Dave's Transformers Kingdom Rant: The Golden Disk Collection

Autobot Puffer and Autobot Road Ranger (retools of Pipes and Huffer)
Autobot Jackpot and Autobot Sights (retools of Studio Series Jazz '86
and Pteraxadon)
Mutant Tigatron (retool of Kingdom Tigatron)
Terrorsaur (extensive retool of Kingdom Airazor)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/GoldenDisk

This is Amazon's themed exclusive line for Kingdom, exploring an
alternate timeline that diverged at the end of Beast Wars season 1.
Terrorsaur is such an extensive retool I'll be reviewing it as a new mold,
with comments about shared pieces.

https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeK2 - Huffer and Airazor
molds
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeK5 - Pipes retool
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Studio/Deluxe11 - Jazz mold
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/Battle2 - Pteraxadon mold
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/VTigatron - Tigatron mold

CAPSULES

Various prices, all exclusive to Amazon but probably snapped up by
resellers to a large degree by now.

Autobot Puffer and Autobot Road Ranger: Original molds were mildly
recommended, and it's weird that they used the fan name Puffer on a Pipes
tooling rather than on the Huffer tooling. Anyway, they both get new heads
and decent colors, and I think they work better if you swap the accessories.
Mildly recommended.

Autobot Jackpot and Autobot Sights: Jazz mold recommended, Pteraxadon
mold recommended. This is a good homage to a relatively obscure G1
character, only missing one or two points. Recommended.

Mutant Tigatron: Original mold recommended. The new colors are a super
obscure (as in, the toy was never actually produced) homage, and work pretty
well for that. Recommended.

Terrorsaur: Original mold recommended. Very nice update for robot mode,
the beast mode is...well, they tried. Recommended, but mostly for robot
mode.

RANT

Packaging: windowless boxes, but with unified deco that technically
shows the entire Golden Disk (the Pioneer disk, not the Vok disk) when the
boxes are placed together, but Tigatron's box is thicker and messes with the
effect: http://www.dvandom.com/images/GoldenDiskBoxes.JPG
They use a space backdrop similar to the Earthrise map pieces, with a
green corona around the Golden Disk pieces. The box backs follow the Kingdom
box back trade dress. Each box in isolation does have more of the Disk
wrapped around the side and top or bottom.
There's no WFC numbers or even chapter numbers on the boxes, nor do the
instructions have that information.
The trays inside are unadorned brown cardboard with rattan strings
holding the bots and some accessories, while corners are folded up to let
things like guns snug into pushed-out loops.

Here's the storyline taken from the Amazon store pages for each set.
They all have the first paragraph in common. Typos and lack of punctuation
in some places are from the original, at least as of the time I copied it
all.

GOLDEN DISK COLLECTION: The Golden Disk is a powerful artifact with the
ability to reveal knowledge of the past, the future, and of the infinite
possible destinies throughout time. Discover an alternate timeline in which
the quantum surge that mutated many Maximals and Predacons into Transmetals,
goes very differently...

CHAPTER 1: THROUGH THE VORTEX: The quantum surge causes a time vortex,
intercepting the GoBot Road Ranger and the Autobots Pipes and Huffer, pulling
them through time and space. During the wild journey through the vortex,
Huffer and Pipes fuse and arrive on prehistoric Earth as Puffer

CHAPTER 2: ...AND OUT THE OTHER SIDE: The quantum surge causes a time
vortex, intercepting the Action Master Jackpot and his partner Sights,
pulling them through time and space. Somehow the journey through the vortex
gave Jackpot the ability to convert into a vehicle mode and altered Sights
[sic] alt mode

CHAPTER 3: ENTER THE MUTANT WARRIOR: In this timeline, the quantum surge
kills all Maximals and Predacons, except Tigatron. He survives, but the
surge has left him severely mutated, aggressive, and savage. He doesn't
remember his allegiance to the Maximals, and another survivor plots to take
advantage...

CHAPTER 4: THE TERRORFYING CONCLUSION: Rather than perishing in a pool
of lava, the lava protects Terrorsaur is infused with powerful lava energy
that gives him the ability to breathe fire! He plots to travel back in time
with his incredible new powers and take his rightful place as ruler of the
Predecons!

