mikeszekely

Appreciate you thinking of me, but 16GB of RAM is a deal-breaker. I'll either wait for another sale on the 32GB version with the 4070, or I'll get the 2025 model with 32GB and a 5070ti.

Big Powered is definitely more than I'd want to spend today, too. Maybe whoever did POP-01 will do a POP-02? I'd definitely go for the Power Greater upgrade for Battle Convoy or Big Powered. I'm mildly interested in Dia-Battles, Battle Buffalo, Grand Dion (with Guardian expansion), and a few of the TriVERS and Versaulters. Yeah, I think it's great that people are getting and doing what they're into, but I looked as some of those links and find people buying 45-packs of generic off-brand Dianauts, and all I'm thinking is that the Dianauts are the least interesting bit for me. I guess Diaclone isn't really my schtick... so I'll get back to my niche, since the third and final set of Mecha Invasion's Constructicons came. 05 is the creatively named Excavator. And, yeah, he's very obviously Scavenger. Maybe, because Bayverse Scavenger is a red repaint of the big wheel guy Prime murked at the beginning of Revenge of the Fallen (and part of Devastator's torso, apparently), there doesn't seem to be much in the way of Bayverse influences here. With tread legs and a shovel on his back, perhaps I could suggest that he's influenced by Scrapmetal, the other Bayverse excavator that makes up Devastator's left hand? But then again, that's kind of just G1 Scavenger, isn't it? And that's pretty much what MI's Excavator is... sure there are some stylized details, like grill abs, loads more mechanical details and greebles, silver feet, biceps, and hands, and the ironing board on his chest is inverted, but I think Excavator is competing (and winning) for least-reimagined Constructicon in this set. The treads that cover his legs are black instead of purple, sure, but the purple is still there under the treads, and yep, there's the shovel on his back. But if I sound like I'm being a bit hard on Excavator, it's because I think MI could have done more to reimagine Scavenger, not necessarily that I think they should have. After all, turning the shovel into the legs definitely made Loader evocative of Bayverse Scrapper as much as G1 Scrapper, but given that Scrapper is my favorite Constructicon I think I was a little disappointed that Loader was skinny and didn't have a shovel on his back. By contrast, sure, Excavator isn't doing anything too daring, but he's a smart-looking Scavenger with strong proportions and just enough mechanical details to be interesting. I dig! As was the case with the first four, Excavator does come with an LED & battery (already installed), but his only real accessory is this gun. Pay attention to the shape of the barrel; his pack-in-partner's gun is extremely similar. Excavator's head swivels, looks down a little, and tilts sideways a little on its ball joint, with a solid 45-ish degrees of upward tilt. His shoulders rotate. Unlike the first four members of this set, Excavator's shoulders can move 90 degrees laterally on the correct side of the swivel- no Hot Rod shoulders here! Actually, that's not quite true, as a transformation hinge on the other side of the swivel can also move his shoulders 90 degrees, but that means you actually get over 90 degrees of lateral shoulder movement. His biceps swivel, as do his wrists, and his elbows bend 130 degrees on a single hinge. His waist swivels. His hips are a little limited... you get 90 degrees backward and just a hair under that forward on ratchets, but only about 45 degrees laterally. If you use the transformation hinges, you can kind of stretch that to maybe 60 degrees. His thighs swivel, and his double-jointed knees bend a full 180 degrees, revealing a diecast joint with molded faux-tread details. His feet cannot tilt up, but they can tilt down and swivel, as well as pivot about 45 degrees. Excavator holds his gun by plugging the peg handle into the hole in either fist. You can see the magnet under the barrel that's used to turn the LED in his eyes on and off. Excavator's transformation is pretty simple, but a relatively interesting take on the character nevertheless. His waist and this thighs both rotate 180 degrees. Stick his arms straight out in a t-pose. Fold his hands in, and rotate his shoulders 180 degrees, then rotate his biceps another 90 degrees so his fingers are facing up, then bend his elbows 90 degrees. Undo the sides of his chest by untabbing and folding them down, then swinging them out the sides. Lift the front of his chest up about 180 degrees, which will also fold his head into his chest. The entire top of his torso will then fold forward 90 degree. The silver part of his chest will fold over the gap and cover his head, and then his shoulders can shift back so his forearms can meet and lock together. The chest bits we folded down and out of the way can swing around and tab back in to square off the front of the vehicle, and the top half is done. Now his hips shift up and away from his pelvis slightly, then rotate back 90 degrees. His feet fold down, so his heels tuck into the treads, but then the silver parts swing around to the inside. Bend his hips back so that the treads line up with the rest of the vehicle, then his feet tab together then into his forearms on the underside of the vehicle and you're done. The biggest complaint I've heard about Excavator is that he seems a bit long. Traditionally, the deck does overhang the back of the treads, but the front of the deck and cab are set back from the front of the treads. While technically correct, excavators come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. I don't really mind it, though I think they maybe missed a beat by not making him one of those really large Terex excavators they used for Bayverse Scavenger. As you'd expect at this point, there's storage in Excavator's alt mode for his weapon. After you've got his chest and arms folded up for alt mode but before you fold his torso over you'll see this I-shaped indent on the inside of his chest, above his head. The butt of the gun plugs right into it, then the barrel can fold down over his head. Excavator's shovel arm is fairly articulated... there's a hinge where it connects to the deck, a hinge about halfway through, and a hinge at the bucket. There's also a swivel near the base. In excavator mode that makes for plenty of digging poses, and in bot mode you can swing the shove around and above his head or over his shoulder. I do wish there was maybe more more hinge, though, just above the swivel. It'd let the shovel fold up almost entirely into a neat little backpack in bot mode. However, that's about it for alt mode. There are no little wheels in the treads, so he doesn't roll, and the deck cannot turn. Finally, we come to his combined mode, and now we can really see why Mecha Invasion thought it was a good idea to flip the limbs around. I've often heard people praise TFC's Hercules for using the treads on Scavenger and Bonecrusher to form Devastator's forearms (a move IDW artists also pulled first for the All Hail Megatron series), but a forearm still needs a hand. While MI cleverly found places to store said hands in Loader and Mixer, and could probably have found a place for a hand on Excavator, what MI found is that treads make for an even better foot than forearm. The mechanical details on the outsides of his legs even combine with his own feet to give the leg mode toes. The transformation is, again, surprisingly simple and easier to do from bot mode than alt mode. His chest and head fold up like he's going to alt mode, and the sides of his chest shift to fill in his lats. His feet turn 180 degrees with the leg kibble, and his arms scrunch up, but the rest is basically just him kneeling. Excavator is another win from Mecha Invasion. It's a solid, good-looking robot with simple, clever engineering into an interesting leg and foot and a passable excavator mode. It's not a premium shelf queen, but it's a fun toy to actually mess around and play with. The biggest challenge most collectors will have is trying to decide where to CHUG-style but Masterpiece-sized bots in their collection, but again you get two bots for the same prices as a Hasbro Commander-class. It's worth making room somewhere.

