mikeszekely

I'm just frustrated. Most of the time Hasbro's been doing pretty well by me since Earthrise, right? Like I'm losing interest in spending $100-$200 on MP figures when $30 mainline figures are delivering what I want. But sometimes they just miss the mark (like Astrotrain). And they keep doing stuff like finding the budget for deep-cut characters like Devcon or newly-invented characters like a bunch of new Junkions (or, if the leaks are to be believed, guys who turn into rocks), but they can't manage to budget for important characters like Bombshell or Breakdown without retooling another character into a semi-accurate facsimile. Doubly frustrated because the characters Hasbro keeps cheaping out on are my favorite ones. If I had the money to get a 3P going, I'd focus on re-doing the figures Hasbro screwed up.

Following on that leak of Shadowstriker, here's another wave 4 Evolution figure: Bombshell. *sigh* Breakdown's my favorite Stunticon, Hasbro cheaped out and made and him 90% a retool of Wildrider. Bombshell's my favorite Insecticon, and wouldn't you know it, he's a retool of Shrapnel. Near as I can tell, it's a new torso, new head, new shoulders, but Shrapnel's arms from the biceps down and entirely Shrapnel from the waist down. I'll note that they don't show the back end of Bombshell's alt mode... probably because people are going to be miffed when they see toes pointing out the back. You know, people like me. I'm also not loving the black hips, gray hands, and gray biceps.

The articles mention who's producing it, but not who's animating it. The style seems awfully similar to Avatar: The Last Airbender (JM Animation) or Legend of Kora/Voltron: Legendary Defender (Studio Mir). Wouldn't be surprised if it's Studio Mir, they've worked with WB/DC before (the two Mortal Kombat Legends films, Death of Superman, Batman: Soul of the Dragon, and Batman and Superman: Battle of the Super Sons.

I think Takara's Hoist looks better than their Trailbreaker, but I don't really care for Hoist enough to replace the X-Transbots version I already have. Annoyingly, I don't actually have a Trailbreaker, and I might wind up with Takara's, but I really don't like the dark gray paint instead of black.

To be totally fair, this is Hasbro. There's a non-zero chance that he's mistransformed there. I'm in, regardless. Heck, I'm in it for the shaving cream accessory.

I was pretty much console-only back in the days of Diablo, and while I was aware of Diablo II as a major thing it sort of passed me by. I loved Diablo III... on console. I know a lot of PC Diablo fans complained that the skill trees were less trees and more like a straight line, and they have a hard time understanding why I preferred to play with a controller, but I think I was approaching Diablo III more like a twin-stick shooter than an ARPG. I did try Diablo II Resurrected and... I dunno. I think DII needed more than just a graphical overhaul. I'm sure it was fine at the time, but the grid-based movement just seemed too archaic to me. Couldn't get into it after playing games like DIII and Titan Quest. I'm definitely interested in DIV, but I'm not really in a huge hurry for it. I'm still working my way through Tears of the Kingdom, and my neighbor's been on me to play Jedi Survivor. I hear you can use a controller on PC this time? I think that'll be what I do... maybe pick up an ROG Ally and take it on vacation.

I was under the impression that the first Jurassic Park crossover didn't sell so well (it's still available and marked down to like $50 bucks), which, y'know, I kind of get that us '80s kids aren't as nostalgic for the '90s, but I thought it was a pretty decent set. But, yeah, I guess they're doing another one? Both figures appear to be new molds, so, neat. I'm in. This one's an Amazon exclusive. I don't know if it'll be on Pulse or not, so far no. Nevermind, it's on Pulse here. In other news, looks like Takara is looking to do a collab with Toyota and JAXA on a new Optimus Prime figure that turns into Toyota's new Luna Rover. Thing is, right now it's being crowdfunded on camp-fire.jp. If it gets funded, it will likely also make it's way to regular Japanese retail, but for right now it's a little out of my reach.

