mikeszekely

Two motorcycles in one wave? It's Legacy Evolution Deluxe-class Crashbar. If I'm being honest, I wasn't a big fan of Scraphook, but out of the gate Crashbar is giving me better feelings. Yellow on his chest and leg gives him a little more visual flair, and the more squared-off helmet with horns is closer to that Junkion biker look than Scraphook's sort of Ironhide-esque head. His goatee, which is very reminiscent of his designer's (Mark Maher) own facial hair, is picked out in a darker gunmetal color. There's also the not-so-subtle fact that Crashbar's got motorcycle parts clearly on his body. In other words, although he's going to be necessarily smaller than Wreck-Gar and Junkheap he looks (at least to me) more like a proper Junkion than Scraphook. Crashbar comes with two cannons and two pipes. Plus, as part of the Junkion gimmick in the Evolution line, his entire arms and his legs from the knees down come off. His instructions also suggest that you can pop his head off of its ball socket. However, as there's only one other Junkion to swap parts with right now, and Scraphook's head is on a mushroom swivel and not a ball joint, I fail to see the point of removing Crashbar's head. So, yeah, head on a ball joint, with the actual ball joint being part of the head and connected to a socket in the torso. Pretty good up/down/sideways tilt. Shoulders rotate and extend laterally just under 90 degrees. Biceps swivel, elbows are a single hinge but bend 180-ish degrees. His wrists swivel, love to see it, as does his waist. His hips can go slightly over 90 degrees, forward, backward, or laterally. His thighs swivel. The wheels in his calves kind of get in the way of his knee bend, but even if you move them out of the way he's going to be a little shy of 90 degrees. Both of his feet can tilt up a good bit. His right foot can tilt down slightly. His left can't usually tilt down, but if you fold out some handlebars from the middle of his foot the front will be able to tilt down. Both feet have ankle pivots, but the shape of his left leg gives that ankle more range. This is the default configuration, per the instructions- a cannon in each hand, and the pipes plug into ports on his back. Note that each cannon actually has four different pegs, while each pipe has three. Crashbar has one other sort of secret accessory. It's not mentioned in the instructions at all, but you'll notice that the struts holding the wheel in his right leg have hinges. You can actually open them up and remove the wheel, which has fold-out blades inside. I have no idea why the instructions don't mention it, as it's easily one of his cooler features. Looking for a place to attach the wheel ones you've popped it off? In addition to his fists, Crashbar has a 5mm port on the outside of each shoulder, one the outside of each forearm, on the inside of each forearm, on each side of his torso, two on his back, one on the outside of his left leg, two on the outside of his right leg, two on the inside of both legs, and one under each foot. Of course, his arms use 5mm pegs to attach to his torso, and his lower legs use 5mm pegs to attach to his thighs, same as Scraphook. I think the idea was that you could swap limbs between Junkions, like you saw them do in the movie. It's a little awkward in practice, though, because Crashbar's arms are a little shorter than Scraphook's. Meanwhile, Scraphook's legs are a little shorter than Crashbar's. If you swap just one leg or one arm they wind up looking a little crooked or off-balance. Swapping accessories, though, works a lot better. Crashbar's transformation is a bit like Prowl's, in that he turns his waist 90 degrees and one leg becomes the front while one leg becomes the rear. In practice, though, Crashbar is honestly a bit easier, and his alt mode a bit more cohesive. You don't have to take him apart to transform him like you had to with the previous Weaponizers, Modulators, and Fossilizers, but just like Scraphook his accessories are part of the alt mode and they do have to partsform. In particular, while you could probably leave off the pipes, his cannons become saddlebags and they help lock his leg in place at the rear of the bike. And as bikes go, yeah, he's definitely got that Junkion vibe. I dig the flame paint, but wish they could have used some of that red-orange to pick out some of the spikes on fenders. As with the robot mode, the yellow helps give him a bit of visual flair, and again the fact that he turns into a motorcycle really helps sell me that this is a proper Junkion, just a short one. Unlike Scraphook, Crashbar's instructions don't really offer any way to use him to armor up any old Legacy figure. Maybe his relatively small arms and clearly motorcycle-parts-for-legs don't make for convincing upgrades. His instructions do, however, call attention to the fact that he can swap limbs with Scraphook even in alt mode. Well, I guess it kind of works better to have Crashbar's limbs on Scraphook than Scraphook's limbs on Crashbar, but even then it's not really something I'd go for. Swapping accessories works a bit better- Scraphook's spikey tire shield looks especially fine on Crashbar, and Crashbar's pipes look like they were designed for Scraphook. In a line where I'm salty that they've wasted slots on reimagined G1-ish non-G1 characters like Arcee and Prowl, more obscure G1 characters and Needlenose and Pointblank, and totally made up characters like Scraphook, but can't find the budget to do a proper Breakdown, I was prepared to hate on Crashbar. Like I said, I didn't really care for Scraphook. And while, yes, I do still wish they'd have done better with Breakdown (I'm not going to stop beating that horse), and yes, I would rather they fill their new-mold Deluxe slots with the remaining characters from the G1 cartoon who need updated, I actually kind of like Crashbar. He's a fun little motorcycle that's actually a better figure than his wavemate, Prowl, in addition to being a better figure and more recognizably a Junkion than Scraphook. I'd go so far as to say that I'd be in for a repaint or two, especially if they have alternate heads and/or accessories. Is Crashbar essential? Certainly not. But if you'd like your Junkions to have a few more members than just Wreck-Gar and Junkheap then Crashbar is a fun little figure that's worth a look. I'm going to go ahead and recommend this one.

