TF Views

Dominic wrote:I am not above picking up random issues out of curiosity and such. And, comics should be kept accessible. But, with a book that is fairly new, (less than 5, or even 10, years old), I do not like having random issues around, as those are more clutter than anything else. I like having complete runs. With long running books, I can tolerate gaps, so long as I have a cohesive run, say for a writer or artist.

This nicly limits what I buy, and the clutter in my collection.

Fair do, then. The TPBs are only $20ish, though, if you do get interested. I like the guy's webcomic to begin with, so I was already on board.

How is the ocmic not a "good" precedent? Much of G1, including the cartoon, was incluenced by the comics. And, contrary to popular belief, many of the early issues of the comic were good, often better than average.

No, I was saying that the fact that Starscream's nosecone was white in the cartoon was precedent. Being that it's virtually the only place it's 'ever' been white, that doesn't make it a very good precedent, but it is.

I see a lack of articulation, especially on a toy of a character that is supposed to be nimble, as more than a basic flaw. (The fact its analogue from 25 years ago, based on a mold that is as old as I am, had more articulation does not mitigate this.) Ravage is a piece of junk. (I may be able to improve it a bit with some Steeljaw guns, as part of a conversion, but that does not help the core toy.)

I dunno. He 'is' a free bonus, and he's mostly just gonna sit by Sounds anyway, so eh.

I like Heavy Load's arm cannon when it is open. Of course, that leaves the risk of the missile popping out and getting lost.

Mine's missile never pops out like that. Hm. I'll have a fiddle when I get home.

Cyclonus was an affront to the natural order of things, plain and simple.

Yes.

-wants more "they shoulda done it this way" toys in "Universe".

Isn't that almost every toy so far? Except...well, Galvatron and Cheetor. And Dinobot. And Octane, I guess, he's kinda sucky, even if he fits nicely next to Astrotrain.

andersonh1 wrote:I hated that toy. The robot arms and legs are not hidden at all in copter mode, just folded away, and the top of the head is very obvious on top of the copter. The gimmicks may be very good, but the helicopter is incredibly unconvincing. It's a pile of lumpy parts that only vaguely looks like a vehicle. That's on top of the playskool color scheme and orange face.

Did you just seriously try to use "Playskool" in a non-ironic sense? 'Really?' I thought you were above that, man.

Also: Knee guns! Knee guns are awesome.

Onslaught Six wrote:

andersonh1 wrote:I hated that toy. The robot arms and legs are not hidden at all in copter mode, just folded away, and the top of the head is very obvious on top of the copter. The gimmicks may be very good, but the helicopter is incredibly unconvincing. It's a pile of lumpy parts that only vaguely looks like a vehicle. That's on top of the playskool color scheme and orange face.

Did you just seriously try to use "Playskool" in a non-ironic sense? 'Really?' I thought you were above that, man.

Also: Knee guns! Knee guns are awesome.

I was trying to come up with a descriptive phrase that was more creative than 'ugly'. Obviously I failed.

I'll just go ahead and say it: Armada Cyclonus had two ugly color schemes, and one good one (the urban camo), and even the good scheme couldn't save the toy. Dom has his basics, and I have mine, and one of them is that there needs to be more than a token attempt to hide the robot limbs. It's like they barely even tried with Cyclonus. All the resources were spent on the gimmicks, leaving none for a good vehicle and transformation that did a better job of hiding the robot.

Keep in mind, the visual theme for "Armada" was "kiddie". It had a very "Silver-Age" look to it. Cyclonus fits that perfectly.

Dom
-waiting to hear back from Digital Toys.

He does, but he's still an ugly, unappealing Transformer.

Not to me!

I never did pick up any variation of that toy, but seeing as the character had an ugly, unappealing personality and voice in the show, I was in no hurry to pick him up. I would've gotten the Buzzsaw repaint if anything, but I did not.

Cyclonus is a bit weak as a toy, there's many parts that could and should have been done better. Buzzsaw, however, I love. The homage, the retooling, the headsculpt, many good things there, despite the original mould's limitations. As per usual for Armada, though, the design was always good.

I found both of these at Target, so here's your reviews:

Cyclonus is pretty cool. His alt mode is decent, a little more blocky than the original but looks good none the less, lots of little guns sculpted everywhere. However, the rear section is somewhat gappy and unsure of itself, the leg halves don't really want to go anywhere that much. Transformation is super clever, lots of fun stuff, I'd love to see more of these elements recycled into other figures. Bot mode is great, very tight design, minimal kibble, lots of attitude, great way to get the wings into the cartoon look, just brilliant all around. He comes with Nightstick, his Targetmaster companion, who is now more minicon-esque with actual articulation. Nightstick is pretty simple but acceptable, he even plugs onto Cyclonus' untransformed wrist stump. I'd give this set an "A-".

===

Dinobot is a mixed bag, what works does so well, what doesn't work really doesn't. Alt mode is a more cartoon-accurate raptor, but he still has kibble issues. His forearms and bot claws are now under his thorax (on the original BW figure, it was his horrible legs), Hasbro makes this worse by packaging the bot mode hands out instead of the claws. Also, the robot thighs are left very obvious, so the figure only looks good from the right side (the left side is covered in screw holes). Annoyingly, this figure is less poseable than the original, his legs barely move at the hip and knee which leaves him a rather "leggy" raptor.

Transformation is almost "stand up, you're a robot" but has so much going on that it doesn't feel unsubstantial, I really appreciate the conceptual engineering that went into a transformation to get a cartoon-accurate bot mode. However, the actual toy suffers because of too many small panels just not getting their jobs done, which I'll elaborate on in a little bit.