I think this was probably inevitable after Evolution Prowl... Prowl's not one of my favorite Legacy/Evolution figures (and Legacy/Evolution has usually been less appealing to me than Earthrise and Kingdom), but yeah, I'm in.

Shadowstriker (Deluxe, Evolution Wave 4) was leaked. And... oof. That's a lot of kibble. And sure, her limbs are the sort of thin you tend to associate with fembots, but then I'm also thinking that aside from the head it doesn't really look like Shadowstriker. I mean, there's no front-end on her chest, no doors on her forearms, no wheels in her ankles, etc... For reference, But I kept thinking, I've seen that chest before. I know I have. Shadowstriker's gotta be a pretool, but for what? After racking my brain for a bit, it hit me. That's 100% Shadowstriker's head on RID 2001 Sideburn's body, kibble and all. All I have to say is if they're hitting the RID 2001 cast I better get a Leader (or Commander!) Optimus Prime/Fire Convoy...

This. Don't get me wrong, I love the open-world approach, but part of BotW's mystique was the way you felt like you were journeying into unknown, untamed wilderness with tiny pockets of civilization. You get some of that in the depths, but it's also a lot of been there, done that. Keep playing. Impa will give you a quest to check out these big glyphs. Doing so will unlock memories that reveal that Zelda's story is much more interesting this time around.

I wish a GPU cost the same as a console. For me to really upgrade from my 2080 on actual performance and not simply more ray tracing or more frames through DLSS it's more like two consoles. I'd need practically the entire budget from my last PC just for a GPU.

The Studio Series stuff from last week's reveals is up for preorder. Brawn already sold out on Pulse, but I was able to preorder on Amazon. Weirdly I can't find Prime, Megatron, or Cliffjumper on Amazon but I pre-ordered them on Pulse. Rhinox is still available at both as of 2:00pm EDT.