A new mature, God of War-esque TMNT game based on The Last Ronin is apparently in development.

Did you guys look at the recent Holiday Optimus Prime and think, "Man, that's a really great mold, too bad it's done up like Santa pulling a candy cane instead of a more traditional Optimus look,"? Well, I'm not sure where or when, as it's just listed as a Fan Fest sku, but...

That he is. Which is probably why I like MMC's stuff so much. Well, I don't really have a strong opinion on MP Skyfire, save that I looked at pics and decided that I'm good with the Phoenix I already have. But I do have a different jet to talk about... Legacy Evolution Voyager-class Metalhawk. While Metalhawk is retooled from Kingdom Cyclonus, they honestly did such an extensive job retooling him that I figured he's deserving of his own review instead of a Repaint Roundup. Basically, they have the same hands, the same feet, the same hips and thighs, the same shoulders and biceps, the same opening flaps on the calves, and partially the same wings... and that's it. New head, new forearms, mostly-new lower legs, totally new torso, and some extra bits in the wings makes him around 70% new parts. And it's pretty impressive how well HasTak was able to take Cyclonus and make an accurate Metalhawk out of him. Like, OK, his shoulders are tapered to an angular top instead of the blockier shoulders you'd expect to find, but the new head, intakes on his shoulders, torso, and legs are pretty much spot on. It doesn't even matter that he's got Cyclonus' feet and thighs, because those feet and thighs do remarkably well for matching Metalhawk's animation mode in The Headmasters. If we're being picky, it would have been nice if his hands matched the blue of his forearms, which have a little extra chunk on the underside. And Metalhawk's wings are technically attached to his biceps on both the animation mode and the G1 toy, but I don't think attaching them behind the shoulders makes much of a practical difference beyond allowing Hasbro to use that silvery gray plastic for his biceps instead of a more proper red. His hands and biceps being gray instead of blue/red is undoubtedly a concession to the sprue they're on. Oh, and I'll note that while the Decepticon Pretenders that have shown up so far have been alt modes similar to their inner robots with bot modes based on their Pretender shells, Metalhawk is fully based on his inner robot (or, more accurately, the animation model of the inner robot as seen in The Headmasters). This works for me. I think the monstrous appearance of the Decepticon Pretenders shells were much more memorable than the simple, generic robots inside, but I have no love for the weird human faces with alien battle armor the Autobot Pretenders used. Metalhawk comes with three weapons, all new and not reused gear from Cyclonus. They're copied from the G1 Metalhawk toy- the two guns are the same ones used for the inner robot, and the sword is technically meant to be used by the Pretender shell (along with a larger rifle, not included here). Of course, there is no shell, so might as well scale the sword for the robot we got. Metalhawk's articulation should be the same as Cyclonus'- a head on a hinged swivel with kind of limited tilt, shoulders that rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees, bicep swivels, 90 degree elbow bends, wrist swivels, waist swivel, hips that go forward, backward, and laterally 90 degrees, thigh swivels, double-jointed knees that get a little over 90 degrees, feet that tilt up but not down, and 45-ish degrees of ankle pivot. While Metalhawk can certainly dual-wield his pistols, you can actually combine them into a double-barreled pistol. That'll free up a hand to hold his sword. If you do want him dual-wielding pistols, though, the sword has a peg on the hilt that'll allow you to plug it into a 5mm port on his back. He additionally has 5mm ports on the outsides of his shoulders, the outside of his lower legs, on his wings facing forward, and two under each foot. Despite those ports, there doesn't seem to be a good place to store his guns if you don't want him carrying them in his hands. If you remember how to transform Cyclonus, you already know how to transform Metalhawk. If anything, Metalhawk's a bit simpler. His nose folds out from his torso in just two segments, without having to open those segments to find yet smaller ones like a Russian nesting doll. His hands simply fold into his forearms, they don't open to encapsulate them. And while his back does still rotate 180 degrees, once you're done you don't have to rotate the shoulders because his arms will already be oriented correctly. I think Metalhawk's alt mode definitely has more concessions to being a retool of Cyclonus than his robot mode. His nose is a little stumpy, he's a little too wide, and the top of his fuselage is too smooth. This is largely because those nose is tucked into the torso instead of hanging on his back in robot mode, and in jet mode his arms are tucked along his sides instead of folded over onto his back the way the G1 toy worked. Even still, the mix of blue and gray on the fuselage, and the shape and placement of his wings are pretty accurate to the G1 design. And I like that there are little touches that help him maintain a unique identity from Cyclonus. Like, even the little parts that unfurl from his calves to cover the bottom of his legs after the feet are folding in are different. Instead of having a 5mm port on each panel, they're divided into two segments each, with the smaller blast effect nubs on them. Another nice touch? There are slots on the outsides of his legs, so the guns can use the same tabs they use to combine to plug into the sides of his legs, becoming part of his jet mode's tail. That's exactly how they worked on the G1 toy. The sword is another matter, since the G1 toy wasn't meant to carry it in jet mode. There are two tabs on the side of the hilt opposite the peg, and these fit into slots on his calves so the sword just kind of lays along the top of the fuselage. It's not idea, but also curious because you don't actually need those tabs and slots. The 5mm port on his back is just in front of those slots, so you could just use the same peg on the hilt you used for bot mode storage to plug the sword into almost the exact same spot along the top of the fuselage. Oh well. As far as using other accessories go, well, the sword's covering the 5mm port on his back, his wings cover the 5mm ports on his shoulders, and the guns cover the 5mm ports on his legs. You do still have one 5mm port under each wing, though. You know what Metalhawk doesn't have? Landing gear. Unlike Cyclonus, there's no fold out landing gear. I guess, being a retool, he's probably on a stricter budget than Cyclonus was, and he probably spent a lot of it on his retooled parts and accessories. Maybe landing gear would have put him over? It's not a deal breaker by any means, but it is a minor disappointment. All told, Metalhawk gets a hearty recommend from me. Although he's not 100% G1-accurate, he's surprisingly close for a remold of Cyclonus and still probably the best figure in this wave so far. It probably helps that the original mold was one of the best figures in the entire Kingdom line, but Metalhawk is still different enough to warrant a purchase.

