatron, their Legends-scaled Agamemnon, was criticized pretty hard for having a very ugly back. NewAge clearly took the feedback to heart, because Romulus is clean as a whistle from darn near any angle. Scaled down, Romulus would give Magic Square's Doomsday more of a fight than Agamemnon did. Scaled up, Romulus could replace MP-36. NewAge must have been under some pressure to keep the final cost down. As great as the figure looks, the accessories are almost an afterthought. I mean, you got the fusion cannon, which is fine, but the red bump is actually a separate piece, and there's a milky translucent bit in the barrel that really makes me wonder if a light-up gimmick was planned at one point but scrapped. There's a trio of alternate faces, and they're as good as the stock one. But the rest is Megatron's signature mace, the laser sword he used during his fight with Prime in the '86 movie, and the pistol he used to murder Prime with in the '86 movie. Those last three are done entirely in a translucent purple plastic; fine for the mace and the blade of the sword, but cheap for the gun and the handle of the sword. There's no stock, and no silencer. As for as faces go, the stock face (far left) is a neutral expression. There's two open-mouthed faces, one with a happy maniacal laughter face and the other with an angry yelling face. The forth face is one of the best faces I've seen for a Megatron. I've heard it called his "duck face," but if you've watched the '86 movie as many times as I have over the years you'll recognize it as the sneer he makes after saying, "More than you imagine, Optimus Prime!" in response to Prime saying, "Now all we need is a little Energon and a lot of luck" on Laserbeak's recording, and NewAge absolutely nailed it. I think the last time I'd seen a face sculpt on any toy that so completely nailed the character might be MMC's Saltus (Springer). The change faces, pull up the entire top of Megatron's head along with the face; it's pegged in. Once you'd done that, the face has a tab at the top that fits into the forehead. Wiggle the tab out, swap in a different face, then plug the top back into the rest fo the head. Speaking of heads, Romulus's is on a ball joint. He can look up or down or tilt his head sideways about 30 degrees in addition to the standard swivel. His shoulders rotate, and you should get at least 90 degrees of lateral movement. His biceps swivel. His elbows are double-jointed and get nearly 180 degrees of curl. His wrists swivel, and are hinged so they can bend up or down. His fingers are articulated; they're hinged at the base and middle knuckles, with his index finger being separate from the other three. The thumb just has a hinge at the base that has it fold in a somewhat unnatural position. His waist swivels, and he's got over 90 degrees of ab crunch. Due to his somewhat unconventional hip skirts his hips can move forward and laterally a tad under 90 degrees, and only about 45 degrees backward, but that should be enough for most poses. His thighs swivel, and his double-jointed knees bend until his shapely calves collide with his thighs. His feet tilt up and down a little, and have over 90 degrees of pivot. All-in-all, really top-notch articulation. Romulus' wrists are pegged in, so using his mace is as simple as unplugging one of his fists, then plugging the end of the mace into the hole. His fusion cannon has a tab on it that fits very snuggly into a slot on either forearm. His grip on the sword and gun are a bit more tenuous. They both rely on the tension of his fingers wrapped around the handle. Where the thumb ought to curl around and rest over the top finger it instead must be either left half open, or be folded against his palm along side the handle. The first time you transform Romulus is bound to be a bit intimidating. The instructions aren't always clear, and there's a lot of thin parts on hinges. Once you know what you're doing, though, it's kind of clever. Instead of the usual stuffing the head inside the chest his chest actually turns inside out over his waist and lower back. The final result doesn't have quite the same level of real-world details as the G1 toy, but it's really one of the better attempts and it's interesting how similar in size it winds up being to the G1 toy. There's no safety, and some of the mechanical details that should be under the slide have been replaced with some basic hinges, but there's some texture molded into the back of the slide and the grip. I'll also note that there's a cutout in the back of the grip that's filled in with small pieces that are quite removeable; perhaps a stock and silencer were planned at one time. Perhaps they could still be released as an add-on later? Like the G1 toy, you'll find the gun is a bit on the small size, but still mostly fits in your hand, and you can squeeze the trigger though there's no spring and you'll have to reset it manually. While I was playing with Romulus and taking pictures for this review, I couldn't help but think back to the one Chang Tiao did a few months back. I remember having a discussion with someone who was complaining that it was a pretty crappy figure; mediocre articulation, super basic transformation, hollow lower legs, gaps in the alt mode. And I told them that was exactly why it was good. Chang Tiao understood the assignment- make a Megatron that turns into a gun to replace the tank in the Core-class. They turned in a figure that cost nearly the same price as a Core-class figure, with exactly the same sort of simple engineering and aesthetic flaws you'd get from Hasbro on that budget. The resulting figure couldn't possibly have fit better with Hasbro's own Core-class figures if Hasbro had made it themselves. I'm not sure NewAge understood the assignment quite the way Chang Tiao did. Looked at one way, I think NewAge made one of the very best Megatron figures ever at any scale. But looked at another way, they made a figure with diecast, and I can't remember the last time Hasbro used diecast. They painted the figure with more paint than Hasbro budgets for a Titan. They made him Sunbow-accurate to a degree that not even SS86 manages. It's complicated enough that you're NOT going to be flipping it back and forth between modes. And the result is a figure that doesn't quite have that Generations aesthetic; it's too premium. Which brings us to the cost. $105 from ShowZ (and more like $140 if you buy from an American retailer) for this figure, with clear signs that it was going to be even more but they scaled it back by eliminating paint from the accessories, dropping stuff like a stock and silencer, and dropping electronics from the scope/fusion cannon. Now, in the general scheme of 3P $105 isn't outrageous, but it's roughly double a Leader-class. There's an argument to be made here that if NewAge did the sorts of things Hasbro does; simplified the engineering, static hands, rely more on colored plastic over paint, etc, that they could have turned in a figure that closer to Hasbro in both cost and aesthetics. Then there's the elephant in the room... just look at the box Romulus comes in. NewAge heard, like we all did, that a SS86 Optimus was coming, and they figured they could cash in by making a Megatron to go with him. But, and I know hindsight's 20-20 and all, they wound up jumping the gun. They made a figure that scales perfectly well with Earthrise Optimus Prime, but falls short (pun intended) of being a true rival for SS86 Optimus. If they'd waited a few more months and made Romulus a little bit bigger then he'd be one of my easiest recommendations ever, even with my quibbles about his price/aesthetics/engineering compared to Hasbro's. Instead they worked from an assumption (no matter how reasonable it seemed), missed the mark, and left the door open for another 3P to come in and eat their lunch. Heck, it could be that company that keeps KO'ing their Legends stuff, just come in with a KO Romulus that's 15% bigger. As for this writing, if you're in the market for a Megatron to go with some version of Earthrise Optimus then you should definitely get Romulus. If you're in the market for a cool Megatron toy and don't care about the size, get Romulus. If you're looking for a Megatron to go toe-to-toe with SS86 Optimus, though, event though it doesn't transform the Yolopark AMK Pro version might fit you better (especially if they ever get around to the promised re-release with the more cartoon-style deco), or you might want to wait to see what official SS86 Megatron Hasbro turns out.

