Dave's Zord Morphers Rant: Toyota Vehicle Zords Wave 1 Engine King Eagle Zord (Toyota Camry) Chrome Prowler Tiger Zord (Toyota Prius) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/misc/Toyota1 Bandai's getting into the licensed vehicle mode game, with a pair of hybrid vehicles from Toyota that are hybrid zord/cars too. As I've come to expect from Bandai USA, these toys are about twice as expensive as similarly detailed Transformers would be, much chunkier and far less poseable. Presumably also more durable, being aimed at younger kids, but these days Transformers are pretty sturdy too. Both Toyotas are roughly 1:24 scale, making for a sort of pathetic imitation of Alternators. :) CAPSULES Engine King Eagle Zord: Good vehicle mode, okay transformation, fairly weak zord mode. If it were half the price I might recommend it. $19.99 at Toys R Us. Chrome Prowler Tiger Zord: Likewise, although there's a certain novelty factor in having a Prius that transforms. I like this one a bit better than the Eagle, reversing my expectations (I almost left this on the shelf), although I can't really recommend either at the price Bandai USA wants. $19.99 at Toys R Us. RANTS Packaging: Window boxes 11" (28cm) wide, 7" (18cm) tall and 4.25" (11cm) deep. Standard Power Rangers RPM decoration, which I'm not going to go into detail about. :) They're in beast mode, or as close to beast mode as they can manage with only 11" of width to play with (the Eagle Zord can spread its wings even farther). A photo inset of the vehicle mode is on the front and small photos of both modes on the right side. The back is the same for both, with pictures of both toys in the wave and "Look for additional Toyota Vehicle Zords coming soon!" at the bottom. The red Eagle Ranger is on the left side of both boxes, and the box bottoms have legalese. Inside, the single sheet of black and white line art instructions is tucked in under the left flap. A 2" by 2.75" sticker is included with each, this is a line-wide thing for RPM toys. Eagle has a sticker for the Road Blaster (the crew-served weapon for the main RPM trio), Tiger has the Turbo Plasma Launcher (crew-served weapon for the shark and wolf Rangers). Normally, the stickers are of the toys they accompany...when they don't, it seems to mean that the toy is a non-show character or mech. ZORD: Engine King Eagle Zord Altmode: Toyota Camry XLE V6 Packaging: No twist-ties, just a partial blister shell taped over the beast mode. Eagle Mode: Well, it's an eagle Zord, so they don't really try to make it look realistic. The wings are car sides split the long way with feather details in and around 'em. The chest is an obvious car hood. And so forth. The car parts are black plastic, most of the non-car parts are red plastic. Fully extended the wingspan is 13.5" (34cm) and the figure stands a little under 6" (15cm) tall. There's dark red paint on the feathers between the door segments (since it's painted on black plastic) and on the tail feather pattern molded into the trailing car roof. The beak and talons are gold, there's silver bits on the head, wings and thighs. The eyes are bright green and set far forward making for a teeeeeny head, proportionally speaking. And big neck. Not a lot of meaningful articulation, unsurprisingly. The hips are universal joints, and the ankles are hinged side to side to let the talons sit flat. (There's forward hinges on the ankles too, but they're solely for transformation and do not have enough range to be useful in posing the beast mode.) The wings can move backwards on transformation hinges, and the neck can lift up. There's a ratcheting waist-bend hinge that doesn't do much useful, being mainly for transformation. Well, I suppose it lets the bird bend down to attack something in a swooping pose. But the lack of a rotation joint on the wings makes this look a bit dumb. Transformation: Pretty straightforward, although getting some of the pegs in place is a bit tricky, and you need to position the eagle neck just right to avoid it blocking the windshield. The wings become the sides, folding around the bottom some. The tail and roof become the trunk, the chest becomes the hood. Vehicle Mode: 7" (18cm) long, making it 1:27 scale, a little small for Alternators. All the visible plastic is black, including the tires (no rubberized plastic tires for Bandai USA!). The windows are painted over in a dark red-brown rather than being clear plastic, no Alternator here. The side mirrors are rubbery plastic to avoid being snapped off. XLE is the highest trim level of the Camry, nothing but the finest interiors for the RPM Rangers. Not that the toy has an interior to look at (again, This Isn't An Alternator). This is the sixth or seventh generation Camry (hard to tell from pictures, and the box doesn't say). While there's a hybrid version of this Camry, there's enough detail on the toy to be sure that the lack of a "Hybrid" logo is not accidental, making this a regular Camry. It's a sedan (four-door). [Later note from my usual car expert friend: the twin exhaust pipes mark it as the XLE V6 (amended above). The XLE has leather interiors and traction control.] Other than the windows, the main paint color is silver, which is on: front grille, headlights, turn lights, hubcaps, door handles, trim