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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 10:36:47 GMT
Rounding out Wave 1 we have Caliburst & Huffer:
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 10:37:12 GMT
Caliburst
Caliburst is the Minicon who is packed and co-moulded with Huffer. His robot mode is mainly clear blue - the same as Huffer's combined mode eyes. On his left arm is a gun - cast in silver grey plastic like his upper legs with a nozzle moulded in the clear blue plastic. The gun is mounted on a ball joint that allows it to turn. The gun can be popped off the ball joint and in a delightful coincidence the size of the ball hole exactly fits on a 5mm Minicon peg allowing you to attach it as an extra weapon to Huffer or any of the Minicon drones. In fact there's two Minicon pegs on Caliburst: one on the side of each ankle, but I'm not convinced of the usefulness of a foot mounted gun. Huffer's shoulders are each made up of a 120 degree segment of a circle with the curve ranging from level with the body to above the back of the head. The pieces are moulded with a lot of cog like detail. These look like wings here and can be folded out to the sides to increase the appearance. That's got an affect on the articulation though: the robot's shoulder joints just turn, they're not ball jointed, so folding the wings out to the sides means that the arms can only swing to the sides. In addition to this Caliburst has ball jointed hips (this makes the more limited shoulders seem a little odd) and bending knees that will bend both ways as part of the transformations necessary.
Caliburst's vehicle weapons mode is formed thus: Fold the arms down to the sides with the gun pointing down. Fold the shoulders forward 180 so that the arms cover the chest. Bend the hips and the knees so the Minicon is in a sitting position. Fold each leg out to the sides. Turn the hips through 180 degrees so the feet point upwards and the legs are beside the Minicon's body. Caliburst can then be attached to any Minicon post via the socket in his back. In this mode the gun is mounted between the cogs which appear like the mechanism for elevating the gun. It's a good job that the ball joint does allow the gun to elevate then! This mode results in the Minicon posts pointing upwards: if you bend the robot's knees the other way then turn the hips through 180 degrees you end up with the two Minicon posts pointing down which will enable the weapon to be hand held by any robot with 5mm peg hole hands.
However Caliburst's official weapons mode for the Huffer robot is slightly different. Starting from robot mode fold the arms down to the sides but this time point the gun upwards before you fold the shoulders forward and close the arms over the chest. Bend the robot's legs into a sitting position and then peg the Minicon under his forearm. Somehow this mode doesn't work as well for me as the vehicle weapons mode. I think it's because the gun is pointing the wrong way for the cog mechanism to be functional and that the robot's legs are just hanging off the back of the weapon.
Caliburst's armour mode is formed by folding the shoulders forward, then raising the arms so that they're along the top of the shoulder segments. Fold the legs up over the front of the chest and mount on the front of a commander robot. It's not a bad piece of chest armour but the symmetry is rather spoilt by the gun on one side but this can be pointed forward to give the robot some armament or removed and pegged on elsewhere on the robot.
I like the robot, vehicle weapon and chest armour here. Like Searchlight's Minicon Backwind the robot weapon is a bit of a failure but here the alternate version of the vehicle weapon makes up for it.
Darkray
Darkray is Caliburst's repaint in Wave 3 of the Powercore combiners. In this wave there's some mix and matching going on: Darkray isn't paired with Huffer's repaint, Crankcase (who becomes a 5 pack commander with two of the Combaticon and two of the Aerialbot drones). Instead he's packaged with Searchlight's Decepticon repaint Windburn. The clear blue becomes clear green and the silver grey becomes a darker grey, nearly black. The same changes are made to Crankcase on the light pipe on the combined mode head and the upper legs indicating that the repaints still have the same Commander and Minicon co-moulded it's just that the Minicon and drone limbs are then swapped around.
My main issue with Darkray is who he's packaged with. Windburn is the only one of the Wave 3 2-pack commanders that's capable of holding the weapons mode of Smoulder's repaint, Razorbeam. So to my mind Windburn should have got Razorbeam. Instead Razorbeam's packed with Darkstream, a repaint of Skyburst, who can't hold the weapons mode. This is just plain silly. To make it even worse Darkray's vehicle mode weapon looks huge attached to the bottom of Windburn which means Windburn can't rest anywhere near flat in vehicle mode with Darkray attached. If he's had Razorbeam the you could have attached the axe mode flat under the helicopter adding the handle pointing out the front as a weapon. Grrrr.
As you may be spotting I have some issues with the Wave 3 repaints of the Powercore combiners.
Still good looking, but poorly paired up this time.