It's not so much that IPS/VA has advantages as much as OLED has disadvantages in that area. 1. As discussed, long-term display of static images can lead to image retention or burn-in on OLED displays. 2. Due to the different way OLED subpixels are laid out Windows TrueType fonts can have fringing issues when displayed on OLED. 3. OLED tends to be more expensive (though not always). Then it comes down to the fact that most of OLED's advantages are a boon for gaming and content consumption but have little bearing on productivity; better contrast, wider color gamut, true blacks, high refresh rates, less motion blur, wider viewing angles, etc. If you're playing a modern video game or watching a movie in HDR then the picture quality of OLED just can't be beat. This isn't to say that you can't use an OLED for productivity. I definitely do productivity work on my desktop, and frankly the 32:9 aspect ratio (it's basically like two 16:9 27" monitors side-by-side) and Windows Snap is pretty great for the stuff I do. But the thing is, I maybe put 4 hours of gaming in for every hour of productivity I do on my desktop, assuming I'm not just surfing the internet on something like the M1 MacBook I'm currently typing this on from the living room instead. But if you're not really using your display for gaming then cons of OLED start to outweigh the pros.

I think if you're primarily doing productivity, yeah, IPS is probably the better way to go. For what it's worth, though, I don't notice any text fringing on my G9 OLED. I'm not claiming it's not there, mind you. Just that, from where I sit (two to three feet away, with my eyes level with the top third of the display) at 1440p and the scaling set to 100% I'm just not seeing it. It's possible that I might if I got up closer, but as I'm now in my mid-40s* I'd need reading glasses anyway. *I joined MW when I was in college. It's weird to think that there are people here I've been talking to for basically my whole adult life yet I've never met any of you in person.