Hot on the heels of last Tuesday's announced Studio Series Rhinox... I went ahead and bought the mainline Rise of the Beasts Voyager-class Rhinox. Have we seen CGI of Rhinox's bot mode yet? Because, generally speaking, I think this figure is pretty much what I've come to expect from the Maximals in this movie. He's got a limited color pallet, he's got more mechanical details, but by and large he's still recognizably Rhinox. He's still got rhino toes on his wrists, the crotch armor, the round head with the chin strap, and chunky shins. I'd say the biggest departure from the classic Rhinox design is that he's got sculpted pecs and abs instead of a massive lower jaw for a torso. Even from behind, he's still got the rhino head for a backpack. Note that the horns are not attached out of the package, probably so they don't fall off and out of the open-faced packaging. Once they're installed, though, you don't remove them again. Here's a quick shot of Rhinox with Studio Series Cheetor and ROTB Primal. Aside from Cheetor being super tall I'm pretty ok with this scale, and I think they look pretty good together. Rhinox comes with his signature gatling gun saw blade thingies. The 5mm pegs on them have plastic that wraps around Rhinox's fists, making it look like his hand transforms into them, which is cool... but I'm wondering if they're even in the movie? I'll note that the upcoming Studio Series Rhinox gets a hammer instead. Anyway... Rhinox's head is on a swivel only, no tilt. His shoulders can rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees, but he has no wrist articulation. His waist swivels. His hips go 90 degrees forward and over 90 degrees laterally, but his backpack kibble prevents him from getting more than 45-ish degrees backward. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet have a slight up/down tilt, and 45 degrees of ankle pivot. Let that sink in... ankle pivot on the cheaper mainline ROTB toys, but none of two out of three (technically at least three out of five, since Cliffjumper is a retool of Bee) Studio Series Gamer Edition? As mentioned, Rhinox's guns plug into his fists with plastic that covers over said fists so it looks like the guns are his hands, or his hands transform into guns. Rhinox doesn't have any casual weapon storage, but there are 5mm pegs on either side of the plastic that covers over his fists on the guns, and he has 5mm ports on either shoulder. This gives you at least one option for storage, in case you'd rather have Rhinox wielding Rhinox (I do, and I kind of want mini versions of all my Transformers that turn into guns for the bigger ones). Rhinox turns into a rhino, duh. The transformation is very similar to the Kingdom toy, but simplified. Like, in both cases their lower legs open and expand to form most of the rhino's rear half, but ROTB Rhinox has the rhino legs just hanging out of his calves whereas Kingdom Rhinox has them fold out from inside his robot legs in a more complicated (and with less clearance) process. His chest doesn't have to fold up, and his arms don't reverse butterfly and collapse to push his shoulders back. Instead, the shoulders are connected to panels that rotate 90 degrees. OK, now I know we have seen the CGI for Rhinox's rhino mode, and... this figures ok. Broad strokes, it's definitely a mechanical rhino with a lot of browns and some silvers. Digging in, though, the impression that I get from the CGI is that Rhinox should be more like bare metal, and what brown he has on him is more like dirt or rust. Also, despite being a mechanical rhino, the CGI has a dynamic, realistic rhino shape, whereas this guy looks like someone turned a refrigerator on its side, stuck some cinder blocks under one end, then stuck some tree trunks and a rhino head on the other. The articulation in rhino mode is pretty consistent with that visual description as well. His jaws can open, but there's no head or neck articulation. His front legs can still rotate and move laterally at the shoulders, and he's still got the bicep swivels, but turning his rhino toes forward means he has no functional knee/elbows. He's got a little bit of forward/backward movement in what I think is the rear rhino knees, but no hips or ankles, and no swivels. Those 5mm ports on his shoulders, and the pegs on the sides of his guns? Yeah, they're not really there for robot mode. They're there so that Rhinox can carry his guns in rhino mode. Rhinox reminds me a lot of ROTB Primal. In both cases you can kind of tell that they didn't quite get the budget for paint and engineering that a Studio Series release would get, but neither of them seem to put out by that, and both of them have an aesthetic that matches Studio Series Cheetor more than the mainline ROTB Cheetor. So, the question is, why bother if the Studio Series toy is coming? Well, for someone like me, there's the fact that I could grab this guy right off the shelf while my wife was looking for white shoes for our daughter's dance recital... it's less about "this is the definitive movie Rhinox toy!" and more the experience of buying a toy on a whim at the store instead of preordering it months in advance on Pulse or Amazon and just seeing what that toy is all about. I reckon, though, that most collectors aren't doing that. So, I guess my next question would be whether or not the Studio Series toy is actually going to be better. From the pictures, there's things I like about it but I'm not loving how thin and weedy his legs are (both in bot mode, and the rear legs in rhino mode). For now, I'm inclined to suggest waiting for the Studio Series toy, but I'd definitely want to have the Studio Series toy in-hand to compare before I make a final call.

As someone who's grown up with Nintendo, has owned just about all of Nintendo's hardware (sorry, Virtual Boy), and to this day thinks Nintendo makes some of the best games, I think they're kind of terrible. The way they go after anyone who uses their IPs, even Fair Use, is so out-of-touch it's unreal. And they act like emulating an old NES game is a serious crime, but these are the same bozos that released a Super Mario 3D collection that a) didn't include Super Mario Galaxy 2, and b) they promised to stop selling after six months. Full disclosure, yeah, I've got Yuzu installed on both my desktop PC and my Steam Deck, and yes, I do own copies of all the Switch games I have roms for. But I also have roms for probably every game released on a home console in North America from around 1985 all the way through the launch of the Saturn, because it's the NES library not the Disney Vault.

Less buggy and I hope it didn't get it's ending cut, but yeah, I think that's a pretty good comparison. I bought Live a Live shortly after it came out, but never got around to even starting it. Guess I just wasn't in the mood for a JRPG.