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 10:40:56 GMT
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Post by Bogatan on Jul 23, 2010 11:50:36 GMT
Ah why wont these hurry up heading North.
Andy
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 12:16:14 GMT
2-packs haven't yet been sighted at UK retail. Mine are all imported.
Tmw morning, maybe...... It's Argos day tmw.
The 5-packs are out but so far only sighted at Sainsburys.
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Post by Bogatan on Jul 23, 2010 13:03:12 GMT
Yeah we only have one Sainsbury and its miles away and never has a decent toy selection.
Andy
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 13:08:59 GMT
Booo.
Well argos tmw maybe.
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Post by Bogatan on Jul 23, 2010 13:11:05 GMT
Fingers crossed.
Andy
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 13:17:22 GMT
Honestly? Get Smoulder & Chopster and Bombshock & the Combaticons first if you're limited in money. Best of each size class.
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Post by The Doctor on Jul 23, 2010 16:22:43 GMT
Having played with Uncle Phil's I agree.
-Ralph
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Post by Philip Ayres on Jul 23, 2010 18:57:01 GMT
HufferOf all the first wave Powercore combiners Huffer is probably the most anticipated. There's not been an officially mass released Huffer Transformer since the 1984 original. 1989's Powertrain obviously is Huffer, and 2005's Cybertron Armorhide *should* have had been repainted and mass released as Huffer but instead became Botcon 2007 Huffer. Huffer is packed with the Minicon Caliburst. Huffer's vehicle mode is a truck as per the original but he's gone from being an orange flat fronted truck with a dark blue flatbed to being a more mustard yellow (think Combaticon Swindle) all over and having a long nose like many modern Optimus Prime toys. The bonnet of the toy is painted bright orange and this stands out as it's the only time this colour appears on the toy, it doesn't match the rest of the toy and only serves to remind you what colour the toy should have been. Resting on the back of the flatbed is a black plinth with a Minicon port on top of it. I've not got the other toys to hand to check but it *might* reach far enough back & up to connect with the trailers for Armada Overload and Optimus Prime. This flatbed Minicon post is used for mounting Caliburst's vehicle weapons mode. The gun will fit on either way round and can be rotated when mounted. Sticking out the back of the vehicle are two Power Core combiner cubes: A little imagination and you can think of these as boosters for the vehicle mode. Transformation: remover the Minicon. Lift the black plinth up off the flatbed: it contains the hands which are holding onto two posts on the flatbed. Separate the flatbed and the cab in two then, fold each half forward so they lock into the sides of the bonnet. Fold the Power Core blocks back to form heel spurs, separate the flatbed in two down the middle to form the legs and stand with the underside facing you. Fold the arms down to the sides from the shoulders and rotate at each elbow so the hands face front. Flip the head up from the top of the chest. The G1 Huffer theme broadly shows through on the robot mode: mustard yellow legs with a painted blue body (over the mustard yellow), silver arms and a visored head - sadly not light piped but painted in silver. Gone is any structure behind the head be it the rounded shape of the animation model or the more sensible square of the toy. Articulation is decent in this mode: bending knee, swivel jointed thigh, universal hips, ball jointed shoulders bending upper elbow and ball jointed lower elbow joints. My biggest complaint about this mode is the hands: no 5mm peg holes of any kind, which means he can't hold any Minicon weapons let alone Chopster which needs a 5mm hole through the hand. If they'd have made the hands with 5mm peg holes then the pegs on the back of the legs could have been extra Minicon posts. Ok, not a lot of use there but.... To me this is a big fail on a line that involves Minicon compatibility. His chest features the same fold up Minicon peg as other Powercore 2-pack commanders: this allow him to attach Caliburst in armour mode to his chest. Caliburst's prescribed armour mode is a little lop sided with the gun mounted on one side of the armour but you can also mount his vehicle weapons mode on the chest for amore symmetrical look with the gun in the middle. Be careful to mount it with the gun at the top of the chest though: the other way round places the gun at waist level and allows it to move in an arc from pointing straight down to pointing straight up which is a little bit on the phallic side.... Huffer can also form the core of a combined robot: From robot mode fold the forearms up at the elbows over the front of the upper arms. Bring the elbows forward slightly so the arms are at a slant and the slots on the forearms fit the tabs on the top of the chest's sides. Fold the Power Core cubes out of the shoulders. Fold each leg out to the side at the ankle, then bend the leg at the now exposed sideways joint bellow the knee so that peg on the side of the silver part of the leg goes