mikeszekely

I have the ToyWorld Coneheads. Based on Meteor I'd like Endgame better, but I kind of lost faith that MT would actually release the other two.

To be clear, I'm not advocating the elimination of choice, nor do I mean to criticize anyone who does move the taskbar. I guess I'm just surprised by how many people are actually saying they do it. I used to work in computer setup and repair, and in four years of doing it I don't think I ever worked on a PC that had the taskbar moved, nor did I have any requests to move it during setup. I know it's all anecdotal, but I must have worked on close to a thousand computers during that time.

That's not good. Planet of the Monsters was pretty boring. City on the Edge of Battle started to show some promise, but it was all squandered on the just plain bad The Planet Eater. I'd expect almost anything to be better than that trilogy. Wasn't aware that Singular Point was available to watch on American Netflix yet, but now that I know it is I guess I'll check it out.

I guess Rexy is coming soon, then?

Is there really that many people who don't have their taskbar on the bottom (I guess having it on the left looks a little like Ubuntu)? MS locking it to the bottom doesn't really affect me. Not sure how I feel about them moving the Start Menu and icons to the middle, though. It makes some sense, especially for high resolutions and/or ultra-wide monitors, not just touchscreens. Fortunately, those you can move back to the left side of the taskbar if you like. As for the new Start Menu, after the debacle that was Windows 8 my initial reaction is fear and rage, but when I calm down I think it's actually fine. You pin your most-used apps at the top instead of the right, with icons instead of tiles- assuming you haven't already pinned them to the taskbar. And for the stuff you use less often, well, how many of you still scroll through the list of all programs vs typing name and having it quickly come up in search? Toss in the return of something like Aero glass, so we can move on from a decade of "flat" design, and gaming features like better Xbox integration and DirectStorage and AutoHDR (Az might be cool on it, but I have a 4K HDR10 display and games that support HDR look noticeably better with it, so...), and I'm cautiously looking forward to Windows 11.

New haul, @Kuma Style, or just got them back out for pictures? I managed to get the three main ones. QC and crowdfunding issues kept me from getting Sunstorm and Acid Storm, but I love how they look. If they weren't too expensive I'd like to go back and get them (and G2 Starscream) someday.

Between the impressive performance on the newer Ryzens and the difficulty sourcing any individual parts at reasonable it is, and I never though I'd be saying this, pretty much better to buy a whole new pre-built computer.

Awhile back I mentioned some leaks for a "Transformers crossover bat" and a "Prime Optimus Prime." Those leaks turned into speculation that the crossover would be the Batmobile and Prime Optimus Prime would be a new mold of Optimus from Transformers Prime. Nope to both. The crossover is Universal Monsters X Transformers Draculus, a Transformer version of Dracula. Maybe it'll be an improved retool of Titans Return Mindwipe and I'll actually want it... As for "Prime Optimus Prime," it's Amazon Prime x Transformers Optimus Prime. It's expected to be a repaint of Earthrise Optimus Prime as an Amazon Prime delivery truck. Presumably that means a white cab and a blue trailer, although I've seen the reverse (and would LOVE a blue Optimus, so...). On the one hand this one feels a bit commercial, even for me. On the other hand maybe this will lead to a Pepsi x Transformers and we'll get a new version of Pepsi Convoy...

If you've been collecting the mainline Transformers like I have, at first you were probably a little miffed that, between Earthrise, Kingdom, Gen Selects, or other store-exclusives, you've re-bought most of the figures you just bought in Siege to get Earth modes. The further along we get, though, I'm kind of wanting two things. First, I'm wanting an Earth-mode Hound. I mean, I'd gladly take more Earth-mode Seekers (especially Acid Storm and Sunstorm), and with the recent announcement of an Earth-mode Sideswipe (and leaked images of Earth-mode Red Alert) I wouldn't mind Earth modes for Deep Cover, Tigertrack, and hey-can-we-please-get-Clampdown-yet, but I think Hound is the last of the Siege sorta-G1-but-sorta-Cybertronian releases that hasn't seen an update. But going the other way, suppose I want to have my Cybertronian Siege figures battling, and I pretend they crash and get reformatted into their Earth modes. Now it seems like there's some Season 1 characters we have Earth modes for but we don't have Cybertronian ones. I guess it's pretty unlikely that Hasbro's going to go back and give us Cybertronian modes for Brawn, Huffer, Gears (who can't even get an Earth mode!), Jazz, Wheeljack, and Trailbreaker. But Hasbro does actually have us covered for Bumblebee (and where there's a Bee, there's often a Cliffjumper retool). Friends, I give you Origin Bumblebee. No word on a release date, but it's part of the Buzzworthy Bumblebee line so it'll be a Target-exclusive (at least in the States). The report I read also didn't have a price, but given the "War for Cybertron" branding clearly printed on the box I fully expect Origin Bee to scale with Netflix Bee, which would suggest a price between $20-30 depending on how much the jetpack and energon rods cost.