That last figure would be Deluxe-class Dark of the Moon Hatchet. Let me preface all of this by saying that the history of this mold is weird. It originally began life as Berserker, from The Last Knight's toyline. In the earliest days of Studio Series, before Siege came along and sort of raised the bar for Hasbro's figures, Berserker was retooled into Crowbar. Fair enough; since Berserker's CGI model was largely copied from Crankcase they shared the same alt mode and a lot of design similarities, and Hasbro at least remolded a lot of the robot parts on Crowbar so he was more accurate to Crowbar's CGI model. The mold would pop up again when Hasbro decided to redeco Crowbar and release it as Studio Series Crankcase- which actually makes him super inaccurate, and one wonders why they didn't redeco the original Berserker version instead. Regardless, by early 2019, whether you bought both Studio Series Crowbar and Crankcase or you (like me) decided to sub a copy of Berserker for Crankcase, you had two of the three "Dreads" from Dark of the Moon. It's taken us six years, but finally someone at Hasbro was like, "hey, maybe the Bayverse fans* would like to complete that team?" *While G1 is still king, there is definitely a large, vocal group of collectors who came up later than most of us here who definitely did very much want this. Perhaps in an attempt to maintain cohesion with Berserker/Crowbar/Crankcase, Hatchet is again another retool of Berserker. A lot of the robot parts are new or at least tweaked, while all the alt mode parts are the same. And, frankly, the result is kind of a mess. The new parts are kind of phoned in, lacking in some of the basic articulation the original versions of the mold had, and leaving the unmodified car kibble draped awkwardly like it doesn't belong. The grill of the car just dangling off his butt is visually the most egregious, but the worst is actually the car panels on his forearms, which are only very tentatively tabbed into his arms and come off almost constantly. Oh, that reminds me... this is his sole accessory. It's his tail. And, like I said, articulation is kind of a problem. His head swivels, but in a quadrupedal stance that equates to 360 degrees of tilt with no ability to look side-to-side. His jaws open. His shoulders are on ball joints, but the stems aren't hinged like the original versions. They're forever stuck in the "shrugged up for transformation" position, leaving them too close together and too far forward on his torso. It also restricts his lateral shoulder movement to 35-ish degrees. His elbows bend over 90 degrees, and he does have bicep swivels. His wrists bend up, but they don't swivel or pivot, so he can't really stand with his front feet flat. He's got no torso articulation. His hips are ball joints for swiveling and moving about 45 degrees laterally. No dedicated thigh swivels, but his knees are ball joints and bend about 90 degrees. His digitigrade ankles can tilt upward, but like his front paws he's got no pivot. Combined with the grill of his car dangling back there and getting it the way, it's hard to get him into dynamic poses. This is further compounded by the fact that he has no tail articulation. It has a forked tab that you're meant to wedge into the space behind the hinge for the grill kibble. At best, it just points straight out the back. But the fit is exceedingly poor, so what're more likely is that you're going to see it falling off. Constantly. Just like the kibble on his arms. Despite the more bestial shape and remolded robot parts transformation is by and large the same as Berserker/Crowbar/Crankcase. He's a shellformer, so half the transformation is unfolding his backpack. When you've done that, you straighten his arms and turn them inward so the kibble on his forearms lines up (assuming it hasn't fallen off), then you turn his legs in, straighten them, and bend forward at the hips so the kibble on his calves also lines up. Then you line up the grill and you're done. It's easy on paper, but in practice because you're relying on ball joints it's trickier to line everything up than it really needs to be, and that frustration is made worse by the fact that the panels on his arms, which go a long way toward holding the vehicle together, don't like to stay attached to the figure at all. It is kind of cool, having three different robots that all look so similar in alt mode. The only way to really tell them apart is the fact that Hatchet's missing the Decepticon badges for some reason (and Crowbar's dreads won't stay hidden under his alt mode). Hatchet even still has the slots on the rear fenders for spiked club accessories that Berserker and Crowbar came with. Of course, he doesn't have spiked clubs, just his tail. As near as I can tell, the forked tab that connects the tail to his butt plugs into a slot created by bringing his hands together under the vehicle, then closing the legs around it. The instructions really look like they're telling you to do it upside down, but that can't be right because the tab on the tail wouldn't plug into anything and it'd fall back out. Before Siege came along and elevated what mainline Hasbro Transformers could be it probably made a lot of sense to go back to the then-recent The Last Knight toyline for molds that could be reworked for the fledgling Studio Series. In 2025, though, it gives us a fiddly, barely-functional mess of a figure. Remolding Berserker again does have the benefit of keeping the alt mode consistent across all three figures, and maybe that's enough to keep the Bayverse fans who've been wanting this for six years happy. But at some point in the last six years someone needed to step up and say, "TLK Berseker is kind of old and not-good, maybe we should do new versions of all three Dreads from scratch?" If you're one of those Bayverse fans who's been waiting over half a decade to complete that freeway chase scene by all means, here's your Hatchet, but everyone else should stay away.

I was hesitant at first, and before finally pulling the trigger I was considering the Odyssey Neo G9, which is/was a similar 32:9 49" Samsung display, but with a VA mini LED. But the curvature of the Neo is too aggressive for my tastes, and despite being an older model it was often selling for more than the OLED. Plus I keep seeing articles like this one about how burn-in isn't really as big a deal as it's made out to be. Since I use my desktop mostly for gaming and the picture on OLED displays flat out looks better and I didn't want to spend more for less I went with the OLED. Aside from occasionally wondering if 32:9 was really the way to go or if I should have gone with 21:9, I have no regrets. When I'm working on the desktop I'll notice that the entire screen will shift occasionally, and it does a better job of displaying the desktop while still in HDR mode without blowing everything out than my old LG. And games look fantastic. It's pretty cool when you're exploring a dark tomb in a game like Assassin's Creed Origins/Odyssey, and it's genuinely dark without losing detail, then you exist into the sun and with HDR on you're squinting at that sudden brightness like you just stepped out of a movie theater after a matinee. And so far, no issues with burn-in or static images. To be fair, though, I don't like to leave static images up too long. With my LG I'd leave the screen on all day, but with the Samsung I set a screensaver to run if I don't use the computer for five minutes. Funnily enough, I set the same screen saver on my ROG Ally X, and I had it hooked up to my LG side-by-side with the Samsung. Screen saver came on the Ally first, and I was thinking, "oh, this looks fine, maybe I didn't really need to upgrade after all." Then the screen saver came on the desktop and suddenly the LG looked like trash. The colors were so much duller, and on a dark gray background instead of pure black.

I had a pretty nice 27" 4K LG monitor, and I thought it looked great... until I saw a demo kiosk that had a Nintendo Switch and Switch OLED that were both running Tears of the Kingdom. The OLED didn't just look better, it was revelatory. So I replaced my LG with a 49" Samsung G9 OLED, and honestly, I don't think I can go back. I'm trying to convince my wife into letting me replace the TVs in the house; ideally anything in my house with a screen on it going forward would be OLED (alas, I don't believe the Switch 2 will ship with an OLED display, and OLED displays on portable PCs like the ROG Ally are a rarity).

I appreciate you thinking of me. Seems like a great deal, but when I buy a laptop I gotta lug that thing to China, and 16" is bigger than I'd like. I probably will go over my budget, but because I'm eyeing this guy https://www.bestbuy.com/site/asus-rog-zephyrus-g14-14-oled-3k-120hz-gaming-laptop-amd-ryzen-ai-9-hx-32gb-ram-nvidia-geforce-rtx-5070-ti-1tb-ssd-platinum-white/6613954.p?skuId=6613954 I have the original Zephyrus G14 with the RTX 2060, and it's been my favorite laptop I've ever owned. The new one's got a 5070ti, double the RAM, and a much better OLED display. And let me tell you, after replacing my desktop monitor with an OLED, I don't think I could go back to LED.