True, I just want to make sure that my small (but excellent!) audience is seeing the content that matters to them. That said... I'm pretty sure everyone wants to hear about the "Original Optimus." And by that, I mean POP-01 Original Optimus. Yeah, that's really what it says on the box, and I have no idea what Chinese fly-by night has that kind of stones, because near as I can tell they didn't put their own name on it anywhere. There was some Chinese I thought might be a company name, but turns out it's just the Chinese for "Original Optimus." Of course, it's not actually the original Optimus Prime. But, as many of you undoubtedly know, the toy that became the original Optimus Prime toy was borrowed from Takara's Diaclone line, where it was called Battle Convoy. And that's sort of what POP-01 is... a KO of Battle Convoy. Just not that Battle Convoy. Rather, it's a KO of the more recent Diaclone reboot Battle Convoy V-MAX, a more modern and roughly Voyager-sized figure that I'd kind of wanted for my Optimus collection. Yeah, it's not technically Optimus, but it's the kind of homage that brings things full circle. And it does have a very Optimus vibe... mostly blue-head with a silver mask, mostly-red torso, silver thighs, mostly-blue shins and feet. One thing I might have changed if I were in charge would be giving him a silver pelvis and ditching the gray on his shins, but hey. That's not the biggest deviation from your traditional Optimus design, rather, it's the Mechwarrior cockpit in his chest and the overall "this definitely doesn't turn into an Earth truck" aesthetic. So why a KO? Well, I wasn't particularly interested in the Diaclone reboot at first. It's an expensive, gimmicky line, and while the early figures did have a neat retro '70s sci-fi toy look they didn't really grab me. By the time I was aware of Battle Convoy V-MAX it was sold out at the original price and now mostly sits somewhere between $700-$1000 on the aftermarket. Heck, Takara released a set of vehicles called "Power Greater" that was essentially an armor upgrade kit for Battle Convoy, and that by itself is regularly over $300. Generally speaking I think it's better to support the originals when you can, but if Takara is willing to let the aftermarket get that insane without reissuing their more popular figures and someone else comes along and offers me basically the same thing for $160, well, KO it is. And where Takara is pushing the line on nostalgia for the original Diaclone toys while doing their best to keep it distinct from the Transformers brand that the original Diaclone toys begat, whoever made POP-01 would rather bank on that Diaclone-Transfomers association, figuring (probably correctly) that Transformers collectors with no real interest in Diaclone at large will definitely buy another Optimus Prime. Which is why they've included this new, even more Optimus-esque head that I don't believe the Takara Battle Convoy V-MAX came with. And, yeah, that's the head that's going on my copy. Aside from an alternate head, you get a ton of accessories. You get a trailer, because what's an Optimus Convoy without one? There's a pair of double-barreled turrets that I've placed on top of the trailer. There's a pair of guns, and a red pod. And because Diaclone is supposed to NOT be Transformers, we have a pair of Dianaut pilots. There's a... platform? Bed? It's a thing... the instructions (which, near as I can tell, are a straight copy of the Chinese Battle Convoy V-MAX instructions) call it something like "repair splint". There's also all this! From left-to-right, top-to-bottom, we've got a pair of pads for parking the little Diaclone motorcycles, some girders that make a pair of arches, two connectors for turning the pair of arches into one bigger arch, four chairs, a sticker sheet, two claws, two small computer consoles, two medium computer consoles, two large computer consoles, two connector parts, two of what the manual seems to call "core hooks" (my Chinese isn't great), and two "decks." There's also a sheet of magnetic tape; I haven't done anything with it, but it seems like you can put the tape on places in the trailer and magnets in the Dianauts' feet will allow them to stick there. Now, from what I've seen of the actual Battle Convoy release and what the manual indicates, vs what we actually got, POP-01 comes with two fewer connector part, two fewer decks, and four fewer core hooks than the legit release, plus the single sticker sheet is missing several of the stickers that came with the pair of sheets the legit version did. If there are other differences that you know about that I didn't mention, please feel free to chime in. Moving right along, "Optimus" has a head on a ball joint that swivels, looks up, and tilts sideways just fine, but doesn't have a lot of clearance to look down. His shoulders rotate, ratchet 90 degrees laterally, and have a little forward butterfly. His biceps swivel, and double-jointed elbows bend almost 90 degrees. His wrists swivel, and his fingers (which are molded as a single part) are hinged at the base. His waist swivels. His hips go 90 degrees forward, and just a little less than that backward or laterally. His thighs swivel, and despite being a single joint his knees bend around 130 degrees. His feet swivel, plus they have one hinge that gives him a slight upward and nearly 90 degrees of downward tilt, and another hinge that gives him nearly 90 degrees of ankle pivot. The guns on his shoulders can swivel upward; they're technically pegged in, and can be removed and held in his hands. The barrels of his shoulder guns are also pegged in and can be removed. Flaps under those guns can open to reveal molded and painted missiles. And he can hold his guns by plugging them into either fist. Note that while they're using a peg-and-peg-hole style similar to Transformers the pegs are a tad smaller. Those pegs exist in more places than just his fists... he's got some on his back, the backs of his forearms, the sides of his shoulders, and his shins that you can use to plug in other accessories, like the trailer turrets. Technically, the ports his shoulder cannons are plugged into, or in what's leftover of the shoulder cannon after you pull the barrel off. Speaking of barrels, there's a port under the barrels of his guns, so you could pull the barrels off his shoulder guns then plug them onto his rifles to make them bigger guns. Modularity is the name of the game, here. Speaking of, while there's nothing in this set that uses them, if you're into Diaclone you might have some smaller accessories with smaller pegs. "Optimus" has some of the ports for those smaller pegs on his back, on the outsides of his wrists, and on the sides of his feet. There are also a pair of clips on his hips. These clips cab grab onto his rifles. They're going to come in handy later. On that note, you can pull the blue "core" cockpit out of his chest, and swap it with the red one. No one's stopping you. Both have opening canopies that the Dianauts can sit in. The so-called "core hooks" are another place you can sort of dock those pods. Doing so adds some pegs to them, if you want to look for a place on his