Dave's Transformers Cybertron Basics Rant: Undermine Brakedown Armorhide http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Japan/GD0608 has my review of Dinoshout, the Galaxy Force "ancestor" of Undermine. This review will focus on differences between the two. Brakedown did have a GF version, but I didn't get it. Armorhide is a U.S. original, and while it's not impossible that Japan will get it in some form, they don't yet (Sept 23, 2005). [Updated 9/23 with the key code info, which just got put up.] CAPSULES Undermine: Somewhat bolder colors than Dinoshout (reminiscent of Dino-Bot from the Go-Bots line). Other comments. Recommended. $6.94 at Wal-Mart. Brakedown: Great vehicle mode, decent transformation, so-so robot mode. Recommended largely on the strength of the vehicle mode. $6.94 at Wal-Mart. Armorhide: Okay vehicle mode, interesting transformation, decent robot mode. Design goes the extra mile many times, though, and the little things raise it to Strongly Recommended. $6.94 at Wal-Mart. RANTS DECEPTICON: UNDERMINE Planet: Jungle Altmode: Dinosaur (Raptor/Spinosaur/Ankylosaur chimera) Prior Name Use: None Key Gimmick: Ramming Blade Key Code: s48a Cruel and predatory UNDERMINE serves as a scout and spy for SCOURGE, unquestioned ruler of the Jungle Planet. He enjoys hunting, and will often toy with his prey before moving in to rip out its power source with his powerful fangs. Silent, cunning and all but impossible to sneak up on, UNDERMINE is probably the greatest hunter the Universe has ever seen. The only reason you haven't heard about him before now is that none of his prey have survived long enough to talk about it. STR 6.5 INT 5 SPD 6.5 END 8 RNK 4 COUR 8 FRB 6 SKL 9 Avg 6.875 Planet Key Info: Undermine is just like what his name means! He is sneaky, dirty and foul! He would sell his own Grand-Transformer-Spark to make a dollar! In fact, when Scourge had just taken over as leader of Jungle Planet, Undermine did something that truly earned him his name! Scourge had a bodyguard-bot named Shrapnel, Shrapnel was a reliable bot and never once said anything bad about any other Transformer. Well, Undermine took a mini-recording device and faked a message of Shrapnel telling Scourge he was a smoke-ring blowing sissy! Well, when Scourge heard that he was furious!!! Soon enough, Shrapnel was sent packing, and Undermine was placed as Scourge's new bodyguard. What a rotten guy! [Also shows a color guide for the plastics and paints. I think this entry used up an entire month's supply of exclamation points.] [Note 9/27: The instructions are incorrect, leaving out the step where the beast forelimbs are folded up.] Planet Key: Standard Jungle Key. Packaging: This, and the other two, are in standard Basic packaging, and come with the Speed Planet map. 7 twist-ties and no rubber bands. Plastic Changes: The bright green is replaced by a more yellowish green. The olive drab is replaced by a medium green with a hint of turquoise. The gray is a little darker and cooler. The clear green in the Key is the same. As mentioned in the Capsule, I'm reminded of the color scheme on the Go-Bot Dino-Bot. Paint Changes: I only found one application difference, and that's the roof of the mouth (painted red on Dino Shout, unpainted on Undermine). The bluish silver is a bit lighter, the gold and red seem to be the same. Mold Changes: None that I could find. Cartoon note: The little forearms that drape like a scarf over the shoulders in robot mode actually move around in the cartoon, they're not just useless appendages. Overall: A decent mold, albeit with a laughable "head-punch Luthor" sort of gimmick. Worth picking up. [Later note: I've since looked up more Spinosaur pictures, and some of the reconstructions are closer to Undermine's design than the ones I'd looked at earlier. Given the scarcity of Spinosaur remains, this is probably to be expected. However, even leaving aside the fantasy elements of the shark-like fin/sail and the mace tail, it doesn't agree totally with any Spinosaur I could find. The main remaining disagreement is in the head and neck, which probably had to be redone to allow for the transformation, but ended up looking more raptor-like. And, of course, this is at best some kind of weird pygmy Spinosaur.] AUTOBOT: BRAKEDOWN Planet: Speed Altmode: Fantasy drag racer Prior Name Use: None (G1 Stunticon Breakdown was inspiration) Key Gimmick: Racing Saber Key Code: s5f3 An old racer on his last lap, BRAKEDOWN was the fastest around in his day. He knows every inch of track on the Speed Planet, and while his systems can't keep up with the supercharged speed of younger robots this old speed demon's still got one or two tricks up his sleeve. With his pipes rusting through and his suspension grown brittle with age, he's got to rely on CLOCKER, to whom he's passed his knowledge of the Great Race. STR 5 INT 8.5 SPD 6.5 END 7 RNK 5 COUR 6 FRB 4.5 SKL 9 Avg 