The Transformers Thread (licensed) Next

[mikeszekely]

1 hour ago, M'Kyuun said:

I cannot get the central bit of his hood, which folds inwards similar to the ER Datsun design, to snap into place within the grey part of his abdomen.

You probably don't have it tabbed into the front of the car all the way.  If you look behind the electronics junk there's a thick tab, and the underside of that panel has a slot.  It takes a bit of force to really get it to click into place, and if it's not then the end won't line up right and seat properly into the abdomen.

1 hour ago, M'Kyuun said:

the shoulders' ball joints, thankfully, are quite tight

Do both of yours stay on?  Wondering if I should buy another one and return the first one since the left arm pops off constantly.

Anyway, for a better sense of scale, from left to right, this is the Jada Toys 1:32 KITT, Agent Knight, and the Jada 1:24 KITT.

 

[JB0]

5 hours ago, M'Kyuun said:

Got my copy of Agent Knight today (earlier than projected, thank you very much, Amazon Prime) and I cannot get the central bit of his hood, which folds inwards similar to the ER Datsun design, to snap into place within the grey part of his abdomen.

Yeah, I dug up some videos after having similar issues. It just takes a terrifying amount of force.

There's a visual tell that the manual TRIES to call out, but without using words it is often hard to tell WTF these illustrations mean. The plate that flips down in his stomach area mates into a cubby in the gray part, and there is  tab at the bottom that is supposed to secure that plate. There's a gap along the bottom of that plate that disappears once the chest is fully engaged and the tabs on the black and gray pieces interlock.

[mikeszekely]

Studio Series Gamer Edition Deluxe-class Gamer Devastation Optimus Prime

It's... not great.  Deluxe-class doesn't really go all that far anymore, eh?  Not sure how many people are even going to want this, what with the excellent new Commander-class toy (or even one of the many Earthrise variants still floating around) doing the same thing but much better, but I understand that this is considered an A-Level product, which essentially boils down to Hasbro wanting a cheap version of the brand's most popular character on shelves for a long, long time.

Of course, despite my negative first impressions I'm a big enough sucker to buy and review it when it comes out anyway, so... I guess I'll let you know.

[Radioguy]

1 hour ago, mikeszekely said:

It's... not great.  Deluxe-class doesn't really go all that far anymore, eh?  Not sure how many people are even going to want this, what with the excellent new Commander-class toy (or even one of the many Earthrise variants still floating around) doing the same thing but much better, but I understand that this is considered an A-Level product, which essentially boils down to Hasbro wanting a cheap version of the brand's most popular character on shelves for a long, long time.

Of course, despite my negative first impressions I'm a big enough sucker to buy and review it when it comes out anyway, so... I guess I'll let you know.

Oof. I thought it was a Core class figure at first glance.

[mikeszekely]

4 hours ago, Radioguy said:

Oof. I thought it was a Core class figure at first glance.

I mean, it's a class or two down from Earthrise, so it's gonna be a downgrade from just about everything before it. But we have a Core-class Optimus, and it does look better than that.

[M'Kyuun]

20 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

You probably don't have it tabbed into the front of the car all the way.  If you look behind the electronics junk there's a thick tab, and the underside of that panel has a slot.  It takes a bit of force to really get it to click into place, and if it's not then the end won't line up right and seat properly into the abdomen.

Do both of yours stay on?  Wondering if I should buy another one and return the first one since the left arm pops off constantly.

Anyway, for a better sense of scale, from left to right, this is the Jada Toys 1:32 KITT, Agent Knight, and the Jada 1:24 KITT.

 

Addressing your left arm issue, mine was also popping off yesterday when I transformed it the first couple of times trying to move the arm to clear the fender to swivel it out. I think the issue was due in part to the tightness of the rotating fender piece. I transformed it today and managed to do so without popping the arm off for the first time after about three transformations total. It's progress.

