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mikeszekely

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  1. mikeszekely
    Last one... torso mode. Honestly, I think he's pretty spot on here. David, Scyla, you guys are of course entitled to your own opinions but I frankly don't get the hate here. Would it be nice if his head were purple with a white face, like the cartoon? Sure, if you're into that, but the head is spot-on for the original toy. The chest plate could be a little different (silver on and around those two bumps in the middle, silver squares to the left and right of center, etc) but it's unmistakably Abominus' chest. And by keeping the pelvis armor as a separate piece from the chest, Ordin retains a waist swivel. And I frankly don't get the hate for the dragon neck thighs in this mode. They're thick enough that they don't look super skinny like the original toy, but they're not too thick. Feral Rex fans might like 'em thicker, but even if you go back to the cartoon Abominus doesn't have chunky thighs. Without the chest and pelvis armor, you can see that Siegfried makes a solid torso. His forearms peg into his biceps, and then to his side, and the chest plate pegs into the the two holes on his abs as well as the now-exposed holes in his elbows, so everything's locked in tight. As for his legs, sliding the lower legs up reveals the combiner ports, and once you fold out the ports the legs can't slide back down, so they're locked into place. You can also see how the dual-barrel cannons fit in and fill out his abdomen. The pelvis armor attaches just to the center hole there, and the the sides of the armor are ball-jointed so they won't interfere with posing Ordin. Once more, for funsies, a comparison with Feral Rex's torso. I have Rex's thighs in the middle position; if you collapse them all the way they look too chunky, but if you extend them all the way too much of Leo Dux's thighs show. In this position, Looks like Ordin's torso is slightly taller from the knee combiner ports to the tops of the antenna, but Rex is taller if you go to the tips of his back guns. (Sorry for the blurry pic; Dux can't stand on his own in torso mode like Siegfried, so I had to hold him with one hand and take a crappy cell phone pic with the other). The flaws in torso mode are carry-overs from robot mode, which is that he's still got the alt-mode tail just hanging off his back, and while they're still folded up neatly the dragon's hind paws are still just resting atop his shoulders instead of pegging in. I'd still say those are pretty minor flaws, though, and probably won't even create as much backheaviness in the combined mode. Based on torso mode... well, I can't really say it's fair to recommend him. Ordin can only be as good as the complete gestalt, and I don't have the other four members. Siegfried does seem to be a very good torso, though, and based on the strength of his bot and alt modes I think Siegfried's definitely worth adding to your collection.
  2. mikeszekely
    This is Siegfried's alt mode. Articulation in this mode is just great! His necks have the benefits of using the robots knees and hips, plus an additional joint used in torso mode. The heads, as discussed, are on ball joints, and the balljoint can swivel a little up and down. His jaws open and close. His front legs have his arm joints: rotating shoulders than can swing out to the side a bit, bicep swivel, double-ointed knee, and his paws are on ball joints. For his rear legs, his hips can rotate and wiggle a little, but they can't really swing out like the front. He doesn't have thigh swivels there, but he's got digitgrade knees that bend where they connect to the hips and where they connect to the lower leg. The back paws aren't on ball joints, but they can swivel. Finally, he's got an up-down swivel on his final tail joint, his tail can swivel where it connects to his body, and the two joints in between can swivel up and down and side-to-side. You can mount weapons onto peg holes on the rear hips Or, using parts of that chest plate, make some interesting back weapons. Some of the chest pieces and his pelvis armor can make little wings for him. Siegfriend is longer than Leo Dux, but much leaner. So... I seriously have almost nothing to complain about in this mode. Deviations from the original toy/cartoon are, for the most parts, improvements. His tail is longer, his body leaner, and his forelegs aren't the little stubs they once were, but that gives him a more dangerous, predatory look more in-line with current ideas of dinosaurs and the dragons inspired by them, vs the flat, slow reptiles they were envisioned as back in the '80s. The detailing on his back legs and his claws are fantastic. Looking at him, I actually prefer that his hind legs are white like the front legs, with black thighs/elbows. It gives him a nice, uniform look. And I prefer the cartoon-style red eyes to the wraparound visor (that was a sticker) on the G1 toy). My one and only complaint is that the part of the dragon necks made by the robot lower legs are sort of chunky. Well, you could rightly argue that the robot mode didn't need to have such beefy shins, but if you look at the G1 Abominus toy you'll notice that his thighs are comically scrawny, so I guess this is just part of the sacrifice to make a good-looking combined mode. For some it's a deal-breaker, and while I can understand and respect that opinion all I can tell you that it's not as bad in hand as it is in a lot of pictures. You definitely get used to it. Based on alt-mode, I highly recommend Siegfried.