body to store the extra pod. Then again, you could dock the spare core pod with the trailer. That said, the trailer has it's own cockpit, complete with seats for Dianauts, and one assumes it can operate as a vehicle on its own without "Optimus". "Optimus" has a transformation that's honestly kind of similar to the original Convoy/Optimus toy. Turn his head 180 degrees, lift the flap it's on, then turn it 180 degrees as well. Slide the core forward and tuck the head into the space behind it (or maybe take it out and put it back after tucking the head in, as the new head doesn't seem to have enough clearance to fold in with the core in place). Fold his fists in, slide the shoulders back a bit, then swing them behind his body and tuck his arms up under them. Spin the feet 180 degrees and fold them so his soles line up with his shins. Fold the wheels out of his calves and swivel them under his feet, then swivel his waist and make him sit down. Tab his legs together, and swing the front wheels from his legs around to the front. It's a tad more moon buggy than truck, but I don't hate it. Like I said, it reminds me of some of those old '70s style sci-fi toys that imagined what a future moon or Mars base might be like. The only thing I'm not a big fan of is the gap between the front wheels, under the core cockpit. I think that's because they're not meant to be empty. Well, like I said, modularity is king here and you can really do whatever you want, but the instructions want you to put the rifles into their hip-clips, and then dock the second core pod onto the front, between the guns and under the other core. That's the "complete" truck mode. The complete truck can then, of course, pull the trailer. The connector is even on a swivel, so the truck can turn independently of the trailer. It's a bit awkward, though... the connector is on a hinged stalk, and it has to stick out a bit from the front of the trailer, otherwise the height of the truck will lift the front of the trailer. Takara seems to know it's a bit awkward, so there's another gimmick. You can press this thin gray button on "Optimus'" butt, and his upper body will detach at the waist. Once detached, you can flip down to connectors on the front of the trailer and dock the entire upper half of "Optimus" directly onto the front of the trailer. This sort of leaves his lower half to act as "Roller." It's fine, though. It's got it's own cockpit, and the rifle clips can swivel a little. The shins can fold up and away a bit to create a pair of twin-barreled guns. Another option is the repair thingy. You can mount it onto the back, then it can hinge up to an angle. It's got fold-out repair arms, little winglets, and a flap at the back. I suppose, if you don't fold out the repair arms or the winglets it looks like a mobile launch device. But what could it launch? How about his own upper half? Turn the shoulders 90 degrees and you can wrap the arms around to the sides. Wings and stabilizers fold out from said arms, and little canards from the sides of his chest. On the underside you can find some landing skids that you can deploy. With nothing docked to it the trailer still has uses. Open these connectors on the sides and lift up a flap on the back. That'll allow you to fold it down. Once that's done, the sides of the trailer open up, just like the original Diaclone Convoy. On the front of the trailer you can open the corners and then, after pushing a button to release it, slide the cockpit up and spin it around. Once you've spun it around, you can slid it back down. The cockpit itself can slide down into rails on the trailer, acting like an elevator of sorts. Or, heck, just remove the whole thing. The sides stretch out into the "Directive Flying Orbiter (D.F.O.)". The D.F.O. even has ports on the sides and top for accessories. The inside of the trailer is pretty spartan, but that's where all those other accessories come in. There's ton's of peg holes on the floors and walls. Personally, I arranged it like this: arches with the claws on the rails inside on the edges of the front central part, with the motorcycle pads directly under them. The repair module is plugged into the floor of the rear middle, with the core hooks flanking it. The small computers went into the front-middle of the two front sides; with the hooks on the arches slide toward the rear, they'll pass under the arches when the trailer closes. The decks go onto the walls at the top rear of the trailer, and the other four computer stations with chairs go onto the rear sides. This will allow the trailer to close with everything in place, as the computers and decks will go over the bed and core hooks. There's enough playability there, too. Dianaut's can sit in the chairs and operate the computers. The rifles peg and neatly into the decks on the walls. "Optimus" can lay on the bed, with the flap at the bottom holding his feet while it's angled. Which is good, he needs repairs! His arm fell off! Which is still one more gimmick, mind you. You can apparently swap is arms with the arms of other compatible Diaclone mecha (such as the Power Greater set I mentioned near the beginning). Again, modularity is the name of the game. In fact, not only do you not have to arrange the inside of the trailer the way I did, you can rearrange the trailer itself. All three ramps pull off, and shuffle them around if you like. That's actually where those leftover combiner pieces come in. If you look around the trailer you'll notice that it's actually got quite a few of them already on. If you pull them apart, you can split the front and rear halves of the trailer. To this end, Takara sold "Grander Expansion Units" which were basically half a trailer with more arches, hooks, and connector parts. Pull the doors off and you could use the connector parts to add an expansion unit to make a trailer that's half-again as long... or buy several and make an infinitely long trailer. Up to you. So where does that leave us? As an Optimus toy POP-01, and by extension Battle Convoy V-Max, is ok. Simple transformation, unrealistic sci-fi alt mode, but decently articulated and pretty recognizable as Optimus despite not actually being Optimus. I think the POP-01 price is fair for what you get, though I definitely wouldn't pay for a legit one at this point. But that's sort of got me thinking... who is Diaclone actually for? The modularity makes for a great play pattern that I think would be really appealing to kids, but Takara sells these things for at prices that pretty firmly target collectors nostalgic for the original Diaclone line. The kinds of collectors that might pose them on a shelf and not touch them again, and don't really need the modular play pattern. Even from my own adult collector perspective, the mix-and-match thing might be fun but they're so expensive that I'm not sure I really want to buy more. Well, I guess the bottom line is that if you ever wanted a Battle Convoy V-MAX, whether you're into Transformers and see this as a version of Optimus or are just into a cool sci-fi robots, but find legit Takara copies to be priced outside what you feel comfortable paying, POP-01 is a solid alternative.