Well scratch that. I just tried transforming the upper body to prove the point and that left arm popped off twice on me. It's definitely not on there as tight as my right shoulder, which has yet to pop off once. I can manage to stow the arm without popping if I keep my index finger on the wheel and my thumb on the shoulder and move it carefully into position. If I try to do it by just grabbing the arm, it pops, at least the left one. The right shoulder seems more forgiving. I'm thinking it's probably a slight mold issue between the ball and the socket. Anyway, once attached, the shoulder seems snug, which I can live with. Knowing that it's sensitive to how and where it's handled, I'm hoping to avoid popping it off too many more times to prevent undue wear. I generally don't handle my toys much, anyway, so I think it'll be ok for the long run. I put batteries in it today and played through its various sounds and messages with the wife, who also grew up in the 80s, although she was only about three when Knight Rider first premiered in '82. It brought smiles for both of us, although I think the nostalgia runs deeper for me, as I was about eleven years old when KR first turbo boosted into American living rooms and brought us along for the ride. Like most 80s kids, I ate up shows where some sort of souped-up vehicle was the primary draw, and KITT was no exception. Never was crazy about the "buddy' stuff or The Hoff, really. It was always about the car and the tech. Bonnie the lovely technician was rather pleasant, too. 😁

16 hours ago, JB0 said:

Yeah, I dug up some videos after having similar issues. It just takes a terrifying amount of force.

There's a visual tell that the manual TRIES to call out, but without using words it is often hard to tell WTF these illustrations mean. The plate that flips down in his stomach area mates into a cubby in the gray part, and there is  tab at the bottom that is supposed to secure that plate. There's a gap along the bottom of that plate that disappears once the chest is fully engaged and the tabs on the black and gray pieces interlock.

I've since been able to get it to 'lock' in, but it's not the definitive 'snap' that one would wish for on such a crucial tab. As you can see in the pic, the grey tab is somewhat slotted into the black hood piece, if only barely, and it will neither stay all the way down flush nor center without great force applied from above. I don't know what's acting upon it to prevent it from going down nice and flush and wanting to stay that way, but at least this is better than what I was able to achieve after my first transformation. Thus far, it seems to be holding together to where I can move the arms without the hood section just flipping up from the shoulder friction. It's tenuous at best, but so far effective.

 

Edited November 12 by M'Kyuun

[sh9000]

I was doubting whether the voice used for Agent Knight was William Daniels' but after watching a video on youtube I now know for sure that it's not his and that's sad.

[mikeszekely]

20 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

You probably don't have it tabbed into the front of the car all the way.  If you look behind the electronics junk there's a thick tab, and the underside of that panel has a slot.  It takes a bit of force to really get it to click into place, and if it's not then the end won't line up right and seat properly into the abdomen.

Just going to elaborate on this.

When you fold in the panel on top of the hood so his head can pass through, this slot on the panel needs to plug onto this thick tab inside the chest behind the electronics.  Out of the box, it's very tough, to the point I thought it was misaligned.  And you can see on my copy that forcing it a couple of times has worn off some plastic.

But you need it to be on all the way, so the panel is flush with the chest.  If there's any gap the bottom of the panel won't line up right with his waist.  If it is on all the way, the hinges in the shoulders should kind of "thoop" into place, and the panel should slide down into place.

 

[M'Kyuun]

12 minutes ago, sh9000 said:

I was doubting whether the voice used for Agent Knight was William Daniels' but after watching a video on youtube I now know for sure that it's not his and that's sad.

Yeah, but ya know, having grown up watching the show, it's close enough to fool me if you told me otherwise. Whoever they tapped to do it, he's pretty close to the mark. I wish the messages were more like "Michael, I'm sensing danger ahead" or ,"turbo boost engaged" followed by the turbo boost sound effect. The screeching tires effect is ok, but the turbo boost was really the draw. "Thank you, sir" is really apropos of nothing and a bit lame, as phrases go, considering his capabilities and the references that could be made instead. Despite my criticism, however, he's one less crossover wishful realized, and the fact that he has lights and sounds for the first time (it would've been cool to have the siren for Ecto-1) in a crossover figure opens the door for future releases to receive similar features. At the end of the day, I get to hear KITT say a few lines, hear and see his scanner cycle, and get to turn him into a pretty decent looking robot, all things considered. Too, they did a far better job with weapon storage than most releases, so I'll give them props for that as well.

