Dave's Cybertron Scouts Rant: Wave 4 Street Speed Team Brushguard Backstop Wreckloose The store I got these at was already out of the Street Speed Team, although given my ehn reaction to the originals, I'm not too disappointed. I may get them anyway to see if they improved things, though. They're recolors (but not renames) of the Armada Street Speed Team. Brushguard is a recolor of Overhaul. Reviews of both below: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Armada/MiniCon3 - Street Speed http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Cybertron/Basic1 - Overhaul Update 11/29/05: got the Street Speed Team. Update 11/30/05: Painted Oval up somewhat Prowl-ish, but still yellow: http://www.dvandom.com/kitbash/ovalprowl.JPG Update 3/14/06: Key code visual content added. CAPSULES Note: I got all but the Street Speed Team on sale for $6.29 each, down from Target's regular $6.99. Street Speed Team was $6.94 at Wal-Mart. Street Speed Team: Rather garish recolor with extensive remolding (practically every part visible in car mode other than tires). Fragility issues not really fixed, sadly. Mildly recommended. Brushguard: Really, no better or worse than Overhaul, it comes down to matters of taste in the colors and whether you like the character. Mildly recommended. (Note: the characterization does really sell this toy.) Backstop: Nice beast mode, interesting transformation, laughably bad robot mode. Recommended, largely for the amusement value. Wreckloose: Nifty beast mode, interesting transformation, and pretty good robot mode. Notable as one of the few U.S.-only molds. Could be better in some ways, but still recommended. RANTS Packaging: Standard Cybertron Scout stuff, mine came with the Earth map. No co-sells. MINICONS: STREET SPEED TEAM Planet: Speed Altmodes: Cars, all at least slightly modified from models listed below Backtrack - Cadillac XLR Oval - Saleen S7 or McLaren F1 Spiral - Mercedes CLK Prior Name and Mold Use: Armada Street Speed Team Planet Key Code: (don't have it yet, may never exist) The talent of the members of the STREET SPEED MINI-CON TEAM for working in tandem while racing at top speed across a battlefield or crowded city freeway has made them invaluable as spies and scouts for the AUTOBOTS. All three are in love with racing, and they sometimes disappear for weeks to compete in the Speed Planet rally circuit. SPIRAL: STR 7 INT 8 SPD 9 END 6 RNK 4.5 COUR 6 FRB 5 SKL 8 Avg 6.69 OVAL: STR 6 INT 7 SPD 9 END 7.5 RNK 4.5 COUR 7 FRB 5 SKL 7 Avg 6.63 BACKTRACK: STR 8 INT 7 SPD 9 END 8 RNK 4.5 COUR 8 FRB 5 SKL 6 Avg 6.81 In other words, they are utterly generic Speedians with no personalities of their own. Sigh. So here's some of my own UNOFFICIAL bios. The thinker of the group, SPIRAL isn't actually a lot more intelligent than his partners, but he's clearly more intellectual in personality. Sometimes his tendency to overthink things is mistaken for cowardice, which he resents...especially since he's not all that brave compared to his teammates. SPIRAL'S built-in Torque Blaster twists its target to pieces if he hits them just right, but often just turns them round. OVAL may not be the strongest, or smartest, or bravest, or toughest of the trio (each claims to be the fastest), but he makes up for it with the sort of quiet determination that may not always serve him in combat, but is unwavering when it comes to what's right and wrong. While not officially a police officer, he took on design aspects of an Earth highway patroller to symbolize his stand for law and order. His Blaze Flares can dazzle an opponent or burn through their armor. If SPIRAL is the brains of the group, BACKTRACK is the brawn. Strong, tough and a touch faster than the other two, he tends to be straightforward and physical in his approach. He's actually pretty smart, but he's also silent and prefers to let SPIRAL take the credit for thinking. The Impact Beam installed behind his headlights can be fired in either mode, smashing with a pressure of a million Pascals at close range. Key Code Info: None yet, if ever. Interesting package art note, they give Spiral and Oval proper faces in gray, rather than the faceplates the toys have. Oval's face reminds me of A-Smokescreen. No twist-ties, but each has a rubber band around the front end. Note, none of their tires have changed at all from the Armada