I had a lot of fun playing Cyberpunk 2077. I played on PC, and I'm not sure how much patching they've done in the, oh, 16 or so months since I played it, but I can't say that I experienced any gamebreaking issues. I kind of agree with @renegadeleader1 on the story, though. It had some neat elements, but Silverhand came across to me as kind of a spoiled whiner. There were some pretty great side quests, though, including some psychotic taxis and a sentient vending machine. Dunno how it is on consoles these days, or really how bad it was at launch, but it's definitely worth playing on PC now, especially if you get it on sale. Or a Steam Deck. I'm loving mine.😁 In all seriousness, though, since the days of the original PlayStation I've had a bad habit of buying all the consoles, even though I'm primarily a PC gamer. I bought a PS5 for the PlayStation exclusives and I honestly haven't touched it since God of War Ragnarok... which will probably wind up on PC, just like the first Dad of War. I wound up picking up Horizon Zero Dawn and both Spider-Man games on PC, too. If Ghost of Tsushima gets a port I could probably sell my PS5 and not miss it. Xbox, though, is kind of a different animal. I actually wound up buying two, a Series X that's hooked up to the big TV in the living room, and a Series S that's hooked up to the TV in my bedroom (and is the console I grab if I'm going to play Rock Band over at a friend's house). I almost never buy any games for it, but I play games on it fairly regularly, and it's all about Game Pass. See, as a PC gamer I was already interested in Game Pass for PC, right? But for $5/month more you can get Game Pass Ultimate, which gets you Game Pass on both PC and Xbox, EA Access, Xbox Cloud Gaming, and Xbox Live Gold which gives you free games in addition to online multiplayer (the one feature I don't use). And Xbox's cloud saves make switching between platforms pretty seemless. I can start playing a game like Forza Horizon 5 on my PC, then pick it up later on my Series X for an hour while I wait for my daughter to get home from school, then grab a controller like the Razer Kishi for my phone and keep playing in the waiting room while my daughter's at her dance class. If you're console only and don't have anything modern, maybe your choices are a bit different. PlayStation does have a few really good exclusives. But probably 95% of the games that come out do so on both.

Prowl Blart... now I kind of wish he came with a Segway. It's apparently based on the design for an unproduced Soviet Bomber, the DSB-LK. 4th wave, sometime this fall.