Guess I'm glad I updated my computers last year, then. I went from a 3rd-gen i7 to a 9th-gen, and I replaced my laptop (5th or 6th-gen i7, I think) with a Ryzen 9.

I'm not telling anyone that they're wrong for having that opinion, especially since my dissent seems to be the minority. But with an RTX 2080 I can barely hit 60fps with everything turned up graphically, and I can barely tell the difference between 30 and 60 let alone 60 and more-than-60, so 4K and 60 for me. (Side note, I have a laptop with a 1080p 120hz display and an RTX 2060, and it conveniently works out that whatever settings I use to hit 4k 60fps on my desktop get me 60fps on the laptop.)

Yeah, if it's not the PSU or RAM then you can be 90% sure it's the board. The only thing you can't really know anymore (unless you have a PSU tester) is whether the board was your original issue or if problems with the old PSU caused the issues with the board.

Ugh. If I had the money (and hadn't just bought a new PC early last year) I'd buy the tower. Not so keen on the monitors. I mean, yeah, they look cool, and I know a lot of gamers prefer higher refresh rates, but I'd rather have the 4K resolution and 60hz display I already have. Game Pass is a really good deal. Especially if you want an Xbox; I did that program where I paid nothing up front and $35/month for two years and got a Series X with two years of Game Pass Ultimate. I've played some ok games and some good games, on both console and Xbox, and I haven't actually bought an Xbox game yet. Speaking of, I downloaded Dark Alliance. And... yeah. I mean, almost everything you've probably read about it is true. The name is a way to dupe fans of the older Dark Alliance games, but has zero similarities in terms of gameplay. Weirdly, it's like a melee action game with shooter controls, very clunky. The enemy AI is stupid, the lock-on controls suck, it's a bit glitchy, and the scaling between difficulties is way off (on 1 I can run through a level and barely get hurt, on 2 I barely cleared the first level after dying three times and using all my potions on the boss despite having a "strength score" high enough for 3). The character models look a little weird, especially Wulfgar and Cattie-brie. And yet... maybe because I've read almost all of the Forgotten Realms books, including all of the Drizzt ones (and most Dragonlance and some Ravenloft and Spelljammer books), and maybe because I've been playing D&D since 3rd edition... once I got over the fact that it plays nothing like the older Dark Alliance games I'm actually enjoying it. I might have felt differently if I'd bought the game, I suppose, but for something that I'm getting for "free" it's fun.

MMC. Not going to criticize anyone for going with XTB's- their Groove looks fine, as did their Streetwise. But I saw the transformation for their Streetwise, and yeah, I'm sticking with MMC.

I mean, I'll definitely see it. Most likely in theaters. I'll almost definitely buy the Blu-ray and half the toys. Because Transformers. That said, while Bumblebee and the '07 movie were pretty good, the franchise doesn't have a great record as a whole, so it's hard to really get excited for it.

Shattered Glass Goldbug is up for Pre-order on Pulse. No surprise, they have to use the Cliffjumper/Hubcap/Bugbite mold with a new head instead of Bumblebee (licensing, what can you do?). I do really dig the colors, though.

I need this. Hope they can manage what Capcom did for Mega Man ZX and give us the DS games, too.