  3. mikeszekely
    Ok, so this is Siegfried, Unique Toys' take on Hun-Gurrr. As I mentioned before, I had the original Hun-Gurrr way back when I was 7 or 8-ish. While I didn't have any fictional attachment, since most of my time with the Marvel comic book was a few TPBs and a random issue here and there and as a kid I didn't care for the third season of the cartoon because Rodimus sucked and Optimus was dead, I loved the toy. I think part of it was that I got it at a time when the toyline seemed to be shifting toward Pretenders or Micromasters or something stupid, but partly because Hun-Gurrr was pretty freaking articulated by '80s Transformers standards. Needless to say, I was pretty excited to get Siegfried. For the most part, I think UT nailed Hun-Gurrr's look. Purple head with a white face, mostly white body with dark thighs and the dragon heads forming his legs and dragon legs forming his arms. He's a little beefier, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the only major departures are that he has blue eyes instead of yellow (toy) or red (cartoon), and he's got light gray forearms instead of a dark gray (toy) or black (cartoon) and black hands instead of white (toy and cartoon). You can also see alt-mode paws on his shoulders... well, better there than on his butt like the original toy. Instead, those legs fold up neatly onto his back, along with his tail (and the original also had the tail on the back). As you can see, his back really isn't that bad with the dragon legs. It's mostly the tail. He's got all the articulation you've come to expect from a 3rd-party release in this price range: head's on a ball joint, shoulders rotate and can swing out from the body (although not the same degree that the Feralcons can), bicep swivel, wrist swivel, double-jointed elbows, waist swivel, hips that can swing forward and backward or out to the sides, thighs swivel above the knee, knees bend, the feet are on ball joints. One thing to note here, Siegfried comes packaged in torso mode. At first, I thought I got a bad one because his waist extends for transformation and mine was so loose that when I picked him up the weight of his lower body would pull slide the extension the whole way out. There's actually a small tab on a panel on his back and a slot in the extension piece. If you tab it it correctly, everything stays together quite nicely. Of course, you can arm him with some guns. Now his chest plate... I know a lot of you guys hate partsformers. I don't like it on robot-to-alt or vice versa, but it doesn't bother me having extra bits that go on the combined mode. So, his chest plate wouldn't bother me if it really didn't do anything; I don't see it as being that much different than Feral Rex's pelvis armor (which all the MMC fans don't seem to mind), the G1 toy's chest plate just stuck on Hun-Gurrr's arm and made a shield, and I think it'd be difficult to integrate Abominus' iconic chest plate into the robot itself. But, if it really bothers you, I'm happy to tell you that the chest plate breaks apart and can be used in his other modes. Here, I have it as chest armor, back armor, and shields. In terms of scale, I'd say Siegfried is a tall Voyager, making him a good fit with CHUGs. As you can see, he's a little shorter than Leo Dux. In overall terms of quality, I'd say he's quite good. He's got a good feel to him; not quite as hefty as Leo Dux, but heftier than your average HasTak Voyager. His joints are mostly just the right amount of tight, he's got enough detail without being too busy, and there are plenty of tabbing flaps and hatches that he avoids the hollow look common to HasTak. Plastic quality is good. You should be able to play with him without feeling like you're going to break anything of have stuff pop off. He's not perfect, though. I do have a few gripes, but I'll remind the MMC fans that I don't think Leo Dux is perfect either, and none of the flaws are really deal breakers for me (although YMMV). For starters, there's the balljointed feet. UT obviously did it so the dragon heads would be on balljoints, but they're just a tad too loose. Not floppy, but with the dragon legs and tail on his back he's backheavy enough that they have trouble supporting him. Still, nothing a little Future can't fix, eh? There's the matter of his light gray forearms and black hands. I think this has to do with the fact that the dragon's forelegs were entirely white, and due to his transformation his arms actually become the forelegs, not the back legs. Then maybe they went with black hands to break up the white/light gray? Either way, I can live with it. There's his blue eyes... I've heard people say it gives him an almost heroic look, but the molded scowl mitigates that. I'm sure some yellow/gold/red paint would be an easy fix if you want. Lastly, while his dragon legs fold up neatly on his back with his paws draping over his shoulders, they don't actually peg in place. That's a shame, considering that said paws are hollow underneath. Based on bot mode, I'd recommend him.