Bot mode looks great in the sculpt, this is recognizably Dinobot from the cartoon, they pay homage to the leg design, the feet, the hand claws, and of course the head. Dinobot could be a little wider at the shoulders, more beefy, and the chest design isn't all that show-accurate in general, but it gets the idea across pretty well. Strangely, the thighs, which were a problem in alt mode, are still a problem, this design looks too standard TF, too robotic and not particularly character-accurate, so it leaves one to wonder why they went this route at all. Articulation is mixed, the arms have a fair amount, and the hips and ankles are ball joints, but the knees have limited range and there's no rotation at the thighs which kills the best poses. My biggest problems with this bot are first the secondary colors, the horrendous yellow-gold plastic used everywhere, this color is absolutely fugly; also, instead of Dinobot's signature blue bot mode coloring, they went Decepticon purple in plastic and paint (even on his face!), that is a total "WTF" moment. But most damning is the panels that make up the chest, there is absolutely no cohesion to this design, the shoulder panels require the torso panels to hold them in place, but the torso panels cannot possibly do this, so moving the arms usually dislodges something. Then there's the spring-loaded panel that covers the bot face in alt mode, this thing is supposed to slip across several sections inside the torso, but that interior design has too many bumps and gaps so instead it forces the raptor head to stick further out leaving it less stable and more unattractive (when it doesn't pop the raptor head completely off).

In terms of gimmicks, the figure has a rotating panel on his chest with tiny Maximal and Predacon logos painted on, as well as regular raptor sculpting, it's tough to rotate because it's so small, but it's nifty. The figure sports traditional robot-style hands with 5mm holes that can rotate around to make up the signature claw-hands, it's a clever gimmick if a little tough to work with at times. The whole rear quarter of the raptor becomes a weapon again, this time it's a stationary (boo!) representation of the original weapon, and it's a spring-loaded missile launcher. This larger weapon can be clipped by its firing tab to the back of Dinobot's collar to be worn on his back, or held in his right hand only through friction bumps that are specifically cut to only be used in that 1 hand with that 1 orientation - this is such a strange choice because they could have easily NOT done this, made it a 5mm handle, and thus held in either hand in either orientation. The sword is a red/orange translucent missile, it's got the basic shape of the cartoon sword but is shorter and they had to blunt the tip because it's a missile; it can be held in either the hand-style fist or the character's claws, but I do wish it was longer and not clear.

Overall, I like what they were thinking with Dinobot, and I'd love to see some of these concepts reused down the line, but here they just don't seem practical enough to make up this torso, there are too many little issues so that he's a likable figure to look at, but not to pose or play with. The drawbacks mostly seem to come down to odd choices: why did they leave a problem under the alt mode again, why did they limit the range of motion on the knees, why did they use that thigh sculpt, why did they go with those horrible color gold and purple colors, why did they design in a handle limitation to the larger weapon. Those choices detract heavily from this figure, and they didn't need to. My grade would be split, for the "fun" collector: "C", and for the "character" collector, a generous "B-".

Hmm, that's the first proper review of Dinobot I've seen, thanks JT. For some reason, over the past few years I find that the figures who give me an initial 'ew' reaction grab my attention the most in person; perhaps it's because I find them strange and unappealing that I'm curious as to how and why they're engineered in a way that displeases me. Maybe I find them boring. Suffice to say, some of them have since become favourites of mine, such as Movie Dreadwing and Energon Cruellock. Or Universe Ironhide! Well, Henkei Ironhide, at least.

The 25th Beasts are so very different from the rest of the line, I'm puzzled. Cheetor just looks like ass, yet here I am importing the Henkei release with the stupid chromed head (Fine, I only got him because he was shipping with Henkei Hound, but then Hound sold out practically worldwide, and well..). And I find myself drawn to Henkei Dinobot as well, they significantly improved the beast mode colours at the very least.

Speaking of colours, why, Hasbro, why? Why 10th anniversary Dinobot? Why this, now? Why are their beast modes much more static than need be, and the robot modes much less fluid in design? The originals both look to be better toys with more articulation and niftier accessories, and given how average Dinobot and Cheetor are, that's saying a lot. They seem to have shot for engineering cleverness with a few throwaway fanwanky gimmicks, and lost sight of the overall intention along the way.

But, damnit, I want to own those toys and see it for myself!

So, I have an update for Dinobot. I was sitting here on the PC last night with Dinobot standing in beast mode on my laptop near the floor, when out of the blue I heard a faint "click" from that area and immediately surmised that the missile had triggered. Indeed that was the case, the launcher tab seems to have given up and will not hold the missile for more than a second. The spring is unusually strong too, so this situation has lost-missile written all over it. I think I'm going to remove the spring entirely, it's not a feature I care for, but there's a pin and a glued piece standing in my way. Friggin' Hasbro QC is getting really bad, I also had a ton of troubles with Animated Swindle.

onslaught86 wrote:Hmm, that's the first proper review of Dinobot I've seen, thanks JT.

Sure thing.

The 25th Beasts are so very different from the rest of the line, I'm puzzled. Cheetor just looks like ass, yet here I am importing the Henkei release with the stupid chromed head (Fine, I only got him because he was shipping with Henkei Hound, but then Hound sold out practically worldwide, and well..). And I find myself drawn to Henkei Dinobot as well, they significantly improved the beast mode colours at the very least.

I actually feel like the beasts aren't different enough from the Universe design ethics, just the aesthetics. The Henkei Dinobot pics I've seen don't look remotely different from the Hasbro ones, the purple is still purple and the gold is still ugly yellowy.


I can back up Dom's claim of the overly-bright colors on TFU Smokescreen, I bought it for a friend and it's just too loud.