Hot on the heels of Evolution Skyquake, I also have for you Legacy Evolution Deluxe-class Prowl. If taking the designs for Prime and G1-ifying them isn't really a great idea, it seems that taking Derek Wyatt's exaggerated cartoon style from Animated and G1-ifying it is an outright terrible one. In broad strokes, we have elements of Animated Prowl- the wings on his back, the head that's meant to look like a motorcycle cop's helmet and shades, the gold-trimmed bike chest, the arm pads, the wheels in the shins, etc. But the changes in proportions just look weird; he's simultaneously shorter and thicker. His chin is still on the larger side, but somehow still generic and lacking Prowl's personality. To add to the ugliness, Animated Prowl's gray wheels are the same black plastic as his shins... well, most of his shins, because for some reason they decided to use unpaintable gray plastic for some parts at the bottom of his shins and his biceps. About the only think that I think they actually did improve on Evolution Prowl is his wings, which have hinges now that allow them to angle up in a manner more similar to the cartoon than the original toy. Speaking of the original toy, Evolution Prowl's accessories work exactly the same way. The hubcaps come off the outsides of his lower legs, and twisting the bottoms will cause the blades to pop out... kind of. They don't seem to work right on my copy, and I find that I might have to pull the blades the rest of the way out or shove them the rest of the way back in on my own. Oh, and there's not traffic light on a string this time. Sorry. Prowl's head is on a ball joint that has some pretty great range... slightly down, but almost 45 degrees sideways tilt and nearly 90 degrees upward tilt in addition to the usual swivel. His shoulders swivel and move laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, though. His waist swivels, and he's got a slight ab crunch. His hips can go 90 degrees backward, a little over 90 degrees forward, and way over 90 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His legs under the wheels can also swivel around the wheels, due to transformation, so you can use that as a double knee if you need to, or as an upward foot tilt. His feet tilt down, swivel, and his ankles pivot on ball joints. As far as holding his weapons go, you'll note that his left hand is molded so his thumb is closer to his fingers, which makes it perfect for holding the blade on one of his throwing stars. His right hand, though, is a more typical 5mm port. Despite what seems to be a groove cut into his palm, his grip on a throwing star placed in that hand is tenuous. Additional 5mm ports can be found under his feet, one each forearm, on each shoulder, and one on his back. In broad strokes, Evolution Prowl's transformation is extremely similar to Animated's. The front of the bike swivels up from the chest, the shoulders shift backwards so the forearms can tab together at the back of the bike, his waist turns 90 degrees and his pelvis shifts forward, then his legs fold up with his feet swiveling around the wheels to get the wheels into the right spots. The differences come down to a few minor details- the front of the bike comes up over his head instead of his head folding into his back, his foot and thigh swap places on the back leg, and his foot fills in the underside of the bike's front instead of tucking under the bike on his front leg. Maybe the slight differences in transformation are due to the thicker, blockier limbs. Whatever the reason, Evolution Prowl looks a lot less cohesive than his Animated counterpart. His shifted shoulders leave a gap that his wings don't cover. The bike's seat leaves a gap between it and his forearms at the back of the bike, too. The gold plastic parts his arms are connected to and his khaki pelvis and thigh stand out against the black while those parts were either black or tucked behind his wings on the original toy. Evolution Prowl just looks messy, IMHO. With his throwing stars in their hubcap configuration, I guess there's not a lot else to say about the bike mode. The wheels roll, and the 5mm ports are still available along the sides of the ear and in front of the gas cap if you want to arm him up with some other weapons. His bike mode is a bit too small for an "average" Deluxe like Earthrise Prowl, but probably too big for a Core-class figure. Maybe a small Deluxe like Bumblebee or Cliffjumper. As I've said before, I don't mind G1-ifying popular characters without G1 analogs... I'd love for them to do Slipstream, Blackout, or Strongarm, for example. But when they do it to characters that already have a proper G1 version, all it does for me is highlight how the new toy doesn't fit with the franchise it came from. And Evolution Prowl seems like an especially poor update, lacking the character of Wyatt's unique style and making a less cohesive bike mode. You can't even use the "well, at least he's got better articulation" argument that a lot of modern Transformers get away with, because Animated Prowl already enjoyed some impressive articulation. So who is this supposed to be for? Animated fans? The original Animated toy is already superior. G1 fans? I don't want to speak for all of my fellow Geewunners, but I'd have preferred they took the budget they wasted on Prowl and invested in more retooled parts for Breakdown (and I will keep beating that dead horse every time Hasbro wastes a Deluxe slot on trash). Unless there really are people out there who were thinking, "I really like Animated Prowl, but I wish he were shorter, fatter, and more generic so he'd blend in better with my other War for Cybertron and Legacy figures" and you're one of them then you should probably leave Prowl on the shelf.

Apparently this just showed up at a Gamestop in Canada...

I know I just got my review up, but I already have two addendums. First, and most importantly, TFWer BrokenForge figured out what's up with Skyquake's backpack not fully collapsing. The gist is that if you look at the armature that connects his cockpit to his torso, right on the cockpit side of that mysterious, useless swivel, is a hinge. The wheel of the landing gear tucks up against it, but it's too thick. You'll see a circle where the part was connected to the sprue, basically you want to cut into the groove where the wheel sits, extending it right up to that circle. Once it's cut out the wheel will have enough space to tuck in all the way, the backpack will collapse and the wings will tab right in. It's easier to get access to if you take apart the cockpit by removing two screws and gently prying in half. Note that there's a tab that's glued that'll probably break, but once it's screwed back together you won't see it. The other thing I noticed is this- I mean, just swap the arms at the biceps and that's a much more Prime-ish cockpit chest and wing orientation. Apparently I'm not the only one to think of it, either, and someone tested swapping the arms. It still transforms, his forearms just wind up upside down. That means that they don't tab into the underside, but the ratchets will hold the arms perfectly in place anyway, and there's not enough clearance to plug the gatling gun into his butt. That may be moot if Dreadwing comes with a remolded weapon, and it's not like there aren't other ports. There's some speculation that this is an intentional design; if it's not I might keep Dreadwing in this configuration when it comes out to make him more Prime accurate and more visually distinct from Skyquake.