  4. mikeszekely
    Barzam's giant vernier crotch would beg to differ.
  5. mikeszekely
    They released the Z'Gok, didn't they? And Jegans were in Unicorn. I'd imagine an RG Alex or Nu would sell gangbusters.
  6. mikeszekely
    Siegfried arrived today. Scyla, I think I know why you were kinda hard on the Ordin team's weapons; after watching Peaugh's reviews, it looks like only Alberich came with guns. Fenrir and Troll only seem to come with whatever you can make the feet into, and I'm not exactly sure what Hagen comes with. Beyond that, Fenrir's tails become... hooks? Whips? I dunno. Siegfried sort of fixes that. He comes with all this (excluding his chest and pelvis armor)- Even after you give some weapons to Siegfried, there's plenty to go around to his pals. I mean, there's four pretty good-looking rifles, two dual-barrel guns that could be mounted on arms or shoulders or something, and a pair of swords. The four rifles combine to make a pretty solid gun for Ordin. You can attach the dual-barrel guns to the rear, although they rightly belong in Ordin's waist. Still, if you fold the big handle back, you'll have a 5mm peg, so you could have Siegfried carrying a big gun. Alternatively, there are peg holes on the front of the gun, too. If you peg the swords into them, Ordin's gun becomes a crossbow. More to follow...
  7. mikeszekely
    Not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, yay, more RG UC kits! But the HG Sinanju and HG Unicorn were both pretty good kits already, and like others have said there are kits that need better 1/144 representations, like Nu, GP-02, and Alex.
  8. mikeszekely
    I noticed that when I was watching Transformers: The Movie with my six month old this afternoon. I'm willing to let that one slide, though, because it's on his back. As far as I know, it hasn't, but BBTS is still listing it for February.
  9. mikeszekely
    Hey, Steam users! There's some kind of event going on right now on Steam. I'm not following it, but the takeaway is free Sega games. Right now there's one bundle available; simply pick one of the games in the bundle (I went with Jet Set Radio). You'll notice that the game still has whatever price it's listed for, but under it it'll say "Packages that include this game" with a button that says "Install games." If you click on that button, you own the games in the bundle. Apparently, if enough people on Steam are either playing Company of Heroes or a Total War game, more bundles will unlock. The current bundle is Jet Set Radio, Hell Yeah! Wraith of the Dead Rabbits, Golden Axe, and Sega Classics, and upcoming bundles will include Streets of Rage II, Binary Domain, Condemned: Criminal Origins, Gunstar Heroes, Viking: Battle for Asgard, and Renegade Ops. Mixed quality, to be sure, but there's at least one game in each bundle that's worth playing, and who can say no to free stuff?
  10. mikeszekely
    Well, UW Devastator is much larger (Giant only comes up to Devy's waist). Depending on your tastes, that can be a pro or a con. It makes the individual bots approximately Deluxe-sized and the combined robot is about the same height as CW/UW Superion/Menasor/Defensor/Bruticus/Galvatron/Prime/everyone but Devastator. UW Devastator is more animation accurate (excluding Mixmaster), with solid green limbs, green treads on Bonecrusher, a purple drum on Mixmaster, and purple treads on Scavenger. Giant has a lot of black worked into him. UW's individual Constructicons are much more animation accurate. Giant's bots range from pretty close (their Mixmaster) to "what were they thinking?!" (their Long Haul). Giant's alt modes are pretty good, though. As is the case with most 3rd-party offerings, Giant is more articulated and, arguably, higher-quality. For starters, while both have separate forearm pieces, Giant's don't have a big empty space where the hand flipped out of. Giant comes with two heads, one of which has a mouth than can open and a fold out visor so you can go with either two eyes or a single visor. Hook's crane can extend and fold over Giant's back, or detach to form a sort of melee weapon. And Giant can attach jackhammer bits on his wrists. My take? UW (or even CW) Devastator is an imposing toy with better individual bots (especially if you replace Mixmaster with the Dr. Wu one), and I think he's worth buying. Giant comes with better articulation and more features, as befits a more expensive toy, but is best if you plan on keeping him in combined mode with HasTak combiners. I personally don't like their takes on the individual bots, and Giant's pretty small compared to newer 3P combiners.
