mikeszekely

I mean, it's something. I just wish it were a sequel to the PSP Frontier games instead of a vertical shmup.

I mean, it's gotta be better than Rise of the TMNT, right? I could go for a new Streetsharks. Yes, absolutely! Also SWAT Cats.

Could be. I definitely think they'd have been better off with a cartoonier lion face, like the original BWII toy. The shoulder joints don't bother me too much. I guess I'm too used to modern Japanese mecha designs like Gundam Barbatos and Gundam Aerial with thin, sometimes exposed joints. But yeah, the proportions are goofy. I don't know if it's just that the arms are too big or if the thighs are too short. I mean, everyone's entitled to their opinions. But no, definitely not. I suppose you could try using some Perfect Effect kits, if you have them, but it's kind of a lipstick/pig situation. I mean, CW Menasor also has weird proportions, but compounded by weird joints and stability issues. And, for those that it matters to, Legacy is definitely more cartoon-accurate. The Stunticons themselves have better articulation, accessories, and cartoon accuracy. CW Breakdown might actually have the better alt mode than Legacy Breakdown. But Legacy wins the other four. All-in-all, the Legacy Stunticons are by no means perfect. I definitely have my issues with them, and the biggest is Breakdown being so minimally retooled from Wildrider. But, especially given the constraints of Hasbro's budgeting, they're miles better than Combiner Wars. I still love the original G1s, though... I don't know about an entire new trailer/Menasor skeleton, but DNA has an upgrade kit that just released. I'm waiting for TCP to get it in stock, but I'll be taking a look for sure.

I tried one of the early Monster Hunter games on the 3DS, and I couldn't get into it. Maybe because I only play single player? Still, it's on Game Pass, so I'll check Rise out. Also on Game Pass (and out for all other major systems) are Persona 3 Portable, Persona 4 Golden, and Persona 5 Royal. All three are excellent games, but P4G is my favorite. Even though they're on Game Pass I'll be buying P3P on Steam to complete the trio on PC. Thinking I might get a Steam Deck anyway, could be fun to play there.

To continue with Legacy Evolution, we're going to need a Repaint Roundup. Up first isn't Evolution, but rather from Walmart's Velocitron Speedia 500 line we've got Leader-class Galaxy Shuttle. He's mostly Siege Astrotrain with a new head. And... well, the best thing you could say about Astrotrain was that the robot mode was a pretty good Astrotrain, but aside from both turning into a space shuttles and both having wings on their backs, Galaxy Shuttle and Astotrain aren't all that similar. I mean, the nose of the shuttle should be Galaxy Shuttle's torso, which is not the case with Astotrain. Velocitron Galaxy Shuttle is missing a lot of the markings you'd expect, too, and the new head has the exaggerated ear points of the box art that neither the toy nor the Victory cartoon really had. As a Leader-class, Galaxy Shuttle comes with all the accessories Astotrain did- four guns, a missile launcher, and a box to store them all in. I wonder if the used so much blue plastic on the box because they wanted it to represent the Autobot's Shuttle Base? But the real question is why three of the guns and the missile launcher are red plastic, but one rifle is black? None of them have the engine bell or tail that G1 Galaxy Shuttle's gun did. Galaxy Shuttle has the same "wear all my accessories" gimmick Astrotrain did. But I don't recommend it- on my copy, at least, the knee joints are far too weak, and the weight of the box on his back makes him fall backward. I think, maybe because Galaxy Shuttle rarely appeared in robot mode and spent most of his time hauling the Autobots around in shuttle mode, that it was their priority mode for this release. The colors, the placement of the Autobot symbols, even the hints of blue and yellow on the sides are a lot more accurate than the robot mode. Unfortunately, the weird gaps and exposed hinges made the back of Astrotrain's shuttle mode look extremely unfinished, and it's not something they fixed for Galaxy Shuttle's release. You could mitigate that a lot by keeping Astrotrain's chest in its robot-mode position, filling in that section, and filling in the back with a 3D-printed part with a new tail. Unfortunately, I don't believe such a part exists for Galaxy Shuttle yet (although I suppose you could buy an Astotrain one and repaint one yourself). Train mode was Astrotrain's weakest mode- it's almost ok, but for whatever reason instead of making the front of the train flush with the bottom of Astrotrain's legs they felt some need to put the swivel point for the shuttle nose in the middle of a larger part, which means that the front of the train looks like a smaller train that isn't even touching the ground bursting out of the front of a larger train. Oh well, Galaxy Shuttle isn't a triple changer and isn't supposed to have a train mode anyway. But... seeing the black locomotive, and the white-and-black shuttle, kind of makes me think this release should have had an all-white head with a red visor, and it could have been Astrotrain in his original Japanese toy colors. But mostly this release reminds me that Hasbro kind of over-engineered Astrotrain in ways that totally worked against his alt modes. Really the only thing I do like about this mold, the robot mode, doesn't really work for Galaxy Shuttle anyway. I'm glad that Hasbro is paying attention to Japanese G1, but you can definitely skip this release- all it really does is make me want Hasbro to do a new SS86 Astrotrain that doesn't suck. OK, now we can get to Evolution, with Deluxe-class Breakdown. Breakdown is my favorite Stunticon, so why is he the one that keeps getting screwed? The Combiner Wars Stunticons weren't the best molds in general, but Breakdown was probably the worst of the five. Legacy Breakdown fixes some of CW's issues, like his whole pelvis is white now, his fists are blue, and he's got better proportions without those weird hips. But why are his feet white now? Why are his eyes yellow instead of purple? But my real complaint is just how much Hasbro reused parts from Wildrider's mold. I mean, I figured that they'd reuse the engineering, just like Dead End used Dragstrip's. In robot mode, you can see that he's got a new head, chest, and waist- and those parts look great! But the arms, the crotch, the thighs, the shins, and the feet are all Wildrider. Now, the shins I can almost forgive. Wildrider had a vented pattern that really belonged to Breakdown in the first place, and although he's got Wildrider's protruding knees if I squint I can imagine it's the flatter squares normally drawn on Breakdown. Breakdown's wheels should be on the insides of his legs instead of the outside like Wildriders... but that complaint applied to Dead End, too, and I think it might be a bit much to expect from a Hasbro Deluxe. I can forgive the arms- the linework doesn't really belong to either Stunticon, who had smooth arms in the cartoon. I might point out that Breakdown is missing his shoulder wheels, but that complain would also apply to Wildrider. Again, maybe it's a bit much to expect from a Hasbro Deluxe. But I don't really understand, given that his waist and crotch are on the same part, why they only remolded his waist? They could have keep that lined pattern on his crotch, too, and it would have been more accurate. I also wish they'd have remolded the thighs. I get that it's probably one of the parts that most people wouldn't care too much about, but the octagonal bit is 100% Wildrider, and to me the rectangle with the two circles is one of his more memorable traits. Well, one thing Breakdown didn't reuse is Wildrider's guns. Instead, Breakdown gets a totally new one... but just the one, where the others had two. Instead, Breadown's other accessory is... his spoiler? Like, I'm glad that means his alt mode has its spoiler, but you have to remove it for robot mode and then, do what? Have him hold it in one hand like some kind of boomerang, apparently. Alternatively, his gun's barrel is 5mm peg-shaped, and there's a port on one side, so you can combine his gun and spoiler into a pickaxe. Still, I don't know why they didn't just make the spoiler two pieces. Then it could have stayed in exactly the same place it goes for alt mode- no need to remove it for transformation. Speaking of transformation... to quote Sesame Street, "one of these things is not like the other." Hasbro painted the trapezoid on the hood, and the blue around the skirts and bumper (well, they actually missed the blue on the back on one side of mine), and he's got his spoiler, but that's so not a Lamborghini. Like, not even a "legally distinct" Lambo like Combiner Wars Breakdown or Earthrise Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. They actually did remold part of the back of the car, so the vents over the rear wheels and the engine are more Lamborghini-esque, and the position of the 5mm peg holes is different so the spoiler can plug in. But from just in front of the rear wheels to the front the rest of the car is 100% Wildrider, and he looks more like Wildrider in white than Breakdown. Could Hasbro really not have found the budget to have at least remolded the nose to look more like a Countach? Heck, even painting some extra lines on the side windows to look more like a Countach's would have helped. Oh, if you're thinking, "hey, Wildrider stored his guns on the 5mm ports on his rear, but Breakdown needs them for his spoiler!" don't worry. Hasbro's still got that covered. There's a protruding chunk on one side of his gun, and it fits into a cutout on the nose's armature to fit just under his front end. The gun can even stay plugged in when Breakdown is combined to Menasor. Speaking of Menasor... I'm guessing Hasbro held Breakdown for last because we'd be the least satisfied with him as an individual, but a lot of people will plug him onto their now-complete Menasor and forget about it. Speaking of Menasor, although he's just now complete I think I covered him pretty well when Motormaster was released, since he basically transformed into a 90% complete robot just waiting for cars to stick to his limbs. Suffice to say that he's a huge improvement over Combiner Wars Menasor, but his shins look a bit plain and his proportions are a bit off. I'm not usually a fan of this much of the gestalt not coming from the limbs members, but I think it works for Menasor to use the trailer in this way. I just wish they'd used all the trailer instead of leaving that gun tower. At least it gives you a place to store the cars' weapons. But as for Breakdown himself, you kind of have to buy him if you want to complete Menasor, or even if you just want to complete the team. But Hasbro really pulled a fast one on us here, by releasing their better efforts first then half-assing it once we'd bought Motormaster, figuring at that point we'd buy Breakdown even if they didn't retool Wildrider at all. But it leaves me very angry. Even more so because Hasbro will undoubtedly use budget as an excuse. Fact is, Hasbro found the budget to scrape the bottom of the G1 barrel with Needlenose, to start catering to Armada fans with Hot Shot, and to create brand new characters no one asked for with Scraphook, and they cheaped out on Breakdown because they knew he's sell anyway, even they could have made Breakdown a totally new mold then retooled and repainted all five Stunticons with G1 toy and G2 decoes to get their repaints out of them. In a just world, no, I would NOT recommend buying Breakdown and rewarding Hasbro for this farce, but four out of five Sunticons in and Hasbro's got us all by the short and curlies. Hopefully someone like DNA will make a new nose for the car and a split spoiler, even if replacing that nose is going to require removing a pin.