And DLSS. I haven't really liked Frame Gen so far, though I'll give the new version a try, but DLSS 3 was already pretty good AFAIC. If DLSS 4 is even better I'm not sure why you wouldn't use it.

I really hope Hasbro will be shipping this guy soon. Ok, that robot actually looks better than I expected. Need to see the alt mode. I still think Optimus Prime and Macross 7 is a pretty out-there choice for a crossover when SDF Macross and Jetfire are right there, but it might not be the clustertruck I was expecting.

Legacy United isn't the only line with new figures coming out. Studio Series is a bit trickier to follow, what with everything not broken into neat annual lines and releases getting seriously shuffled around. But, I'm pretty sure I have all of this wave in hand, and despite no apparent need to clean house before moving on to a new year, that's pretty much exactly what Hasbro did. Yeah, just like the final wave of Legacy United, this wave is all* repaints and retools before we get to the good stuff in the spring. *almost all So up first, we have the only SS86 figure from the wave, Leader-class Galvatron. Nothing retooled here; he's strictly a repaint of Kingdom Galvatron. This might make him a bit of a hard sell for people that bought that version, and perhaps even harder if you bought the Legacy version that didn't have the Siege-esque schmutz on his forearms, chest, and shins. No remolding means stuff like his chunky proportions and short back spire are still issues. And his goatee and belt buckle are still unpainted (I might have to pull that sticker off the Kingdom version for SS86's belt). He comes with the same crappy chain, Matrix, and weird Revenge-shaped guns I didn't need the first time around. But the colors, man! I know he's sometimes more purple in Season 3, but when I think "Galvatron" I'm definitely thinking of a bluer shade akin to the SS86 version. And while I do enjoy the sparkly translucent cannon, I have the toy-colored version for that. The solid orange is a better match for the cartoon. The use of gray on places like his knees and shin instead of black isn't just more cartoon-ish, the G1 toy was technically gray there, too. And the glossy gray face seems to bring out the details better than the metallic silver. And, again, no schmutz! Alt mode is mostly the same case. I very much prefer the bluer purple and the grays instead of lilac and black. However, in alt mode I do think he loses a bit for not having the metallic paint on the rim around his cannon. As I alluded to, buying another copy of a Leader-class figure just because the color is different is kind of a tall ask. In my personal opinion, though, SS86 Galvatron looks so much better than the Kingdom toy that I think it's worth swapping. Next up, Voyager-class Gamer Edition Skywarp. Skywarp himself has no mold differences from Starscream, and he comes withe same mace. However, Starscream's Null Ray has been swapped for a Thermo Rocket Launcher. I feel like Hasbro's taking advantage of the fact that collectors tend to go for all the Seekers, because compared to Starscream he's a little phoned in. Like Kingdom Galvatron, the shade of purple they used is too bright and not blue enough. And he's straight up missing paint apps Starscream had... his toes should be purple, and there should be gray on his shins. The mechanical details on his forearms aren't painted the way they are on Starscream, either. Starscream took some flack for his fat cockpit, gaps in his fuselage, and tiny wings (even though the tiny wings are game-accurate). I personally found Starscream to be one of the better GE figures, though. So, your mileage may vary, but I don't regret picking up Skywarp and I await the inevitable Thundercracker repaint. We're finishing off the day in Rise of the Beasts. First up is Deluxe-class Doublepunch, who is a straight repaint of Scorponok. Although technically the red one should be Sandstorm, and the blue one should be Doublepunch. I wonder if Hasbro will eventually release a tannish-green version and call it Sandstorm so we can actually have Scorponok? If they do, the completionist in me will buy it, but should you? Like I said, there's no mold changes here, and the blue one was already kind of an awkward robot with unsatisfactory articulation, too much kibble, a waist that doesn't tab in properly, and a tail accessory that attaches oddly to the inside of his forearm. Alt mode is only marginally better. Still very limited articulation, but at least this looks like something we saw in the film. So, no, unless you're a completionist for Rise of the Beasts I can't actually recommend this mold in any color. Last but not least we have Leader-class Apelinq. Much like the CGI model in the film, Apelinq is retooled from Optimus Primal. He's sporting new shoulder pads, new forearm armor, and a new head. Interestingly, given that Primal usually had a battle mask in the film, I believe the designers actually intend for you to swap the new head onto Primal and give Apelinq the head with a mouth. Apelinq retains the key to the space bridge, though it's entirely orange now, and the two-part chain accessory that Primal came with. He loses the axe, though, and in place of Primal's scimitars he has shorter curved blades. The instructions tell you to connect the chain to them as you can with Primal's scimitars, making something akin to a kusarigama. The issue, though, is that the chain parts are identical, with a 3mm peg on one end and a 3mm port on the other. That worked for Primal because one of his scimitars has a 3mm port, the other a 3mm peg. Both of Apelinq's blades have pegs, though, forcing you to connect the chains on the side of the last link. Beast mode is the only one of Apelinq's modes to actually appear in the film. As with his bot mode, the new forearm armor and shoulder pads, as well as the grayer color, help him stand out from Primal. However, he's also got a new, film-accurate beast head with the same hinged jaw as Primal. In both modes, you can fold the handles of the blades to sit under his fists, and the blades themselves can plug into notches on the forearm armor to give him his more iconic arm blades. I already though Primal was a good figure, and I think Apelinq is retooled and repainted just enough to be worthwhile... though, as a character who dies in the opening scene of the film, perhaps not essential. **I technically have one more figure to go over. And, while I think he is technically a retool, he's so extensively retooled that I think he'll merit his own review. Realistically, I'm far more excited for stuff like Age of Extinction Optimus and the 86 Stunticons than anything in this wave. That said, with a pretty decent Apeling and a (personally) greatly improved Galvatron, plus two weaker figures that at least tickle that completionist itch, I wouldn't say it's the letdown that the final wave of Legacy United was.