  11. mikeszekely
    Headmasters only really made sense to me in the Japanese series, where the actual living robot was the head, the larger bot needed the head attached to do stuff, and the smaller bot can't stay attached in alt mode and therefore pilots it. David, isn't the new Windblade toy for the RID cartoon? The only RID figure I bought was Grimlock, and from a toy design POV they're a significant step down from similarly-priced CHUGs.
  12. mikeszekely
    I know what you mean. I mean, I swore off Transformers, but I started again because, hey, combiners! And yet I find myself making a wishlist of Titans Return figures, too. I'm probably going to pick up Skullcruncher, Hardhead, Chromedome, Scourge and Mindwipe (dunno if he was shown at Toyfair or not). Maybe Blurr... I have the previous Generations figure and I dig it (especially the IDW head), but this one has the better alt mode. I'll probably pass on Brainstorm, though. I think they did a respectable job turning Blurr's mold into Brainstorm, but the Voyager from a year ago looks much better. I'm down for Galvatron. I haven't decided on Sentinel... he looks kind of awful in all three modes, but the colors are spot on for IDW Sentinel Prime. Astrotrain and Alpha Trion are wait-and-sees. I'm definitely interested in Power Master Prime, but I'm finding myself rather cool on Blaster and Soundwave. I think they look good enough (well, Blaster anyway) but I don't feel like they scale well with Deluxe and Voyager CHUGs. On the Legends end, I'm thinking I'll get Rewind and Wheelie. And like yourself, I'm down for a Legends Kickback. Heck, if they can redeco Shrapnel as Chop Shop, there's no reason why Hasbro couldn't do a Kickback, then reuse him as Ransack. On the largest and smallest ends, heck yeah I'm down with Fortress Maximus. They did a pretty bang up job of reusing Metroplex's mold without making a toy that didn't look/feel enough like Max, and besides I didn't get my hands on Metroplex the last time around (and for the aftermarket prices on him, I might as well just buy Utopia now). And while I was never hugely into the whole Headmaster thing (aside from Brainstorm, who I actually had as a kid) for some reason the whole guy turning into a head for the guy that turns into a head for the big guy really tickles my fancy. But the tiny Titan Master figures can kiss my grits. I mean, it might be something kids are into, and it might be useful for kids who lose the heads that came with their toys and need replacement, but I have no use for them.
  13. mikeszekely
    Yeah, but not this year. My PC can run Oculus, but I'm going to give it a year or so for prices to come down and to see which VR platforms have the better software.
  14. mikeszekely
    Pretty much. I guess we won't know for sure until we see pics, but I doubt that Astrotrain will have Cybertronian alt modes. I don't expect that they'll exactly be realistic Earth modes, but stylized Earth alts. As for Alpha Trion, I don't recall him transforming at all in the original cartoon. According to the Covenant of Primus, shapeshifting was Amalgamous Prime's thing, and the T-cogs of all Transformers are based on Amalgamous's, so it's entirely possible that Alpha and the other Primes who weren't Amalgamous weren't supposed to be able to transform. I do seem to recall him transforming into something like Batman's Tumbler in Spotlight: Orion Pax, though. Which brings me to your question- doesn't look like it. IDW Alpha Trion is bigger than G1, yeah, but still similar, although he's often wearing a cloth cloak. His beard is shorter, too. TR Alpha Trion has a different head and all those beast bits that IDW Alpha Trion doesn't. Unless IDW is planning something for the eventual Titans Return storyline... well, then all bets are off.