versions. Spiral: The blue plastic is replaced by bright red plastic with a little bit of sparkle in it, and the gray parts are slightly darker. The windows are still silver, the visor is light blue, the headlights are gold, and the spoiler has yellow accents. The grill, airdam and headlights are remolded, but the hood, front window and roof are unchanged. The sides of the car are slightly remolded to bring the fenders out a bit, but the side windows are unchanged. Rear windows are gone, replaced by sort of ventlike things, and the spoiler was remolded to look like it can split into two. The taillights are also reshaped. The only body shell pieces that are unchanged are the front window/roof bits (robot shoulders). However, none of the robot-mode-only pieces were changed. This was the least troublesome of the original molds, and is no better or worse than the original. The rear window area looks a little bloated, though. Oval: The green plastic is replaced by a slightly sparkly yellow, and the gray parts are slightly darker. His windows are dark blue, the headlights are orange, and the visor in robot mode is yellow-green. The front end has been remolded with new headlights and grill, plus a turbocharger hump in the hood. The sides are smoother, with a more pronounced bulge in the rear fenders. The front window has a notch at the top. The roof has police flashers molded onto it, but there's no paint on them (something I'll probably go ahead and fix). The rear also has a different shape, more flat across. The Powerlinx connector on the underside has its support bars inside in the shape of an X, where the original's are in a + shape. In short, every part of the auto body has been remolded. On the other hand, every part that's only visible in robot mode is unchanged, as with Spiral. Unfortunately, the "fall apart" issues that plagued the original Oval remain in this remold. The chest and elbows are particularly susceptible to popping apart. Backtrack: The golden brown plastic is replaced with a bright lightish blue with very faint sparkly bits, and as with the other two the gray is darker. The windows are painted dark blue, the headlights are yellow, and the visor is red. Okay, say it with me...no robot-only parts were remolded. Now that THAT is out of the way, everything else IS remolded. There's a turbo bulge in the hood (the back of the robot head), the rear window is replaced by some Armada-Blurr-like tech details, and there's more vent patterns on the doors. It generally looks like a more sci-fi-greebled version. This is the one case where, at least with my copies, the remold works better than the original. The arms can be bent 90 degrees without falling off (A-Backtrack's arms max out at 45 degrees before popping off). Overall: These are a LOT more than simple recolors, each has had remolding that moves it significantly away from the original pseudo-real car models of the Armada versions. Too bad the people in charge of colors didn't actually LOOK at Oval's remold, though...it'd have been nice to have an obvious patrol car named something other than Prowl. DECPTICON: BRUSHGUARD Planet: Earth Altmode: Offroad 4x4 Prior Name Use: None Prior Mold Use: Overhaul Key Gimmick: Heat Blast Key Code: s0u6 One of many scientists working for MEGATRON, BRUSHGUARD has dedicated his life to xenobiology - the study of alien plant life. A firm believer in DECEPTICON supremacy, he hopes to find unique toxins in Earth plants for use against the AUTOBOTS and their human allies. Though he dislikes violence, he has been retrofitted to fire short-range bursts of superheated acid from his chest. STR 6 INT 8.5 SPD 4 END 9 RNK 3 COUR 6 FRB 5.5 SKL 6.5 Avg 6.06 Rank 3? No respect for the scientists. Ironically, Brushguard has no brushguard in vehicle mode. Key Code Info: A cousin of Overhaul, Brushguard was lured by Megatron into a life of evil by hollow promises of money, Energon and power. Brushguard, though a brilliant scientist is secretly in love with movies from Earth. He has an entire collection of primitive Earth DVD's that he watches while he is in his laboratory cooking up monstrous viruses and genetic mutations for Megatron. His dream project would be to create a bio-mechanical Autobot eating plant that resembles the Earth Venus Fly trap plant. He would teach it to talk too - it would say, "Feed