So, a bunch of hours in and... yeah, TotK is good. But probably not 10/10 good. It's good, because it's still very much BotW, which was itself a great game. Combat is the same, same open world setup, same wander-around-looking-for-shrines to upgrade your health, same collect-crazy-amounts-of-junk to give the Great Fairies to upgrade your armor. There's still Koroks to be found, and shrines are still numerous mini-dungeons, mostly using a mechanic to solve a puzzle with the occasional combat trial thrown in. There's still characters to meet and sidequests to keep you busy. But, after six years, I kind of expected more. They reused a ton of BotW's assets. Most of the game is, in fact, in the same Hyrule you explored in BotW. Sure, there was an upheaval, and now there's floating islands in the sky and a big underground area, but when one character suggested stopping by the dye shop in Hateno Village I was thinking, "yeah, I know where that is." BotW lived up to the "wild" in its name- you felt like you were going into an unknown, mostly unpopulated frontier. That unlimited potential just isn't there in TotK. And, they didn't fix any of my complaints about BotW. I hated the weapon breaking mechanic then, and I hate it even more now. At least in BotW if something broke you just grabbed another. Now you also have to fuse that weapon to some monster part you were probably hoping to save for upgrading your armor for it to do more than tickle an enemy, knowing full well that after killing three or four baddies that weapon (with your monster part) is going to break. Doing stuff besides walking still requires stamina, which in and of itself I don't mind, but you still can't climb wet surfaces while it's raining (which it seems to do all the time). Nothing takes you out of a game quite like, "well, I really need to get up this cliff, so I guess I'll just sit here on my phone for 20 minutes real-time while I want for the rain to stop." Sure, there are new recipes and armor you can use to mitigate this, but that smacks of the developers realizing it was a problem but doing as little as possible to actually correct it. Finally, and maybe I'm just misremembering BotW, but TotK feels a lot more poorly balanced. See, the one thing they really changed in TotK is your powers. Gone are Magnesis, Stasis, Cryonis, and Remote Bombs. Instead you get Ultra Hand, Rewind, Ascend, and Fuse. Fuse is used to upgrade your weapons by sticking monster parts to them- that's it. Ascend and Rewind are useful, but very situational. Is there a ceiling overhead? Try Ascend. Did you see something move? Use Rewind to move it back. Ultra Hand is the ability that's getting all the attention. Like Magnesis, you can use it to pick up and manipulate objects. Unlike Magnesis, they don't have to be metal, and you can stick objects together. The game often provides things just for sticking... for instance, you can stick a flamethrower in a balloon, then attach the balloon to a platform to make a lift. You can attach big wheels and a steering device to a chunk of wall to make a car. You can stick some logs together to make a raft, then attach a fan to it to make the raft go in a direction you want. At first it's pretty neat, but after awhile you realize that almost every shrine is solved by figuring out how to "right" way to stick the assortment of junk laying around together. So, the shrines are much easier than BotW's. But the actual combat seems harder. Like I said, you need to fuse monster parts to your weapons to do enough damage to kill them, but you have to do enough damage to kill them to get their parts in the first place. Before you find the Great Faries you can expect to die in one or two hits, even after getting a few heart containers. Now that I've upgraded my shirt and pants twice and my hat three times I'm not quite so squishy, but if an enemy mob has more than one Black Bokoblin I'll try to avoid them instead. I've yet to successfully kill any stronger enemies like a Stone Talus or a Hinox, and the one time I saw a Lynel I yeeted out of there as fast as I could. So, yeah, like I said. It's a good game, but also kind of disappointing. Maybe an 8 or 8.5, not a 10. Not even as good as its predecessor.

It was a fun movie, easy for newbies to follow but with tons of easter eggs and in-jokes for people who do play the game. I'm not sure how the writers pulled it off without the usual Hollywood/studio meddling, but it was a well-written, well-acted movie made by people who genuinely care about the source material. And it's a shame we'll probably not get a sequel because Super Mario Bros took over the box office... D&D actually did better than expected the opening weekend, and it's had a ton of positive word of mouth, but everyone went to see SMB instead, I guess.

