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M'Kyuun

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About M'Kyuun

  • Birthday 07/05/1971

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  • Gender
    Male
  • Location
    Spokane, Wa
  • Interests
    Robots, especially those that transform; LEGO; sci-fi; well-engineered toys

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  1. Unfortunately, between my mother-in-law and myself, I'm going to be at appointments right when these streams are happening every Thursday this month. I definitely want to be there, if not for the fan streams, then for the POs on Pulse, most especially for Swoop and the commander OP. Gotta make that membership fee pay for itself! I'm excited to finally finish off the Dinobot team, and as excellent as I think ER prime is, I'm intrigued to see how this commander class fig turns out. If they go too toon slavish, though, it's not going to fit with the rest of Generations/SS86, so I hope the bot mode has some nice surface detail, as well as judicial use of mechanical details.
  2. I hadn't seen or heard anything about a B:TAS Batmobile, but I was hoping for it with the announcement of the lovely Gotham cityscape. $59 is a lot considering last year's '89 Batmobile came in at $48 with 438 pcs with two minifigs. I'm guessing the Animated Series Batmobile is going to be substantially longer than the Keaton-mobile, which itself is a relatively long car model at minifig scale. Ever since LEGO acquired the Batman license in 2006, my two grails have been the '89 Batmobile and the Animated Series version. LEGO has exceeded my expectations for the '89 with the awesome UCS model, a nice minifig scaled GWP set, last year's stand-alone Batmobile set, and the Batcave Shadowbox. Seeing them now leaning into The Animated Series warms my heart and ignites my hope for some great vehicle sets, especially that iconic Batmobile. I wouldn't mind them going further into Batman Beyond, giving us a Terry McGuiness Batman, Batmobile, and an old Bruce Wayne minifig. They've already done sets from the Nolan films, Reeve's Batman, and Snyder's Justice League. They even did a low key Batmobile set from Beware the Batman, a far too short-lived animated series from 2013. I wonder if they'll make sets from the Schumacher films, The Batman animated series (which also had a nice Batmobile design), or Batman: Brave and the Bold, which had a Batmobile that transformed into a mech. That last one would be awesome.
  3. Really wish this had been the original release, as the plastic color choices and paint apps are better all-around and Eject looks so much better in opaque plastics. Eject is IMHO the best of the cassette bots in this scale- full basic articulation and they even managed to use 5mm peg holes to simulate his cassette reels. All he's missing are his G1 toy's weapons, and as big as Blaster is, it's a shame they didn't just utilize the hollow areas in his legs to store them. I don't plan on POing him, but if I happen to run across him at Target, I'll probably grab a copy.
  4. Wow, exceptional paint job, so crisp! Agree with you about the mold- it works, but I still prefer the look and transformation of Classics Hound over this version. I didn't buy Detritis, but if its tolerances are similar to the Siege version, untabbing the legs from the hood of the jeep mode requires the use of a prying tool (I use a LEGO brick separator). That tolerance is way too tight. Happy to pass on the info. Beyond Optimus, I'm not sure what models Joe has been involved with, but he certainly has the acumen to bring some creativity to whatever projects he works on.
  5. I'm also onboard with rereleasing figs, especially those that were once exclusives or just hard to find. Additionally, I have no issue with Earth jeep mode Hound being a part of this multipack; it's the fact that he didn't receive a regular Legacy or SS86 release that rankles. I figure he'll get an eventual release, although it may be a year or so down the road, at which point there may be an even better mold out.
  6. I wouldn't doubt it. Brick Clicker is a reliable source for upcoming sets. Moreover, OP was done pretty well within the limitations of a retail LEGO set. That he can even transform is an amazing feature as Hasbro seldom allows other licensees to make their TF products transformable, keeping the salient feature to themselves. G1 Bee makes sense as LEGO has had dealings with Volkswagen for years, the simplicity of the G1 toy works well, as it did for OP, and Bee remains one of the most popular characters. It's pretty much a no-brainer from LEGO's POV. Too, Joe Kyde, former Hasbro TF designer and now LEGO designer, who designed LEGO OP will likely work on this Bee set as well. Kinda cool to have a designer with one foot in each world.