The individual Predacons look bad. Like, sure, there's joints and stuff that look like a regular retail Hasbro product, but their proportions are way worse.

I mean, Nintendo still makes some of the best games, so I figure I'm in. I just wish they'd launch with OLED.

Looks like a less-good Valkyrie...

I'm pretty pumped for Age of the Primes, but before they start hitting shelves Hasbro decided to do one final, bonus wave of Legacy United. So it's review time... not for a single figure, though. For the whole entire wave. Up first, we have G2 Breakdown. He's sporting a new-to-me head, though if you bought the toy-colored Menasor giftset you'll be familiar with it already. Otherwise, for better or worse, it's the same mold with the same issues... only one gun when his mates all got two, and a spoiler as an accessory that won't really be an accessory once I cut it in half and it can stay on his calves, like I did with the regular version. He also has the same reused not even close to a Lamborghini nose from Wildrider, which is the thing I hate the most about him. Both versions. So... yeah, I guess get him if you've bought the other two G2 Stunticons and cross your fingers for a G2 Wildrider and Motormaster (which they almost certainly will). Or, maybe get him so your Menasor has some kind of leg bot if you were buying the Legacy Stunticons at retail and missed out on G1 Breakdown (which seems to be a thing people did). Otherwise Breakdown isn't the G2 Stunticon you want to start with. Next up is a guy that wasn't much of a surprise... it's Armada Wheeljack. We've already seen this Sideswipe retool in the form of Shattered Glass Sideswipe, who himself was originally a repaint of Armada Wheeljack. While Wheeljack has no mold differences from SG Sideswipe, SG Sideswipe already had a new head, chest, and doors compared to the Siege/Earthrise versions. Wheeljack also has the clubs that were created for SG Sideswipe, which were Wheeljack's weapons in both his original toy and the Armada cartoon, and the shoulder rocket launcher that has nothing to do with Wheeljack but gets packed in with every version of this mold, no matter how retooled. Oh, and speaking of the cartoon, the deco Hasbro went with is cartoon accurate, not the yellow stripes on the toy, but with a number of "we ran out of budget for paint" issues like a black hands instead of silver, no silver on his thighs or feet, and no gold on his biceps. Wheeljack, like the other retail Armada characters, does NOT have the minicon that Sideswipe came with. While Wheeljack's bot mode is, more or less, close enough, his alt mode suffers the most for being a Sideswipe retool. The clubs stick out weirdly from the sides, and he's a little too flat. Plus he's missing his spoiler. Ultimately, I think Wheeljack is fine. Despite being a major part of Hot Shot's story arc he was a very late edition to the Armada cast; I would personally prefer the "new mold" budget go to a more worthy character. And, despite getting a little long in the tooth, the Sideswipe mold is still a solid one. If you're collecting Armada I say pick him up; I'm definitely happy to have him rounding out my collection. On the other hand, if you're not into Armada and you've passed on guys like Optimus, Megatron, and Starscream I can't imagine why you'd suddenly want Wheeljack on your shelf. And... well, that's it for the Deluxes, as the rest of the wave were package refreshes of Cosmos and and Origin Bumblebee. If you missed out on them, Cosmos is pretty great and you should definitely grab him this time. Origin Bumblebee is the weakest of the Origin figures, but ultimately OK enough. I'm happy that people are getting another crack at them; Cosmos was previously a notoriously shortpacked Walmart-exclusive, and I think there are probably a number of people who passed on Origin Bumblebee as not entirely necessary when he was the only one, but maybe regret skipping him after Jazz and Wheeljack became a thing. Both were already in my collection, though, so we can move on to the Voyagers... ...which are just more package refreshes. In this case, Ramjet and Tarn. Ramjet I kind of get; he was previously part of a store-exclusive two-pack with Dirge, and Dirge himself was part of a package refresh not so long ago in Legacy Evolution. I think that begs the question, though, what about Thrust? I recall him being the most difficult of the Coneheads to acquire by far. Perhaps he could have replaced Tarn in this very wave, because his inclusion is a real head-scratcher for me. He wasn't some kind of store-exclusive before, he already had a retail release less than two years ago in Legacy Evolution. I've heard some people complain that he was hard to find at retail... was it really that bad though? I recall him shelfwarming at my local Walmart and Target. But, even if you did miss his retail release, there was the Target pack with the moderately-redecoed Cyberverse Tarn, along with Tarnatulas, and Squeezeplay, fighting Prime Cliffjumper. A set that, despite many people buying it just for Squeezeplay, appears to be shelfwarming because I've been to two different Targets since the weekend and both still had stock. So, yeah, I guess I'd recommend Ramjet and Tarn if you don't have them yet, but in the back of my mind I'm pretty sure if you wanted Tarn you already got him. And that brings us to the Leaders. So we've got Overcharge, a redeco of Blitzwing with a barely-retooled head that's based on the Diaclone version of the G1 toy. His accessories are the same; a sword, two rifles, and those stupid Hulk hands. As was the case with Blitzwing, the tank mode is passable if you can ignore the cartoon-accurate cockpit sticking out the front. But the jet mode is still absolute trash, and the Hulk hands are a waste of plastic. I sincerely hope that if the team ever takes another crack at Blitzwing, maybe in Studio Series, that they spend the money on his abundance of accessories on better engineering. You should pass on Overcharge; I only bought him because I've bought all the Diaclone repaints so far, and Overcharge is the first one that's making me question my life's decisions. But hey, at least Overcharge looks passably good in two out of three modes! Because the second Leader and final figure in the wave is one more package refresh, Galaxy Shuttle. Galaxy Shuttle, you may recall, was a repaint of Astrotrain as the Autobot from Victory, ostensibly as part of the same Walmart-exclusive line Comsos was in, but with an even spottier release that made him even harder to get. So I should be saying again that I'm glad for the people who missed him the first time, except that I strongly feel those people are better off missing him again. Galaxy Shuttle sucks. Even if I thought Astrotrain was a great figure he'd be a poor fit for Galaxy Shuttle. He's missing the engine bells in the heels, the gun that's his vertical stabilizer, and the shuttle nose that's supposed to be his more prominent torso feature. But maybe those are acceptable sacrifices in your book to bring a more obscure Japanese character to retail. Well, the Astrotrain figure he's repainted from is NOT a great figure. The bot mode was ok, but BOTH alt modes sucked. The shuttle mode had a gappy, unfinished look to the rear, while the train mode looks like it's giving birth to a smaller train; the wheels don't even line up! When Legacy began with figures like G2 Laser Prime, Kickback, and Dragstrip I was pretty excited for what was to come. In hindsight, though, I think Legacy got worse as it went on, burying us with repaints and retools, some of which were head-scratchers in the first place (Chromia), others that were poorly planned in ways that caused both versions to suffer (Sideburn and Shadowstriker), and wasting new-mold cash on characters like Rescue Bots Chase and Detritus while delivering disappointingly lazy remolds for characters like Breakdown and straight up ignoring season 1 characters like Windcharger. Right now, I'm excited for Age of the Primes, but I sincerely hope it doesn't fizzle out the way Legacy did. This last wave of United isn't Legacy ending on a bang... it's more like ending on a wet fart.