Yeah, that's pretty much exactly it. A pen filled with a liquid resin, on the other end is a little UV light that cures it. It's apparently very similar to what your dentist might use to fill a cavity. My experience with it is mixed- it's not as strong as a glue, and because you have to be able to shine the light on it it's pretty useless for some things. But I've had luck using it to repair cracks like the one on your Pointblank. The one I got came from Amazon under the name Bondic. Well, since Amazon stopped sending me Evolution figures I guess I'll take a little break from them and cover a 3rd party release. See, back in November I reviewed Studio Series Hot Rod. And I compared him with Studio Series Lockdown... which got me thinking about my copy of Unique Toys Peru Kill. And that made me decide to buy DX9's La Hire, their version of an MPM Hot Rod. You might recall that Studio Series Hot Rod was only half a head shorter than Lockdown, who were both Deluxes. But... Hot Rod was around the same size as Bumblebee in The Last Knight. But, in Age of Extinction Lockdown was just a little shorter than Optimus... so shouldn't the size difference between Hot Rod and Lockdown be greater? Probably! And indeed, La Hire only comes a little less than halfway up Peru Kill's chest (to be fair, I don't think Hasbro's Hot Rod is too big, I think their Lockdown was too small). As you'd expect from something aimed at the MPM market, La Hire is a lot more screen-accurate than Studio Series Hot Rod, too. As a matter of fact, La Hire was apparently done in collaboration with Unique Toys, and while I'm not exactly a fan of the Bayverse designs, the figures I've got from them (Nero, Challenger, Dragoon, and Peru Kill) have been extremely impressive, with screen-accurate robots that don't even look like they should transform but cleverly do into vehicles that barely look like they transform. And on that first point, robot that doesn't look like it should transform, La Hire nails it. Like, from the front, I have to start nitpicking little things like the orange bits on his waist should be black, and they probably should have painted some silver on his biceps. From behind he's nearly as impressive, as he doesn't have a big chunk of folded-up car for a backpack. Instead, he's got a movie-accurate engine on his back, and although they're a bit smallish here even diecast movie-accurate buttocks. The backs of his biceps, forearms, and thighs lack much of the mechanical details of the CGI model, though, and the GGI's almost Gundam-esque orange heels are black vents here, one of the few concessions to car kibble that wasn't present on the CGI. That said *looks at MP-44* it's a lot more effort into a screen-accurate back than most companies do. La Hire comes with a few accessories. You have a faceless girl in a black jumpsuit- presumably Viviane, although I don't recall if the outfit is screen-accurate (wasn't it sleeveless?). You get a replacement set of wing mirrors, and a translucent yellow blast effect part. Finally, you get a pair of guns. You might recognize one as his "stop ze time!" gun, and just assume the other is his regular gun. Actually, both guns are identical- the magazine under and the... I dunno, time grenades? around the one are removable. The underlying gun is the same as the naked one. La Hire's head is on a hinged swivel. He can look up maybe 30 degrees and turn his head, but that's about it. His shoulders swivel and have a hinge for 90 degrees of lateral movement. However, the swivel is on the wrong side of the hinge. Normally, that'd mean swiveling his shoulder then trying to get some lateral movement would be impossible (liek Studio Series 86 Hot Rod), but fortunately La Hire has a backward butterfly that will still provide some lateral movement. His biceps swivel. His elbows are double-jointed and good for basically 180 degrees of bend. His wrists swivel. His thumb is on a ball joint with one additional hinged knuckle, while his fingers are pinned at the base with one additional hinged knuckle. The index finger is separate, but the other three are molded together. His waist swivels. His hips go about 90 degrees backward or laterally, and just a bit shy of that forward. His thigs swivel, and his knees bend maybe 125 degrees on a single hinge. His toes have a very slight upward tilt, and his ankles can pivot up to 90 degrees. His guns tab into his palms using the time-honored method of plugging little tabs on the handles into slots on his palms. The blast effect can plug into the barrel of either gun. I guess he can pick up Viviane, but there's really not a lot you can do with her in this mode. So we'll go to his other mode! And... maybe this is why Unique Toys let DX9 put their name on this one. There's some of the same Unique Toys' trick of basically turning inside out, but it just doesn't feel as elegant or refined as UT's efforts. It's also not as intuitive- it's been forever since I've handled Peru Kill, but I had no trouble figuring it out again after all that time without any instructions. I needed the instructions to figure out how to transform La Hire in the first place, then just a few days later I still needed the instructions to transform him again. Oh, and we can see how UT was able to make Peru Kill so big while La Hire is so much smaller... these cars are definitely NOT in scale. Peru Kill is noticeably larger, but in real life his alt mode is around 9" shorter than La Hire's. And what is La Hire, exactly? He's a Lamborhini Centenario, and if you ignore all the seams he's a fairly accurate one, too. He's even got the retractable spoiler (although it doesn't extend super far). Only thing he's missing is the Lambo badge on the nose, and that's likely because DX9 is more afraid of Lamborghini taking legal action than Hasbro. Not only does the spoiler work, but the doors open. And in a refreshing change of pace, they don't just open on robot kibble... there's seats in there, and you can fit Viviane inside. Sadly, though, there doesn't seem to be any place to store his weapons in alt mode, which is a bummer. Ultimately, La Hire sits in a somewhat awkward position. If you're a fan of the Bayverse designs then you'll probably love La Hire. He's got a screen-accurate robot mode that's a step up from a lot of the official MPM stuff and turns into a very nice Lamborghini. However, if you're less a fan of Bayverse designs and more a fan of what Unique Toys specifically does with them, you may find La Hire a tad disappointing as he lacks some of the refinement that gives UT's figures that "wow" factor. Still, I'd say he's better than the only other non-HasTak and non-UT MPM-style figure I have, NewAge's Mista, and ultimately I think he's worth checking out.

Yeah, weird, mine still hasn't shipped but it's supposed to arrive tomorrow? I'm skeptical. I actually went out for a bit today, since I needed to pick up a prescription. It's weird, last time I was in Target they restocked with a bunch of Buzzworthy stuff (NEST Bonecrusher, Jetwing Prime, and the Bumbleswoop set from Cyberverse) and Earthspark stuff. Today, they had a few Studio Series Arcees (the one from Bumblebee, not 86) and some Earthspark 1-step changers, but the rest of the Earthspark stuff and all the Buzzworthy stuff except Bumbleswoop was gone. Walmart had a lot more stuff, but they're still choking on those Kingdom repaints (Sandstorm, Buzzsaw, and Nightprowler), and weirdly, a few Legacy Arcees from way back in the first wave. I think those Kingdom repaints have been pegwarming for so long that my Walmart didn't even bother to get the other waves of Legacy Deluxes, so sorry, still no Dead End. The rest of their Transformers section had a few leftover Velocitron Blurrs, Road Haulers, and Burn Outs, a couple of Blitzwings, and a ton of Jhiaxuses, then a ton of Core-class stuff. I'll still keep an eye out, though. There's another Walmart out by my buddy that I stop at sometimes when I go over to play D&D, they usually have a better selection (my Walmart is like the worst one in the area).

Well, Dead End's not really the last, Breakdown is. Granted, Dead End hasn't been out for super long (I got my preorder in and reviewed him mid-November), but that might be why you're having a harder time finding him. Last time I checked Target they were pretty empty, but I'll keep an eye out there and Walmart, if I see one I'll grab it for you. Supposedly my copy of Breakdown is set for Wednesday from Amazon, but since they haven't actually shipped it yet I'm a tad skeptical. Tarn and Scraphook are still saying March, but I'm hoping to see them sooner than later. Along with a Fan First Friday to announce the next wave, and maybe some Studio Series stuff. I had like two pages of preorders before, now I'm down to just those last three Evolution figures and the four officially-announced Studio Series ROTB figs.