  15. mikeszekely
    Remember that time Alpha Trion was a Headmaster? Yeah, me neither. But he's in the Titans Return line... And while we all knew he'd be coming, here's Astrotrain.
  16. mikeszekely
    The answer would seem to be the same reason why Blast Off doesn't. Because Hasbro is stupid/lazy/incompetent/cheap. While there's hopefully/probably some new parts, they're all pretty clearly existing molds. Scattershot is still Silverbolt, Nosecone is indeed Brawl, and Afterburner is the first use of Deluxe Groove outside Japan. Harder to say for sure about the others, but it looks to me like Strafe is Skydive and Lightspeed is Breakdown. And that gold disc on Strafe looks like a repaint of Legends Cosmos. He does appear to have actual hands and feet, though, instead of the combiner Wars hand/foot/guns.
  17. mikeszekely
    In addition to Computron, it sounds like Titans Return Deluxe Brainstorm is going to be remolded as Brainstorm... which makes very little sense to me when a better Voyager-class was just released, what, last year?
  18. mikeszekely
    I hope those of you who get him love, but I think I'm done with MP-scale toys.
  19. mikeszekely
    Hey, I wanted to share these, even though my painting (done with brushes) can be charitably described as amateurish. So, first up is my "Classics" Barricade, from CW Prowl. I used a lot of Reprolabels for this one, specifically the ones for CW Streetwise, 2007 movie Deluxe Barricade, and two of the extra add ons for 2007 movie Deluxe Barricade. I also repainted the entire car black, painted the doors white, the windows a light blue, and the sirens on top and in the front grill red and dark blue, with a touch of silver on the lights in the grill. For both paint and stickers, I was trying to keep as close to Barricade as possible, but some of the markings had to be rearranged to fit the shorter, wider CW figure. The CW Streetwise labels were primarily for the head and taillights and Barricades toes. Next up is "Classics" Blackout, repainted from CW Vortex. Unfortunately, the gray paint I chose wound up being not significantly different than Vortex's (I wish I'd used a bluer gray), but I eliminated the purple markings, covered all the turquoise with black and gray, and repainted the yellow missiles with a hopefully more realistic white with red markings. I also used a small set of Reprolabels intended for 2007 movie Voyager Blackout to give him the tail number and a few other military markings. The third member of the team is "Classics" Knockout, from CW Dead End. He's a bit of a work in progress yet. I've repainted him with a brighter rer, trimmed the front and rear with silver, and I got the gold rims. Not sure how I'm going to recreate Knockout's silver tribal/flame markings, though. I think I'm going to try to order a Reprolabels kit meant for TF Prime Knockout and see if I can make that work, otherwise I'll have to try to paint them by hand. Here's how they came out in bot mode. You can see I used a lot more silver on Knockout, with a little gold in his elbows and knees Barricade remains predominantly black, but I highlighted some details with a lavender paint and some silver on his shins. For Blackout, I again have the turquoise covered in black, with some dark blue and silver to break up all the gray and black. Oh, and his head is actually from my CW Blast Off (who has the Vortex head). In terms of color I'm pretty satisfied, and I think Prowl's head works fine for Barricade. I can live with that head on Blackout, because it's different than Blades/Vortex/Alpha Bravo, but it doesn't really say "Blackout" to me. For Knockout, that Dead End's head is an awful fit, and I'd like for his chest piece to look more like a car's hood. I'm probably going to hit up Shapeways and see what sort of replacement heads/chest pieces I can find.
  20. mikeszekely
    Depends on what you're going for, I guess. PE has two sets; one is the usual hands and feet, the second is a new head for Bruticus, extra parts for Shockwave to make it easier for the PE hands to hold him (if the UW Bruticus doesn't come with Shockwave, I recommend picking him up separately), a new color-accurate head for Bruticus, and new cannons for his back. From what I've seen, the cannons might be too big (they look ridiculous on Onslaught), and the head less necessary for the lighter-headed UW version. PE's feet and hands are nice, but I don't really care if they come apart to make weapons. Having feet with ankle tilts are pretty much a necessity, and taller cannons are important if you want them to remain visible with the official transformation. The thing is, for both PE sets you're looking at around $60-$70. I'm rolling the dice on Dr Killenger/GCIToys. If you preorder before March I think it's only $20, and it's just for new feet and cannons. I'm not sure how the cannons will look. The feet are modeled after the G1 toy and don't become weapons like the PE feet. That route's a lot cheaper, but you get less gimmicks and you don't get new hands. I can live with that; the CW hands don't bother me as much as they do as feet, but if you want articulated fingers the GCIToys set is not for you.