I think TFA Omega is a good choice for a figure to be made one way or the other, but I don't think I'm in for him. I swore Tidal Wave is the only Titan they could get me to buy after Nemesis, and I'd have stuck with that if they hadn't made smaller, cheaper Titans like Star Convoy.

I feel like the safe bet is RiD Megatron to go with Omega Prime, but at the same time I'm not sure why you couldn't do him with a retail Commander-class. Maybe a box set with Slapper, Gas Skunk, and Dark Scream? I dunno, I have enough stuff to be excited for, I'm half hoping it's something I don't want, so I don't have to worry about scraping together a bunch of money for a toy I won't see for another year+ anyway.

Dunno if this got lost along the way, but Hasbro says they're announcing the next Transformers HasLab at Megacon, which runs from February 6-9th.

I preordered everything but Jazz and Shockwave, since they're package refreshes, and Trypticon, because despite the recolor being more animation accurate I can't justify $200 on him when I'm pretty happy with the original release. That said, the original one was super cheap at Burlington at one point... maybe I'll get lucky and the repaint will, too.

I'm thinking probably not. For one, when you change up too much stuff just for the sake of being different you run the risk of the end result being unrecognizable. Two, I think the shape of their alt modes don't lend themselves to switching places as much. That's definitely the sort of engineering challenge that can be overcome with enough transformational origami, but that would come with the more complex engineering of someone like DreamStar Toys, which seems to run counter to Mecha Invasion's style. And third, Devastator's traditional purple chest shield covers up a lot of what goes on in his torso anyway, so even if they did flip them there's a chance it might not have made much visual impact anyway unless you ditched the chest, but that would bring me to back to the first point. Frankly, I think even switching the limbs was less about originality and more about the ease of doing an all-in-one design. Traditionally Devastator has needed not just hands but whole forearms to be partsformed. Scrapper and Mixmaster's longer alt modes and room for hand storage lend themselves better to being arms. Meanwhile, I've seen what MI is doing with Bonecrusher and Scavenger (near as I can tell the final prototypes we done in early December, and should be ready to ship soon after CNY). They're sharing a lot of engineering, and doing a thing where their treads are folding into pretty symmetrical feet.