6.44 Key Code Info: BRAKEDOWN is one of the oldest TRANSFORMERS on Velocitron. He has been around almost since the first Cybertronian settlers arrived on Speed Planet carrying the Cyber Planet Key. This veteran racer was the Transformer that trained Override for her races when she was first brought on line. It was BRAKEDOWN that made sure she became leader of Velocitron -- the Speed Planet! In fact, BRAKEDOWN has been training and racing with the fastest and brightest speed stars of Velocitron for close to a million years! [Canonical printing of Velocitron, woot. Also shows an early pencil sketch design of his vehicle mode, which looks significantly different from the final design.] Planet Key: Standard Speed Key. Packaging: Three twist-ties (one just around the saber) and one rubber band. It's packaged with the saber deployed, something you can't normally do in vehicle mode. Vehicle Mode: This is a sort of fantasy sci-fi drag racer, with big clear yellow tachymer rear wheels and tiny clear yellow front wheels inside a sort of ramscoop fender that makes it look like a trike. A nice unintended feature is that the front wheel mold didn't mesh perfectly, so there's a sort of rattling "distant engine" sound made when the toy rolls across a wood surface. 4.5" (12cm) long and sleek, in a mix of light gray, dark brown and clear yellow plastic (the last being on the wheels, saber, windshield and engien valves bit). The paint applications are mostly copper, with a little yellow on the back, and some light gray paint on brown pieces. The robot head is the top of the engine, but it doesn't stand out AS a head, as with Red Alert or Override. The robot chest and abdomen form the rest of the rear-mounted engine, and are vaguely recognizable as such. A small Autobot symbol is printed at the rear. The Key Gimmick doesn't really work in this mode. You have to remove the weapon piece to insert the Key, then plug it back in. With the racing saber deployed, the overall length increases to 5.5" (14cm). There is no place to store the Key in this mode. Transformation: You have to pull out the weapon piece to transform, although there's a place to store it on the back later if you want. The forearms are pegged kinda weirdly onto the legs. This is one of those toys that will end up facing the other way once transformed, as the front of the chest is the back of the car. There's a lot of double folds involved. Robot Mode: 3.75" (9cm) tall at the head, 4.75" (12cm) tall at the front wheel backpack. The proportions are weird, with the shoulder joints almost above the head, the forearms being tiny stubs, and the thighs being spindly. It doesn't look too bad just standing at attention, but once you start moving the arms it gets a bit odd. The shortness of the forearms makes it hard to hold the weapon in any sort of decent position (it points down a bit) unless you rotate the forearm sideways. The head turns stiffly, and the waist turns as well, if at a somewhat odd angle. The shoulders are very limited ball joints. The hips are slightly less limited ball joints, while the elbows and knees are the sort of ball joints often used for those joints on Scouts. The toes point on a transformation joint, and the feet are long enough to keep this top-heavy figure standing. There's additional yellow paint on the biceps, and the face is painted light gray. The eyes are lightpiped yellow, and the engine bit on the back of the head really helps channel the light into the eyes. It's notable that the boots are dark brown plastic painted light gray and copper. The racing saber can be stored on the back, although this can unbalance it a bit. Overall: The vehicle mode is very nifty, but the robot mode has some weird proportioning issues. The Key gimmick weapon isn't too impressive. Still, it's a good toy and worth picking up. AUTOBOT: ARMORHIDE Planet: Earth Altmode: Semitractor (with tow crane) Prior Name Use: RiD Combaticon tank Key Gimmick: Missile Battery Key Code: s645 A soldier to the core, ARMORHIDE is frustrated by missions that don't go perfectly. He often finds himself aggravated during the search for the Planet Key on Earth. Still, he finds a kind of joy in the frequent battles with the DECEPTICON forces that seem to block him and the other AUTOBOTS at every turn. Tough, dedicated and Fearless, ARMORHIDE neither asks nor gives any mercy in the ongoing battle with the evil DECEPTICONS. STR 8 INT 5.5 SPD 5 END 6 RNK 4 COUR 9 FRB 8.5 SKL 8 Avg 6.75 Key Code Info: As a plucky new recruit to the Autobot army, Armorhide is always ready with a word of encouragement or a joke to get his partners through the day. In fact, Armorhide is really working on his material as one of the only stand-up comedians in the Cybertronian army. Before the war with the Decepticons broke out, he used to try out his routines in the great hall of Altihex. After Megatron launched a surprise attack on Altihex while