I was looking for something to do this evening, and I and my wife (I bought her a Quest 2 also) decided to buy a VR game called Walkabout Mini Golf. I had to tweak the locomotion controls a bit- by default the main trigger will teleport you to your ball, but you're not always lined up right, and the joystick can turn and move you but the default settings don't feel natural. I also recommend setting it so that you have to squeeze the grip button to swing, otherwise the club is stuck to your hand and it's too easy to hit the ball accidentally when you're lining up your shot. Once I got the settings to something more comfortable and started to get a feel for it, though, the game was a blast (although the funniest part was that I'd created a private lobby for me and my wife and named it "Poop," then after awhile another guy joins the lobby and we're both confused as all get out before we realize that there are more than one person out there who thought of naming their lobby Poop. Anyway, definite recommend if you like mini golf.

100% this! I appreciate the hookup that let me get this review up. And I'll get the shoulders sorted one way or another.

Since I originally posed my question six months ago, I played through Superhot VR (loved it) and a lot of Beat Saber. I mean, A LOT of Beat Saber. Not because I like it- I loved it for awhile, but I'm pretty burnt out on it (and will definitely, therefore, look into Moon Rider). No, I play it every day because it's basically light cardio, and playing for around 40-45 minutes a day plus making a few changes to my diet (not drinking anything with calories, greatly limiting junk food, eliminating between meal snacks) has allowed me to run enough of a calorie deficit to lose about 30 pounds (which still leaves me around halfway to my goal). Aside from that, I actually haven't played a ton. Maybe because I'm starting to think of the Quest 2 as a fitness thing- when I do browse the store, I'm looking for stuff that'll give me a workout comparable to Beat Saber. That said, I picked up a game called Void Racer on a whim. It's ok, fun while I'm playing but nothing holding my interest for a long session. And I bought a ton of Star Wars games on May the Fourth. Star Wars Pinball is in kind of like Void Racer for me; fun while I'm playing, but nothing making me rush back to play it some more. Galaxy's Edge might be good. I was playing it while my wife and kid were at karate class, and I was starting to get into it, but I couldn't figure out what the game wanted me to do so I quit when my family got home. I'll try again later. I did finish the first chapter of Vader Immortal, though. Calling Vader Immortal a game is a it of a stretch, but as an interactive movie-like experience enjoyed it and I'll play part 2 soon. I haven't actually bothered to hook it up to my computer. I think playing a game you can sit with might work at my desk, otherwise I'll have to drag out my less-powerful (but probably still plenty capable) laptop.