Eh, I was going to save it for tomorrow or Monday (though I guess it technically is tomorrow now, since it's nearly 2:00am here), but I'll be busy and this guy comes in the same box as Craner, so... here's Tipper, Mecha Invasion's Long Haul. At a glance, you're probably thinking, "yeah, that's Long Haul all right." Really, the first thing that I noticed that was less-than-G1 were his colors. Rather than being almost entirely green with a silver head and black arms, the green is broken up with a black pelvis, silver thighs, green forearms, and silver hands (kind of ironic, given that the other three have black hands instead of their usual green, then the first guy that should have black hands is the first guy that doesn't). There's also some painted details like the silver trim around his feet... I dig it, it looks like treads on boots. Tipper is more jacked than G1 Long Haul, but without the dumpy proportions of Combiner Wars Long Haul or even his GT counterpart here. Anyway... I'm embarrassed to say that I didn't really notice it until I had him in hand, but Tipper's chest isn't the usual truck grill you'd find on a more G1 Long Haul. You know who else didn't have a truck grill for a chest? Bayverse Long Haul. Bayverse Long Haul also had his wheels on the backs of his shoulders or shoulder blades (kind of both, they're big tires). Which is exactly what we find on Tipper. While we're at it, on Bayverse Long Haul part of the bed flap that stick out over the cab sat behind his head in bot mode. And yep, we're doing that on Tipper, too. So I feel like we're getting back to the mix of G1 and Bayverse that was missing from Craner. While we're focused on his back, you'll note that the hollowed-out plastic on his fists. Guess Hasbro's the not the only ones cutting costs by cutting plastic. Tipper gets this gun, which is decidedly less phallic than Craner's. No real complaints here. Tipper's head is on a ball joint with good upward and sideways tilt, but downward tilt's a little limited. Of course it swivels, too, but he's got a bit less clearance so he only gets about 45 degrees in either direction comfortably, and maybe 90 if his head is tilted up as much as it goes and you don't mind his chin scraping the raised bits near his shoulders. Speaking of shoulders, just like the other three he's got rotation and 90 degrees of lateral movement, but the lateral movement comes from a transformation joint on the wrong side of the swivel, giving him "Hot Rod Shoulders." His biceps swivel, his elbows bend over 90 degrees, and his wrists swivel. His waist swivels, and like Craner he's got no ab crunch. His hips go forward 90 degrees, backward a little less than that due to some kibble getting in the way, and over 90 degrees laterally, all on strong ratchets. His thighs swivel. His knees bend 90 degrees on ratchets. His feet can tilt down, but not up, and he's got nearly 90 degrees of ankle pivot. And just like the previous three, the peg handle of his gun fits into the hole of his non-articulated fist. It's cute how tiny his gun looks in his hand, given that it's not actually that much different in size than the others. Also like the other three he's got light-up eyes that are turned on/off via a magnet in his gun. Tipper's transformation, at least between bot and truck, is a return to the simple, satisfying engineering experienced with Loader and Mixer. I've heard some complaints that, like Craner, bits of the alt mode are prone to coming untabbed, but that hasn't been my experience at all. Tipper's a solid dump truck that could be used to bludgeon someone. Much like Craner, I can't find a specific make and model for Tipper's alt mode, though I think it's mostly me Liebherr vibes. That said, with it's tall, flat face and the ladder/stairs it's clearly meant to be a larger mining-type hauler rather than the G1 Long Haul's much smaller Hitatchi truck, which is certainly in line with Bayverse Long Haul's Caterpillar 773B mode. From the front and sides I think it mostly looks pretty good, though why they didn't paint the ladder on the side of the grill to match the stairs going across it is a bit of a head-scratcher. Things are a little messier at the back, specifically in the bed. To be fair, though, I think it's a better than GT's Long Haul. Tipper at least has some room in his bed, whereas GT's couldn't even contain all of his own kibble. And while Tipper rolls great on his big rubber tires his bed isn't articulated. No tipping for Tipper. Tipper does have storage for his weapon, though. On the underside, between his silver thighs, you'll find a black flap. Open it, and you can see a slot on the underside of Tipper's crotch. A tab on the back of his gun plugs it into that slot, then you can close the flap back over it. Tipper will form the waist, pelvis, and thighs of the combined mode, no fun surprises there. So, as with Craner, I'll cover it in a review of the entire combined mode later. This second set has turned out to be interesting, because if Craner is the weakest MI release so far, then Tipper is probably my favorite. It's not that he does anything particularly different or better than Loader or Mixer, I just think his bot mode looks the best (versus Loader, who I think is too skinny and loses something for having his bucket form his feet instead of a more traditional backpack). In any case, while not everyone has room in their heart or on their shelf for a set of stylized Constructions, I can't help but point out that Mecha Invasion's set of Hook and Long Haul run about the same as Hasbro's own Commander-class two-pack of same. And, sure, the Hasbro set comes with an additional trailer of combiner kibble for Long Haul to pull, Mecha Invasion's Constructicons are significantly bigger. That isn't to say that one is necessarily better than the other (I'll be getting Hasbro's, too), just that for a 3rd party product where normally just one of the two would cost even more, MI's Constructions are still a great value for sturdy, solid, extremely playable figures. Tipper, like Craner, Loader, and Mixer, is an easy recommend, and I can't wait for the third set (which will very likely be out by spring).

