Dave's Transformers Rise of the Beast Rant: Voyager wave 1

Optimus Prime (Semitractor)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/RotB/VPrime

The other half of the wave that included Optimus Primal.

CAPSULE

$35-40 price point.

Optimus Prime: Decent design if not as good in the real world as it
probably was in the computer, and reasonably differentiated from the standard
G1 Prime transformation. Recommended, but QC roulette could cause problems.

RANT

Packaging: Same as Optimus Primal's box. The main art is of robot mode
rather than altmode.

AUTOBOT: OPTIMUS PRIME
Assortment: F5495
Altmode: Semitractor
Transformation Difficulty: 20 steps
Previous Name Use: Yes
Previous Mold Use: None

Packaging: Five twisted-end or tied (not all the same way, weirdly)
strings hold the robot mode to the cardback, one string holds the rifle down
in the lower left.
The boxback renders don't quite match the actual toy. They have light
gray for the shouldertop greebles where the toy has red, the hip fronts are
painted yellow and black (totally unpainted on the toy), and the kneecaps are
missing the red paint on the faux taillights (which the toy actually has).
Also, the rifle is gray on the box, but black on the actual toy. I'm not
sure if the ankles are shown in the wrong color, or just deep shadow, but the
hip joints are shown gray when the toy has them red. Specifically in vehicle
mode, the front sides of the side mirrors are painted silver while the render
has them painted red. And it looks like the renders assumed snap-in wheels
rather than pinned ones, the mold of the hub of each tire isn't even the
same, leaving aside the missing pins in the render. Rather a lot of
disagreement between the render and the actual toy.

Robot Mode: It's basically like G1 Prime put through a live action
filter. Some greebles and bigger feet, plus a chest that is split open a
little like most movie Primes. There's long smokestacks on the shoulders and
little winglets. Oddly, there's headlights molded onto the shoulderpad
fronts, which suggests that the "true" transformation puts the shoulders down
on either side of the grille. The front wheels just rest in the small of the
back rather than being hidden away inside or left on the hips.
6.25" (16cm) tall in red, light gray, and dark blue, with bits of black
and silver. There is no opaque blue plastic in this toy. On the boots and
feet it's pretty obvious that the blue is paint, but on the helmet I ended up
having to carefully remove some paint in back to tell that the non-clear part
of the head is black plastic. Red plastic is used for the back and most of
the top of the upper torso, the backs of the shoulderpads, the fender chunks
folded up on the forearms, the hip swivels, and the ankle struts. Clear
light blue plastic is used for the chest window panels and the head's
lightpiping. As noted, the rest of the helmet is black plastic, and black is
also used for the collar area, the rifle, and the wheels. Everything else is
light gray plastic, including the forearms and the fronts of the
shoulderpads.
There's red paint on the non-fake-bumper parts of the shoulderpad
fronts, most of each forearm, and the window borders on the chest. Silver
makes up most of the face, the forehead tablet, the shades on the tops of the
chest windows, and some bits on the forearm fender pieces. Much of the boot
fronts and the tops of the toes are painted dark gloss blue, and the
non-clear parts of the helmet are dipped in that color. Despite being
lightpiped, the eyes are painted bright blue...good job, guys. The kneecap
details are black rectangles with red circles, and the center of the pelvis
is painted black. There's a white Autobot symbol printed on the front of
each shoulderpad, and the line-triangle molded detail atop each forearm are
painted white.
The neck is a pinned swivel joint, so no worries about it popping off
in-package. The waist is a swivel but can only turn a little bit each way
because of details interfering with it. There's a transformation swivel
between chest and abdomen that can also turn a bit without needing to undo
other parts, which gives the figure a somewhat more organic torso turning
action. Hinge and swivel shoulders with the shoulderpads having separate
hinges that let them wiggle a bit. Bicep swivels, hinge elbows that can bend
to about 45 degrees acute, and ball joint wrists that can also bend inward 90
degrees. The hips are the hinge and swivel variety that has the entire side
of the pelvis turn, and there's side flaps that are hinged to get out of the
way when lifting the leg to the side. Upper thigh swivels, 90 degree hinge
knees, and ankle struts that are hinged front-back at the top and sideways at
the bottom. The entire shin-vent core has a transformation joint that can
help extend the front-back range a little.
The fists hold 5mm pegs, there's a shallow 5mm socket in the center of
the upper back, and one in the underside of the right foot (it's the trailer
hitch socket for vehicle mode). There's a 3mm socket in the back of the
pelvis.
The rifle has some vague resemblance to the classic G1 Prime rifle, if
sleeker and thinner, being a single 2.5" (6cm) long piece of black plastic.
It has a 5mm peg grup and a 3mm socket barrel, so it can use R.E.D.-style 3mm
post Fire Blasts (including the Shapeways ones I commissioned from Trent
Troop).