Legacy Evolution is continuing to slowly trickle out, one figure every few days, from Amazon. No sign of the other Deluxes, but today we've got our first Voyager-class release with Leo Prime. Leo Prime is about the same height as fellow Maximal leader Kingdom Optimus Primal, which you may recall from that review is a tad shorter than Earthrise Optimus Prime. Curious, how the Maximal analogs of Optimus Prime are shorter than the Autobot leader, but the Predacon named Megatron is bigger than his Decepticon namesake (when the Beast Wars cartoon depicted both as significantly smaller than their ancestors). I'm not very familiar with the Japanese Beast Wars sequels, but AFAIK Leo and Primal being around the same size squares with with the theatrical story "Lio Convoy in Imminent Danger". So, for the parts of Leo Prime that are the robot, he looks pretty good. The proportions are better than any Leo Prime save the MP version, the head sculpt is strong, and there's a decent amount of paint on him meant to get his colors right- they even painted parts of his gray-molded hands blue The aesthetic issues I have with this guy are more due to the lion kibble. Not in the sense that he has it- it's simply a fact of life that the Beast-era animation may have fixed some proportions but was generally much more accurate to the toys than G1, kibble and all, so I expect the head on his right shoulder, the butt on his left, and lion arms dangling off the backs of his forearms. No, it's more that the aesthetic established with Kingdom with more realistic animal modes has a somewhat detrimental effect on that kibble. The lion's face as mane lack the almost mechanical look of the animation. This isn't limited to the head, either, but the bits of mane on his forearms, which were much sleeker in the animation. On his left shoulder, the irregular shapes of the lion's back half stack awkwardly on top of each other rather than nestle together like overturned spoons to form a nearly continuous, domed shoulder pad. Then there's the lion legs on his forearms. Traditionally the lion's legs look like they're coming straight out from under the mane, but this time he's got a more realistic-looking lion shoulder. While the leg can kind of curl up behind the shoulder, the whole thing sticks out a bit further on a ball joint and gets in the way more than designs that have the lion leg laying more flush against his robot arm. There's the backpack, too. It's a chunk of the lion's back that just kind of lays there without tabbing into anything in this mode. I get that a Voyager-class toy isn't going to have the budget that an MP does, but I do wish that Leo Prime maybe borrowed a little more from MP-48 in these regards. Leo Prime comes with a few accessories. They're unfortunately all molded from the same gold plastic as his mane, so the colors aren't cartoon-accurate (but they are Robot Masters accurate), but the accessories themselves do appear in the cartoon. The two smaller ones have 5mm pegs, while the longer ones just have little tabs. Weirdly, the shorter ones have slots on them, but the tabs on the longer ones do NOT fit into them. Nothing does. Those slots seem to exist solely to conserve plastic. They lack any sort of missile-firing gimmick, but are otherwise roughly in-line with what the original Lio Convoy toy came with in 1998. That said, I do wish he came with one more gun... I don't know if he used in the cartoon I never watched, but both the Robot Masters Lio Convoy and MP-48 had it. Leo Prime's head is on a ball joint with some up/down tilt, but nothing really sideways. His shoulder kibble has hinges to tilt up toward his head, as well as hinges to fold back off of his shoulders (with the lion head even being on a slider to ensure that the mane clears his backpack). This allows the shoulders themselves to swivel and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, but his waist has a swivel. His hips can go forward and backward about 90 degrees, and laterally slightly over 90. His thighs swivel. His knees bend 90 degrees. It's more for transformation, but he does have an ankle swivel, and his ankles pivot up to 90 degrees. His feet do not have any up/down tilt, though. He can hold the smaller weapons via their 5mm pegs as pistols, which is good enough, I suppose. The tabs on the longer weapons do not allow Leo Prime to hold them in his 5mm fists. Indeed, there's a relative dearth of of 5mm ports. The only ones immediately visible are on the outsides of his knees and under his heels. To use the larger weapons, you flip the bits of mane on the sides of his forearms down, revealing... 5mm ports? It's kind of weird that the tabs on those weapons don't fit into Leo's fists, but do fit into these peg hole holes, but for what it's worth those peg holes are the hexagonal kind. So, they work with the larger weapons, but if you like they also work with any 5mm-pegged accessory, including the ones on the pistols. Another gimmick from previous toys and the cartoon is that you can flip the lion legs around, and on the backs they have fold-out claws. They don't have the swivels that the MP does, so the only way to get the claws to curve toward his fist as they do in the cartoon is to turn the whole leg around. All of his accessories have storage in robot mode. There are panels in the top of the lion's mane that flip forward, revealing 5mm peg holes that the pistols can plug into. On the inside of his backpack are two slots and two tabs- the tabs on the longer weapons (I believe they're supposed to be missiles, but they have the little nubs on the tips for blast effects like guns) go into the slots, and the tabs on his backpack fit into slots near the tips of the weapons. This leaves the tips pointing downward in bot mode, so if you wanted to stick some blast effects on them you could pretend Leo Prime has a jetpack. And you wanna know the best part? His accessories can stay in those spots even through transformation. I love me some concealed alt mode storage. Leo Prime's tail can flip out of his left shoulder, which I guess is an attack from the cartoon? The sides of the lion's mane are not hinged, though, so he can't do the "Lio Typhoon" thing. But he does have one final robot gimmick- the panel on his left breast opens to reveal his Energon Matrix... which I guess is something the Beast Wars II writers decided all the Maximal leaders have, so there's more than one, but I'm not even clear is a physical thing that could be removed (it's not removable here, at least). But anyway, you can open the door and look at it. Well, you can actually do slightly more than that... there's one of those little nubs on it, so you can stick a blast effect (not included) onto it. Is shooting a blast out of his Energon Matrix something Lio Convoy did in Beast Wars II? Sure would be nice if someone like Shout Factory would sub Beast Wars II and Beast Wars Neo for the US. Transforming Leo Prime into a lion is mostly pretty easy once you know what you're supposed to do. There's only two problems- the first is that you need to tab his wrists into an armature under the lion's head, and once everything is secure and in place it'll be fine, but they like to pop out while you're lining everything up and securing it into place, giving him a touch of fiddliness. The other issue is that the instructions aren't super clear on what it is you're actually supposed to be doing, making the first time transforming him a little confusing. Aesthetically I have some mixed feelings. As I previously noted, the designers opted to keep the more realistic animal style they started with Kingdom, and it's not doing Leo Prime any favors in the head department. The original toys and the cartoon had a face that was very cartoony, almost Kimba the White Lion-esque that conveyed a sense of intelligence and heroism, but Evolution Leo Convoy just looks kind of doofy. I know @Scyla suggested that the face looks kind of squished, but lions don't actually have very long faces. In fact, if you take the following picture of a lion and hold Leo Prime at a distance from your screen such that they're the same size, you'll find that they have nearly identical proportions. However, you'll also find that the real lion's mane also covers his cheeks and jowls. Leo Prime's mane is simply back too far, giving him the appearance of sunken cheeks and narrow jaws. Combine that with eyes that are just gold orbs with no pupils and, yeah. It's not the best. Aside from his head, though, I think he looks pretty good. Sure, there are seams where his body panels line up, and some inevitable robot bits showing on his pelvis, chest, and the backs of his legs- that's part and parcel of robots turning into "real" animals, I'm afraid (and one of the reasons Beast Wars initially bothered me so much but stuff like the G1 Predacons never did). If I'm being totally honest, though, the seems are a lot better, the lion's flanks look a lot more like an actual lion, and the parts of his mane that were on his forearms are actually integrated into the rest of his mane, which are actually significant improvements over MP-48's lion mode. Articulation in lion mode, however, isn't so hot. He can open his mouth a little, but has no other head articulation. His front legs can bend forward at the ball joints, which work out to be his lion elbows, but the forward range is fairly limited. They have swivels, but as they're below the elbows I guess they're technically wrist swivels. The paws themselves have no articulation, which is a bummer, although you can still deploy the claws, I suppose. Back legs are a bit better, due to being his robot legs. His hips have a little bit of swivel backward, lateral extension, thigh swivels, digitigrade knees that bend forward plenty but only a little bit backward before his robot knee pads get in the way, ankle swivels, and ankle pivots. His tail is technically hinged at the base for transformation, but using it to articulate the tail in lion mode breaks the sculpt. But hey, you can have a gorilla riding a lion, and that's never not cool. Although everything stores in lion mode, you might want to have it deployed while in lion mode, which is something that the older toys and cartoon did. For the pistols, you just flip over the top of his lion mane again. For the longer "missiles" you'll have to dig them out of his back, then fold over the parts of his mane that were on his forearms and plug them into the revealed 5mm ports. I've kind of always liked Lio Convoy (once I discovered him). A lion just seems cooler to me than a gorilla (and gives him an alt mode that makes a bit more sense than starting with a humanoid form and transforming into a slightly different primate), and I really like the more traditional Optimus colors on his robot bits mixed with white. I think he's cooler than Optimus Primal, and I like this figure better than Kingdom Primal. That said, despite being very popular in Japan he's a touch more obscure in the West, and I could see even the Beast Wars fans among us being a bit turned off by the somewhat static lion mode with the doofy face and the kibble on his robot arms. I'll say I like him, and I'd tentatively recommend him, but I'll also say he hasn't dethroned Needlenose as my favorite of the wave and note that in general Legacy and Evolution haven't generated the same excitement for me that War for Cybertron and Studio Series 86 has. That said, I hope you guys like this mold. I have it on good authority we'll be seeing the guy who really started the black, gray, and teal repaints of Primes, Copy Convoy/Black Lio Convoy, later in Evolution under the name "Nemesis Leo."

That's unfortunate. I had one go on like a glove, the other was so tight it wouldn't go at all until I filed the peg down. Do you think you might be able to repair it with one of those UV resin pens? Mine's out, because Pointblank needs a weapon. I just don't take him out of gun mode. But Nonnef has hinted that he's planning on making some Targetmasters, starting with Peacemaker.