Well, I'm still not one of those people who started finding the Voyagers early in Target or anything, but it seems that the current wave of Evolution is really starting to hit now. I recently received an email telling me that I could order Transmetal II Megatron in his Evolution package refresh. Also recently, Leader-class Skyquake showed up at my door. Skyquake's box proclaims him as "Prime Universe" Skyquake, and at first blush it does appear that, like Bulkhead, Arcee, and Knockout, that this is simply a G1-ified version of the character from Transformers Prime. Thick limbs, green thighs and forearms, red trim around his wrists, large shoulder pads with fins, the shape of the head with the eyebrows, the wings on his back, and the cockpit on his chest, those are all elements of the Prime design (as seen on Dreadwing, as I never bought Prime Skyquake back in the day). But then you realize that the window on his chest isn't actually his cockpit at all. Because, unlike the G1-ified Prime Arcee who was seemingly meant to coexist with actual G1 Arcee (and exists primarily as a pretool for Road Rocket), Evolution is G1-ified by amalgamating the Prime design with the late European-only G1 Skyquake, a toy that wouldn't be seen in the States until it was redecoed as Machine Wars Starscream. That non-cockpit translucent chest window is 100% from G1 Skyquake, and once you notice it you'll notice other details. Like, Evolution Skyquake's wings on his back are upside-down compared to Prime's, but that's the correct orientation for G1 Skyquake. His head colors, actual mouth, and pointed chin are Prime, but they've replaced the the eyebrows with a crest similar to G1 Skyquake's. And even a few minor details, like the raised ridged bits on top of his feet and the vent on his crotch, appear to be lifted from G1 Skyquake. In robot mode, I'd say he's roughly 70% Prime and 30% G1. Does this please Prime fans? Even though Skyquake's G1 toy wasn't a part of my American childhood, I honestly find myself wanting Evolution Skyquake to be less Prime and more G1. I'm honestly not sure if I have his torso transformed correctly. He's got a huge empty space in his backpack, and it looks like it should collapse in a bit more. There are even slots that his wings should tab into that they don't quite reach. The reason for this is that the instructions tell you that, from jet mode, you're supposed to fold the tip of his nose under the cockpit, and that the cockpit itself should kind of shift and the canopy will slide forward. However, when you go to do it it doesn't seem to shift as far as the instructions illustrate, which in turn means that the nose isn't tucked under quite far enough and doesn't leave you with enough clearance to further collapse his backpack. I haven't checked with too many others, but at least one well-known YouTuber seems to have the same issue. Well, moving along, Skyquake comes with two accessories in the box, his gatling gun and a translucent orange sword. The sword can fold in half, and the entire thing can be tucked into a hollow space on the gatling gun. The gatling gun itself does have a little nub for attaching a blast effect (not included). Skyquake's head is on a ball joint, but the way it's designed it might as well be a hinged swivel. He can look down slightly, but something like 75 degrees up, no sideways tilt. His shoulder pads have a swivel, two hinges, and a ball joint for getting them out of the way but keeping them generally over his shoulders, and the shoulders themselves can swivel plus they can move laterally 120 degrees on ratchets. They're also on flaps due to how he transforms, and the flaps don't actually lock in place which gives him 90 degrees of forward butterfly joints. His biceps swivel, and his elbows are double jointed (but due to the bulk of his forearms, are still limited to about 120 degrees). His wrists do swivel, as does his waist. His hips go forward, backward, and laterally, all on ratchets. His thighs swivel, and his are double-jointed and bend roughly 150-ish degrees. Practically, though, the upper joint is too tight and you'll find yourself mostly limited to the lower joint. His feet tilt down due to transformation, and he has some ankle pivot. However, he has small feet and limited heels, so I've found him a bit challenging to balance in more dynamic poses. Skyquake can hold his sword, and by plugging the peg on the back of his gun into the top of his hand he can hold it like a rifle. However, you can plug the peg on the back of the