Dave's Transformers Tie-In Rant: TF Movie Lunchables Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Artifacts/Lunch1 Updated 5/17/07: Bumblebee packaging details. Updated 5/18/07: Another Bumblebee package. Updated 5/19: Got Bumblebee's code from Shadowwing, used screensaver to get remaining profiles. Updated 6/8: Max McLeod sent me Starscream's code. Updated 8/4: Orson Christian snagged a complete set of the "toys". This is going to be more in the way of a "what's out there" report than an actual review, and it's not going to be in any way exhaustive. But I'll try to keep it updated with info about the packaging and premiums available. Lunchables is a line put out by Oscar Mayer, intended to be a "throw it in the backpack and take it to school" sort of all in one lunch pack for harried moms to give their kids. Because they're selling convenience, they're overpriced for what you get, so I've never bought 'em in the past, and don't plan to buy many now. :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunchables is the relevant Wiki page (there may be a Teletraan-1 page too, for all I know), and lunchables.com is the corporate page. There's several sub-lines, and it looks like each sub-line will have its own Transformer on the packaging. "Maxed Out" Lunchables have larger portion sizes, cost about $3 or so, and have Megatron in all the cases I've seen so far. Minis (Mini-Hot Dogs, Mini-Burgers, etc) have shrunk down versions of regular foods, cost about $2, and have Bumblebee on the packages. The chicken line (sticks, dippers, etc) seems to be Optimus Prime's corporate home, also $2. There's also a nachos line, but I haven't seen any yet in TF packaging. Update: Looks like there's no consistency on which $2 packages have Prime and which ones have Bumblebee. Maxed Out Lunchables have a series of "making of the movie" fun facts on the back of the box, and a contest piece to win one of 100 "Transforming" movie posters. As per the law, you can also send a card in to a listed address (which I suppose I'll copy down at some point if no one emails it to me) to enter. Minis have six cut-out trading cards on the back with attack and defense stats for use in a simple little game. Prime, Bumblebee, Jazz (IIRC), Megatron, Bonecrusher and Blackout are featured. Some show pictures of vehicle mode, some have the drawn control art of the characters. Rules inside, I presume. So far I haven't seen one I wanted to actually eat, and I'm not buying a $2 box. :) Update: I picked up a "Pizza & Treatza" package with Bumblebee on it. (Aside: it's actually pretty yummy, if a bit messy...but kids like messy. Later aside: WHOA is it bad for my blood sugar, though!) In looking more closely, I've seen at least three different box-backs in the Bumblebee style, meaning a greater variety of trading cards. All of the Bumblebee boxes have "The Ultimate Robot Showdown" card game pieces. You punch out the single rectangular block, then cut out the six cards in the block. The game is a pretty simple "War" variant. Each card has a Strength and a Defense, but you just add up the numbers and compare the totals. In the case of a tie, you check the "hidden" number on the other side, stuff like "AUTO3OT" or "DECEPTIC2N". Keep playing until one player has all the cards. The Pizza & Treatza box has the following cards: Bumblebee: STR 8, DEF 4, Hidden 4. Photo of 70s car mode. Optimus Prime: STR 9, DEF 7, Hidden 4. CG of robot mode in the "Inferno" style used on a lot of the merchandising. Ironhide: STR 6, DEF 4, Hidden 3. "Just standing there" robot CG with big Autobot symbol next to him. Barricade: STR 5, DEF 5, Hidden 2. Closeup head and shoulders CG. Blackout: STR 5, DEF 7, Hidden 3. Upper body action pose CG. Megatron: STR 8, DEF 8, Hidden 2. Upper body CG, old head. Note that the Decepticons tend to lose ties, at least with this set. Also in the inside of the package is the code word STRIKE, which unlocks one of the puzzles at lunchables.com (which is now live). STRIKE lets you try the Blackout puzzle, where you slide silhouette pieces into place to make Blackout's body, and when you finish you get to see the proper CG robot mode. This gets you a wallpaper image of Blackout and buddy icon access, plus a data file: NAME: BLACKOUT Allegiance: Decepticon Function: Transport Personal Motto: "He who cares for the opinions of others is lost." Earth Disguise: Assault Helicopter Colors: Gray/Black Special Assets: - Individuality - Heavy armor for durability - Electromagnetic Pulse Generator (EMP) - Advanced Tracking Skills Weaknesses: - Not sufficiently devoted to Decepticon Cause - Doesn't follow orders Update 