me Brushguard!" (No visual content as of 11/29/05. Little Shop of Decepticons! And here's some visual content: http://www.dvandom.com/kitbash/brushtomato.JPG ) (3/14/06 update: Brushguard now has the toy color guide up.) Packaging: One tie for the vehicle, one for the missile. Planet Key: Standard Earth Key. Mold Changes: The Autobot symbol molded onto Overhaul's right shoulder has been smoothed out, but not replaced by a molded Decepticon symbol. It's simply flat. The "no stable halfway position for the Key that won't launch the missile" issue from Overhaul is still there for Brushguard. Plastic Swaps: Dark green changed to light blue. The claws are a lavender or light violet. The clear red missile and lightpiping on Overhaul are changed to light violet. All other plastic on Brushguard is very dark blue. Paint Apps: In vehicle mode, the windows are silver, the spare tire is painted dark blue, the headlights are bright yellow-green, and there's dark gray on the hood and the front of the roof. A silver cracked globe symbol is on the driver's side of the hood. It looks at first to be a mountain in a circle, but looking closer, I don't think it's a mountain at all. My best guess is a cracked planet. In robot mode, there's white and yellow-green accents on the chest. The face is white, with yellow-green on the "horns" of his helmet. The shoulders are painted light blue (to match the plastic) and white, with a purple Decepticon symbol printed on the right shoulder. Overall: Really, no better or worse than Overhaul, although the violet claws are a little weird. Don't bother unless you're a completist or like collecting scientist characters. AUTOBOT: BACKSTOP Planet: Jungle Altmode: Rhino Prior Name Use: None Key Gimmick: Ramming Robo-Horn Key Code: stw7 Once the most feared and powerful warrior on the Jungle Planet, BACKSTOP was long ago beaten and cast out by SCOURGE. Forced to live among weaker beasts, he came to value the equality of all creatures above all else, and now fights against SCOURGE with the other Jungle Planet rebels. He hates the cruel dictator, and dreams often of the day on which he will finally throw down and destroy the evil, three-headed dragon-bot. STR 8 INT 6.5 SPD 5.5 END 7 RNK 5 COUR 9 FRB 7 SKL 6 Avg 6.75 Rather different from his show version. Potentially more interesting, too. Key Code Info: Backstop is an ancient and wise master of martial arts. He may not look like it due to his stocky size and Rhinoceros alt-mode, but deep within this thick-skinned bot lies the beating heart of a master warrior. At one time he was just like Scourge and Leobreaker - quick to anger, full of rage and unable to keep his temper in check. He went on a journey as a young Transformer to find the meaning of life and saw the galaxy - he learned the secrets of martial arts and the teachings of the wise from ancient masters like Banzai-Tron and Bludgeon...upon his return to Jungle Planet, he was a changed Bot. He realized that fighting may be important, but it is what you fight for that makes you a strong warrior. (No visual content.) (3/14/06 update: now has toy color guide up.) Packaging: Three twist-ties hold the beast mode in. Planet Key: Standard Jungle Key. Beast Mode: This is a robotic Black Rhinocerous (species, not color) with pretty good proportions, 5.5" (14cm) long from horn to tail tip, and 2.5" (6cm) tall at the shoulder. The head and main body are a faintly purplish gray, while the legs are a medium cool gray. The horn (two prongs) is red plastic and the tail is yellow plastic. There's silver paint on the Key slot at the top of the head, red paint on the discs on the sides of the legs, and yellow paint on the raised discs on the rear hips. There's a small Autobot symbol printed on the left flank. The eyes and the triangle on the Key slot are yellow. The ears and some of the details on the sides are painted very dark gray. Hm, correction on the plastic colors. The main body plastic looks purplish under low light, but brownish under stronger incandescent light. The butt is actually made of red plastic, but with an amazingly good color match on the paint to make it look purple/brown/gray. Huh. The head swivels side to side, the robot arm underneath keeps it from going more than about 45 degrees either way (despite being bright red, the arm doesn't stand out too badly, looking