3 minutes ago, mikeszekely said:

Just going to elaborate on this.

When you fold in the panel on top of the hood so his head can pass through, this slot on the panel needs to plug onto this thick tab inside the chest behind the electronics.  Out of the box, it's very tough, to the point I thought it was misaligned.  And you can see on my copy that forcing it a couple of times has worn off some plastic.

But you need it to be on all the way, so the panel is flush with the chest.  If there's any gap the bottom of the panel won't line up right with his waist.  If it is on all the way, the hinges in the shoulders should kind of "thoop" into place, and the panel should slide down into place.

 

So, my hood panel indeed snaps decisively flush into place without the need for excessive force. Sounds like tolerances are a bit here or there for this fig. The back shoulder hinges indeed "thoop" into place as well. The shoulder fender hinges also "thoop". Despite all these requisites being met, there is still some form of resistance to the hood plate going down flush into its alcove to lock on that grey tab. I have to press very hard to get it to want to go down to where it's flush and the grey tab overlaps the slot in the hood plate, but once I release said pressure, it pops right back up to where you see it in my picture. Perhaps something is pinned just a hair off and it's causing the resistance; I don't know. What I do know is that it doesn't function exactly as advertised, but I've at least got it to a point where it's holding together whilst moving the shoulders, which is an improvement over my initial transformation results. I can also remedy the problem by holding the hood section with one hand while moving the arms with the other insuring that any torsion from moving the arms is negated thus preventing that tenuous abdomen tab from loosening any further. I chock it up to some assembly error where a pin was drilled off from the mark by a mm or two or some similar scenario that created a tolerance issue. It's inconvenient and annoying, sure, but not so egregious that it ruins the figure for me. I keep working that hood tab into place with every subsequent transformation so hopefully whatever the source of resistance, it wears over time without breaking the figure. I plan, as I do with the vast majority of my figs, to keep him in his bot mode, so hopefully time and the environment will help it to hold together. I can move the arms now without the hood coming undone, so even though the tab is somewhat tenuous, it's doing its job now and that's progress. 👍

[lechuck]

Ahh... Transformers Devastation, good times, The game is great, felt like a lost G1 cartoon episode at times.

Shame the first toy entry for it is victim to Hasbro's heavy handed budget constraints. A Takara MP of Devastation OP would be a fantastic proposition, but highly unlikely.

[Hikuro]

Hasbro: Hey there fans! Do you like Optimus Prime?!
Us: YEAH!
Hasbro: Do you like Studio Series?!
Us: YEAH!
Hasbro: Do you.....LIKE DEVASTATION?! 
Us: OH YEAH!
Hasbro: *plops down toy*
Us:.............The hell is this? 

[sh9000]

On 11/11/2024 at 7:50 PM, M'Kyuun said:

Yeah, but ya know, having grown up watching the show, it's close enough to fool me if you told me otherwise.

Yeah it is what it is.  It would have still been nice to go with the rest of my Talking KITT collection:  Kenner Knight 2000 Voice Car, Diamond Select 1/15 KITTs, Hot Wheels 1/18 Super Elite KITT, Hallmark KITT ornament, and Playmobil KITT.  Maybe somebody will be doing a mod.

[Radioguy]

29 minutes ago, sh9000 said:

Yeah it is what it is.

Where did you see it wasn't him?

[JB0]

Minor tweaks to greatly improve a toy:

So I was kinda ADDing and grabbed a random nearby toy robot to flip parts around on. Laid my hands on a Ratchet van. I couldn't remember which one, the internet says it was from the Bumblebee movie.