A million and one thanks to @Wolf-1, who decided our little community needed a Kingdom Leader-class Galvatron review more than he needed a copy right now and generously sent his BBTS pre-order to your favorite(ish?) impatient collector who still writes Transformers reviews on a corner of a Macross board instead of getting his own website. While a new Galvatron was inevitable after Cyclonus and Scourge hit shelves roughly around the same time a few months ago, the fact is that many of us already started seeking out a good CHUG Galvatron almost immediately after getting the extremely disappointing Deluxe-class Universe one way back in 2008. For some of us, that meant going for a 3rd party alternative, like Unique Toys' Mania King, a figure that's held up fairly well but definitely has a few issues (like the fists locked in a gorilla pose, and some loose joints on my copy). Some of us grabbed the holy-crap-has-it-been-five-years-already Titan Return figure, which again was better than I expected with then-uncommon features like a waist swivel and ankle pivots, but he also suffered his share of flaws, most notably the awful headmaster gimmick. Now, after a very good Scourge and a downright excellent Cylconus I think the internet at large was ready to tear into Kingdom Galvatron for being anything less than perfect. And, well, he's not. The Siege battle damage/dirt is back, which I know I'm not a fan of. His face seems a little long, but in hand I actually appreciate it (more on that in a minute). I wish his belt buckle had a bit of red paint. But perhaps worst of all, something we've complained about since he was first revealed, are his proportions. His shoulders sit far too low on his torso, and his arms look too long. I said before that it looks like his upper body is a size larger than his lower body, but was I right? Well, if you totally ignore his arms for a minute, his proportions are actually fairly similar to the Titans Return toy. And those arms? Turns out it's a manufacturing error (so you might have dodged a bullet, @Wolf-1). The inner joint that connects his arms to his torso is upside down. See, if I flip the joint and spin his arm back around you can see his shoulder is raised and his arms don't look as long. This can be a fix, if you don't mind the visible rivet, although you have to rotate it back for alt mode. A better but more difficult solution might be to pop the rivet out, pry apart the shoulder, flip the joint, then reattach, but it will involve an uncomfortable amount of prying and flexing the plastic. Fortunately, Hasbro is aware of the issue and a running change has been made, with fixed copies supposedly already in the wild. I myself will seek out another copy to exchange. Even with the misassembled shoulders, though, I have to admit that in-hand I like Galvatron a lot more than I thought I would. That longish head bears a striking resemblance to Megatron when you have them side-by-side (although Galvatron is quite a bit taller; I wonder how he'll scale with Rodimus?). He's a lot more G1-accurate than Mania King or TR Galvatron, although I think I'd have preferred a bluer shade of purple, and he's a lot more solid as well (I weighed Mania King at 154g, TR Galvatron at 184g, and Kingdom Galvatron at 244g even without all of his accessories). Speaking of accessories, you get quite a few (gotta hit that Leader budget, eh?). You of course get his cannon, again far more G1 than TR's with a translucent barrel that's just a bit of metal flake away from being the G1 toy's. You get a pair of what I suppose are guns- I mean, they're not like anything Galvatron wielded in the cartoon, and the sculpt is basically the Revenge. They can fit together for some reason. Frankly, I'm not huge on them and will probably toss them in a box in my storage closest, but perhaps you'll get more use out of them if you have the Haslab Unicron and you want a Revenge to display with the Autobot shuttle. You also get a soft plastic chain with a Matrix on it. While it's painted a bit differently, especially with a bright blue over the crystal instead of leaving it bare translucent, it's the same Matrix we've gotten with Optimus (and, in my case, Netflix Optimus, Dead Optimus, and Shattered Glass Optimus), Hot Rod, and presumably Rodimus. It uses the peg hole on the back to attach to the chain, so you can pop it off and pop on one of the other ones if you desire. Galvatron's head seems to be on a ball joint. It swivels fine, but there's just a bit of upward and sideways tilt and really nothing down. His shoulders rotate and can move laterally almost 180 degrees. Now, his biceps do swivel, but I'll note that there are little tabs on the treads on the backs of his arms that don't seem to have a function in alt mode, so it seems like the intention was for them to plug into the rivet holes on the backs of his shoulders. Thing is, if you do that then the locked-in treads will keep is biceps from swiveling, so...? Anyway, his elbows are double-jointed and curl all the way up. His wrists swivel. His waist swivels, but only about 45 degrees in either direction before some back kibble gets caught in his hip skirts. Still, should be fine for most poses. Speaking of hips, they can go forward 90 degrees, backward a little less due to the same back kibble, and with the hip skirts hinged out of the way slightly over 90 degrees laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend 90 degrees. His feet don't have any up/down tilt, but they've got about 30 degrees of ankle pivot before the shape of his shin gets in the way. You can use a transformation hinge on the inside of his leg under his knee to move the whole foot out a bit to get a bit more pivot, but it will break up the leg sculpt. The chain with the Matrix just slips over Galvatron's head. You'll notice that there's a tab on the chain and a slot in Galvatron's chest, but if you plug the chain in the chest the Matrix will sit in front of Galvatron's face and the chain will be floating in the air. It seems Hasbro wasn't sure where his cannon should go; to be fair, the cartoon wasn't always sure, either. Hedging their bets, there's a 5mm port on the outside of his bicep, where I think it looks the most proportional, but if you want it to bend with his forearm or to rotate with his forearm like Megatron's there's a 5mm peg immediately below the first one, on the outside of his forearm. Personally, I think the best bet would have been a fold-out peg on the orange part of the barrel itself that plugged into the forearm, but what do I know. Aside from those ports, the rivet holes on the backs of Galvatron's shoulders are 5mm ports, there's one on the small of his back, and there's one under each foot. As for his Revenge-guns, they can plug into his fists separately or combined, but the shape of the gun/ship around the 5mm peg prevents it from being plugged into his arms or the port on his back. Instead, should you wish to store them there are tabs sticking out of Galvatron's back at angles. Slots on the top of the gun/ships allow them the grab onto those tabs. Galvatron's alt mode is always a huge challenge. The exaggeratedly thin lines and mostly-gray color of the animation came from the G1 toy, which was mostly-gray itself and had huge rectangles for biceps with little dangly forearms. Mania King managed to get a mostly-gray cannon by changing the transformation, so his legs are the front of the cannon. Titans Return kind of passed; you could argue that the shoulder pads and cannon kibble sort of make a gray section near the barrel, but the bulk of it is still purple. Credit where credit is due, Kingdom Galvatron transforms in such a way as to have a mostly-gray cannon, although there are some spots molded in the purple plastic near the back of the cannon that still could have been gray as far as I'm concerned. Indeed, I think the extra purple panels on his robot legs are what's keeping the cannon from appearing less cohesive than it actually is (and it's very cohesive- if the gray part seems floppy, it means you don't have the black-and-silver side parts plugged into his chest correctly, a mistake I made the first time I transformed him because that step's kind of glossed over in the instructions). Well, that and the butt of his arm cannon just plugging into the top. It's like, there's space behind his robot chest on the underside of the cannon where you could have tucked it away (seriously, a 5mm port under his crotch is all it'd have taken). The other complaint I'd have is the rear support strut. I'm not sure they could have done anything without a drastic redesign to be totally cartoon accurate. That said, the instructions and many images I've seen have his feet folded down as in the above picture, and I'm not sure that really looks the best. However, you can change the angles of his his arms and the treads*, then fold the feet partway back in and use his ankle pivots to keep everything flat and the cannon angled slightly upward. That actually looks a lot better to my eyes. *On that note, it seems like copies without the misassembled shoulders should be a bit easier to position, as they'll sit in higher and tighter to the body and not force his arms to spread so wide to keep everything level. Galvatron's got room for his other accessories, even in cannon mode. Both of his forearm ports are still visible, and there's a port on either side of the fold-out rear strut. Again, though, the gun/ships actually use the slots to attach to tabs on the body of the cannon. As for the Matrix, while you could just hang the chain over the barrel and call it a day this is the time you're meant to use the tab on it to plug it into the slot on his chest, securing it in place. Aside from the misassembled shoulders I have to say that I'm actually very pleased with Galvatron, much more so than I expected. Yes, both his robot and alt mode have their flaws, but they're definitely not as bad in-hand as they appear in some pictures. I expected that he'd be on par with the TR version (with upgrades like the helmet I got for mine), and that he'd be nowhere near as good as Cyclonus and Scourge. And, actually, well, there's still no beating Cyclonus. But he blows TR Galvatron away, it's not even close, and I think I might actually like Galvatron better than Scourge. So despite my initial fear, where I thought I'd be telling you that you don't need this guy if you have TR Galvatron or Mania King, I'm pleasantly surprised to tell you that I totally recommend this figure. He's solid, he's fun to transform, and he's a definite upgrade from both of those figures.