I believe there was information released elsewhere to the effect that
this fails and the timeline is restored to how it was seen in Beast Wars,
with all changes (including Huffer and Pipes doing the fusion dance) undone.

CHAPTER 1: AUTOBOT ROAD RANGER AND AUTOBOT PUFFER

Road Ranger is a Go-Bot character, some of which leak into TF continuity
every so often now that Hasbro owns the names but not the molds. Puffer
began life as a European release of Huffer done in the Pipes colors in G1
(the G1 Pipes mold was retooled from Huffer). This was a fan nickname for a
long time, but Hasbro decided to canonize it, at least in a way. I do wish
they'd done Puffer as a blue Huffer mold instead of doing it as a differently
blue Pipes mold, though. Kinda loses the joke when there's really no Huffer
elements present.
This box has the lower right quadrant of the Disk, and is 11.75" (30cm)
wide, 6" (15cm) tall, and 2.5" (6.5cm) thick, making it the biggest box
overall.

AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT ROAD RANGER
Assortment: F2820
Altmode: Yard Tractor
Transformation Difficulty: 15 steps
Previous Name Use: None (Go-Bot)
Previous Mold Use: Gen:KI

Packaging: Three strings on the robot, one on the shield. There's a
plastic shield on the cab that's pushed through the tray, I guess they
couldn't completely get rid of blister plastic without risking damage to the
toy. The gun halves are in the push-through loops on the left corner of the
tray.

Color Swaps: Black stays black, and orange becomes black. The blue
plastic is now deep orange, and most of the light gray is now an orange-ish
red. However, the light gray of the elbows, soles of the feet, and the
hinges inside the torso remains light gray. The clear blue plastic is now
clear red.

Paint Apps: Deep red paint on the chest in the same place Huffer has
light blue, gloss red on the goggles. The faceplate is painted a slightly
different orange over the orange plastic, oddly. Lots of silver, with most
of the upper and lower arms being painted silver, most of the shield's "this
side towards enemy" side, all but the grip of the gun, the same bit that's
silver on Huffer's pelvis, the wheel hubs, and all the cab detailing that's
silver on Huffer. The claws of the shield are painted dark gunmetal. The
rooftop lights are painted the same red as on the chest. The taillights are,
I think the same red as the goggles, but a much thinner coat.
In vehicle mode the colors fit together better than on Huffer,
especially with the pickup bed added. While I'm not keen on the pickup bed
on Huffer himself, it sets Road Ranger apart.

Mold Changes: The face has been replaced by a faceplate and slightly
larger-lensed eyes that connect in the middle, like goggles.

Other Notes: This does have a bit of a weird history. This is a very
close copy of the deco of the E-Hobby Road Ranger, including the fact that
this new toy has the faceplate of G1 toy Huffer. The original Go-Bots Road
Ranger looked nothing like this, being a blue and red flatbed truck. Also,
technically the E-Hobby toy had no name, the name having been dropped from
the finalized release out of concerns that Bandai might get all lawyery.

Overall: So, an Amazon exclusive homage to an E-Hobby toy that itself
was vaguely inspired by a Go-Bot. So, about right for this line.

AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT PUFFER
Assortment: F2820
Altmode: Yard Truck
Transformation Difficulty: 16 steps
Previous Name Use: Fanon only
Previous Mold Use: Gen:KI

Packaging: Three strings and a shield on the robot, the pipe cannons are
held in by the push-through loops (and corners taped up behind them so they
can't slide out).

Color Swaps: This one is a little harder to parse, as Pipes has a lot of
sprues that share colors. Light silvery gray is used for the arms, the guns,
the soles of the feet, the front wheel connectors, and the hinge that holds
the cab onto the torso. VERY light gray plastic (no UV glow)is used on the
thighs and the parts of the torso that weren't blue on Pipes. The chest,
pelvis, and head are white plastic (strong UV glow). The cab and boots are a
slightly desaturated bright blue. The clear window plastic is smoky. The
wheels are still black.

Paint Apps: The shoulders and forearms are silver, as are the wheel
hubs. The faceplate is painted very light gray, and the vision slit is red.
The taillights are red as well, a thinner layer as seen on Road Ranger. A
red Autobot symbol is printed on the center of the chest, there's no paint on
the back of the cab (over the robot head). The rest of the cab deco (silver
and white) is the same as on Pipes, except the roof lights are painted black.