Taking a break from reviewing new Legacy Evolution figures in the official thread to take a look a 3rd party kit for a non-evolved Legacy figure. This is Nonnef Production's upgrade kit for Legacy Pointblank. You'll get three sprues with this kit, two blue with most of the parts but a black sprue for the elbows. Nonnef made a limited number of the elbow sprues in red and blue as well; while supplies last, if you have the basic kit in your cart you can add a set of the red or blue elbows by going back to the Pointblank upgrade page and selecting the color you want from a dropdown menu. As you can see, I opted to go with the blue elbows. To get started you'll need Pointblank in robot mode. Turn him over and there's a pair of screws on the back of his shoulder you'll need to remove. Once you've done so, the front of the shoulder and his whole arm will come off. The arm is attached to a post on the front of the shoulder, go ahead and wiggle the arm off. For the next step, you'll need one of the two parts with this gear-shaped hole, and two of these round bits with half a peg on one end. It doesn't matter which ones, as the they're the same for both arms. Note that the gear-hole part has one side that's flat, and one side with a lip. Install the flat side toward the front of the shoulder (that is, away from you) by sliding it on the peg the arm just vacated. Take the round bits and fit them onto the pegs on the bottom of the gear-hole part such that the peg halves become a whole mushroom peg. Make sure you slide those parts onto the gear-hole part all the way, but don't worry too much if there's a slight gap on the peg you're making. Ok, now go back to the arm you removed. You'll find a screw on the inside of the forearm. Remove it, then slide the blue part of the forearm and fist off. Then, remove the other side of the forearm with the car hood by working it off the elbow peg. Hang onto the forearm parts, but we don't need the rest of the arm anymore. OK, whether they're black, blue, or red you're going to need two of the elbow parts. One should be smooth, the other should have grooves molded into it. Take the one with the grooves and set the mushroom peg you just built into it so that the grooves are facing the front of the shoulder (and away from you). Use the smooth elbow part to finish capturing the mushroom peg to form the new elbow, then slide the blue part of the forearm over the peg on the inside edge of the elbow to hold it together. With the forearm in place, put the red part on by feeding the screw post though the forearm and stuffing the peg on the other side of the elbow into the peg hole, then replace the screw in the forearm. Reattach the arm by capturing the mushroom peg on his shoulder socket with the front with the arm and the blue back, then replace the screws. Here's the arm with the upgrade on his right (our left), and the original arm on his left (our right). Well, we can see the first problem with this kit, and that's that the blue of Nonnef's plastic does NOT match Hasbro's blue plastic or paint. It's noticeably darker. If I'm being honest, though, I'm glad I went with the blue elbows, because I personally think the all-blue arms look better, even if the blues don't match, than blue with a black line through the bicep and a red chunk in the forearm. I also like that the new Nonnef elbow is flush with the forearm, were the original stuck out quite a bit. Aesthetic improvements are subjective, what's objectively better is the articulation. On the original arm the elbow bend is the black hinge in the bicep, and clearance between the protruding red chunk and the wheel on his shoulder pad meant he had less than 90 degrees of elbow bend. Plus, he had no bicep swivel, which was a big no-no. Nonnef's kit adds the bicep swivel- it's around that mushroom peg we built. But what's more, since Nonnef's new elbows are flush with the forearms the forearms can bend on the elbow pegs around the new elbow. This puts the elbow bend in a more natural position, and gives him a deeper elbow bend using just that joint. However, their is still a hinge in the new bicep as well. You can use it as a double elbow hinge for some poses, just be aware that the second hinge is above the bicep swivel so it's not useful for some more extreme poses. Now, I should say that at this point Nonnef's kit has address my number one complaint with Pointblank, but it's not without a cost. Those protruding red elbow bits formed the car's front grill. While the grooves Nonnef molded into the new elbow parts is meant to look like a grill, it's not quite as detailed, and it's noticeably more recessed. This is likely to bother some people. However, I don't think the original grill looked all that great to begin with. The minor downgrade in the car's appearance is a small sacrifice for the greatly improved robot mode, in my opinion. While we're in car mode, we can look at Nonnef's attempt to address my third-biggest complaint with Pointblank- the lack of his engine wing thingy. You'll need these two parts, and they fit together by taking the part with the wings and fitting the peg into the hole on the with the hole. Just make sure that the 5mm peg on the underside of the hole-part is pointing toward the back. Install it onto the car by plugging the smaller peg in the middle into the screw hole on Pointblank's butt. And ok... that looks pretty decent. The blue is a little too dark, the molded detail is a little soft, and the wings are a little small, but it's decently G1 accurate. But... ...the wing doesn't have enough clearance for Peacemaker. You can still tab him onto the back, but the barrel will be forced upward at least 45 degrees. I supposed you could think of it as an AA gun for shooting Seekers. Or maybe flip the barrel back in and just pretend he's a big, un-aerodynamic engine block. Nonnef did come up with a solution, but it seems like an afterthought. See, there's one more piece in the kit. To use it, you'll have to pry the wing apart again, then sandwich the third part between them so that the bigger hole is pointing toward the front, and the wing plugs back in to the smaller hole. Then the whole thing can plug on as usual. But this forces the wing up higher and back further, with a large gap under the wing. The peg hole itself sticks out kind of far and doesn't seem to line up with the bottom part. The peg hole at least allows you to plug Peacemaker into it in front of the wing. As a bonus, by using a peg hole and working with the 5mm peg on Peacemaker instead of the tabs that go into Pointblank's knees, you could plug in other weapons or Battlemasters instead of Peacemaker. Still, I can't help but thing that a far better solution would to have made the bottom piece a little longer and thicker at the rear, then putting a 5mm peg hole just behind the 5mm peg. Maybe Nonnef didn't want to change the shape of the bottom part because he was concerned with robot mode storage? See, he designed this kit so that you can plug the wing part into his butt, and the base into his back. The base doesn't actually plug in securely, since it fits by putting the smaller peg into a 5mm port, and relies on the chunk of windshield to pinch it into place. This solution leaves a bit to be desired, I feel, as I'm not a fan of pulling the pieces of the wing apart, and there's nowhere to put the third part with the 5mm peg hole. The alternative is to build the wing, with or without the peg hole adapter, and have him hold it in his fist. It's not pretty, I wish there was some way to attach it to his forearm like a shield, but if I'm being fair to Nonnef plugging the wing into his fist is how the G1 toy did it. One final note about this kit. This is really just me being petty, but Nonnef did NOT address my second-biggest complaint with Pointblank: the awful Sunbow head. I really, really want a head for this guy based on the G1 toy/Headmasters anime, so it's a bit of a bummer that I fixed two issues I have but not that one. So where do we stand? This is kit definitely has a few issues, like the blue plastic not matching, what it does to the car's grill, and being forced to choose between a more-accurate, better-looking wing and getting issues stowing Peacemaker or building an ugly wing but one with a 5mm port. That said, if you're in the US I'm still going to recommend you get this kit. The improvements to his arm articulation more than make up for every issue I have with the kit.

I agree. In this case, I think Wonderful Trans would have been better off designing an original Drift that used more of the Asurada's parts, or an original car that used more of KKK Drift's parts, instead turning everything inside out.

I think it's impressive that they took Flame Toys' non-transforming Drift and not only made it transform, but made it transform into the Asurada from Cyber Formula. But just because something is impressive doesn't mean it's good, and just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. As you said, the transformation looks like a fiddly nightmare with too many sliders, weird clearances, lots of twisting, and the kind of transformation where everything kind of explodes then has to be lined up just so to tab in a bunch of thin panels in just the right order or things won't tab in without gaps. Honestly, I was watching Ben's video and thought, "ah, that's not that bad" until he got to the stuff below the waist. Still, it seems pretty solidly built and decently articulated. Might still be worth checking out, even if you don't plan on transforming it. Ronin goes for something like $110... you could buy like three for the price of Flame Toys, assuming you could even find a Flame Toys at the original list price.