Sorry for the late reply; yes, you can watch it either dubbed in English or in Korean with subtitles. I guess it's good that I don't watch much Korean TV, eh? To what are you referring? I binged both seasons so they kind of run together. A movie or a stand-alone episode. I'm unclear if it's to wrap up a plot thread and that's it, or if it's meant to bridge the gap between season 2 and an eventual season 3. I know the creator wants to the show to keep going, but whether the production companies involved do or not... In other Netflix news, Castlevania might be over, but I hear the same people are going to make another Castelvania series about Richter.

I mean... there's only been seven of them ('76 Camaro, '07 Concept Bee, RotF Bee, Bug Bee, Jeep Bee, B-127, and WWII Bee), not counting repaints. Maybe eight, if you count the repack of TLK Premiere Bee with the repaint of Bug Bee. I can see why you wouldn't have a Bumblebee yet. Seriously, though, just give me another slight retool of Concept/RotF Bee as DotM Bee (maybe this time without the battle mask), '67 Camaro Bee, AoE Bee, and maybe a proper standalone TLK Bee (the Premiere figure is out of scale, as he's slightly bigger than the others), then I think we're done with him until Transformers 7.

For what it's worth, I hit a Walmart and a Target. Both were reasonably well-stocked, better than my home stores, but with older stuff. Lots of Netflix Deluxes, Kingdom Arcee, Airazor, Dinobots, Primal. SS Dino and B-127, and even a few Grimlocks and a lone SS Scavenger.

Today's toy hunt turned up a fat load of nothing.