Yeah, he looks good. But (not that I'm complaining, Brawn was a major character in the first season) I'm curious why Gears and Windcharger don't seem to be getting done (actually, Gears was planned for Kingdom then canceled). You know how Hasbro loves their repaints, and thanks to the comics I'd expect Swerve and Tailgate to move more units than Outback. ...I'm totally gonna buy Outback, by the way. Yeah, it's Senator Shockwave. So, fun fact, Orion Pax's Senator friend was originally unnamed, kind of a "I see greatness in you" plot device. But as they went along, Roberts came up with the concepts of emurpata and shadowplay. The former was the practice of removing the head and/or hands of a Transformer, replacing them with faceless mono-eyes and claws as a sign that they are basically outcast from polite society. The second was basically state-sponsored reprogramming to ensure conformity, officially billed as "personality management." Roberts decided that, since Shockwave didn't have a ton of backstory besides "emotionless mad scientist" at that point that he could make the senator Shockwave, with the story being that he was something of a hot-tempered radical in the Senate. He rubbed some other senators the wrong way, so they had him captured and subject to both empurata and shadowplay, essentially creating the Shockwave we all know and love. Or at least something closer to it. See, IDW really went hard on the mad scientist thing. See, what started as a thing about Shockwave seeding planets with special ores that he hoped would create an alternative to Energon morphed into Shockwave seeding Cybertronian colony worlds with special ores that would give him superpowers at a later date. And when that later date came he decided, for some reason, to undo time. Not go back in time, mind you, like, remove the dimension of time from the universe entirely. It didn't go well, and he did wind up going back in time. So far back that he met the first primitive Cybertronians, gave himself the identity of Onyx Prime and established the rest of the original 13 Primes from among those primitives... essentially creating Cybertronian society and mythology in a causal loop. The 13 created tribes of Cybertronians underneath them, they fought, and eventually they all left Cybertron and created the colony worlds where Shockwave would seed his ores in the first place. In a the course of a run that ended the Autobot/Decepticon war, had Megatron switch sides to join the Autobots, and had Starscream become the democratically-elected leader of all Cybertronians Shockwave became more or less the ultimate villian of the entire IDW run.

My daughter qualified to be in the 2nd grade spelling bee, which happened to be today so I missed the livestream. I take it I didn't miss too much, though? Some Studio Series reveals I knew was coming (GE Cliffjumper and Megatron, 86 Brawn, ROTB Prime and Rhinox), and a tease of stuff I told you would be coming in wave 4 of Evolution like six months ago. I just want to know where the preorders at? That said, I was a bit surprised by the Amazon two packs. I mean, I knew Miner Megatron was coming, but Orion Pax, Ratbat, and Shockwave are total surprises. I preordered both sets. But speaking of preordering two packs... where's that Dion/Elita-1 pack that was being sold at Canadian Gamestops awhile back? I was hoping there'd be some mention of it going up on Pulse for a more reasonable price, because I'm a hair trigger away from paying TCP $100 for it. EDIT: BTW, I'm getting wind that those two Amazon two-packs are just the first Amazon-exclusive comic-universe figures planned. There's going to be another two-pack, figures unknown at this point (Skids and Nautica? Rodimus and Ultra Magnus? Cyclonus and Tailgate? Chromedome and Rewind? Vos and Kaon? Swerve and Whirl? Soundwave and Galvatron? Drift and Ratchet? There's so many good pairs to choose from, you guys.) We're also getting Voyager-class Nacelle (the real question here is whether it's the Earthrise Seeker mold or yet another use of Siege Seeker mold), and the one I'm most excited for, Leader-class Nova Prime.