My Leo Prime should be here tomorrow maybe, so I'm really trying to avoid any other reviews lest the unconsciously bias my own. While we wait for Leo Prime, though, I do have Legacy Evolution Deluxe-class Hot Shot to look at. A complaint I often hear is how Transformers are getting smaller, so I was kind of surprised to see that Hot Shot is the same height, more or less, than the original toy (or the Powerlinx repaint). For that matter, he's pretty similar in height (to the top of the head) with the 2008 Universe release, which I never bothered with. As far as more modern releases go he's a head shorter than Hot Rod, but right in line with the Autobot cars or the Stunticons. Where Evolution Hot Shot differs from previous takes is how much bulk he has (or rather, hasn't), and where that bulk is kept. His shins are a bit narrower, and his arms are downright thin compared to the original toy. Thing is, for most of his body, I actually think the new proportions work pretty well for him. I do wish his arms were a bit thicker. Of course, a lot of the reduced bulk on his arms is because they're kibble-free. If you look at the insides of his forearms they molded fake car windows, but that's it. You may also notice that his back's a bit different, and he could use some gray paint on the circles on his shins. Look a bit closer and you might notice that the bit of tire that pokes out from his shin flaps is on the inside edge of his leg instead of the outside, because on Evolution Hot Shot the hood of the car is on the outsides of his legs instead of the inside. His calves are now dominated by the the top of the car kibble that used to be on his forearms. Hot Shot's lone accessory is his engine gun. It's decently painted, given that it's molded from red plastic, and looks pretty good. Armada fans hoping he'd come with a new Jolt Minicon will be a bit disappointed, but probably not surprised since Legacy Starscream didn't come with Swindle. So, why all the minor aesthetic changes, you might be asking? The answer, plain and simple, is articulation. The original toy barely had any. The 2008 Universe toy had it in theory, but in practice the kibble was constantly in the way and loose joints made him difficult to stand and pose. Evolution Hot Shot's articulation is fairly average for a modern War For Cybertron/Legacy toy... but that makes him among the most-articulated Hot Shots you can get. His head swivels, no tilt. His shoulders can swivel- his backpack and the shoulder pads are going to get in the way such that he can't swivel them 360 degrees, but you get get at least 30 degrees back and over 90 forward, and up to 180 if you unplug and move the shoulder pad. His shoulders also move over 90 degrees laterally. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. No wrist swivels, but his waist swivels for the first time on an Armada Hot Shot. His hips can go forward or laterally just a bit over 90 degrees, and backward just a bit under. His thighs swivel. With the kibble on his calves properly in place his knee bend is fairly limited, maybe 30-ish degrees. If you use the ball joint to move it to the side of his leg, though, you'll get nearly 90 degrees. Untabbing his knee from the top of his shin will allow you to use a transformation joint as an additional knee hinge, pushing the total range to nearly 180 degrees. Speaking of transformation, his feet can tilt downward due to how he transforms, and Hasbro managed to work in 90 degrees of ankle pivot. His gun has two handles, because I guess that's how the original toy was. You can use either one to plug the gun into either of his fists. Both of the gun's barrels have the little nubs for blast effects (not included). Oh, and you guys remember that Star Saber sword that Starscream came with, that everyone thought was kind of small for him? Turns out it's just the right size for Hot Shot. But wait, there's more! Despite the lack of Minicon, Hot Shot does have his axle bazooka gimmick. Rather than being some kind of spring-activated thing, though, you manually fold the axle over and spin it around so the wheel with the 5mm port is facing forward. Said port will make the axle bazooka work with blast effects (again, not included). You can flip his visor down over his face, too- I don't remember when he did it in the cartoon, but I figured I'd pose him like it's a targeting computer or protective eyewear for firing the axle bazooka. What he cannot do is wear his engine gun on his chest. I don't recall him doing that in the cartoon, but frankly, it's been years since I watched it and I didn't really like it anyway. But I do understand it was something the original toy could do. Speaking of stuff the original toy could do that this one can't, you might have noticed a distinct lack of Minicon ports. There's nowhere on his bot mode that's compatible with original Armada Minicons. That said, he does have 5mm ports on the sides of his spoiler where the original toy had Minicon ports, on the outside of each forearm, on the outside of each leg near his calves, under each toe, on his back behind his axle bazooka, and on each side of his axle bazooka (one side of which is exposed on his back when the bazooka isn't in firing mode). I'll remind you that all the Siege Micromasters had flip out 5mm pegs that allowed you to attach them to the larger figures. I don't recall a helicopter that could pass as Jolt, but nothing stopping you from jamming Roadhandler onto Hot Shot. Hot Shot's transformation is a bit more involved than the original figure, but a lot less so than the Universe version. In broad strokes, it's pretty obvious what you're supposed to do, but it's easy to get hung up on certain little details, like if his arms aren't turned the right way the doors can't tab in, or if you had his axle bazooka turned the wrong way on his back the rear of the car can't fold down the whole way, or remembering to flip out the little yellow bits on his roof. I was a bit surprised by how much smaller he gets in car mode- significantly smaller now than the old Armada toy, but pretty average for WFC/Legacy. I think his car mode is decent. The overall shape is pretty close to the original, and he's got translucent windows instead of painted ones. I have a few minor criticisms, though. The silver on his headlights and front grill is fine, but the silver just above the grill should probably have been yellow, and the yellow spot with the peg holes is where that silver should have been. His front bumper is black, and they painted the skirt along both sides black, but his rear bumper is simply missing. Likewise, they painted the lines on his roof, but not the vent in front of his spoiler, which was black on the original toy. Finally, aside from the Autobot symbol (which is nice and clean on this figure), there's no red on him. The original had red taillights and red marker lights on the front bumper, plus red on the center of his wheels (which otherwise had silver rims). I can live without red on his wheels, though. As far as alt mode gimmicks go, you can still plug the engine gun into its spot on his hood. You can still open his bumper up, but rather than painted claws you just have the 5mm ports that are under his toes. The 5mm ports on the sides of his spoilers that replaced some Minicon ports are also available. Curiously, there is one post with a hole on the rear. The post is 5mm, so you can plug in any accessory that has a 5mm port that fits between the halves of his spoiler, like one of Wildrider's guns or Earthrise Optimus' Matrix of Leadership. I suspect but can't confirm (because the Powerlinx Hot Shot I have is a junker someone gave me sans accessories) that the hole in the peg might make him compatible with the original Armada Minicons. In some ways, Hot Shot is a lot like Needlenose. I don't have a ton of attachment to him- Needlenose doesn't have a cartoon presence but at least he's G1, Hot Shot isn't G1 but at least he's one of the main characters in the Armada cartoon. My lack of attachment meant that I wasn't super excited for him, but in-hand he's a pretty decent, fun little figure. He might not be for you if you're strictly into G1, but Armada fans should be pretty happy with him. And even if you're not big on Armada, he's fun enough and aesthetically close enough to retroactively decide Hot Shot was a G1 character all along, like Legacy Bulkhead or Knock-Out.

I have no doubt that the shareholders want maximum profit, and that has lead Hasbro to pressure pretty much every division in the company to cut costs, generate revenue, or both. As a fan on the Transformers side I've seen plenty of that in higher prices, fewer accessories, and plastic-saving cutouts in various parts. And we know that WOTC isn't exempt from that pressure- I don't play Magic: the Gathering, but even I'm aware of some of the blatant cash grabs that have gone on with the brand in just the last year. As far as it pertains to D&D, sure, it's not immune. One D&D seems less about the need for another rules revision and more about the fact that they've had a hard time selling books besides The Player's Handbook to anyone but DMs, so they want a new Player's Handbook out there. They're also pushing hard to expand the brand into other areas- the upcoming film, a newly-announced show on Paramount+, and just today I was at Target and saw action figures for both the new movie and the old '80s cartoon. I guess the real question is how much of the new OGL was due to that pressure? I guess the trendy thing is to jump on the anti-corporation bandwagon, and I'm sure that the revenue sharing was definitely motivated by trying to get money back off of companies like Paizo that have benefitted tremendously from the original OGL. But, like I said, I'm inclined to believe that the OGL draft was more poorly-worded than intentionally greedy.

So, WOTC released a statement on the backlash that the leaked OGL draft was generating. The TLDR version is that a new version of the OGL is coming, but they'll be walking some of it back. That said, some of the language they used is pretty telling. "When we initially conceived of revising the OGL, it was with three major goals in mind. First, we wanted the ability to prevent the use of D&D content from being included in hateful and discriminatory products" Some creators (I'm thinking specifically of the DnD Shorts guy) were concerned that the language of the new OGL would give WOTC the ability to just shut you down if they decided they didn't like you. Not a lawyer here- this may be technically true, and the wording of the OGL should be more clear, and you can't necessarily rely on a corporation's goodwill to protect you. That said, I'd be willing to bet that this was almost 100% about their lawsuit with Ernie Gygax and TSR LLC over the alleged racist content in the leaked playtest for Star Frontiers: New Genesis. "Second, we wanted to address those attempting to use D&D in web3, blockchain games, and NFTs by making clear that OGL content is limited to tabletop roleplaying content like campaigns, modules, and supplements." This statement is interesting if you look at it from the other side. Sure, they're saying that you can't use the OGL to make a NFTs and junk because the OGL only applies to TTRPG content... but if the OGL only applies to TTRPG content, then it (even the new version) doesn't apply to a ton of other content. Critical Role livestreaming their games, making comic books about their characters, making an anime, Youtube discussion channels, skits and parodies, all that sort of stuff would not have been affected. "And third, we wanted to ensure that the OGL is for the content creator, the homebrewer, the aspiring designer, our players, and the community—not major corporations to use for their own commercial and promotional purpose" Hence the provisions for paying royalties only if you made over $750,000, and only on the money you make over $750,000. I think this is the most telling part of WOTC's message, as it's more or less a confirmation of what I said earlier. WOTC doesn't really care about XP to Level 3's Quest-O-Nomicon. They're mad that Paizo used the old OGL to create D&D's biggest competitor in Pathfinder RPG. Ironically, Pathfinder 2e changed enough from "3.5e but slightly different" original edition, and used very deliberate language in the process, that WOTC would probably have an uphill battle proving Paizo owes/owed them anything. Apparently, Paizo only included published Pathfinder 2e with the OGL to make it easier for fans to create Pathfinder content. Regardless, it sounds like when the new OGL is finished and goes into effect it will NOT have any royalty structure in it. I didn't address it before, but another major concern people had was the license back provision. Creators were concerned that it more or less meant that if they made something for D&D using the OGL that WOTC would own it. WOTC's reasoning: "The license back language was intended to protect us and our partners from creators who incorrectly allege that we steal their work simply because of coincidental similarities." My opinion on this was sort of like my opinion on the objectionable content thing- I don't believe that WOTC actually intended the worst-case scenario, but if it allowed for the worst-case scenario then the language should have been more clear about what WOTC can and cannot do. Which seems to be their intention (at least now): "Under any new OGL, you will own the content you create. We won’t. Any language we put down will be crystal clear and unequivocal on that point." Ultimately, I'm back where I started. Was the leaked OGL bad? Yes, but arguably over unclear wording than greed or malice. Small-time content creators and fans were right to concerned, and I'm very glad to see WOTC address those concerns, but the reaction to those legitimate concerns seemed to me a bit overblown and, at times, suffering from hints of entitlement.