Transformation: There's admittedly only so much you can do with the
"robot turns from recognizable Optimus Prime into a semitractor" conversion,
but this got a few unusual bits into the mix, and without the chest windows
being fake. The robot feet fold up onto the shins for a rather thicker than
normal back end, but they included a hitch piece that connects the feet and
apparently in the movie Optimus Prime deploys some rocket boosters back there
anyway. The rifle is supposed to sit in the hitch with the barrel forwards,
but there's another notch in the hitch that lets it sit stably pointing
backwards as well,
Anyway, the only bits that gave me pause were the fists (they need to be
folded in) and the fuel tanks (a little hard to unpeg from the thigh backs to
swing out to the sides). A lot of panels and tabs, but it all fit together
pretty well...eventually. The tabs near the elbows that go into slots on the
thighs are the hardest to get in and keep in.

Altmode: Okay, so it's a somewhat chunky-backed semitractor of the
G1-style cabover variety, but with those winglets from robot mode just being
winglets here too. They don't fold over to cover anything, they just stick
out backwards. So I guess they're movie-accurate, since they're not needed
for either mode to work. Nice tall smokestacks curved backwards at the top.
(The smokestacks are about 3.4mm in diameter, a shade more than 1/8" so a
Lego figure can't hold on very well.)
4.5" (11cm) long, although the trailer hitch peg is over an inch (about
3cm) above the table, so it might have trouble pulling actual trailers that
are to scale with it. Maybe some up-priced exclusive version of the mold
will come with rocket thrusters that plug into the hitch and cover up the
hollow soles of the feet? Anyway, the folded over feet minimize the blue of
the back end. While there's molding for a stripe to go along the sides, they
didn't paint the connecting part between the fake bumpers from the
shoulderpads to the above-the-headlights stripe in front. That's sadly
pretty normal for modern Primes, the designers mold the stripes on but no one
ever budgets paint for them. The grille and bumper pieces are light gray
plastic (part of the small of the back junk in robot mode), with some red
paint above the bumpers on either side of the grille, and bright blue
headlights.
Once you get all the wheels on the same plane, it rolls decently. The
only exposed connector is the 5mm socket in the center of the trailer hitch,
and on the underside the pelvis 3mm socket is accessible for flight bases.

Overall: Despite some obvious cost-cutting moves and a design that
probably worked great in the renders but needs Lego-level QC to work as well
in reality, it's a decent Voyager toy.

Dave Van Domelen, might do some EarthSpark next. Or Studio Series.