he was on the road, Armorhide made it his goal to not only stomp out the Decepticon menace any way he could, but to try and put a smile on anyone's face he came across during the dark times of war... [Huh. Significantly at odds with his techspec bio. Code also unlocks a color guide, as with Undermine.] Planet Key: Standard Earth Key. Packaging: One twist-tie on the gun. Two on the vehicle, plus one rubber band to keep the cab together. Vehicle Mode: I'd earlier thought this was a yard tractor like Huffer, but the aerodynamic thingy (to use the technical term) on the roof marks it as a regular highway semitractor. To give him a place to stick his weapon, it's a sort of ad hoc crane plugged into the fifth wheel. This does not, however, make it into a tow truck. The actual vehicle (ignoring the crane) is 3.5" (9cm) long, with the cab being a little over 2" (5.5cm) tall. The cab is mostly medium blue plastic. Medium gray plastic makes up the front window pieces, the wheels and the rear fifth wheel section. The grille, fuel tanks and gun are light gray. A few inner bits and the crane hook are white plastic. There's silver paint stripes on teh cab, and silver hubcaps. The windows are bluish silver. There's metallic red paint on the crane and a pseudo-logo on the front. The headlights are a combination of metallic blue and flat yellow. An Autobot symbol is printed on the base of the crane. There's a bit of flex in the rear section, but it can usually be massaged so that all six wheels are on the table. The crane has a really clever feature: a clip that holds the Planet Key. Finally, a toy aside from Supreme Starscream that has dedicated storage for the Key outside of the gimmick activator. On the other hand, there's no standard Key slot, just an unpainted triangle-in-square above a slot at the base of the rear of the cab. You have to remove the crane to insert the key, which pushes an octet of missile tips forward and flips the grille down to expose the missiles. These are non- firing missiles, mind you, but the metallic red paint on their warheads looks good. Transformation: We've seen a semi where the rear chunk breaks apart to become the arms before (Energon's Rodimus), but this is a little better done, IMO. Simpler, and more stable. The top part of the cab becomes the legs, which I don't think we have seen before. Note: the instructions leave out a step, pull the boots apart to make the knees more stable. Feet rotate out where they could easily have gotten away without 'em. I mean, the feet only add a couple millimeters of height and the figure would be stable enough without them, so this is a purely "make it look better" step, which I appreciate. The head pops out from what was the bottom of the cab. Robot Mode: A stumpy 3.5" (9cm) tall but 2.75" (7cm) wide at the shoulders and with a small head to create the impression of a bulky body. Additional detail is now revealed on the back, making the Key slot a bit more "proper". And speaking of extra details, while the windshield halves form the kneecap armor, there's tech details molded on the back of 'em, a nice added touch. The head, boots and most of the torso are medium blue. The shoulders, upper arms and thighs are white. The forearms, kneecaps and feet are medium gray. The pelvis, chest, collarbone area, Key slot marker and some other torso bits are light gray. The face is painted silver with gold eyes, and the pattern makes me think of Mirage meets Ironhide. The head is a ball joint, the waist does not turn (but he can lean back on a transformation joint there). The shoulders are actually universal joints, and popping one apart (by accident) revealed that there's an abandoned ratchet mechanism there. One part has the teeth, but the other doesn't. The elbows are the usual Scout-class ball joints, the knees are hinges. The hips are relatively unrestricted ball joints. The toes can point on transformation jointing, a little. The Key gimmick works fine here (the slot is reversible), with the grille swinging up instead of down. Eight ni...never mind. :) While bearing some superficial resemblance to Strongarm's gun, Armorhide's cannot be held by its muzzle (it's a shade over 5mm wide), and the holes in the sides are too big to hold other items (about 6mm wide). Plugging the Key into the storage point on the side has it oriented wrong to be a sight, but it kinda looks like an ammo magazine. For a paintball gun, mostly. Trivial aside: the packaging has Armorhide as a right-handed bot, while the instructions make him a lefty. Overall: While the base design is only "good", I really like all the little ways in which the designers put some extra thought into things. Simple stuff, like a little clip to hold the Key when not in use, or feet that aren't strictly necesary. Snap this puppy up. Dave Van Domelen, notes that the package photos of the toys are seriously photoshopped to bring out contrast and details.