Technically it's a potential problem for the Joycons, the Pro Controller, the Xbox One/Series controllers, and PS4/5 controllers*. They all work by using potentiometers- basically a metal ring that moves with the sticks rubs against pads of an electrically conductive material, and that rubbing can cause it to wear out over time. It's just that those pads are usually on the sides of the sticks, but due how thin the Joycons are they pads are under the sticks, making them extra prone to failure. This is still true for the current model of Switches, including the OLED. Personally my left Joycon is still good, but my right one went bad. I repaired it once myself, but it's starting to go bad again. Next time I'll probably replace the stick with one of Gulikit's Hall effect ones**. *Of all the controllers for all the consoles I've owned, the only other time stick drift was an issue for me was a PS5 controller. **Hall effect sensors use magnets to detect position by changes in the field. No rubbing, so they basically last forever. The sensors are more expensive, which is probably why penny-pinching execs decided not to use them (even though modern controllers are like $70 now). Fun fact, the Dreamcast used Hall effect sensors.

I'm not defending any of decisions that lead to the issues that got them in this mess in the first place, mind you, but they've gone on record as saying that stuff about the warranty is the usual boilerplate text they put on all their beta firmware and that they're still providing warranty coverage for any affected boards even if you do apply this firmware. I think the bigger issue is that the firmware is supposed to correct the issue by limiting the voltage on those pins to 1.3 volts, and testing has shown that the voltage can still get higher than 1.3 volts even after applying the firmware.