 

What I do remember is he's been in the ambulance-esque mode almost since I got him because the humanoid form  is kinda short and dumpy. And he came with an eff-off huge cannon that looks like it belongs to Megatron. And that's still true today, though my memory is harsher on these proportions than my eye, but the gun's still ridiculous... but there's this purple car I don't remember the name of with a neato pistol that kinda looks like some sort of cybertronic multitool. Swap the two weapons around and now Ratchet looks like a doctor and random purple Car-tron looks dangerous.

Edit: Ehh, my camera didn't pick up the details on the hand-tool. To my eye, it looks like some sorta combination scanner/knife/welding laser.
Even if it reads as a gun, it isn't a GIANT gun. It's actually kinda tiny, by the standards of the franchise. So at worst, it looks like an emergency sidearm. Ideally it looks like he's carrying a sci-fi medical tool. Either way, it's more appropriate to a medic.

Edited November 13 by JB0

[M'Kyuun]

Considering this guy is also a deluxe, that Devastation Prime is alarmingly poor. My only gripe with Legacy United G1 deluxe Prime is the lack of paint apps to pick out his OG toy's sticker details, which at least are nicely molded in. One of these days I'll have to remedy that omission. Perhaps I'll do the same for my SS86. 

[shazam]

 

[Hikuro]

I just got myself one of those Galaxy Version Blockees at Walmart an hour ago, according to their box these are the chances of having a specific character:

Optimus: 1 in 12
Jazz/Ironhide/Ratchet/Prowl/Bluestreak/Megatron/Skywarp/Thundercracker: 1 in 9
Optimus Prime Secret: 1/36
This is kind of tricky cause it doesn't mean in a case sent out or anything like that, it means that every 9-12 or 36 figures produced in the line there is at least 1 of those characters. Now i'm not good with the odds or the math behind it, but you could end up spending quite a bit of money to complete an entire lineup let alone get the special figure which seems to be a different color Optimus with lots of highlights and comes with his energon axe. 

I cracked mine open and built it pretty quickly and I got Ratchet, which honestly disappointed me a bit, I really want Prowl or Bluestreak since I collect a lot of Nissan Z stuff and wouldn't mind having one of these in my 370Z like when I had a yellow Sentra SERSpecV I had one of those little bumper transforming Bumblebees.

Honestly the price though isn't bad, these things are under 5 bucks a pop and fairly decent in size. I might take these little guys as part of my work desk display. 

[tekering]

Geographically, I'm usually several months behind what you guys get Stateside, but sometimes I have content to contribute:

I'm not a big fan of this mold, but it's pretty sweet cast in clear plastic. 😊

[Radioguy]

5 minutes ago, tekering said:

Geographically, I'm usually several months behind what you guys get Stateside, but sometimes I have content to contribute:

I'm not a big fan of this mold, but it's pretty sweet cast in clear plastic. 😊

I considered getting that, but yeah, the bot mold is not for me. I did go for the Bumblebee which was a kinda cute, but a tradeoff the other way as it wasn't a VW.

I'm a sucker for transparents, though. TT shoot themselves in the foot not doing more when 3P cleans up in that area pretty well.

[sh9000]

Missing Link Sunstreaker and Cordon.

[obakesan]

On 11/29/2024 at 9:32 PM, sh9000 said:

Missing Link Sunstreaker and Cordon.

PSA - pre-orders up now - on AE atleast

[obakesan]

Promo Page for Missinlink Sunstreaker

https://tf.takaratomy.co.jp/tf_missinglink/c-05/

 

Cordon

https://tf.takaratomy.co.jp/tf_missinglink/c-06/

 

Edited December 4 by obakesan

[sh9000]

Preorder listings for Missing Link Sunstreaker and Cordon are also up at Hobby-Genki, Nin-Nin-Game, HLJ, Amiami, and CD Japan.

[sh9000]

Transformers x Sonic the Hedgehog.

Age of the Primes box art.