I've been to two different ones (and a Walmart) last weekend. Unless you wanted Coronation Starscream (or the Walmart-exclusive Kingdom repaints) they were pretty much empty of Transformers entirely. Hmm. I need some other stuff, perhaps I'll make a Target run tomorrow. I was meaning to check out some of the Earthspark Deluxes, and I hadn't been able to find those anywhere else yet. Even Pulse sold out surprisingly quickly. Well, local stores have been a bust, but seems like Amazon is going to send me stuff one figure at a time. Today, we can move up from the Cores with Legacy Evolution Deluxe-class Needlenose. Sometimes it's interesting what Hasbro can do when they're not beholden to a cartoon, eh? Evolution Needlenose has proportions that fit with other figures in the War For Cybertron/Legacy lines, and coupled with his newly-red eyes he looks like he could have been based on the cartoon, but he was never animated. Instead, Needlenose borrows a lot from his G1 toy. He's got the yellow face and the knight's helmet. His arms are purple like the toy, and have have similar molded details like the two horizontal lines above his thumbs, to vertical lines on bottom corner of his shoulders, and the raised rectangles on the top corner of his shoulders. His torso has the same shapes and gray colors as the G1 toy, including the raised collar. Blue pelvis with the indent on his crotch, that's a toy detail. His gray thighs lack the stickers of the G1 toy, but there's some molded lines that somewhat recall them. Likewise, molded turquoise vents on his shins are a simplified version of the stickers the G1 toy had. He's even got raised gray kneepads where the original toy's solid thighs and knees cut into the hinged blue lower legs, and we cap it all off with purple feet, ala the toy. Heck, Evolution Needlenose even has pegs on the corners of his wings where the original toy did! Like the G1 toy, Evolution Needlenose also carries his alt mode on his back in the same way. The biggest difference is that more of the fuselage folds over on his spine than just the blue nose. The result is something along the lines of "what if the G1 toy, but with better proportions and articulation?" And as someone who grew up with a lot of the post-movie toys this is something I find appealing. Size-wise, although Needlenose is a Deluxe he's fairly large, standing something like a head taller than the Autobot cars or the Stunticons but maybe a head shorter than Starscream. Considering that the original toy was fairly small, in lieu of a spot on an official scale chart I think he's an ok size- right about the same as his fellow Targetmaster Spinister. Speaking of Targetmasters, like the G1 toy he comes with two, Zigzag (the black one) and Sunbeam (the purple one). I have mixed feelings about these two. On the one hand, they're remarkably accurate to the originals, down to Sunbeam even having a molded rifle on his left hand. Zigzag's just missing his white pelvis (although he's covered in paint- he's actually molded from the same purple as Sunbeam- that black is paint). As with Pointblank's Peacemaker, I appreciate that they're not just recycling the same two Battlemasters over and over anymore, but in a way I feel like we're moving backward. I mean, Zigzag and Sunbeam have zero articulation in their robot modes- the only moving parts are flipping out their gun barrels. That's exactly how the G1 toys were back in the '80s. But, over a decade ago, Universe Cyclonus came with a Nightstick figure that has shoulder swivels, elbow bends, and hip swivels that could move independently of each other. I think I'd almost prefer if Hasbro did like Spinister and just gave Needlenose non-transforming guns that looked sort of like Zigzag and Sunbeam's gun modes. His Targetmaster buddies might not have articulation, but Needlenose himself sure does. His head is on a ball joint for swiveling, some downward and sideways tilt, but nothing really up due to the engine behind his head getting in the way. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his elbows are double-jointed for a full 180 degrees of curl. His wrists swivel, as does his waist (although his backpack might have to be moved out of the way. His hips can go over 90 degrees forward, only a little bit backward due to his backpack getting in the way, and over 90 degrees laterally (his limit is really when his leg starts banging into his shoulder). His thighs swivel, and his knees bend around 150 degrees. His feet can tilt down 90 degrees, and his ankles can pivot around 60 degrees. Although you can have his wings flat against his back like the G1 toy, they can fold back away from his body about 45 degrees (more than that and they'll push his backpack out). Needlenose can hold his weapons in either hand. Additionally, he's got a 5mm port on either shoulder, on either forearm, on the side of each leg just below the knee, under each foot, and the exhaust nozzle behind his head is 5mm compatible as well. Additionally, there's the 5mm posts on his wing tips. Transforming Needlenose is more complicated than the G1 toy, but still surprisingly similar. His whole head folds down into his chest instead of just his helmet covering his face, and his arms fold up above his head instead of tucking into his sides, which in turn necessitates shifting his entire backpack and up and toward the rear of his alt mode. But his legs still wrap around his sides so his toes point toward the rear, and his nose still folds down off his back. Of course, the similarities to the G1 toy mean that, like the G1 toy, he's got a lot of folded-up robot on his underbelly, which is sure to displease some of you. Given the source material and the realities of a Deluxe-class budget, though, I'm not super bothered by that. Even his feet, which sit where the original's head was, comes together with to form a box with an hexagonal indent that looks oddly purposeful and not simply like robot feet. His red cockpit is present, and the blue and turquoise paint on his wings recalls a simplified version of the stickers on the original. I just wish he had some paint on his tail. Speaking of his tail... the original toy didn't have those horizontal stabs on it, nor did it have the diminutive canards that Evolution Needlenose does. While it could be as simple as making Needlenose less obviously an F-16XL to avoid paying Lockheed Martin for a license, there's been some speculation that Hasbro could slap new wings and a different head on this mold and make Windsweeper. Anyway... you have the 5mm port in the exhaust, in case you wanted to use an effects part, and the ports that were on his legs are technically accessible on the belly of the jet (although, with no landing gear, he's going to wind up sitting on them). However, like the original toy, Zigzag and Sunbeam have 5mm ports on the top sides of their gun modes. These ports allow them to mount onto the pegs on the underside of his wing tips. The ports also allow you to plug one into the other to make a single, larger gun. Sure, this was a gimmick the G1 toy had, and sure, he could use the super gun in bot mode like the G1 toy. However, Hasbro added a specific gimmick that requires Sunbeam to be placed into the more forward port on Zigzag. Then, you can undo the back of the plane just enough to open Needlenose's feet. A notched tab on Zigzag's heels will plug into slots under Needlenose's exhaust nozzle, with clearance behind the nozzle for Sunbeam's head. And... yeah, I mean, it's a thing you can do. Doesn't look much better than when Darkwing and Dreadwind become Dreadwing, but it's something. Gotta be honest, when they announced Needlenose I can't say I was super excited for him. Sure, he had a role in the IDW comics (as the brother of Tracks, no less), but I didn't have the original toy, he wasn't in the cartoon, and I was out of the Marvel comics by the time he showed up. I didn't dislike him, but a part of me was asking, "why this guy" for a new Deluxe mold, especially when Breakdown is getting shafted into a minimal retool of Wildrider. Early pictures, with the robot wearing a jet on his back and a jet carrying a folded-up robot on his belly, didn't exactly wow me, either. In hand, though, the ease of flipping him between modes and his solid articulation make him a very fun figure to mess around with, and I'm finding that I actually like this guy a lot. I'm going to go ahead and give him a a solid recommend from me.

More or less. Like I said, his dinosaur legs are connected to the sides of his robot hips and the outsides of his robot knees; that's the only way his robot legs are attached to his body. For combined mode his dinosaur legs rotate near the ankles, effectively turning his dino legs into Volcanicus' thighs but turning his robot legs to the outside as yet more kibble. I keep thinking that he'd have had the same amount of kibble but a much better bot and dino mode if they made the dino legs thinner, cartoon-accurate ones attached near his ankles (and not his hips at all), given him actual thighs that connected is lower legs to his body, and did the ol' splits at the hips, legs bend inward at the knees and used his robot legs for Volcanicus' thighs. But what do I know?