So Prime had to compete with an earlier release with a Voyager budget and turned out pretty great. Barricade had no competition and a Deluxe budget and wound up being one of the absolute worst Transformers figures in recent memory. And now here comes Studio Series Gamer Edition Bumblebee, a figure that does compete with an earlier version but is also straddled with Hasbro's penny-pinching Deluxe budget. Does he belong on a shelf next to Optimus, or in the trash with Barricade? We'll start with aesthetics, where I'd suggest that Hasbro has fixed some of the issues I had with the 2010 toy, but then introduced some new problems. The new figure doesn't have the overly long, thin limbs of the original, with forearm pads that much more closely resemble the CGI model. And if scale is important to you then you'll likely find the newer figure to be a better size, coming in taller than Earthrise Bumblebee but closer to a modern WFC/Legacy Deluxe than the 2010 toy. However, the newer figure puts a lot more mass in the front of the torso, giving him a beer gut that kind of hides his waist, and the older figure has legs that look a lot closer to the CGI. Despite the bulk, the new figure isn't left holding his arms slightly out to the sides like Randy in A Christmas Story. The older figure also has better paint apps on the forearms, although I'll note that neither got the feet right (they should be mostly yellow, like the SSGE figure, but but with the black toes of the Generations figure), and both left off some gold details on the hips. Both figures have pretty big backpacks, but maybe because more mass is shifted forward I do think that the SSGE figure's backpack tucks in a bit tighter. I also like how the bit of inner torso you see through the wheel wells has the game-accurate ribbed appearance. Not a fan of the hollow butt (more on that later), and again the lower legs are kind of a mess on the newer figure. They don't maintain that triangular shape from the game, they look more like a mass of kibble and hinges. Even with the actual wheels on the inside of the the ankles (where they're not actually visible on the CGI model) Hasbro felt the need to fill it out by sculpting fake wheels into the outside and back, but they couldn't be bothered to paint them. Well, forget that goofy little pistol the original toy had, SSGE Bumblebee definitely takes the cake here. He's got a sword that lacks the black-and-red glow but is sculpted pretty accurately. He's also got two guns. One is a chonkier gun I've seen in promo images and cutscenes. The other is the smaller pistol I remember actually having in the game. Bee's head is on a ball joint with adequate up/down/sideways tilt, no issues there. His shoulders are also ball joints that swivel but fall a little short 90 degrees laterally. His biceps swivel and his elbows bend 90 degrees. His wrists don't swivel, but his waist does. His hips are ball joints that don't quite get 90 degrees of range forward or laterally (although he's fine going backward), but I think he's close enough. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend slightly over 90 degrees. His feet, unfortunately, have no articulation. After making ankles standard since Siege, I guess Deluxe-class toys don't have enough budget for ankles anymore. Actually, that's not entirely true... due to transformation, his ankles do bend 90 degrees. They just bend outward. Continuing the gimmick for the line, Bumblebee's right (and only right) forearm can be removed, leaving a 5mm pegged stump. Either blast can be pegged onto that stump. However, since only the right arm comes off you have to pick one blaster or the other. Bumblebee can't dual-wield. Not guns, anyway... you're still free to plug the sword into his either fist, but you'll probably use his non-removable left fist for it. Bee at least manages to have storage for all his accessories. There are slots on his backpack, and all three of his accessories have tabs that fit into them. So, while one blaster is on his arm, the other can go on his back. As can his sword. Actually, you have have both guns on his back, and (intentional or not) the tab on the sword will fit into a cutout on either thigh. That said, for all his accessory storage he's got no place to put his forearm when he isn't using it. That is, I feel, a major issue. Bot mode accessory storage that isn't the fists is always nice, but worst-case scenario you lose a gun and give him a Battle Master or an extra weapon from another figure. Or maybe you buy some new 5mm accessories from a 3P, or these days if you have a 3D printer you can even print your own. But lets say you set that arm aside, and then lose it. Now you're just screwed. You need that arm for alt mode, buddy. Speaking of alt mode, while they have some necessarily similarities (chest becomes the front, backpack makes the roof and rear, etc) there's some pretty major differences. Instead of making the sides of the vehicle from the arms, this time they tuck underneath the front with just the forearm wheels peaking out. The legs, which fold in a much tidier manner this time, make up the sides of the car. Generally speaking, I think the engineering is improved over the original toy, but there's still some minor frustrations, like getting his shoulders enough clearance to fold in. Both figures look pretty good in alt mode, each with their ups and downs. SSGE Bee has the black on his grill, plus the smaller size. The stripes on the top are slightly more accurate as well. I think the extra molded geometry along the sides is, too, but I'm not totally certain on that point. The older figure's stripes aren't marred by a gray hinge, though, and correctly paints the rear "window" that the newer figure didn't. As for the "headlights" I'm a bit torn. The red lines in them aren't actually accurate in alt mode... but they are in bot mode. And generally I think you need to prioritize the bot mode mode, so... yay for red in the headlights, I guess. All of Bumblebee's accessories can be stored in alt mode. There's a slot on top that you can use to tab in any of his accessories. The four on his backpack are also available on the rear bumper (although for practical reasons only two can be used at a time). One more slot is revealed on the underside of the vehicle, allowing you to plug an accessory in between a space between his limbs. Note that only the smaller blaster or sword will fit there, though, if you actually want him to roll when you're done. Well, let's get this out of the way right now... Bumblebee is OK, bordering on good. He's not Barricade. He's got decent accessories, mostly adequate articulation, I'd go so far as to say that I do prefer this figure over the 2010 version. That said, I do feel like Hasbro's kind of hitting the bare minimums here. The transformation could be a bit smoother, and the QC is started to drop. I didn't mention it earlier, but if you go back and look at my pictures you'll probably notice some nasty sprue marks on the yellow plastic, and one spot on the rear where they got a little black paint on him. This, despite skipping the paint on the rear "window". The real killer for me is the lower legs. It's not just the lack of ankle articulation, mind you, but the fact that details on the inside of the leg are more accurate to the outside, while what you get on the outside of the leg is sort of a mess of hinges and junk. Hasbro could have made this figure significantly better, I think, if his legs were swapped then each rotated at the thigh for transformation instead of his whole lower body rotating at the waist. Unfortunately, that doesn't leave him with the clearance he needs for his backpack to cover his rear in alt mode, though. You can get close to seeing what I mean by not swapping his legs, then just spinning his waist 180 then spinning his thighs 180. Details like the wheels in his ankles are on the outside, where they belong, and his the transformation joints in his ankles become ankle pivots. Unfortunately, the hollow gaps in his butt then become his crotch. Oh well, maybe a 3P will make a gap filler that'll work. In any case, I'll give Bumblebee a tentative recommend. He's still pretty decent and I dig the accessories. But I don't know that he's an essential upgrade over the 2010 figure the way Prime was.