more like jowls than an arm). The hips are all restricted ball joints, and each leg has a knee joint that bends back and forth about 40 degrees either way from the centerline. The tail is on a hinge. All in all, about as poseable as a real rhino. And the entire butt flips down for a devastating ass-catapult attack! Inserting the Key does two things. One, it kinda makes Backstop look more like a Styracosaur (i.e. Killerpunch). Two, it makes the horn spring forward an inch (2.5cm). The main shaft of the ramhorn stores inside the body, which is why the head can swivel, but not move side to side. The Key slot is very tight, so it's easy to store the Key without popping out the horn. Transformation: An interesting transformation I don't think has been tried before, although there's many good reasons why it hasn't. The butt unfolds to become the left arm, with the tail being a middle claw for a three-clawed paw. The right arm unfolds from under the head. A panel in the left flank flips up to reveal the head. The pelvis pulls down, allowing the front beast legs to be snapped together as the right robot leg, and the rear beast legs as the left robot leg. The right robot leg can even be twisted so that it faces forward, but the left leg is sideways. Robot Mode: Squat...3.75" (9cm) tall, but over 4" (12cm or so) wide. The left shoulder and both upper legs are yellow plastic. The right forearm and left upper arm are red plastic, as are the face and pelvis. The fingers of the right hand and the forehead band are painted very dark gray. The robot eyes are yellow. The face could use some paint. The Autobot symbol ends up right below his face in this mode. The right shoulder is a swivel, the left shoulder is a universal joint. The right elbow is only a transformation joint, he can pat his own chest. The left elbow is a hinge, as is the left middle claw. Yes, Backstop can flip you the bird. The right hand has no articulation, but it's one of the rare open-palmed unarticulated hands. The hips are swivels. The way the beast hips work lets you swivel the legs somewhat just below the robot hips, as mentioned earlier. The right leg can swivel 90 degrees either way, the left leg about 20 degrees outward and 40 degrees inward. There are hinge joints between ankle and knee level, but only the right leg's can do much worthwhile. In default mode, it looks like his ankles can break on command. The horn cannot be brought to bear in any reasonable way, and just looks stupid if deployed in this mode. In fact, the instructions recognize this by not showing it triggered in robot mode. Overall: The more I play with this, the more it grows on me. It's still pretty hilariously bad in many ways, but almost manages to transcend its oddball limitations. Worth picking up. Oh, and as rhino TFs go, it COULD be worse. And has been. http://www.dvandom.com/images/rallnoxbackstop.JPG Rallnox is the Rhinox toy made for kiddiemeals at the Rally's/Checkers burger chain, and is probably the worst official Transformers toy that actually transforms. DECEPTICON: WRECKLOOSE Planet: Jungle Altmode: Monitor Lizard with Antler Hat Prior Name Use: None (although Undermine was going to be called Wreckloose in some early info) Name Pun: Reckless meets Recluse Key Gimmick: Armor Blades Key Code: su39 An eager fighter for SCOURGE, WRECKLOOSE throws himself wholeheartedly into battle. He rarely carries a ranged weapon, preferring to use his bladed shield in close combat. Able to blend in almost perfectly with the Jungle Planet underbrush and move silently through even the densest vegetation, he will wait in hiding for days just to ambush a challenging opponent. STR 6.5 INT 5.5 SPD 7 END 8 RNK 4.5 COUR 8 FRB 5.5 SKL 8.5 Avg 6.69 Key Code Info: Wreckloose, much like everyone else on Scourge's team, is a dirty fighter. He will set up elaborate traps and booby traps within the forests to capture his prey. Once while on patrol, he got word that some of Snarl'ss friends from the other side of the Jungle planet were going on an expedition into the deepest reaches of the forests. Wreckloose spent days wiring up a particular section of the jungle with highly corrosive Technaracnid spider webbing. As the Transformers walked into the trap, Wreckloose moved in for the final blow. The Transformers never knew what hit them... (No visual content.) (Update 