[mikeszekely]

Did you guys know that Cybertron Con is happening in China?  And wouldn't you know it, it's the official reveal of Age of the Primes.  Hopefully we gets some more info and clearer pictures soon, but here's what I've managed to wrangle up for you guys so far...

Sonic Collab

Titan-Class Star Convoy.  Looks like he has all the gimmicks of the G1 toy, including a Micromaster Hot Rod!  Forget Devastator and Superion, Star Convoy is my most-anticipated 2025 release now.

Commander-class Silverbolt and Superion. Bot and combined mode looks good, but it looks like Superion's using similar engineering to Menasor, and the rear half of Silverbolt's alt mode is a massive brick of combiner kibble.  That said, if you look closely you can see what appears to be a while veritcal stab folded over, so the current theory is that Silverbolt turns into a jet that combines with the brick of kibble to become a bigger, blockier jet (though, even without it, he's definitely a robot with a jet on his back tha turns into a jet with a block of robot kibble on its belly).

G2 Grimlock

Armada Red Alert

Wasp

Primus

Solus Prime

Some artwork for Onyx Prime

Skybyte

Heatwave (who's probably a Bulkhead retool, just saying) and Crasher (who's the same Earthrise Mirage retool we already got in Velocitron)

Slingshot's bot mode

with art for his alt mode

and art for Air Raid's bot mode

and his jet mode

[mikeszekely]

18 minutes ago, mikeszekely said:

Commander-class Silverbolt and Superion. Bot and combined mode looks good, but it looks like Superion's using similar engineering to Menasor, and the rear half of Silverbolt's alt mode is a massive brick of combiner kibble.  That said, if you look closely you can see what appears to be a while veritcal stab folded over, so the current theory is that Silverbolt turns into a jet that combines with the brick of kibble to become a bigger, blockier jet (though, even without it, he's definitely a robot with a jet on his back tha turns into a jet with a block of robot kibble on its belly).

Yep.

Also, Slingshot.

Also, hey artwork for Vortex.  Guess we already know that Onslaught's the Commander for 2026.

I'm hearing that Hasbro will announce their next Transformers Haslab in the spring.  I'm like 75% sure it's Gigatron/RiD Megatron.

Edited December 6 by mikeszekely

[davidwhangchoi]

unrelated to the news

[M'Kyuun]

Any faith I had that Has/Tak might actually produce Aerialbots with decent somewhat accurate alt modes has dissipated entirely. The Combiner Wars bots and planes looked better, IMHO. These are just beyond terrible. I will say I think this version of Silverbolt looks better than CW Silverbolt, but that doesn't erase the fact that he's still a giant block of bot under a plane, with none of that long fuselage used to form the robot. SMH. Pretty f'n shitty for a company with 40 years' experience making these things, and yet, not unexpected. And yet still, rather disappointing given the overall quality we've come to expect from the main line of late. I'm equal parts sad and mad.

[Black Valkyrie]

 

Still waiting for an update from Macross7 X TF collab. 

 

 

[mikeszekely]

6 hours ago, M'Kyuun said:

Any faith I had that Has/Tak might actually produce Aerialbots with decent somewhat accurate alt modes has dissipated entirely.

Depends on what you mean by "accurate".  The AOTP Aerialbots aren't accurate to their real-world jets, no. But they're pretty close to their animation models... I just wish Air Raid had bigger wings and his arms tucked in a bit better like Slingshot's.

[Scyla]

25 minutes ago, mikeszekely said:

Depends on what you mean by "accurate".  The AOTP Aerialbots aren't accurate to their real-world jets, no. But they're pretty close to their animation models... I just wish Air Raid had bigger wings and his arms tucked in a bit better like Slingshot's.

Every time I‘ve seen the abbreviation AOTP I think it stands for Attack of the Primes. I blame George Lucas for that.

 

[sh9000]

I'll get Superion to go with my Menasor.

[David Hingtgen]

I'm only going to comment on what seems to me to be a "doesn't get how airplanes work" issue, and skip any "alt-mode accuracy" things specific to Harriers/Concordes etc:

Silverbolt's now a double-decker plane it seems. (look how high the cockpit is above the passenger windows---that only happens when the cockpit is a full deck higher than the passengers are). 