  21. mikeszekely
    With just the handful of Feralcons I have, yeah, it's obvious that MMC makes some quality stuff (I don't know why, but I get a kick out of the comic book in the instruction books). But if I wait for MMC-versions of every combiner I want (let alone non-combiner characters) my six month old will graduate from college before I get them. I'm waiting for some reviews of the two newly-released limbs, but Axle seems pretty decent and I really like Rover. My only concern is that it looks like they don't form the entire limb but attach to a skeleton like M3. I'm concerned that when Vulcan comes out he'll be overly-large. And I think that's fair. Everyone has different ideas about how a character should look (or, perhaps, how to modernize a character's look). What's more, people have certain preference and peeves that are different for some than others. For example, Alberich's arms not have a peg to lock them in place in arm mode isn't great, but it bothers me less than the forearm gaps in Bovis and Fortis. And, while I don't like partsforming when going from a robot to an alt mode, partsforming to complete a combiner doesn't bother me. In fact, I prefer it to the hamfisted ways that some companies try to integrate the combiner parts into the individual modes. I mean, Leo Dux could have had a better chest cover if it didn't have to become part of Rex's sword. Similarly, if they'd made a jointless handle for the sword instead of using Dux's tail you wouldn't have to worry about the sword flopping when you re-pose Rex. But in any case, I respect that you and David don't like Ordin, but he's pretty appealing to me. I suppose that one of the great thing about having a ton of 3P companies is that you have a lot of options (especially for Dinobots and Devastator). Regarding Quantron, yeah, I mean I get how he and his components can be pretty awesome toys in their own right. I just don't feel like they capture enough of the Technobots aesthetic for my tastes. Based on Diesel alone I wouldn't be interested in M3, either, but the combined mode looks pretty good, and I absolutely LOVE their not-Breakdown. Seriously, I love him so much that if there was a way to modify him to work with CW Devastator I'd buy him right now. I'm sure that the PlanetX Dinobots are good, but again it comes down to us each of us having different preferences when it comes to the overall aesthetic. I'm just not up for FoC Dinobots. Ironically, the same Peaugh reviews that turned you off of the Toyworld Dinobots are what sold me on them. I actually dig the torso mode, but the thing is everyone but their Swoop seems like solid G1-ish Dinobots in their own rights. Their Swoop is pretty disappointing, and it looks like some joints might need to be tightened for the combined mode (and that Spear's wings are too tiny for the combined mode), but I can live with that.
  22. mikeszekely
    I think that's one of the things I like best about Peaugh. He'll tell you if he likes something or not, but I feel like he mostly highlights things that he thinks were done well or done poorly without gushing nor nitpicking, letting the viewers make up their own minds. I think he also does a good job of taking the price into consideration. I mean, if he's reviewing a Hasbro Voyager-class he's going to evaluate it as a $25 toy. It's a peeve of mine when Hasbro's mainstream stuff gets trashed for not being up to the standards of the MP line or 3rd party figures. I mean, yes, as a consumer if you want to spend more to get a higher-quality toy that's perfectly fine, but you can't expect a toy that costs $25 to live up to one that costs five times that much. But anyway, yeah, Peaugh is good. I just wish he'd do something to improve the audio. It sounds like he's using his camera's built-in mic; maybe get a dedicated line-in mic? I think Benscollectables can be overly positive, but I just like listening to him talk. Must be his accent.