  7. Hey, thanks for the info, Mike. I don't remember that 4-pack at all, so my interest must have been pretty low. Honestly, the only reason my interest in Ransack was piqued is due to Chop Shop and Barrage, but with all the retooling done to make them more closely resemble the original toys, a simple repaint of Kickback just doesn't quite measure up. If they were to give him a completely new body similar in appearance to the original, reuse the Ransack head, Kickback's legs and arms, then I think it would work better. I doubt they'll do it, but they've gone back and redone figs before, so never say never. Well, TBF, Hasbro have indicated that size classes are more price points now as it pertains to budget. That said, YMMV if the budget/ asking price/final toy was worth it. IMHO, many times, yes. I'm an aviation fan, and in about 98% of cases, Has/Tak's aircraft alts are inaccurate, disproportional (generally, undersized forward fuselages), lazy (robot arms just tacked on the sides of the plane), lacking full landing gear, with said gear rarely retractable (usually just the nose), lacking opening canopies or detailed cockpits (a lesser gripe-relatively speaking, few car bots have any car interior to speak of, and I'm fine with it). Dreadwing/Skyquake has a bulky but well-done jet mode where the arms are hidden Macross-style between the legs and form the lower surface of the jet. His tricycle landing gear all retract, although the wheels, as usual, are just molded into the struts- pretty much gone are the days when they put rolling wheels on retail Transformers planes, more's the pity. Again, he's bulkier than most jets, but I love the integration of his shoulder pauldrons in jet mode. He carries his weapon, again borrowing a page from Macross, on his centerline. One complaint is that the main gear aren't sufficiently long enough to provide adequate clearance for the gun in that position. Transformation of this fig spawned a great deal of discussion on the TFW2005 boards. I modded my Skyquake, which still doesn't lock together as solidly as I'd like, but my copy of Dreadwing I left unmodded and it works fine and seems to be a little tighter/less fiddly. I think it's a neat transformation schema, but tolerances and internal locking mechanisms could have been better for a more consistently solid figure. That said, I love the bot mode as much as the fighter mode. For me, it ranks as one of the best jetformers they've done. Too, I agree about the heels- some sort of folding heel or putting the exhaust nozzles on an off-center rotation peg to allow it to rotate back would have helped stability in bot mode. Overall, though, my opinion of this fig remains highly positive.
  8. I had to take my mother-in-law to an appointment, so I missed the PO window on Pulse. I got Chop Shop & Barrage on Amazon- same price as Pulse, only I don't get the free shipping. They appear to be some good retools; the base toy is obviously still Shrapnel, but there's enough retooling in the torso and heads, and even insect leg details that they channel the OG toys pretty well. As @mikeszekelypointed out, Ransack is a far lazier effort, and the final fig lacks the insect abdomen that formed the OG bot's lower torso. They could have retooled Kickback's body to give it more of a likeness, but they didn't. Maybe there'll be an upgrade kit that does so. Speaking of which, if Ransack went up for, PO, I totally missed it. He's a bit underwhelming, esp next to Chop Shop and Barrage, but I'm hoping, if and when I'm able to PO him, that hypothetical torso upgrade kit will become a reality, and the three of them will look purdy darn good along with their G1 counterparts. Disregard; he was part of a Target Buzzworthy repaint four-pack. No interest in the other three box-mates. Maybe they'll release Ransack as a solo character in a couple of years. Or better, maybe they'll do a proper retool- I doubt it, but I can hope. I completely forgot about Venom, the cicada dude. I can see them doing a major retool of Kickback to make his legs form the abdomen. Really, though, he just needs his own mold.
  9. M'Kyuun