3/14/06: color guide for toy now shown as visual content.) Packaging: 5 ties hold in the beast mode, plus one more on the antler hat. Planet Key: Standard Jungle Key. Beast Mode: This is a komodo dragon or other sort of monitor lizard, wearing an antler hat to make it look vaguely draconic. It's 6.25" (16cm) from snout to tail tip, mostly black on the top half and pale green on the belly side, with lots of copper plastic and paint interspersed (mostly and joints and the like). There are copper painted strap patterns on the tail, making it look like his transformation is unstable and he has to tie himself together in beast mode. The antler hat is dark green plastic with copper paint, and copper antlers. Parts of the front legs are also dark green plastic. There's some silver paint on the sides of the neck, yellow-green eyes, and gold strips under each eye. There's a small Decepticon symbol printed on the front side of the hat. A more detailed part-by-part inventory of what colors go where would be too exhaustive even for my reviews, though. The head and neck area doesn't hold together as well as I'd like, although the hat tends to clip it closed reasonably well. The jaw opens up, but the head doesn't otherwise move. The front shoulders are universal joints. There's a hinge and ball double joint at the front knees, and hinge ankles (the robot fists are kinda blatant as heels, though). The rear hips are ball joints, and the rear ankles/chicken knees are also ball joints. The robot joints allow some sinuous poseability in beast mode: the mid-torso has what amounts to a limited universal joint, the robot knees give the tail a side to side joint, and the tail tip can wiggle up and down a bit. As with another U.S. only mold (Hardtop), the Key gimmick piece is completely separate and not really part of the altmode. It's a hat. Inserting the key at the back makes the antlers spring to the sides, with a span of 4.25" (10.5cm). The Key never actually locks in place, but it will sit there okay without triggering the antlers. I tried putting the antler unit on the robot mode storage point to see if it works as a sort of boogie board or whatnot...it doesn't, not really. Transformation: Simple, but different. The tail splits into legs, with the top half becoming the left leg and the bottom the right leg (with beast rear legs hanging off). The head and neck split apart to become huge shoulderpads, revealing the robot head inside. The forelegs become robot arms, and the whole thing turns 90 degrees at the waist to bring things in line. The antler hat can either peg onto a T-shaped gap on the underside of the forearm, or onto the back. Robot Mode: 4" (10cm) tall, with a 4.25" (11cm) wide shoulderspan. The upper body is symmetric, but the legs are not (as mentioned above). There's a lot of silver paint accents made to look like the armor has been cracked, showing raw metal underneath. The head is pale green plastic with copper lower face and horn, plus yellow-green eyes (that almost don't show up as different in color from the face). Poseability is very good. The head and waist turn. The shoulderpads are on universal joints, with the upper arms connected to the shoulderpads by another universal joint, almost making up for the fact that the pads get in the way a lot. The elbows are combination swivel and ball joint, and the wrists are hinged. The hips are restricted ball joints, the knees are hinges (that bend both forward and back), and there's a swivel below each knee that's really a restricted ball joint, but there's no meaningful use of the extra range. The ankles are hinged, and he has pointy jester boot toes. Placing the antler hat on the arm as a shield works okay in some limited poses, but it's too awkward to move the arm much. If you put it on the back, the heelspurs are too short to keep the figure from falling over backwards unless you're very careful. The t-peg on the shield is too big to fit in the 5mm peg holes on the fists, unfortunately. Overall: The tolerances are a bit bad in several places (the beast head, the way the shield pegs onto the arms) and it's kibbly at times, but it's certainly an interesting design, and shows a fair amount of thought. Worth picking up. Dave Van Domelen, gonna have to put away some Cybertron toys to make room for these on his "active display" shelf....