Well, here's a quick upgrade kit from Nonnef, for Legacy Slipstream. This kit is a collab with Toyhax, so you get a label sheet, some chest parts, some wing fillers, and some new null rays. Note that this is what you get with the "basic" kit. You can also get the chest and wing fillers in different colors. There's also a more Cyberverse-accurate chest, but it's sold separately. We'll start with the wing fillers. They're exactly the same as the ones he did for Windblade, and attach to the wings by pushing two pegs into the 5mm ports on the wings. Next up we'll do the null rays. To assemble them you'll need the rays themselves, plus four parts off of the above sprue (save the other parts for later). Stuff the finned parts into the gaps under the null rays, which will leave just the 5mm port open. The other parts have two 5mm pegs. One goes into the null rays, the other goes onto the backs of Slipstream's shoulders. Here's how we're doing so far. Much as with Windblade, I can take or leave the wing fillers. The null rays fix one of my major problems with this figure, though. Before, you could put the stock rays on her wings which looked ok in standing poses, but didn't really work for action poses, or you could plug them into the undersides of her forearms (or stick them into her fists) which just looked wrong. With Nonnef's setup they look to be positioned more accurately and still move with her arm (plus, by most versions of the character, gray/silver is a more accurate color for them). My other major problem with Slipstream was that they just repainted Windblade's chest rather than give her a more traditionally Seeker-esque cockpit torso. So... let's build her a new torso. Begin by removing these two screws on her back. This will let you slide the front of her torso off, bringing her head with it. Slide her head off. Attach her head to the larger purple piece, and screw it in place of her old torso. Remember those last two parts on that one runner I told you to save? They're for her abs. You can pick either style, and it simply plugs into the the lower port on the Nonnef torso. Take the other purple piece and plug it into the top to ports. It's a better shape, but still devoid of detail. That's where the stickers come in. There's three cockpit designs on it. A and B are for this chest, C is for the Cyberverse chest (which I didn't order, but am considering). Aside from cockpits, you've got various stripes for her wings, some silver accents, and a few extra Decepticon badges. Here I've got with chest B, since her actual canopy is blue and most depictions of her use blue. I also put the purple stripes on her teal wings. It's definitely an improvement, but I find myself wondering if I'd like the Cyberverse chest better. It's flatter with a wider cockpit, but it has the turbine intakes the G1 Seekers have. Also, while her wings are usually depicted as teal with purple accents, given that the other side of her wings are still mostly purple I wonder if I wouldn't prefer purple wing covers with teal stripes. There's the transformation to consider, too. The new chest isn't an issue, but the wing covers take up the ports you'd normally use under the wings for her null rays. Nonnef's solution is to plug his null rays into the ports on the edges of her shins and flip them up over her wings. And, yeah, that technically works... but I don't really like it. All-in-all this kit's a bit of a mixed bag. I think it does a lot for her robot mode, but negatively impacts her alt mode. To be fair, I don't think Hasbro did a great job with Slipstream in the first place; she's supposed to be a female Seeker, not Windblade with a Starscream head. I don't think she needed wing covers, she needed entirely new wings. And while Nonnef's new null rays are an improvement over the stock and are designed to work with her existing arms, I kind of think she needed whole new arms. Finally, the new chest is appreciated, but it'd be better if we weren't relying on stickers to make the canopy. For now, I think that Nonnef's kit is reasonably priced and worth checking out as it does address some of this figure's big issues. But my fingers are crossed, hoping someone like DNA will take on a more extensive overhaul of the figure.