    Arcadia VF-5000G

    It's niche primarily because Harmony Gold held the Macross trademark hostage in most of the world for three decades while doing little with it and preventing the rest of the Macross series from proliferating and becoming popular. I was really hoping that would change when Big West struck their agreement with Harmony Gold allowing Big West to market everything Macross except SDFM, but from what I've seen, they've done very little to promote Macross since. Getting Macross onto streamers would have opened it up to a new huge audience and they could have subsequently pushed all sorts of merch, but for whatever reason, they didn't. The only positive for us collectors is that the valks can now be purchased through domestic vendors, a far better situation than the old midnight madness. As to the Bandai vs Arcadia argument, I think both produce pretty good toys, although neither they, nor Yamato who preceded Arcadia, were free of duds. However there's an argument to be made that Arcadia, and Yamato before them, operated from a place of passion, and I think that shows in the toys they've made. But with such a dearth of companies making Macross stuff, I'm glad that a juggernaut like Bandai, with plenty of resources, is making them, although it's not lost on most of us that in some cases, like the upcoming DX YF-21, some design decisions seem poor or not as well-considered as they could have been given their acumen and level of resources. But, we Macross fans live in a nigh constant state of famine for want of merch, so perhaps a little good and a little mediocre is better than none at all. End of the day, you decide with your wallet.
  10. Barrage and Chopshop actually aren't half bad retools/repaints. Better than I thought they'd be.
  11. I understand that Hasbro likes to cater to its retail partners by doing exclusives, and that's fine. Well, actually exclusives suck, but for the sake of argument, it's fine. That's business. However, they're not quite living up to their motto of, "Where fans come first" in pulling these kinds of shenanigans. Hasbro knows fans want all the G1 bots in just regular color schemes, clear windows, etc to complement each other, so it's a bit of a middle finger to put a featured First Season bot who remains popular in an expensive multi-pack full of repaints. It certainly rankles with this fan. If I had an iota of talent and an airbrush, I'd just buy a copy of Detritus and give him a Hound paint job. Alas, I have no skills, so I'm at the mercy of Hasbro's weird and frustrating marketing decisions. 😒
  12. I wouldn't mind having the Earth-alt Hound, but I already have the rest of the included bots in arguably better liveries, and I just don't have the room or the inclination to buy copies of them just to get the one fig I actually want. Hopefully at some future point, Hasbro will finally release just this version of Hound in some form or fashion. Until such time, the excellent Universe Hound remains my G1 Hound placeholder in my CHUG collection.
  13. Heh, heh, I never have that issue. My wife and I maintain separate accounts, although we each have access to the other's and neither of us really ever checks on the other's. Too, we have no credit cards; we pay for everything from our checking accounts, and we're both careful to never overextend. Well, honestly, my wife spends little of what she makes, as she covers the groceries and I cover everything else, not to mention I'm the one with multiple expensive hobbies. My wife's main gripe when I buy something new concerns where I'm going to put the new acquisition, to which I reply, "I'll find someplace", to which I usually get some sort of dubious, "Mmm-hmm". Finding said 'someplace' is becoming increasingly more difficult; I've pretty much filled our house with my toys. I didn't go in on the Missing Link Prime, and I'll likely skip most of the line. If they do Megatron, or Prowl, though, I'm down for either. I'll find someplace to put them. 😉
  14. Funny you mention that; my next door neighbor's girlfriend is a HUGE cat person (I believe they have 6 cats) and she had bought Stray, but couldn't bear to play it b/c she got too emotional every time her cat character died. So, she gave the game to me and I played it through to the end once. Admittedly, I missed a bunch of stuff on my first playthrough and will likely play it again to see if I can beat it more completely. But, the game itself was fun, a little challenging in a few spots, but I enjoyed it. Edit: I forgot to mention, I played it on the PS4; I don't yet own a PS5, but eventually. I want to play Jedi: Survivor and the new Armored Core. I have Horizon: Forbidden West for PS4, but I'd probably get it for the PS5 for the DLC.
  15. Ramen certainly has a passion for M.A.S.K. that's evident in their designs. I'm not sure Hasbro would have this much investment, although I have to say their G.I. Joe Classified line is pretty amazing. If they did a M.A.S.K. line at that level, methinks they'd be some pretty sweet toys. With the potential for a new show, I guess we'll have to wait and see what they serve up in terms of toys. Although I didn't have any M.A.S.K. stuff as a kid, the whole transforming gimmick and premise of the show endeared it more to me than G.I. Joe, whose toys were amazing, but the show, like most in the 80s, was purdy darned cheesy. Alas, I have neither the space nor the funds to add yet another toyline to my collections, but I do certainly love what Ramen is doing. I'd definitely love to see M.A.S.K. make a comeback, especially if the show has some really good writing and high production values.
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