over the side windows, exhaust pipes, taillights (top halves). There's also silver printing in various places: "CAMRY" logo on front and rear license plates, Toyota hood ornament logo, Toyota logo over real license plate, small Camry nameplate on trunk, "XLE" on rear. There's orange paint on the front turn signals and red on the majority of the taillights. It rolls along okay on its hard wheels, but there's no other car- ticulation. There's a big obvious hinge at the rear of the roof, but otherwise it's a fairly good vehicle mode in terms of lacking seams or kibble. And once you get all the panels in place, it holds together well. But it IS like an Alternator in how tough it can be to get all the panels in the right spots. The roof piece doesn't like staying in place, but this doesn't affect the stability of the rest of the toy. Overall: Nice idea, but typical Bandai USA execution. And I'm a bit disappointed that they went to 1:27 instead of 1:24 scale. Unless you're really champing at the bit to expand your Alternators collection, give this one a pass. ZORD: Chrome Prowler Tiger Zord Altmode: Toyota Prius NHW20 Packaging: A single twist-tie goes through the backing card and blister and wraps around the tail, while a second one holds in the right forepaw. A spacer keeps the rear paws from flopping around. Tiger Mode: If it's silver and black, is it really a tiger? More of a jaguar. Shattered Glass Ravage! His guns aren't deployed in package, which is odd, since it'd fit (unlike the wingtips on Eagle not being able to fit into the box). There's a slight Zoids feel to this Zord, with boost vents on the rear legs and the guns on either side of the head. The guns are formed from the car doors folded up with gun patterns molded into them. The head really looks more panther-like than tiger-like. The head, forelegs, wheels and torso core are rigid black plastic. The tail tip and hind claws are soft black plastic. The car's antenna is also soft black plastic, and while it's on the underside it is fortunately far enough forward on the chest to not draw comparisons to the part of the tiger that poachers are interested in. The rest of the toy is metalflake silver, including the root of the tail. Gold paint is used on the guns, the tail tip, the boost vents and the claws. There's a silver stripe down the center of the head and silver on the jaw, reminding me of Energon's Battle Ravage. The neon green eyes add to that impression. Thrust engines molded shallowly into the sides of the torso core (in the space behind the windshield) are painted red. Other paint apps as in vehicle mode, below. The color balance is odd, mainly because the forelegs are primarily black and the hind legs are mainly light gray. The front hips are hinged and move in a rather restricted range, but a transformation swivel also lets them rotate along their long axis. The head can lift up a little before exposing a gap, but if you open the bumper flap you can lower the head. The rear hips soft-ratchet on very stiff 8-point swivels. The rear ankles and toes are hinges, but the practical articulation of the rear legs is minimal. Especially since the rear bumper halves rub up against each other. The tail is hinged at the base and the midpoint, although the root hinge can only lift up about 45 degrees. Transformation: A little more involved and less peg-problematic than the Eagle's. A little flap opens up in the front bumper to let the beast head in or out, and the midsection twists 180 degrees. The belly folds back to become the center of the hatchback, a nice little filip. Vehicle Mode: 6.6" (16.8cm) long, so around 1:26 or 1:27 scale, pretty much in scale with the Camry. The body shell is slightly swirly metalflake light silvery gray plastic, with black hard plastic tires. Soft light gray plastic is used for the side mirrors, and softish black plastic (same as the tail tip) for the antenna at the rear center of the roof. This one does have the Hybrid logo, although it's tiny and hard to read. As with the Camry, no interiors or clear windows. The lighter plastic of this toy makes the seams more obvious. The windows are painted the same dark red-brown as on the Camry, with black trim around the side windows. Black is also used on the front grille, the windshield wipers (including the rear window wiper) and the license plates. Silver paint for the headlights, foglamps, door handles, hubcaps, and most of the taillight area. Silver printing for the Prius logo on both license plates, Toyota logos on front and back center, Prius nameplate on the rear, and Hybrid logos on the front fenders. Because of the way the transformation works, the doors actually open more or less correctly. You can also deploy the head for a freaky hood ornament or (dare I say it) a hybrid car/beast mode. Overall: Well, there's certainly the novelty of having an official Prius transforming toy, I may need to find the person who parks a silver Prius in my usual lot at work and show it to 'em. This would have looked better in black vehicle mode, although A) I'm not sure the Prius is available in black, and B) that might have triggered lawyernotes from Hasbro. I am tempted to see if this plastic will dye black, though. Dave Van Domelen, now has some playmates for Alternators Ravage.