Asking in the 3P thread, too. I've been posting reviews for upgrade kits in the unofficial TF thread, on the logic that they are unlicensed kits made by various 3Ps. I was thinking today, though, that a lot of collectors into unlicensed 3P figures may not be interested in upgrade kits for official figures because they're not into the mainline stuff. Likewise, I know there are people who are into mainline figures and don't mind getting unlicensed upgrades, but are vehemently against 3P figures. So what do you guys think/prefer? Should upgrade reviews stay in the unlicensed 3P thread, because they're unofficial, or should they go in the here in the official thread because they're for official figures and not really relevant to 3P collectors?

I've been posting reviews for upgrade kits here, on the logic that they are unlicensed kits made by various 3Ps. I was thinking today, though, that a lot of collectors into unlicensed 3P figures may not be interested in upgrade kits for official figures because they're not into the mainline stuff. Likewise, I know there are people who are into mainline figures and don't mind getting unlicensed upgrades, but are vehemently against 3P figures. So what do you guys think/prefer? Should upgrade reviews stay here, because they're unofficial, or should they go in the official thread because they're for official figures and not really relevant to 3P collectors?

Sweet. It's not my favorite of the Gundam Battle series, but it's good enough that I dug my Vita out to play it the other day. Hopefully we get more Artdink remasters on Steam, like Macross 30.

Ugh, I should have waited. It's definitely worth that price.

Not for long! But I guess, since the PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Switch 2 are all backward compatible and the Lunar games aren't exactly pushing the hardware it makes sense to make them for the older consoles and maximize your audience.

I guess good news for console gamers who collect those physical releases, but as a PC gamer I can't remember the last time I didn't just buy a digital game on Steam (my plan for Lunar).