into the hole in the top of the pipe projecting from the yellow part of the leg. Fold the second set of Power Core cubes down from the back of each leg. Fold the smaller robot head down onto the top of the chest. Fold back the orange panel on the back, fold out the combined mode head then fold the back panel up putting the head onto the shoulders. Attach limbs of choice, but if you've only got the first wave 5-packs you'll probably be using the Combaticon drones ;-) Huffer's combined robot mode has some nice features including a head modelled on Stunticon Menasor and some nice sloped panels at the front of the shoulders formed from the back of the smaller robot's forearms/plinth on the truck flatbed. One side has the Minicon post on it allowing you to mount Caliburst as a weapon there. The other side is a blank black panel - maybe an Autobot symbol there would be nice. The articulation is a problem though: The shoulders turn and move up and down which is fine. The new knees bend and Power core cube (and thus the drone leg) rotate bellow the knees. Unfortunately the old robot knees still operate and for some reason the hips are a lot looser than they were for the smaller robot, probably due to bearing the extra weight of the drone limbs. This means it's very difficult to get the combined mode to stand upright without any support. I like the new head with it's Menasor homage and clear blue light pipe eyes, but unfortunately the back panel it folds out of doesn't fold flat against the back in this mode. Decent truck mode, ok robot but with the caveat that the hands don't have 5mm peg holes. Decent looking torso mode, but with balance issues when linked to drones. CrankcaseCrankcase is a repaint of Huffer who's packed with four drone limbs instead of a Minicon: a purple repaint of the Missile Carrier drone (which turns into an arm) and a black repaint of the Armoured Car drone (which is a leg), both from the Bombshock & Combaticons set, plus a pale blue repaint of the Recon Plane drone (another arm) and a grey repaint of the Combat Helicopter drone (the other leg) from the Skyburst and Aerialbots set. Together these four drones are the Destrons, bringing the Japanese name for the Decepticons into western continuity. Early solicitations for this set read Crankcase and the Stunticons which led some fans to expect a more car based set. Crankcase is a black repaint of Huffer: The yellow of the cab and the silver grey becomes black while the flatbed and the black of the hip becomes grey. The clear blue in the combined robot's light pipe becomes clear green, which is the same colour swap applied to Huffer's Minicon, Caliburst, now named Darkray and packed with Windburn, a repaint of Skyburst. The combined robot does now have a fraction symbol on it's shoulder - honestly, I didn't know that when I wrote the Huffer passage, I've just spotted it now ! The effect on the commander scout is the same as applied to Cybertron Armorhide to turn him into Movie Armorhide. Decent black repaint, but the repainted Drones are a disappointment when we were expecting more car like Stunticons.
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Post by The Doctor on Aug 18, 2010 19:48:21 GMT
It's ok, but I have stress marks on the plastic at the slot where the legs peg together after only 5 mins play. That's going to shatter if I'm not careful.  -Ralph |
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Post by Philip Ayres on Oct 25, 2010 9:33:37 GMT
Crankcase with DestronsCrankcase is a repaint of Huffer who's packed with four drone limbs instead of a Minicon: a purple repaint of the Missile Carrier drone (which turns into an arm) and a black repaint of the Armoured Car drone (which is a leg), both from the Bombshock & Combaticons set, plus a pale blue repaint of the Recon Plane drone (another arm) and a grey repaint of the Combat Helicopter drone (the other leg) from the Skyburst and Aerialbots set. Together these four drones are the Destrons, bringing the Japanese name for the Decepticons into western continuity. Early solicitations for this set read Crankcase and the Stunticons which led some fans to expect a more car based set. Crankcase is a black repaint of Huffer: The yellow of the cab and the silver grey becomes black while the flatbed and the black of the hip becomes grey. Pale blue details are added to the vehicle bringing Robots in Disguise Scourge to mind as well as Cybertron Armorhide's repaint Movie Armorhide. Unfortunately both robot heads remain the same - a remould would have easily given us a Power Core Scourge. The clear blue in the combined robot's light pipe becomes clear green, which is the same colour swap applied to Huffer's Minicon, Caliburst, now named Darkray and packed with Windburn, a repaint of Skyburst. The combined robot does now have a fraction symbol on it's shoulder - honestly, I didn't know that when I wrote the Huffer passage, I've just spotted it now ! Decent black repaint, but the repainted Drones are a disappointment when we were expecting more car like Stunticons. Future RepaintsDo the head remoulds as suggested above, recolour him and release him as Optimus Prime. A second remould to the combined robot head and a white repaint would give us Ultra Magnus.
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