gun into the underside of his hand. Then, there's a 5mm peg on a ball joint that can be folded out closer to the barrels. Between the articulation of that peg and his own above-average upper-body articulation you can pose him holding the gatling gun with two hands. And should you get the desire, he's got 5mm ports on each shoulder pad, on the tips of wings facing his front, under each forearm, on the outside of each lower leg, in each heel, two on his back on the engine nacelles and one on his butt. Skyquake's transformation is definitely more complicated than your average modern Transformer, but honestly less so than the old Prime Voyager. His cockpit erupts from his backpack, covering his head, then his wings and the rest of his backpack flip over on armatures that cover up his robot chest. His arms scrunch up and tuck into the middle in a Macross-esque fashion, while his shoulder pads on their own independent armatures lay along the fuselage in front of his wings. Then his legs scrunch up and flip around, tabbing under the wings to finish him off. But, I'll note one major curiosity -his cockpit has a swivel. It's not used for transformation at all, but if you were so inclined you could turn his cockpit upside down during the transformation. Aesthetically, Skyquake's G1 influences are more prominently on display. He's a little thicker, with a stumpier nose, but from the canards forward he's Prime Skyquake for sure. The angled points on his wing tips, the red stripes, and the overall shape of the tail is more Prime, too. However, the engines and intakes molded onto his wings are G1 Skyquake, as are the vents on the top, and the translucent window and raised section from the mid-fuselage to the tail, with the large engine exhaust, is also very G1 Skyquake. Again, I wonder how Prime fans like this, because the cranky old geewunner in me would prefer even more G1, although I have to admit that the changes to the tail to minimize the big periscope gimmick from the G1 toy are pretty ok with me. I'll also note that, while Skyquake makes for a thick and chunky jet, he does a pretty fair job of not simply being a plane with a box of robot kibble underneath. Speaking of underneath, Skyquake has three working landing gear, something of a rarity these days, and a canopy that can open, even more rare these days. His combined weapon is meant to plug into the underside of the jet, in the port that's on his robot butt. The ports on his heels can be used for blast effects, and for additional weapon storage you've got access to two ports under his wings, two ports in front of his rear landing gear, two ports just in front of his canards on the sides, and two ports on top of his wings, on the engine nacelles. Skyquake has one final gimmick. See, G1 Skyquake was the leader of a subgroup of Decepticons known as the Predators. The Predators also had four smaller jets, Talon, Snare, Skydive, and Falcon. And of those four smaller Predator jets could attach to Skyquake's rear. Well, we don't have any of those other Predators, but Evolution Skyquake has a pair of tabs that are just the right size and spaced apart just right to plug into Needlenose's chest. Could we get other figures retooled into the Predators in the future? I'm not sure it'd make sense to retool them from Needlenose, but I sure hope so. Skydive's alt mode is a YF-23, and we need more transforming YF-23's. Skyquake is a bit of a mixed bag, I think. Objectively, I'm not loving the balance issues, and he seems to suffer from some build issue that prevents his backpack from collapsing fully. Subjectively, while I can get on board with G1-ifying popular characters without G1 counterparts like Barricade (ignore the Micromaster), Knockout, and Bulkhead I'm less keen when they do it to characters like Arcee and Skyquake that already have G1 counterparts. I really think Hasbro should forget about trying to create a unifying aesthetic and either have gone full-on G1 Skyquake (which would make for a better Machine Wars Starscream and/or King Atlas down the road), or stop teasing Prime fans with these G1-ish toys and give them the new cartoon-accurate figures that they really want. For now, I guess I think this toy is interesting enough to own, but maybe not interesting enough to own all the repaints of. If you're more into G1 than Prime than Skyquake, with his homages to G1 Skyquake, is probably the one to get. But, if you're more of a Prime fan you might to pass on the guy that died in his first appearance and wait for Dreadwing.