  23. mikeszekely
    I don't have all the Feralcons yet and can't really comment on all their individual weapons. I like Bovis' pistols. Fortis' arm cannons aren't exactly bad, but it feels like a cheat that he didn't have a handheld gun. I don't know about Talon's or Leo's weapons, but I expect I'll like Tigris' pistols. Their combined mode looks solid from pics. The melee weapons are rubbish, though. A handful of knives, some with really funky handles, and whatever the heck Leo's are supposed to be. I would put them together in Rex's sword mode forever if it weren't for the fact that you need parts of it for Leo's chest and tail in lion mode. I want a balance. I don't want or expect an overly-slavish G1 design, but to me they are meant to represent G1 (or at least IDW) characters. Too much departure (like TFC's Predacons) and I lose interest. All I can tell you is that I like Siegfried's shield (it's a lot better than Leo Dux's shield) and I think it looks perfect as Abominus's chest plate. I like what they did to break it up, too, so that the waist armor doesn't interfere with Ordin's articulation. So, yeah, if it doesn't look good don't do it, but I personally think on Ordin it looks very good. I didn't really mean to sound like I was disparaging MT/FP. As I don't have a ton of experience with a lot of 3rd parties yet, I'm willing to give anyone at least one try. What I was really asking is why there should be an assumption that a MT/FP toy will automatically be better than UT. Like I said, their Predaking might not have been the best, but I still like Mania King better than any of the individual Feralcons. Does FP usually do more runs? I'd like to get M3, but he's lower on my list. I have to pass on that Menasor. It'll be too large. Their Motormaster is the size of MP-10. I'm passing on that Liokaiser, too, because I've never watched Victory and I'd have to look at a wiki to even figure out who Liokaiser is. I've got my eye on TFC's Poseidon, though. I'll wait and see how the first two couple members shake out, though. For now, I've already ordered Siegfried, so my next 3P purchases will be the rest of Ordin, then I think I'm going to focus on Maketoys Guardian. They don't have to be combiners (like I said, MMC's Azalea is on my list) but being a combiner helps. So... I'm probably going to go with ToyWorld's Dinobots. Yeah, their take on Swoop is horribly compromised by having to become a limb, and yeah, the combined toy seems to collapse under its own weight without some fixes. But the rest of their Dinobots look really good and the gestalt would look pretty good if some of the joints and connections can be tightened. Warden gets suggested a lot. The problem with Warden (aside from the price, yeesh) is that despite being a fan of IDW's Transformers a Voyager-to-Leader-ish Fortress Maximus is non-starter for me. I'll wait and see how the Titans Return Fort Max shakes out. So yeah, in summary, the Ordin limbs, MT Guardian, then I'll re-evaluate my situation (with Azalea, M3, and the ToyWorld Dinobots being heavy favorites).
  24. mikeszekely
    Thanks for the tips guys. Especially Scylla, with that exhaustive list (although I hope my daughter learns to entertain herself before college!). Mostly, I like reviews that let me know what's good, what bad, and whether or not the reviewer thinks it's worth it. I think that's why I started liking peaugh; he definitely has a knack for highlighting what he thinks works and doesn't. I actually don't like transformations in the reviews. Don't get me wrong, I think transformation videos can be extremely helpful, but when I'm just trying to learn if a toy is good or not it sucks watching a dude fumble with it for a half an hour. Now on to Bruticus... the clearly the pics, the more I like UW Vortex and the more I hate UW Brawl. I don't dislike their Swindle, but I do think I like the CW version better. I like Unite Warriors Onslaught more than I thought I would, I just don't like the hamfisted attempt at getting the cartoon look on Bruticus' chest or the brown on the alt-mode cab.. On the other hand, I do like the lighter gray for Bruticus' head and the deeper blue. Then again, I like CW Onslaught's black head. If I can take them apart I might put CW Onslaught's head and chest plate on the UW version. Or I'll put UW Bruticus's head on CW Onslaught. So it's still UW Blast Off and Vortex with CW Swindle and Brawl. The only question is which Onslaught, or which piece of each Onslaught.
  25. mikeszekely
    I know I've disparaged video reviews in the past for taking an hour to tell me something I could read in five minutes, but my six month old daughter hates it when I try to do stuff during the 10-12 hours where I'm her lone caregiver while my wife is at work. Pretty much all I can do that doesn't send my dear daughter into a fit is watch TV while I play with her. With limited time to read but hours to kill with video, the inefficiency of video reviews has actually become advantageous. Anyway... who do you guys like for TF reviews? I'm leaning toward peaugh and benscollectibles.
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