Legacy Evolution continues to trickle out... I haven't got any of the "main" ones you guys would be most interested in yet, but I do have Core-class Sludge to look at today. Well... I mean, where do I even start? Slag, despite having some toy-ish kibble on his legs, was clearly going for a cartoon aesthetic. But it's hard to tell what's even going on with Sludge. Right away, you eyes are drawn to the massive kibble hanging off of his hips. It's not his tail, hugging the sides of his lower legs like the cartoon. It's his dino legs, which I guess is more toy style, except the G1 toy (and the Combiner Wars version) had the legs attached near his robot ankles. At first you might think Evolution Sludge's dino legs are attached near his knees, and they are, and maybe you can just rotate them to be more out of the way, except the dino legs are also attached to his hips. Perhaps you're so distracted by that kibble that you almost don't notice that while his chest is painted red with a black panel, his midriff is bare gray plastic. Or that his pelvis flap and the bottom of the dino feet on his hips are black, but his "thighs" (such as they are) are gray. Or that his wings aren't attached to his back, but rather, are molded onto the outsides of his arms, which are set weirdly out from his chest. Ultimately, while I certainly had my issues with Slag, it's clear that Sludge's transition to Core-class turned out much worse, at least in bot mode. And, at around the same size as Slag, he's going to suffer from the same scale issues when placed with the other Core-class figures. But hey, at least they molded that gunsight pattern inside the 5mm port on his chest. Sludge's issues aren't just aesthetic. The way he's built is just bizarre, and it affects his articulation. His head can swivel, no tilt. His shoulders are ball joints, so they can swivel and move laterally about 60 degrees. He has no other arm articulation- no biceps, elbows, or wrists. He doesn't swivel at the waist, but he can swivel at the chest, so that's something at least. Ok, now his legs are were things get really weird. If you look under his hinged pelvis flap you'll find the black part of his "thighs" are actually part of said flap. Under the flap, you'll find some silver thighs, but they're not attached to his pelvis at all. Instead, they're molded onto the dinosaur legs. Where the dino feet are attached to his hips on a disc hinge is where his hips swivel forward and backward a little over 90 degrees in either direction, and they can move laterally about 45 degrees (but more than 30 degrees and you'll be able to see the gap between his silver "thighs" and the bottom of his pelvis flap). The dino legs have a swivel that kind of acts as a thigh swivel, but it's actually shifting his robot leg out and around, which again quickly breaks the illusion that his robot "thigh" is attached to anything. A ball joint connects the dino leg to the outside of his robot knees, allowing them to bend over 90 degrees. He has no foot or ankle articulation. Sludge doesn't come with any accessories, although his dino head is not attached in the package. Thing is, there's no way for him to hold it in his hand, and it doesn't partsform, so once you have it attached to his back there's no reason to remove it. That said, his fists do have the smaller holes that the other Core-class figures do, so he can at least hold their accessories. Transforming Sludge is pretty simple, but it's noteworthy for one reason- unlike the G1 toy, the Combiner Wars toy, and the Studio Series 86 toy, Evolution Sludge's robot arms do not become any of his alt mode's legs. But maybe they should have, because his alt mode is decidedly not great. His front legs have that sort of stubby look of the G1 toy and cartoon, but his rear legs don't have the shape of either. But what bugs me more is that SS86 Sludge, ostensibly cartoon-accurate and the model the Core-class should follow, has rear legs that bend backward. Instead of copying his larger sibling, though, Evolution Sludge has hips that are set back way too far, and knees that are permanently molded bending forward. Combine that with a hollow gap under his neck and the stumpiest of tails that's connected to his body higher than his neck and he's really not looking too hot (although he does sort of look like my cat when he's about to pounce). Adding insult to injury, Sludge does nothing in dinosaur mode. He has zero articulation- his jaws don't open, his neck doesn't bend. He has no elbow, knee, or ankle articulation. His hips and shoulders do not move. His limbs are frozen in place against his body. I mean, Slag's articulation wasn't the best, but at least his shoulders and hips swiveled, his shoulders had lateral movement, and he could open his mouth. How did Sludge get to be so bad? Well, I'll tell you... he was designed to be a half a torso first, and both of his other modes too a back seat to that. Of course, it may be hard to see when Sludge is in his combined mode without being connected to any other Dinobots... he looks like he simply raised his arms, turned his dino legs 180 degrees, then folded over his robot legs. Because that's pretty much it... and on that note, I'm finding it difficult to believe that his horrible robot mode design was the only way to get his robot and dinosaur legs into a configuration like this. Regardless... once he's in position, take the Volcanicus head out of Slag's tail, then plug the 5mm port on the gold side into the hole on Sludge's chest. With Slag's tail attached, you'll find that the two holes next to Sludge's head line up with two pegs on Slag's chest. The forward-most hole on Slag's tail lines up with a peg on his dino chin, and Sludge's head fits into the cavity in Slag's chest. If everything is lined up right, Slag's front toes will tuck into the dino legs on Sludge's back. Then, you can use holes on the inside of Sludge's forearms to lock them onto pegs on Slag's front legs. Everything should fit together nice and snug. The outside of Sludge's hands have peg holes that I expect the arms will plug into. Sludge's dino legs form Volcanicus' thighs and have 5mm peg holes on the bottom where the legs will plug in. Of course, the other Dinobots aren't available yet... AFAIK, we haven't even seen renders or prototypes. However, using 5mm ports for connections means we can get a little creative and make a complete robot by grabbing some parts from the War for Cybertron Weaponizers, Modulators, or Fossilizers. I used Slammer's shoulders to extend the thighs and turn the 5mm port into a peg, then attached Slammer's legs. I had a harder time finding shoulders with pegs instead of peg holes, But Ironworks would do. I thought they looked a little short on their own, though, so I removed the hook hand and plugged in the rest of Slammer's arm. To use Slammer's other arm on the other side I grabbed the hook arm from the Botropolis Ironworks. Well, now his arms are too long, but... you get the idea. Combined, Slag and Sludge make a decent, if little, torso. And yes, Sludge is a sauropod, Rairyu is a sauropod, Sludge forms the lower torso of this Volcanicus instead of his right leg, just like Rairyu forms Dinoking's lower torso. Honestly, I fully expect Hasbro to redeco/retool this set into Dinoking from Victory before they actually try to do Monstructor. But I digress. As a Sludge to go with your Core-class Transformers, Evolution Sludge is a failure. He's a terrible robot, with a bad dinosaur mode that can't even move, and he's too small to scale with guys like Core-class Ratchet let alone Core-class Prime. If that's what you want, you're better off looking into DX9's old Dinobots, or maybe hoping NewAge does the other four now that they've done Grimlock. The only reason to buy Evolution Sludge is if you're committing now to the Core-class Volcanicus, and on that note at least I can say that Slag and Sludge combined make a decent torso, but we'll see how the limbs turn out.

Nonnef put up a kit that replaces parts of Pointblank's biceps and elbows with ones that allow a proper bicep swivel and a double-jointed elbow bend. The only catch is that the new elbow is more flush with his bicep, so there's a bit of a gap where the grill of the car mode is more recessed. Kit also includes the engine/spoiler/shield thingy, but alas, not a toy/Headmasters head. I ordered myself a copy and I'll be reviewing it in the 3P thread later, but I wanted to post about it here because Nonnef says the default elbow parts that come with the kit are black, but he made a limited number of extra red (that match the car mode better and are the original elbow colors) and blue (that match the robot mode better). While stock lasts, if you put the full kit in your cart you can use a drop-down option on the product page to add an extra set of the other colors, and I figured maybe you guys might want to get on that.

I'm not a legal expert, but there's a ton of gloom-and-doom videos on YouTube right now about this. I suppose it's understandable that content creators whose livelihood revolves around D&D are going to focus on the potential worst-case-scenarios, although the crotchety gen x-er in me can't help but see a level of entitlement around the cries of "how dare Hasbro/WOTC want more control over how my business uses that thing they own!" Like, there didn't have to be an OGL in the first place. In any case, while I do the points behind some of their concerns, I think it might be a bit overblown. Like, it shouldn't affect D&D Online, Neverwinter, NWN, etc at all, because they weren't produced under the OGL, they were licensed D&D products. Likewise, I've heard more than one creator bring up the KOTOR games, but again in the 2000s WOTC was the publisher of the official Star Wars RPG, which used a d20 system similar to the then-current 3rd edition of D&D, so I don't think KOTOR is an OGL product. And the YouTubers? Skits like VivaLaDirtLeague and All for 1 have a lot of leeway, because a.) there's nothing uniquely D&D vs any generic RPG about them, and b.) parody is always fair use. I believe fair use is still going to apply, too, to discussions about the game (eg. "10 best Cantrips!" "Ranking each D&D Class" etc). Stuff like Critical Role, where they're more or less filming their actual D&D sessions, is maybe in a bit more trouble, but it's worth pointing out that Critical Role already has a relationship with WOTC, who have published two official 5e books based on Critical Role material (Explorer's Guide to Wildemount and Call of the Netherdeep). No, what WOTC is really after here isn't old video games or XP to Level 3's "Fireball" video. What they're really going after are the books and supplements being published under the OGL (and even then, only a percentage on earnings over $750,000 a year). See, at it's core, the new OGL is all about Paizo and Pathfinder. Sure, with the changes and what not Paizo made to Pathfinder 2e the game might be different enough now that Paizo could defend it as its own thing, but the fact is that Pathfinder 1e was very much a modified D&D 3.5e they made with the OGL that wound up becoming WOTC's biggest competition. There's also the small matter of the fact that the original OGL was written in such a way that if WOTC did change it that creators were free to stick to the old version. Again, not a lawyer, so I'm not sure how that works exactly - it might also mean sticking to an older version of the SRD, so maybe a creator couldn't make something for the upcoming One D&D under the old OGL, but maybe WOTC couldn't stop them for making something compatible with 3e or original 5e. Regardless, I think this is a topic that's going to generate a lot of noise for awhile. WOTC might even make a few amendments to the new OGL. But in the end One D&D's still going to sell, and YouTuber's are still going to make their videos, and you won't be hearing a peep about this a year from now.

Interesting, but realistically too big for my house and still too stylized (though better than the scrawny Thrilling 30 one).