As a rule---the cockpit windows are level with the passenger windows, because everyone's seats are all bolted to the same floor. The 767 and 757 are about the most extreme examples----the 767 cockpit is 1 step above the main floor, the 757 cockpit is 1 step down from the main floor. That's as far as you can "stray". 

Other than that----you're either level with the main deck passengers, or WAY above them via staircase (747, A380, and even C-17/C-5 when moving troops or medical evacuation on the main deck) 

I wonder if Hasbro was trying to do more of a fighter jet cockpit for Silverbolt, which really doesn't scale or make sense with all the little passenger windows.

[M'Kyuun]

2 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

Depends on what you mean by "accurate".  The AOTP Aerialbots aren't accurate to their real-world jets, no. But they're pretty close to their animation models... I just wish Air Raid had bigger wings and his arms tucked in a bit better like Slingshot's.

I suppose I should have expected them to skew far more towards the toon than the G1 toys, which actually, blocky bot undercarriages notwithstanding, resembled the real-world aircraft they were meant to represent fairly well, at least from a top-down perspective. Anyway, I've about given up on ever having a set of Aerialbots that I like, especially when companies are chasing the toon look and they can't even be bothered to integrate the robot arms or tuck them in flush to the aircraft's fuselage. That sort of thing almost never happens with ground vehicle alts, but for some reason, they just don't seem to care how much robot sticks out of the alt mode when the alt mode is a plane. Well, on the bright side, with my shelf space dwindling, I can save both money and space by passing on these guys.

9 minutes ago, David Hingtgen said:

I'm only going to comment on what seems to me to be a "doesn't get how airplanes work" issue, and skip any "alt-mode accuracy" things specific to Harriers/Concordes etc:

Silverbolt's now a double-decker plane it seems. (look how high the cockpit is above the passenger windows---that only happens when the cockpit is a full deck higher than the passengers are). 

As a rule---the cockpit windows are level with the passenger windows, because everyone's seats are all bolted to the same floor. The 767 and 757 are about the most extreme examples----the 767 cockpit is 1 step above the main floor, the 757 cockpit is 1 step down from the main floor. That's as far as you can "stray". 

Other than that----you're either level with the main deck passengers, or WAY above them via staircase (747, A380, and even C-17/C-5 when moving troops or medical evacuation on the main deck) 

I wonder if Hasbro was trying to do more of a fighter jet cockpit for Silverbolt, which really doesn't scale or make sense with all the little passenger windows.

I don't even think it's a matter of their not understanding, but more an absence of care. Takara has demonstrated said lack of care when it comes to aircraft alt modes since the Diaclone era. The only reason the Diaclone seeker was even close was because Kawamori, an aircraft enthusiast, designed it, and the VF-1 which would be repackaged as Jetfire.  That's not to say that every aircraft alt has been a total fail- they seem to do a great job with helicopters, and there are a handful of jetformers that have been decent. On the whole, however, looking at the totality of forty years of these things, most Transformers with jet alt modes are executed poorly to egregiously poorly on the alt mode end. Unfortunately, that same defective approach seems to affect third parties as well, so it's not just Takara. I think the Machine Robo toys had some of the most accurate jet modes in the 80s, and unfortunately, the care died with that line of toys. I'll mention Chinese company Touch Toys as a notable exception: to wit, they stand alone as the only company currently producing transforming jets with remarkably realistic and accurate jet modes. I don't own any of them, but that doesn't prevent my vicarious enjoyment of them via pics and vids. I wish Takara had even a fraction of their investment.

[mikeszekely]

3 hours ago, David Hingtgen said:

I wonder if Hasbro was trying to do more of a fighter jet cockpit for Silverbolt, which really doesn't scale or make sense with all the little passenger windows.

My best guess is to make it just inaccurate enough that they don't have to license the alt mode.