As much as I enjoyed checking out a design that looks as cool as Dream Star Toys' Shovel Fighter, I'd be lying if I told you I wasn't more excited to check out the second set of Mecha Invasion's boys... which I'm going to do now, starting with Craner, their version of Hook. Compared to Loader and Mixer (aka Scrapper and Mixmaster), Craner's design is pretty conventional. He's got the flat head, purple torso, (mostly) green arms with wheels on the elbows, purple torso, silver thighs, and silver toes of Sunbow Hook. His shins are green, like the toy, and he's got a big-ol crane boom on his back like both. The biggest divergence from G1 are his shins, though. Rather than the silver lumps with a cab on his left foot of the cartoon, or the green slabs which also had a cab on the left one, Craner's shins are kind of backward; they're the underside of his alt mode (with guards and stabilizers folded over his knees). Meanwhile, the cab that's usually on the front of his left leg is actually on the back of his right leg. There are some other, minor differences... he doesn't have that shelf over his shoulders that G1 Hook does, and the wheels on the sides of his shoulders are on the back. On the whole, though, it's probably even less stylized than the Generation Toy version. When I reviewed Loader and Mixer, I noted that they had several Bayverse influences, almost like they were G1/Bayverse hybrids. So it stands to reason that Craner would have to be more traditionally G1- there really isn't a Bayverse Hook to drawn on. Craner's weapon is this... unfortunate-looking gun. Seriously, is this review going to need a NSFW tag? It's even worse when I point out that the silver barrel can collapse into the black stock. Craner's articulation is pretty much on par for the set. His head's on a ball joint with decent up/down/sideways tilt. His shoulders rotate and you can tell that the designer had the same "use the hinge in the chest" mentality that gave the Loader and Mixer 90 degrees of "Hot Rod Shoulders," but due to his transformation he does have maybe 45 degrees of proper lateral shoulder movement. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend a little over 90 degrees. His wrists swivel; there's an additional hinge mid-forearm that swings inward, to help his fists clear the gas tanks on the outsides of his arms. His waist swivels. No ab crunch this time. His hips can go a little over 90 degrees forward with his hip skirts on swivels to get out of the way, and a little under 90 degrees backward due to his backpack. They ratchet laterally a little over 90 degrees. His thigs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees on ratchets. His toes can tilt down due to how they transform, but not up. He's got about 60 degrees of ankle pivot. Craner can hold his sex toy gun in either hand by simply plugging the 5mm port handle into either fist. And just like the previous two, his eyes have a light up gimmick. This time the batteries were included, but it works exactly the same- insert the battery into the LED module, stuff the module into his head, put the cover over it, and turn it on/off using a magnet in his gun. Craner has a little trick up his sleeve. Where other Hooks simply have the boom dangling from his back, Craner's can flip over his shoulder. There's a scope that folds out from the side of his boom, and a cannon folds out from the underside and plugs into the front, giving him a massive shoulder cannon. That'll teach you to make fun of his gun! From the waist up, Craner's transformation is just as simple as Loader and Mixer's. From the waist down it feels like there's a bit more origami going on with the panels in his legs, but it's nothing too difficult. That said, going from truck to robot is going to be a bit more frustrating, and his toes seem very difficult to flip out on my copy. G1 Hook's Nissan UNIC crane truck mode has never been particularly exciting, and G1 Hook's particular version of it loses at lot of what details the actual truck does have. So I appreciate some touches like the silver skid plate between the cab and the crane controls, the metal fuel tanks, and the stabilizers. And I don't even mind that Craner's cab and crane controls are on the opposite side as G1 Hook's (but, it kind of makes sense, Hook being based on a Japanese crane would have the cab on right, because Japanese drive on the left, but a Chinese company like Mecha Invasion would put the cab on the left because Chinese (like Americans) drive on the right). But I have to be honest and say that in some ways his crane mode is a bit unrefined. Like, sure, there's a molded and painted grill, and painted headlights, but the lights molded onto hinges that stuck out from the front of the cab, and there's gaps under the front. And there rear sort of has painted taillights and even a spot that could be a license plate... on what's very obviously Craner's purple chest. Plus, while the other members of this team have been rock solid in alt mode, Craner feels just a bit less so. He's mostly fine, but if you squeeze him in certain spots things start to come undone. You can play with him, though. He rolls just fine on his rubber tires. The crane can swivel, and it moves up/down on ratchet. The boom can extend, and although there's no string or chain that can lower the hook, the hook is hinged at both ends of the black part for posing. What's more, the cannon in the boom can still be deployed while in crane mode. As for his other handheld, er, "weapon," there are tabs on either side. Retract the shaft, and there's some vacant space between his arms on the underside of the vehicle. You'll find a slot there that you can plug the gun into. With Loader and Mixer I talked about their combined modes when I did their reviews... I'm not going to do that with Craner. Mainly because, by himself, his combined mode is kind of a floppy mess. He needs a friend to latch on to. But also because, unlike Loader and Mixer shattering your expectations by becoming arms instead of legs, Craner isn't really doing anything unusual here. He's forming the upper torso and and head of the gestalt. So, after the third set is released, I'll do a review just for the whole combiner, and we'll talk more about it then. For now, all I'll say is that the there's no partsforming. The combined head is inside Craner... actually, the black details on Craner's abs are actually the top of the head! So far, Craner is probably my least favorite of the set. That's not to say he's bad! He's just less good, I guess. His alt mode is just a little less refined, his transformation isn't quite as smooth (though, again, that's relative to the rest of this set... it's still a breeze compared to most 3P toys!), and there's just a few more little annoyances like his toes being hard to get out and his chest not staying tabbed in when you handle him. But also, we're talking about a fun, solid toy that comes with another figure (who we'll be looking at very soon) for just $90... that's two guys for less than one of Dream Star Toys' or X-Transbots' Constructicons, or all four released so far for less than just Fans Toys' Scrapper. Craner's very much worth the prices of admission, so he gets a recommend from me.

Yes. But we should be able to confidently say that it's some upgrade in raw performance without DLSS and Frame Gen over a 3070. Because, even if it's native performance is only on par with a 4070, the 4070 was already on par with the 3080.

I'm happy for the Beast Wars fans that are one step closer to completing their Season 1 cast, but I'm personally not doing MP Beast Wars. I'm curious about Predaking, but it's going to depend on a couple of factors... just how big is it? How do the individual bots look? What kind of price are we talking? And Basara Prime... yeesh. Jet or truck? It's got a head that's a hybrid of Prime and the Fire Valk, with the Fire' Valk's hips for shoulder pads? But the usual Prime truck-window boobs? And I can't shake the notion that I've seen that chest, with those shapes for the windows and that corkscrew between them, somewhere before...

It's a newer Micro SD standard. Basically means faster read/write.

Plus their PR team mentioned "potential" layoffs. When PR says "potential" you should read that as "definite." I can't help but be curious how they got to this state. Usually an engine switch mid-development (which, like I said, results in cancellations more than anything else) is brought on by scope creep, publisher interference, licensor interference, or the game turning out so bad that they go back to the drawing board. I know it's kind of morbid (and I do feel for the dev team), but I sincerely hope Matt McMuscles eventually does a "What Happened?" about Reactivate. Also, I still want a toy of the Megatron they designed for the game.