On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 5:34:21 AM UTC+1, Dave Van Domelen wrote:
> Dave's Transformers Rise of the Beast Rant: Voyager wave 1
>
> Optimus Prime (Semitractor)
>
> Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/RotB/VPrime
>
> The other half of the wave that included Optimus Primal.
>
>
> CAPSULE
>
> $35-40 price point.
>
> Optimus Prime: Decent design if not as good in the real world as it
> probably was in the computer, and reasonably differentiated from the standard
> G1 Prime transformation. Recommended, but QC roulette could cause problems.
>
>
> RANT
>
> Packaging: Same as Optimus Primal's box. The main art is of robot mode
> rather than altmode.
>
>
> AUTOBOT: OPTIMUS PRIME
> Assortment: F5495
> Altmode: Semitractor
> Transformation Difficulty: 20 steps
> Previous Name Use: Yes
> Previous Mold Use: None
>
> Packaging: Five twisted-end or tied (not all the same way, weirdly)
> strings hold the robot mode to the cardback, one string holds the rifle down
> in the lower left.
> The boxback renders don't quite match the actual toy. They have light
> gray for the shouldertop greebles where the toy has red, the hip fronts are
> painted yellow and black (totally unpainted on the toy), and the kneecaps are
> missing the red paint on the faux taillights (which the toy actually has)..
> Also, the rifle is gray on the box, but black on the actual toy. I'm not
> sure if the ankles are shown in the wrong color, or just deep shadow, but the
> hip joints are shown gray when the toy has them red. Specifically in vehicle
> mode, the front sides of the side mirrors are painted silver while the render
> has them painted red. And it looks like the renders assumed snap-in wheels
> rather than pinned ones, the mold of the hub of each tire isn't even the
> same, leaving aside the missing pins in the render. Rather a lot of
> disagreement between the render and the actual toy.
>
> Robot Mode: It's basically like G1 Prime put through a live action
> filter. Some greebles and bigger feet, plus a chest that is split open a
> little like most movie Primes. There's long smokestacks on the shoulders and
> little winglets. Oddly, there's headlights molded onto the shoulderpad
> fronts, which suggests that the "true" transformation puts the shoulders down
> on either side of the grille. The front wheels just rest in the small of the
> back rather than being hidden away inside or left on the hips.
> 6.25" (16cm) tall in red, light gray, and dark blue, with bits of black
> and silver. There is no opaque blue plastic in this toy. On the boots and
> feet it's pretty obvious that the blue is paint, but on the helmet I ended up
> having to carefully remove some paint in back to tell that the non-clear part
> of the head is black plastic. Red plastic is used for the back and most of
> the top of the upper torso, the backs of the shoulderpads, the fender chunks
> folded up on the forearms, the hip swivels, and the ankle struts. Clear
> light blue plastic is used for the chest window panels and the head's
> lightpiping. As noted, the rest of the helmet is black plastic, and black is
> also used for the collar area, the rifle, and the wheels. Everything else is
> light gray plastic, including the forearms and the fronts of the
> shoulderpads.
> There's red paint on the non-fake-bumper parts of the shoulderpad
> fronts, most of each forearm, and the window borders on the chest. Silver
> makes up most of the face, the forehead tablet, the shades on the tops of the
> chest windows, and some bits on the forearm fender pieces. Much of the boot
> fronts and the tops of the toes are painted dark gloss blue, and the
> non-clear parts of the helmet are dipped in that color. Despite being
> lightpiped, the eyes are painted bright blue...good job, guys. The kneecap
> details are black rectangles with red circles, and the center of the pelvis
> is painted black. There's a white Autobot symbol printed on the front of
> each shoulderpad, and the line-triangle molded detail atop each forearm are
> painted white.
> The neck is a pinned swivel joint, so no worries about it popping off
> in-package. The waist is a swivel but can only turn a little bit each way
> because of details interfering with it. There's a transformation swivel
> between chest and abdomen that can also turn a bit without needing to undo
> other parts, which gives the figure a somewhat more organic torso turning
> action. Hinge and swivel shoulders with the shoulderpads having separate
> hinges that let them wiggle a bit. Bicep swivels, hinge elbows that can bend
> to about 45 degrees acute, and ball joint wrists that can also bend inward 90
> degrees. The hips are the hinge and swivel variety that has the entire side
> of the pelvis turn, and there's side flaps that are hinged to get out of the
> way when lifting the leg to the side. Upper thigh swivels, 90 degree hinge
> knees, and ankle struts that are hinged front-back at the top and sideways at
> the bottom. The entire shin-vent core has a transformation joint that can
> help extend the front-back range a little.
> The fists hold 5mm pegs, there's a shallow 5mm socket in the center of
> the upper back, and one in the underside of the right foot (it's the trailer
> hitch socket for vehicle mode). There's a 3mm socket in the back of the
> pelvis.
> The rifle has some vague resemblance to the classic G1 Prime rifle, if
> sleeker and thinner, being a single 2.5" (6cm) long piece of black plastic.
> It has a 5mm peg grup and a 3mm socket barrel, so it can use R.E.D.-style 3mm
> post Fire Blasts (including the Shapeways ones I commissioned from Trent
> Troop).
>
> Transformation: There's admittedly only so much you can do with the
> "robot turns from recognizable Optimus Prime into a semitractor" conversion,
> but this got a few unusual bits into the mix, and without the chest windows
> being fake. The robot feet fold up onto the shins for a rather thicker than
> normal back end, but they included a hitch piece that connects the feet and
> apparently in the movie Optimus Prime deploys some rocket boosters back there
> anyway. The rifle is supposed to sit in the hitch with the barrel forwards,
> but there's another notch in the hitch that lets it sit stably pointing
> backwards as well,
> Anyway, the only bits that gave me pause were the fists (they need to be
> folded in) and the fuel tanks (a little hard to unpeg from the thigh backs to
> swing out to the sides). A lot of panels and tabs, but it all fit together
> pretty well...eventually. The tabs near the elbows that go into slots on the
> thighs are the hardest to get in and keep in.
>
> Altmode: Okay, so it's a somewhat chunky-backed semitractor of the
> G1-style cabover variety, but with those winglets from robot mode just being
> winglets here too. They don't fold over to cover anything, they just stick
> out backwards. So I guess they're movie-accurate, since they're not needed
> for either mode to work. Nice tall smokestacks curved backwards at the top.
> (The smokestacks are about 3.4mm in diameter, a shade more than 1/8" so a
> Lego figure can't hold on very well.)
> 4.5" (11cm) long, although the trailer hitch peg is over an inch (about
> 3cm) above the table, so it might have trouble pulling actual trailers that
> are to scale with it. Maybe some up-priced exclusive version of the mold
> will come with rocket thrusters that plug into the hitch and cover up the
> hollow soles of the feet? Anyway, the folded over feet minimize the blue of
> the back end. While there's molding for a stripe to go along the sides, they
> didn't paint the connecting part between the fake bumpers from the
> shoulderpads to the above-the-headlights stripe in front. That's sadly
> pretty normal for modern Primes, the designers mold the stripes on but no one
> ever budgets paint for them. The grille and bumper pieces are light gray
> plastic (part of the small of the back junk in robot mode), with some red
> paint above the bumpers on either side of the grille, and bright blue
> headlights.
> Once you get all the wheels on the same plane, it rolls decently. The
> only exposed connector is the 5mm socket in the center of the trailer hitch,
> and on the underside the pelvis 3mm socket is accessible for flight bases..
>
> Overall: Despite some obvious cost-cutting moves and a design that
> probably worked great in the renders but needs Lego-level QC to work as well
> in reality, it's a decent Voyager toy.
>
>
> Dave Van Domelen, might do some EarthSpark next. Or Studio Series.