I guess we're not totally done with Reformatted yet... at least, not with their Remix subline. Sadly, MMC decided to skip Ratbat, Slugfest, and Overkill and move on to Blaster's cassettes, starting with Tempo, their version of Steeljaw. We're going to work backward on this one, so like the other Remix releases Tempo turns into 1:1 scale cassette tape. I feel like I've probably touched on this when I reviewed other Remix releases, but going with 1:1 cassettes instead of microcassettes like the G1, official MP, and now Fans Toys versions means that there's simply no Blaster out there that Tempo will fit into. For some, that probably defeats the purpose of transforming in the first place. As an '80s kid, though, this is a powerfully nostalgic form factor, as I had probably a low-hundreds number of cassettes, mostly of hair metal bands that sort of faded away when grunge took over in the '90s. Tempo is pretty bland, though. To be fair, I suppose the other Remix cassettes are pretty bland by default, too, but I got the labels for Jaguar (I seem to recall MMC had some kind of deal with Toyhax at the time?). As is, Tempo has some obvious cassette features, like the thicker trapezoidal section at the bottom and the two spindle holes, but without the window for the reel and any sort of labels he looks more like a flat-packed machine than an obvious cassette. Fortunately, he has one accessory, and it mostly helps with that. Like the other Remix release, Tempo comes with a cassette case you can store him in. Unlike the other Remix releases, though, where the instructions came as liner notes that also fit into the cassette case, MMC seems to have messed up with Tempo's instructions. Yes, they're still designed with a cover and spine, and the instructions are meant to look like liner notes, but this time they do NOT fit into the case. Instead, they sort of wrap around the outside of the case when it's closed. If I'm totally honest, my Remix figures have been in their non-cassette modes pretty much 100% of the time I've owned them, and the cases for the previous ones are in a closet. And yes, once we get Tempo out of cassette mode he's not likely to go back, and his case will also go in the closet. But somehow, this design choice/issue really bugs me. Getting Tempo out of cassette mode has similarities to Jaguar, but with shorter limbs and a lot more building a box around his upper torso. It's not difficult, although there are a few areas you need to pay close attention to. Folding the halves of his body together can be a bit finnicky, though. At the very least, at least his body locks together solidly, whereas Jaguar's halves just kind of lay against each other, so Tempo feels a bit more solid. Or rather, solidly built... like Jaguar, most of the diecast in him is in his forelimbs, but since his forelimbs are smaller than Jaguar's, he weighs noticeably less. Aesthetically, I think MMC did a pretty good job. The molded linework on his mane and the slight upward bend at the end of his tail are both features seen in the cartoon. His face has a more defined, feline sculpt than the flat, mushy animation model. I think the biggest change on Tempo vs the animation are the gold wing guns. In the animation, the gun part is larger and covers a lot of his sides, and the whole thing sits lower so the round part of the wing is below his back. Tempo's design is meant to incorporate the wings into the transformation, no partsforming, without interfering with his articulation, though. So I'd say it's forgivable. Speaking of that articulation, he's got a good bit. His head is on a ball joint, that allows him to look up, look down, tilt his head sideways, and turn his head from side-to-side. His ears can wiggle, and his jaws open. The whole of his mane is hinged, allowing him to arch his back there, plus some hinges just behind where his wings are attached allows him to arch his back or ab crunch. Thing wings themselves are hinged, so they can fold outward a bit (there are clearance issues with the gun barrels and his shoulders). His shoulders have ball joints for rotation and a backwards butterfly, and hinges for 180 degrees of lateral motion. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. His paws are on hinged ball joints, so they can tilt up, down, and pivot. His hips are ball joints that swivel and move laterally 90 degrees. His "knees" bend forward around 90 degrees, and his rear paws use the same hinged ball joint setup as his front ones. Should you get Tempo? For me, the impetus for getting the Remix cassettes has been that, regardless of what Takara says the official scale is, the official MP cassettes seem too small to me. If you prefer the smaller scale, then you're probably fine with the official MPs, or the Fans Toys/Robot Paradise ones. And, hey, Fans Toys/Robot Paradise seems to be working on a Blaster and his cassettes, so maybe you're covered there. But if you're like me, and you prefer the larger scale for the MP cassettes, then Tempo is a fine addition to your collection, and I'm looking forward to MMC doing Ramhorn, Rewind, and Eject.

As far as aesthetics go, some of the people who work with MMC have commented on that. The idea for the Ocular Max line was that the designs would be based on Studio OX, however, it quickly became apparent that full-on Sunbow was what the majority of the market seemed to want. The more recent the design, the more Sunbow less OX/Hasui. Regarding materials, I don't think MMC is necessarily done with diecast (or even thinner panels... I'll be getting to that in my next review). I mean, what was their Ocular Max release before the Assaultus bots? I'm thinking it was Saltus, and he had diecast. I think the lack of diecast on their Combaticons and Protectobots is simply because they're combiners, and the extra weight is more of a detriment than an asset. All that being said, yeah, it definitely gives their combiners more of a Reformatted feel (if not aesthetic), and that's not really a bad thing. MMC's Reformatted releases (with the debatable exception of their Insecticons, who were originally supposed to be OX) have a pretty stellar track record, while some of their early Ocular Max stuff had a few issues. Sadly, the word going around is that MMC may be killing off the Reformatted line. One the one hand, that's a bummer... like I said, they've had some really great releases in that line. On the other hand, sales of Reformatted figures are down. Hasbro's mainline has been resurgent since Siege, and the Reformatted stuff was always sort of too big for Hasbro, too small for MP. Combined with the fact that we're getting farther and farther from IDW v1, where they were taking a lot of their design cues and... yeah.

But he did make it shortly thereafter. So, this is MMC Ocular Max Navigant, their MP-style Streetwise. I suppose I could have had him with Generation Toy, TFC, or Combiner Wars Streetwise- I know that when I reviewed Medicus I put him with the GT version. But, what's really the point of placing a figure like Navigant with such stylized figures? No, I figured the best figure to compare Navigant to was Medicus, so you can see how the team is shaping up so far. Because, like Medicus, Navigant definitely has that Sunbow aesthetic. He's got the truncated hood for abs, a chest dominated by a windshield, the pelvis with the molded square, the V-shapes on his thighs, even the lines on his wrists where the animators where maybe sort of drawing where the alt mode's headlights were. Navigant sports cartoon-accurate white toes (despite the toes being formed from the lightbar on the original toy), the correct number and placement of windows on his shins. He's got the extra red details on his head, and the sides of his forearms are formed from car panels so he's got wheels in all the right places. I'm not sure how cartoon accurate his back is, but there's some mechanical details on his calves that I definitely don't mind, and the large chunk of his actual hood on his back keeps things super tidy. I think the only thing I can really fault is that he doesn't have his stars on the outsides of his legs- they're actually on the insides, due to how he transforms. It's a small thing, though, and I can definitely live with it as-is. Oh, one more reason I compared Navigant with Medicus... Medicus is white. Navigant is gray. Maybe Navigant is a little more gray in-hand than I expected, but Streetwise is actually supposed to be light gray, not white (or the, I dunno, beige that X-Transbots went with). I feel like MMC is the only one to have gotten this right. Anyway... Navigant doesn't come with (or need) a lot of accessories, but he does have slightly more than Medicus did. For starters, you get his pistol. It's slightly larger than Medicus', but it's a similar style that doesn't have a ton of detail. You also get two alternate heads, one with a slight smile and the other a grimace. To swap the heads, you just yank the installed head off of the ball joint and pop another on. Options are good, but I'm fine with the the default stoic face. Although Navigant's neck sits on a ball joint, there's a hinge in his head necessary for transformation. So, he has a little bit of sideways tilt, not a ton down, but he can look 90 degrees straight up. It doesn't even really break the sculpt, because he's got a neck under it all. His shoulders rotate and extend laterally 90 degrees. His biceps swivel, and his double-jointed elbows bend maybe 120 degrees or so. His wrists swivel, plus they're hinged so they can bend outward slightly and inward almost 90 degrees. His thumb is on a ball joint that swivels and folds the thumb over the palm. Each finger is a separate piece with a hinge at the base, though they are sadly molded into a permanent curl. His waist swivels, and he does have around 90 degrees of ab crunch. His hip skirts are hinged, and with them out of the way his hips can go 90 degrees forward, backward, or laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His toes can tilt up and down, and he's got just a bit under 45 degrees of ankle pivot. Like Medicus, Navigant bucks the usual MP trend of putting tabs on the sides of the gun's handle and instead puts one on the back. So, instead of tabbing into his palm just behind the finger hinges, it plugs in to the base of the palm, where it juts out for the thumb. There's a trend I've noticed with companies like Fans Toys, XTB, and even Takara to utilize overly-complicated transformations to take a robot from super Sunbow to a somewhat more detailed alt mode. Indeed, when XTB and MMC announced they were both doing Protectobots around the same time, I checked out the early reviews for XTB's version of Streetwise and noped right out of what looked like a frustrating mess. I'm very pleased to say that the wizards at MMC, though, have a reputation for crafting figures with more clever and, dare I say, fun transformations. That's certainly the case here, as going from robot to car was a piece of cake. Just remember to spin the lightbar around. Navigant turns into a fairly realistic Nissan 300 ZX (I mean, realistic enough that I'm pretty sure MMC was using the '84 50th Anniversary Edition as a reference), so you've got the accurate intake and hood scoop, accurate placement for the headlights, taillights, and marker lights, and a little silver bump where the Z badge should go. Cartoon accuracy means he's got a white nose and spoiler, plus yellow stars on his doors instead of black (although they lack the rounded tips), and the lightbar is the cartoon-style instead of the solid red of the toy. Yet, MMC decided to run a black stripe down each side that neither the G1 toy nor the Sunbow model had, and the side mirrors are also black. The mirrors don't bother me, but I might actually see if I can remove the stripe. I don't usually make a big deal about how the underside of an alt mode looks- to me, it's kind of ok if it's a bunch of obvious robot bits scrunched up under there, as long as I don't see a face. But, lo and behold, Navigant is pretty tidy under there. Only his arms are particularly visible, and even then you kind of have to know what you're looking for there. Navigant rolls on four rubber tires. His doors can open, as long as you ignore the fact that the window and frame stay behind, and there's no empty space for anyone to sit. That said, there is just enough space in there for you to stash his gun. Granted, it doesn't have a cutout that it can sit securely; once you close him up that gun will rattle around in there. But, I can't find any other way to store his gun, and it works for both car mode and combined mode. Speaking of combined mode... the feet, knees, and a structural part connecting the feet and knees of Defensor are going to come from MMC's Hotspot. I think, especially after the many Menasors that have been released, there's a temptation there to just stick a car onto that structure. Maybe mess with the hood to give a "transformed" look. I mean, that's what GT and Maketoys did with their Defensors. Even when Streetwise is the whole lower leg there isn't a lot of transformation, like Combiner Wars or TFC, and Streetwise can make sort of a thin leg. This is not going to be the case with Navigant. From the front, he's got the Sunbow car-with-a-shortened-hood look of the cartoon, but as you look around him you can see how MMC made Navigant actually transform, expanding and filling out his leg mode. Navigant is a very easy recommend from me, even if you just want a solid Streetwise and don't care about Defensor or the other Protectobots. Consider, Medicus was my pick for my favorite 3P figure of 2022, and I think that Navigant is even better than Medicus. His shoulders lock in better, his joint tolerances are better, his proportions are a little better, and his transformation is a bit more intuitive. Just a really solid, fun figure all around.