While I'm sitting here eagerly anticipating Constructicons, Aerialbots, and an awesome new Star Convoy, Hasbro went and sent me the latest Collaborative... Star Wars X Transformers The Mandalorian. Years ago Star Wars Transformers weren't merely a one-off collaborative, but a regular thing that I had basically no interest in. I mean, I like Star Wars, but I don't love it the way a lot of people do. And an Eta-2 Actis that turns into a robot version of Obi-Wan is kind of weird, really. But as a Mandalorian the concept kind of works for me... a Cybertronian explorer gets lost in a wormhole or something, ends up in the Star Wars galaxy, and becomes a Mandalorian foundling. That said, the silver color with the brown "pants" and belt, the brown finger with the blue triangles on the hand armor... it's pretty clear that this isn't a Mandalorian, it's supposed to be Din Djarin, The Mandalorian. So I guess we are back to the weird "turn the vehicle into the guy that drives it" Star Wars thing again? I suppose I can ignore the intention and go back to thinking of him as a Cybertronian Mandalorian foundling, but then I can't help wishing for more unique styling. All that said, I can't really do the whole, "here's how it's accurate, here's how it's not" bit because as a Transformer it's an original character, and as Din Djarin it has to be a transforming robot now. I'll just point out that the lower legs are a tad hollow, and he's got some kibble wings that I don't really mind too much but for the hinged half-circles. Size-wise he's roughly a Voyager or short Leader. He comes with a lot of accessories, though some are a bit questionable. There's a stand base, a hinged translucent piece, a teeny tiny pistol, another weapon that's made up of a chunk of his alt mode, a capsule, a stand arm, and six rubbery effect parts. Mando's head is on a ball joint that swivels and has moderately-limited up/down/sideways tilt. His shoulders rotate, though the spikes on them and his kibble wings can be a limiting factor. They move laterally about 90 degrees, but in a move that's becoming distressingly common the hinge is on the wrong side of the rotation. His biceps swivel, and his elbows bend 90 degrees. His wrists swivel, as does his waist. His hips can go a little over 90 degrees forward, backward, or laterally. His thighs swivel, and his knees bend around 130 degrees. Due to how he transforms his feet can tilt down 90 degrees, but nothing upward, and if I'm being generous I might say he's got 45 degrees of ankle pivot. He can hold the pistol and the lance(?) in either hand via 5mm peg handles. The pistol can store in a holster on Mando's right hip, which is another nod to Din Djarin's pistol and hip holster, except that the pistol is comically tiny in his hand. The smallest blast effect is meant to go on the tip of the pistol, while there's a peg under the pointy bit of the other weapon for the largest blast effect. Or, that's what's intended, anyway. Since they use the same connection, you can use any of the effect parts but the round ones. The hinged translucent part has a squarish peg on the gray hinge. This plugs into a port on Mando's back to give him cape... because, y'know, sometimes Din Djarin has a cape. It's shorter than Din Djarin's, and Din Djarin's is black instead of translucent blue... but I don't mind the idea of a Cybertronian Mandalorian making an Energon cape. As for his other accessories, you can plug the stand arm into the stand base, and one of the round effect parts onto it. There are tabs on the effect part that allow you to plug the pod into it. Is it supposed to be like Grogu's pram? I mean, I know what part of his alt mode it is, but for bot mode, why do I need a chunk of his alt mode flying around? The bubble canopy opens on it, but there's no Grogu to put inside. Note that there's really nothing left to do with the other three effect parts (the other round bit and the two medium blasts) in this mode. Technically, the round effect fits onto a 5mm peg on the stand arm, and the pod has a 5mm port on the bottom, so you don't even really need the one round effect that you can use. If you prefer, you can attach the pod to the back of the lance weapon. It's where it goes in alt mode, anyway. It's kind of awkward, sure, but the lance is kind of awkward period. As a bonus if you're not going to use the stand for the pod you can pull the stand arm off and attach the base to a 5mm port on either of Mando's forearms, turning it into a shield (with Din Djarin's Mudhorn emblem molded onto it). The Mandalorian's transformation is pretty simple. Spin him at the waist, open the back of his legs, spin his feet around, and fold them lower legs over the thighs and waist. Open his chest, fold the flaps on the sides out, spin the front around, and fold it over to tab into his legs. Pull his arms away from his body, fold in the fists, and tuck his head into the spot his chest vacated. Then his backpack opens and swivels around to the where his chest was, covering his head, while the half-circles on the back wings cover over his biceps. The pod plugs into the back of the cockpit, just over his feet, and the lance weapon straightens out and plugs into the back of the pod. Considering that it has to also transform into a robot, I think it's an OK representation of Din Djarin's modified N-1 starfighter. The gray color with a bit of gold striping is right. It's got molded details on the nacelles, fuselage, sometimes with gunmetal paint, where Djarin's fighter was missing hull plating. Mostly the rear pod is too big, and the front cockpit shortened to accommodate the larger rear pod, plus bits of leg showing from some angles. The two medium blast effects plug into the molded guns on the front of the N-1... though again, there's nothing stopping you from from using the other ones. The round bits slid over the exhaust spikes, but they don't slide on all way the and they look kind of dumb to me. Mando can transform with the small pistol in its holster, so that's covered. Note that while the canopy on the pod opens, the cockpit canopy does not. You might have noticed that there are tabs on the sides of the stand arm. Those tabs fit into slots on the cape. The hinge then lets you wrap the cape around the stand arm, giving you a place to store it in alt mode. Mando's N-1 mode has a 5mm port on the underside that allows it to sit on the stand arm. End of the day, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about The Mandolorian, and I think a lot of that comes down to the price and accessories. Mando's $55... basically a Leader-class price. As he's not a particularly large or complicated figure, and Hasbro already has a license to make Star Wars toys, it seems like a lot of the budget went toward accessories. Now, while a stand is nice for flying alt modes, I honestly think I'd have been happier if they ditched the stand, the cape, all the effect parts, maybe even the undersized pistol and just knocked the price down to $35. At $35 I'd say something like, "pretty good Voyager figure, the idea of a Cybertronian Mandalorian is kind of cool, I recommend him!" But Mando doesn't feel like a $55 figure at all, and a bunch of effect parts I'm not going to use don't really change that.

