Review: DX9 Cocomone (Not-GoBot's Crasher)

I won't repeat my introduction to Salmoore (aka Cy-Kill), other than to say that I welcome more GoBots being made!

Salmoore was generally ok. There were a few things I wasn't overly keen on, but generally he was a good figure. The great news is Crasher is even better.

Review: Toyworld (Not) Throttlebots Combiner

A long time ago Toyworld began releasing semi-reimagined versions of the old Transformers Throttlebots, one every few months. Besides the colour of X being not exactly G1-accurate, I really liked these guys. They looked good, were good quality, retained 'hoods' even though their transformation was more complex and were generally fun little figures.

Which is probably why Toyworld gave up releasing them. Because everyone hates me and is out to ruin my fun.

It came as a bit of a surprise then when, earlier this year, Toyworld released the final 3 figures in the line all at once with little notice. Which is why, in part thanks to Auto Assembly, I've only just managed to complete the set.

Long suspected, right from the initial release of Grindrod, was that all six Throttlebots would eventually be able to combine into a Big Figure. Obviously nothing like that has ever been even hinted at in G1 literature for the Throttlebots, and it didn't take anything away from the 'base' ToyWorld robots, so it was always simply going to be a nice bonus if this indeed turned out to be the case.

Which it is.

Review: X-Transbots Hoss (not Go-Bots Road Ranger)

3rd Party Transformers are a lot like boxes of chocolates - you never know what you're going to get. Sometimes you get a Quake Wave, a figure so good it puts Hasbro/Takara to shame. Sometimes you get a Grand Patriot, which, well, is a big pile of poo. Even a company with a good reputation can be a risk as quality varies from product to product. Take, for example, Fans Toys' follow up to Quake Wave, Scoria, which suffered a number of problems.

This risk factor is the reason why I refuse to pre-order 3rd Party products. Sure, there's normally a discount if you order early, but the quality issue and consistent pushing back of release dates isn't worth it, in my opinion. Even online reviews of 'test shots' aren't a reassurance as you never know for sure if minor niggles are going to be corrected (or become worse!) in the final product. It's much safer to wait and see what the final reviews are before committing money - especially with the amount of money these products costs.

X-Transbots hasn't got the greatest reputation in the world. While I don't have a lot of their products, the common complaints online seem to be plastic quality and general quality control. More than one online retailer is now refusing to carry their products because of this.

But I ordered Hoss anyway. And it's really not that bad.

Review: Unique Toys Salmoore (Not Go-Bots Cy-Kill)

People tend to look down on Go-Bots. And it's true; despite being first to market they were never as successful as their transforming rivals. But I've always been of the opinion that Go-Bots were unfairly judged. Take the cartoon. Many would argue that the Transformers cartoon was vastly superior. I would suggest they rewatch a couple of episodes of the original Transformers cartoon first.  Fried gold, it certainly isn't.

The Go-Bots cartoon is exactly what you'd expect from Hanna-Barbera, in style and tone. I also liked the fact that 95% of the time they didn't cheat with their transformations, unlike Transformers. For example, burned into my memory is Rest-Q, in Ambulance mode, crashing and rolling within the first few minutes of the opening episode of the cartoon, revealing his face underneath...just like the toy. In the Transformers 'toon that toy-limitation wouldn't have been there and you'd have seen a perfect bottom-of-ambulance instead.

The Go-Bots toys were licensed by Tonka from Bandai in Japan. Unlike Hasbro, which bought the moulds to their Transformers toys outright, this means that the names and characters were owned by Tonka but the rights to the actual toys were - and still are - owned by Bandai. This means that it's 99% certain that these toys will never be reissued.

Much later Tonka was bought by Hasbro, who've since released a series of Go-Bots, which had absolutely nothing to do with the original line. They did, however, release Fracture, which is essentially an updated Crasher. But that was it.

Maybe spurred by this lack of production from Hasbro, a number of 3rd Party companies have released Go-Bot homages lately, which brings me nicely (and eventually) to my review: Salmoore aka Cy-Kill, leader of the evil Renegades.

Review: Fans Toys Scoria (Transformers Masterpiece Slag)

The first of my reviews falling under the category 'stuff I bought from Auto Assembly' is Scoria, the 3rd Party release of Masterpiece-scale Slag.

Slag was at the top of my AA Wish List and, only being available from Kapow Toys in the UK, was probably only going to be on sale on one particular stall. Of course Kapow had the biggest crowd around it, so at first I was a sad little boy as it didn't appear that there were any available. But, no! I was wrong! As on a second pass on the stall I spotted him and was much relieved.

The relief was short-lived.

Review: FT-03 Quake Wave

There are a load of 3rd Party 'fan' companies producing transforming robots inspired by the Hasbro originals. Some good, some bad, all improving with each subsequent release. It's wise to be wary when a brand new company produces something. There's bound to be flaws - plastic quality, breakages, poor paint... the list is endless.

Rules, exceptions and all that. Despite being labelled as #3 (the first couple of things they designed/announced have never gone into production), Quake Wave is the first release from new company Fan Toys.

And it's perfect.

Buy it now.

What, you want more? Fine...

Review: Impossible Toys Kranax & Arbilus

Impossible Toys announced recently that it was stopping making 3rd party Transformers products. You can read the release here. IT became famous for it's 'Quint' series, making figures of the Quintessons from Transformers The Movie - something that Hasbro had failed to do presumably because they thought no one would be interested in Transformers toys that didn't transform (unless they were Action Masters). They were made in the style of 80s toys, i.e. with the idea that these would fit seamlessly in with existing Generation 1 toys.

The Quints were very good, on the whole, though IT faced design and quality criticism for some of their subsequent releases and they seemed to fall out of favour with Trans-fans as newer 3rd party companies emerged.

Kranax and Arbilus (the names are spelt slightly differently on the box) are, like the Quints, characters from Transformers the Movie (the '86 one aka 'the good Transformers film'). Their role was little more than a cameo, first (barely) escaping Unicorn eating their homeworld and then being fed to the Sharkticons. In the movie they never transformed, though they did in the comic adaptation. In an early draft of the script they were rock creatures, apparently.