Apparently a small norovirus outbreak is going around my daughter's elementary school. She's better now, but during the worst of it should couldn't keep anything down long, not even soup. Well... even though I was just at Target the other day, I found myself going back today for carpet cleaner. And even though they didn't have beans there the last time I went, I stills swung by the toy aisle and was pleasantly surprised to find myself walking out later not just with the carpet cleaner, but also with Buzzworthy Bumblebee Deluxe-class Origins Jazz. It was an oddity of that first episode of the G1 cartoon that all the characters on Cybertron looked exactly like would when they woke up on Earth with their new Earth alt-modes. I'm not sure if the animators thought our young brains were too mushy to figure out that they were the same characters if they changed the obvious car parts on the robots. Or, more likely, they didn't have the time budget to invest in whipping up new Cybertronian robot-mode character models, so they just made a few sci-fi-ish looking vehicles with no thought for how they'd transform, figuring it's just a short scene in one episode that everyone would forget about after the cast got their established Earth modes. It's not like nearly 40 years later someone would try to actually make toys with the regular robot character models that actually transformed into those one-off Cybertronian alt modes, right? Well, from the front Hasbro honestly did a fantastic job. In some ways, the narrower chest and the reduced kibble on the outsides of his legs make Origin Jazz arguably more cartoon accurate than Studio Series Jazz, although the shoulders are a little large, the panels on the sides of his legs cut into the gray on his shins, and he's missing the blue on his pelvis. I also think it might have been a bit better if they'd made his torso white with gray paint instead of black with gray paint, as it'd make the area around his collar blend in with his chest a bit better. From the sides and back we can start to see that Jazz is a bit of a shellformer, with a large backpack and lower legs covered with what will be the rear of the vehicle. But, I think he's less egregiously kibbly than Origin Bumblebee, and honestly kind of similar to Studio Series Jazz with relation to how much kibble and where it's located. Origin Jazz comes with a rifle that's similar to SS86's rifle, but ultimately a new mold. He also comes with that grappling hook he used that one episode. The grappling hook itself can be removed from the winch part, although there's no rope connecting them. However, that should make it easy enough to leave the winch black and paint the gun and grappling hook silver, which I might do. Jazz's head is on a ball joint with a fairly good up/down tilt and slight sideways tilt in addition to the standard swivel. His shoulders swivel, and they can move 90 degrees laterally. Plus, due to his transformation, he's got a slight forward butterfly (although too much will pop the chest out). His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, but his waist does. His hips can go forward 90 degrees; the joints are capable of 90 degrees backward and laterally as well, but his backpack will stop them a little short. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend a little under 90 degrees. His toes can bend down due to transformation, but he's got no upward tilt on his feet. His ankles can pivot a bit less than 90 degrees, but honestly more than you'd actually need for most poses. Jazz's gun can plug into either first. To use the grappling hook, you first fold in one of his fists to reveal another 5mm port, then you plug the winch into his wrist and the grappling hook into the winch. Alternatively, the 5mm peg on the winch has one of those little holes carved into it, so the entire winch can fit over the blast effect-compatible tip of Jazz's rifle. Indeed, with the grappling hook and winch thus attached the rifle, the entire thing can be stored on Jazz's back via pegs on the sides of the gun and a port on Jazz's back. Jazz additionally has 5mm ports under his feet and on the outsides of his shoulders Alas, he does not have a 5mm port on his actual back, which means you can't store the grappling hook and winch into the mostly-empty void between his back and backpack. Jazz's transformation is fairly simple. His chest lifts up on a double hinge to give his arms clearance to butterfly forward, and his backpack unfurls to engulf his head, forming the roof and nose of the vehicle. An interesting bit is that lifting his chest will reveal a 5mm port underneath, and the winch/grappling hook combo plugs into it for alt mode storage. Nice! As for the rest of the transformation, it's easy enough to figure out what you're supposed to do (open the lower legs, fold out the side panels, collapse the legs combiner wars style) but mildly annoying to get the clearances you need while collapsing the legs with everything open then lining it all up at the end. When Origin Bumblebee came out it was impressive enough that they got the general shape of his Cybertronian alt mode right, but due to his wings becoming kibble on his legs they were kind of stumpy. Jazz has no such restrictions, and as such he really looks like he came right off the screen. If I'm being nitpicky, I might suggest that the vents on the sides where the spoiler wraps around could be a bit bigger, but really, the overall shape, the placement of the blue bands and the Autobot insignia, the way the spoiler connects to the rear at the middle, and the way the spoiler wraps around with some of the vehicle still behind it is all cartoon-accurate. The worst I can say about it is that his arms are kind of visible underneath, although the way the whole thing rests on his arms does give him the impression of hovering, and the way he sits on his arms lifts his nose, which can technically make his chest visible, too (but I'm guessing most of the time you're not going to have him in the same dead-on nose shot as I took, so you're not likely to notice it most of the time). While Jazz's winch and grappling hook are stored under the vehicle between his robot shoulders, there's no such hidden storage for his rifle. The instructions tell you to mount it to his roof, via the 5mm peg hole there. For something a bit more out of sight, at least from some angles, you can use the peg on the side of the rifle to plug into one of the ports on the back of the vehicle. I find it a amusing and bit ironic that Siege gave us a bunch of characters with Cybetronian alt modes that were quickly replaced in Earthrise and Kingdom with the Earth-mode versions and a lot of us complained about the double-dipping, yet now that Hasbro's going back and giving us Cybertronian modes for guys that already had Earth modes we're all on board. While the alt modes in Siege were sort of "let's call this scrunched up robot a spaceship!" or cars that were 95% of the way to being the Earth modes already, I like that Hasbro had the forethought to do the G1 cartoon thing and make the robots look like they had their Earth modes. So now, when Hasbro is releasing cartoon-accurate Cybertronian modes for Jazz and Bumblebee they still feel like they belong together. Now, I can't say that Origin Jazz is the necessity that SS86 Jazz is, he's a really good figure that pulls off the standard robot and Cybertronian vehicle from the cartoon better than Origin Bumblebee did. I'm giving him a recommend, especially if you have Bumblebee or a collection of Siege figures you can display him with. I don't know how they'll pull it off, but here's hoping they do Wheeljack, too.