Same. It's dumb, I like Perceptor but AFAIK the only difference is that he'll have a solid red chest door instead of translucent with red behind it, and maybe a different shade of blue. I'm guessing Ratbat won't be any different than the Siege version, aside from colors. But, just like we can't NOT have Buzzsaw, we can't NOT have Ramhorn. When I heard that Walmart was doing a Cybertron capsule Excellion would have been an obvious repaint. Maybe the gold version of Vector Prime or Starscream repaints, too. Curious to see what we get for Sideways, though... I wouldn't be the first time an entirely new mold popped up in a Walmart line. I'm told the Ironfist/Carnivac pack will be some retool of either Siege or Legacy Hound (which itself is a retool of Siege) with a repaint of Titans Return Weirdwolf. Likewise Slugslinger will be some repaint of the Titans Return one, while Sandstorm will be Legacy with a cartoon head. The Devastation pack will be a repaint of Runabout with a repaint of Ramjet or Dirge, but I dig those colors so I'm probably in.

Respect. I mean, yeah, the design had potential and might have been really cool as a Voyager. But for me, the reality was just so bad. It's why one of the very first 3P toys I bought was Mania King.

The Deluxe that turns into a tank? Really? I hated that one. I thought it was bad even at the time.

That too. IIRC the Nemesis version was better for QC, but it's been a long time. From what I can see, there's some stuff that MMC definitely did better... Hasbro's Optimus has hollow gaps around the feet, and the train mode is so stumpy (though it's worth noting that Guidi's original design called for a trailer, which is incorporated into MMC's... maybe DNA will do an upgrade later?). Hasbro's deco is more accurate, though, and probably sturdier. As for Starscream, MMC's has more detail, but I'd say Hasbro's fits the current CHUG aesthetic a bit more. It's hard to tell, but Hasbro's alt mode looks flatter, and therefore better. Regardless, I know that comparisons are inevitable since Hasbro is doing designs MMC did years ago, but the reality is that Hasbro's gonna Hasbro, while Knight Morpher alone went for $85 back in 2010 (which would be a little over $120 in 2025 dollars) and is basically impossible to find now anyway. I prefer to simply think it's cool that Hasbro is tackling these designs at all, in what will likely be pretty reasonably priced sets (I can't tell how big they are, but I'd guess between $50 and $70 per set). EDIT: And I'm with @Radioguy, I'd love to see Shockwave if Hasbro continues the line, and maybe Scourge with his blimp mode. Soundwave had a pretty cool design, too, and all three Insecticons become one train. If they do more Autobot's, I think it'd be cool if they did guys like Hound and Ratchet who turned into train cars, not locomotives, and could be connected to one of the Autobots that does turn into a locomotive.

Got these guys recently- Missing Link Bumblebee and Cliffjumper. Unlike Prime, the only G1 version I have is the Walmart Bumblebee reissue from a few years back, so it's kind of interesting that with the black bumper on his toes, unpainted headlights, and original toy-style head that Missing Link Bumblebee is actually closer to G1 than the reissue. That said, there's going to be some differences, especially given the sheer number of variant releases these two saw during their G1 run. The most obvious things that stand out to me, though, are the number of visible pins where hinges were added and the mushroom swivels on their head flaps. That's not the only change, though. Unlike the G1 toys, the Missing Link versions come with weapons. They're vac-chromed to better match other G1 accessories. Bee gets a tiny pistol (top). Cliffjumper gets a slightly larger pistol, as well as his now-mandatory bazooka. Of course the biggest change, just like with Prime, is that these guys have far greater articulation than the actual G1 toys. Their heads can now swivel. They can look down a bit (so could the originals), but not too much as it's a transformation mechanism that will stuff their faces into their chests. Their shoulders still swivel, but they can also move about 45 degrees laterally. Their biceps swivel now, and their elbows bend 90 degrees. No waist or wrist swivels. Their hips can go 90 degrees forward, but only a little bit backward and (if I'm being generous) only 45 degrees laterally. Their thighs swivel, and their knees bend 90 degrees. They have some slight up/down foot tilt, and 45 degrees of ankle pivot. All-in-all, much more articulation than the G1 toys but not as extensively so as Prime, and well below modern standards still. The pegs that make up their guns' handles fit into small holes on their fists. They also fit into a hole on their backs, for a sort of (awkward) bot mode storage. Like Prime, transformation is pretty much the same as the G1 toy, but with a few added steps. The heads still fold down, the feet still bend down and tab together, and the legs still collapse. When you get to the arms, though, they don't simply collapse into the torso. You have to make sure the elbows are straight and the biceps turned so that the wheels are lined up, then you use double hinges to shift the shoulders down and in. Pegs on the inside of the front wheel wells fit into the fists to lock the arms in place. Aside from the still-visible mushroom hinge on the head flaps their alt modes pass a bit more easily for the G1 toys. They even have rubber tires like the G1 toys. Happily, they both have storage for their pistols in car mode. On the inside of their left feet you find a small peg hole. There are corresponding pegs on the sides of the pistols, and they'll tuck neatly into the side of the foot with room for the other foot to close over it. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any storage for Cliffjumper's bazooka, though. I've been messing with these guys for a few days and I'm honestly not sure how I feel about them. On the one hand, they definitely fulfil the Missing Link assignment- they're G1-accurate cars with largely G1-accurate robot modes, just with more articulation (and new weapons). But Prime had a few things going for him that these guys don't; he's one of the most iconic toys ever, Takara managed to get a lot more articulation out of him, and he came with all the accessories the original did, so he seemed like a decent value. With Bee and Cliff it feels like Takara worked in some very basic articulation, gave them guns they never had, and suddenly they're $40 each. I know Hasbro has to import these from Takara, and I know that collector stuff is just more expensive in Japan, but I'm having a hard time accepting that these guys are twice the price of their Studio Series Deluxe versions with half the size and half the articulation, just because they're designed to be super similar to ((very cheap at the time) G1 toys. As a one-off for the novelty you should buy Prime instead. I'd suggest passing on these guys, unless you've already decided that you're going all-in on this line.