I pre-ordered from Amazon, who decided I'm at the end of their route (which is weird, because USPS, FedEx, and UPS are usually here by lunch). Then we had a function at my kid's school (but hey, she won a prize, so 👍). Needless to say I was up until 2:00am after the girls went to bed, and I still basically just started. Compared to a lot of games I've looked forward to Tears feels like an event. BotW was the only game I bought with my Switch at launch, and for six years has still been my pick for the best game on the system. A true sequel is a nice bookend for the Switch, because it's definitely time for some new hardware.

So, the ROG Ally... when I first heard about it I was thinking that it's nice that a bigger company like ASUS was entering a market that has belonged to companies like Aya Neo and GPD, but with their performance claims I fully expected it'd be over $1000 and I'd be perfectly content with my Steam Deck. Because, when Steam Deck is good it's great! I was concerned when only around a quarter of my Steam library had that coveted green "Verified" checkmark, but it turns out that most of my games have the yellow "i", which basically means, "also plays just fine." What's more, even a few with the "unsupported" badge actually will load and run. But more than supporting more games than I thought, what Valve really nailed was the OS. Yes, Steam OS is Linux, and yes, you can put it in desktop mode and use the Steam Deck like a little Linux PC. But in its normal operation Steam OS on the Steam Deck does an amazing job of behaving like a console OS. But yeah, the Ally. ASUS announced that it's coming in at $700, or $50 more than the Steam Deck with the same level of storage. Shots fired, that's pretty aggressive. The thing here is that Windows is going to be a double-edged sword for them. ASUS could improve their Armory Crate software to hide Windows behind a console-like front end, but from my experience with their Armory Crate software that runs the RGB on my desktop I wouldn't hold my breath... ASUS is a hardware company, not a software one. And from everything I've seen and read Windows is still gonna Windows, and until Microsoft does something about it at the base OS level you're just never going to have the same sort of fluid experience on a Windows handheld that you will on the Steam Deck. But at the same time, for all the accolades Valve deserves for bringing PC gaming to Linux, PC gaming is still ultimately the domain of Windows, and so the Ally's biggest weakness is also it's biggest strength. I mean, yes, Steam is my first choice for PC games, and as of this writing I've got around 500 games in my Steam library. But, when Ubisoft started requiring Uplay even for stuff you bought on Steam I started omitting that Steam middleman, that's 55 games that aren't in my Steam library. EA didn't just require Origin, they tried to cut out Steam on their end... that's another 57 games. Amazon buys Twitch, and as a Prime member I can start claiming free games. That adds up over time... to about 250-ish games in my Amazon Games library. The overload of launchers was starting to get to me so I actually held off on Epic Games for a long time, but eventually they had a freebie I couldn't resist, and now I'm up to around 50 there. And that's without mentioning GOG, or Microsoft's PC Game Pass. These are options that, at best, are a huge hassle to get working on the Steam Deck, and at worst simply don't work on the Steam Deck. Speaking of not working, there's that little fact that even though I can easily get an unverified game like the Mega Man X Collection running on the Steam Deck, there's still some that just won't work. Or games that, even running on 720p low, are still more than the Steam Deck can handle (yes, I want to play Jedi Survivor while waiting at my daughter's dance class, and yes, I know it's having trouble running on even well-equipped desktops, but last I checked there's been four patches and some improvement on desktops but is still falling under 20fps on Steam Deck). I dunno. I'd say I'm generally happy with my Steam Deck. I wasn't playing it thinking, "if only it had a little more power so it could run such-and-such" or "Valve needs to get cracking on a Steam Deck 2" or anything like that. And yet, ASUS basically rolled up, opened its coat, and said, "hey kid, more power and it'll run your non-Steam stuff, only $700." And I'm thinking, yeah, I might give them my money...

Hmm. If this were around $20 I'd say yeah, but I personally think the previous Drizzt figure looked better, and it came with a lot more accessories (including Guen!). It's still available, and for only around $12 more.