It looks like a glorified Choose Your Own Adventure story. So far all I've bought were the two Axiom Verge games, plus Ni no Kuni 2 that was actually on sale the day before. But I've got something like 150 games wishlisted right now and a new Steam Deck I want to play games on, so I'm sure I'll buy a couple more before the sale is over.

I don't think the more traditional G2 decos are off the table. They might still turn up as Generations Selects or something, especially since I haven't heard much about what Hasbro might be planning for Gen Selects this year. Frankly, I think these Walmart exclusives are going to shelfwarm the way half of Velocitron, all the Beast Wars repaints, and a good bit of Netflix did. ...and, I dunno. I kind of like the yellow with teal tiger stripes Grimlock. But yeah, that Jazz... 🤮

Hah, I guess my phone's autocorrect cut the end off! Yeah, 10% off, so prices range from $360-$585. That makes the most expensive model a bit more palatable if you're not comfortable replacing the SSD. That said, if you are comfortable, a 1TB Sabrent Rocket goes for around $160, which is still double the storage for $65 less.

Today begins Steam's Spring sale. Lots of deals on games, sure, but I feel compelled to point out (what like two weeks after I bought one) that the Steam Deck itself is 10% off.

It's not that I don't want games based on MASK and Silverhawks (and, while I'm at it, Dino Riders, EXO Squad, and SWAT Cats), but I think they'd work better in another genre than beat'em up.

I'm down for this. I actually watched this show as a kid, but have never seen the Troma films. Mummies Alive, Conan the Adventurer, King Arthur and the Knights of Justice, Street Sharks, Masters of the Universe, Thundercats, Gargoyles, Cowboys of Moo Mesa... the '80s and early '90s had lots of good options for beat'em ups.

While I totally get wanting new Legacy or MP toys to look super cartoon accurate, I don't see the appeal of repainting the G1 toys in cartoon colors. I'd really rather they stuck with straight reissues, especially since I don't have a G1 Thundercracker or Hound.

So, Jazz, Cloudcover, and Toxitron went up for preorder (with Toxitron selling out at Pulse already). No sign of Grimlock, though. Weird. I was thinking I'd preorder Grimlock and Cloudcover, but without Grimlock I kind of don't feel like preordering Cloudcover, either. Jazz is too ugly, and while Toxitron is kind of cool I'm not a fan of bad guys that look like Optimus that aren't a mix of black, gray, and teal.

Walmart's smoking something... So, yeah, you guys might know that they're doing some kind of thing for collectors on Thursday. Leaked today are the Transformers they're going to be carrying (I guess that toy Hot Rod and any other Velocitron releases were canceled?). The theme is G2, but... Well, first up we have Toxitron. Toxitron isn't actually G2, though. He was a planned repaint of G2 Optimus for the Universe line before being canceled. Despite the original toy being canceled, this is actually the third toy that did get released, the first two being a Botcon set that redecoed Animated Optimus, and the second being a TFCC figure that was a redeco of Combiner Wars Optimus. Next up, we have Cloudcover. Cloudcover isn't only not a G2 character, he's not a character period. Or rather, he's a brand new character, based on a hand-painted Ramjet that was maybe going to be a planned G2 release. Or not. He's kind of pretty, and I'll probably pick this one up, but I do kind of wonder why Ramjet's mold has been used like four times now but there were never any repaints of Thrust or Dirge. Also up we have G2 Jazz... whom I remember looking a lot different than that. Despite (the original) G2 Jazz looking awfully similar to G1 Jazz, I probably would have bought a repaint in that deco. Or a Stepper/Ricochet repaint. But this all-orange Jazz, who is apparently based on concept art for a planned G2 repaint, is an eyesore. Finally, we have G2 Grimlock. Or, at least the box for him. Yeah, that's probably not the G2 you were thinking of, that basically swaps all the gray plastic for blue. Like Jazz, this is apparently based on concept art for another potential repaint that was never made. My first reaction is, like Jazz, to be mad that we're not getting the actual G2 Grimlock. But a yellow dino mode with teal tiger stripes? I mean, the more I think about it, the more awesome that sounds...

Better than my Target. Tons of Bumbleswoop, some Studio Series Bumblebee Arcees, a lone Wheelie, a Leo Prime. That's it. I also swung by Walmart today. I don't know if they're better or worse... they have more inventory, but it's about 70% Legacy Arcees, 20% Legacy Jhiaxus, and 10% random crud like those YuMe plushies.

If Legends would have been more of a thing when I really started collecting I'd have gone all-in and never thought twice about MP. There's definitely an advantage to the smaller figures, but I think the aesthetics of the current NewAge and Magic Square offerings are already ahead of early MP offerings. But I think I already had maybe 60-70% of the G1 cartoon cast before Legends was more than just Iron Factory, and I just didn't bring myself to start over.

I don't know if it's because I never felt like starting a Legends collection on top of my mainline Hasbro collection an my MP-scale stuff, the fact that my MP-scaled stuff is getting pretty close to complete, or the that I just don't feel like spending $150-$200 a pop on the MP stuff in this economy, but I found it hard to get too excited over the TFCon stuff. The only things that really caught my attention are MMC showing off their Hot Spot and finally admitting that they're doing Devastator after Defensor. Here's hoping they do Abominus, Predaking, Computron, Superion, Menasor, Piranacon, Raiden, Liokaiser, Road Caesar, and Landcross, too. Preferably in that order.

It's not bad. I think they originally went for $120/each a few years ago. In TFSource fashion, they marked it up before they marked it down so it looks like a better deal that it actually is, but yeah, it's still a pretty decent deal. The only thing I'd caution is that I think the DS Seekers are probably better figures at this point, especially if the robot mode is your main concern. They're just a pain to transform. That said, I bought the MT Seekers when they first came out, and while I definitely think the DS ones were better I didn't think they were so much better that it was worth replacing the MTs.

You don't need to join Facebook anymore, just a Meta account. I know, that sounds like splitting hairs, but the gist is that you use the Meta account just for the Quest, not social media, so while Meta will know what you're buying and playing (in other words, exactly what Sony gets whenever you buy from the PS store) they're not getting all the personal info they'd get from a Facebook account.