Because, even 15 years ago, MMC wasn't constrained by budgets the way the bean counters at Hasbro shackle their design teams. Still... do want. EDIT: Oh, and it's not the only two-pack... Liokaiser, Hook, and Long Haul aren't the only new preorders today, BTW. Age of the Primes Voyagers Sky-Byte and Heatwave are also up. Sky-Byte looks new, Heatwave is very obviously Bulkhead.

I'm probably in for Liokaiser, especially if they hit the Deathcobra stretch goal. But I'm kinda disappointed that Victory is monopolizing HasLab while also not existing outside of HasLabs.

Decisions, decisions. The 2024 Zephyrus G14 is on sale right now. The 2025 model will use the same 120hz 3K OLED display, (mostly) the same chassis, same 1TB SSD. Both models have 32GB of RAM, though it's slightly faster on the 2025 model. The main differences are the CPU and GPU. While I'm not expecting an RTX 5070 to be a big upgrade over the RTX 4070 (especially given that the 4070 was already thermally constrained by the G14's chassis and cooling), the 5070ti is probably a more noticeable difference. On paper the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 is looking like a good upgrade over the Ryzen 9 8945HS, too. But will the theoretical and on-paper upgrades be worth the extra money? With the sale price on the 2024 we're looking at a bit over $500 in savings over the unreleased 2025 model.🤔

Are you buying Bonecrusher because you want Bonecrusher, or are you buying Bonecrusher because you want a Devastator that scales with other Hasbro combiners and he needs a left arm?

The first season had Jazz using an icicle to hit snowballs at Starscream.

The coronation was on Cybertron, and the repeated visits by humans in the first two seasons and Daniel's near-constant presence in Season 3 implies that Cybertron not only has an atmosphere, but one amenable toward human life. You guys are overthinking it. Just because they happen to look like bugles, assume that they are in fact some sort of Cybertronian instrument that interfaces with and works differently than an Earth bugle. Problem solved.

Yes. I haven't tried Az's Clonezilla suggestion, but I've used EaseUS Partition Master to clone SSDs I've upgraded in laptops and an ROG Ally. It works basically like Az says, you use the software to clone the old drive onto the new, then expand the cloned partition to take up the extra space on the new drive.

Big if true, and frankly not that surprising. As I said in my Romulus review, SS86 Prime actually scales better with the other Autobots, so it's Megatron and the Decepticons that are too short. It's a given that 86 Megs will be taller, and Hasbro was bound to continue that scale correction with new versions of Soundave, Shockwave, and the Seekers. OK, maybe Astrotrain is a bit of a surprise... I'd have guessed a new Seeker mold they could milk for repaints would come first. It's a welcome surprise, though, as I personally think that Siege Astrotrain is the worst modern triplechanger.

I don't know. I didn't get a PS3 at launch, and I tended to favor the Xbox 360 more during that generation. I played Ninja Gaiden and a NG2, but on the Xbox/360. I just always assumed that the Sigma versions were the "definitive" versions since they came later. It sounds like that's semi-true for the first Ninja Gaiden (though Itagaki himself says it's Black, not Sigma), but it sounds like porting from Xbox to PS3 was easier than porting from 360 to PS3, because reading up on it makes it sounds like some stuff was added and tweaked but some stuff was straight up cut in NG2 Sigma.