5/18: Picked up the Ham & Cheddar Stackers, another Bumblebee package. The code word is POWER, and here's the cards: Bumblebee: STR 7, DEF 6, Hidden 3. Closeup of robot face without mask. Ironhide: STR 7, DEF 4, Hidden 2. Photo of black pickup truck mode. Optimus Prime: STR 9, DEF 8, Hidden 3. Closeup of robot face with mask. Megatron: STR 8, DEF 9, Hidden 1. Old art of robot mode. Blackout: STR 9, DEF 4, Hidden 2. CG of robot in action pose. Barricade: STR 3, DEF 8, Hidden 1. Photo of police car mode. Yeah, looks like Decepticons lose ties all the time. Codeword POWER unsurprisingly gets the following: NAME: MEGATRON Allegiance: Decepticon Function: Decepticon Leader Personal Motto: "Peace through tyranny." Earth disguise: Alien ship - no earth disguise Colors: Metal Gray Height: 35 feet Special Assets: - Leadership - Smart - Brute strength - Military Strategy Titles held: - Commanding General in charge of all Anti Autobot Operations Arsenal: - Moves incredibly fast - Able to shift form so quickly that, to the human eye, he seems to disappear Weaknesses: Unknown The chicken dippers I did buy, since I can always use the five nuggets for lunch at work. I can just hear Starscream mocking Prime for being associated with chicken, too. Annoyingly, the nutritional info is for the whole package at once, so I don't know how much of the sugar listed is for the Capri Sun drink bag (I'll probably just cut it open and dump it into the bottle of grape juice I have in the fridge). The toy premium is in the tray with the chicken nuggets, you probably want to remove it before microwaving. [Later note: those were the blandest chicken nuggets I've ever eaten.] http://www.dvandom.com/images/lunch1.JPG shows the back of the box, with special decoder and secret messages. The messages are translated inside, and the highlighted letters spell out the altmode. You can also see a pic of the toy premium. I'm not sure if different products will have different puzzles on the back or not, they only had one variety of movie-version dippers when I was there. On the inside are the following translations and info: Bumblebee This spy looks best in a smart disguise. He will always back his Earth friends. Disguise: Sports Car Starscream First to a fight, he tries to speed thru the sky to jump into the battle. Disguise: Fighter Jet The toy premium looks kinda like a Cyber Planet Key when folded up, all in a single color of opaque plastic. Width is 1.75" (4.5cm), height is als0 1.75" (4.5cm). It's all once piece of plastic, folded over along three folds. The front has an Autobot symbol (or, I presume, a Decepticon symbol) molded into it. It unfolds to reveal the robot mode in picture form, with the character name at the bottom. This is helpful, since I couldn't tell the Ironhide I got from Megatron. There's also a code word molded onto the outside back to enter at lunchables.com, unlocking content. I don't know if the color is a sure indicator of the character, or if a true completist is gonna go nuts trying ot get all six characters in all however many colors. :) I got Ironhide on a blue piece, with the code word "PROTECT". Opened up, it doesn't really lie flat, instead looking kinda like one of those folding chair-lets people buy to put on stadium seats. I don't think the lunchables.com site is set up for code entry yet...if it is, I don't have the patience to click through whatever set of links is necessary to wade through the pile of flash animation and find it. Update: I now have a complete set of the toys. The Decepticon ones have Decepticon symbols molded into them. Megatron is dark gray, code POWER, and it has the old face (more drone-like). Blackout is a light slate blue-gray, code STRIKE. Starscream is olive green, code MISLEAD. Bumblebee is, unsurprisingly, yellow. Code LOYAL. Finally, Prime is red, with code FREEDOM. If you can find a variety you're willing to eat, it might be worth two bucks to get the box and one of the little fold-over toys. But I'm certainly not going to try to collect all six (I wouldn't say no if a reader who regularly eats Lunchables anyway wanted to send me their spares, of course!). Update: PROTECT unlocks the puzzle for Ironhide, appropriately. Here's his data file: NAME: IRONHIDE Allegiance: Autobot Function: Optimus Prime's Sidekick Personal Motto: "High tech circuitry is no replacement for guts." Earth Disguise: Earth Pickup Truck Special Assets: - Most battle experience - Defensive Specialist - Optimus Prime's personal bodyguard - Trithyllium-steel alloy outer skin made with irradiated carbon fibers - Immune to most forces of attack - Advanced sonar, radar and radio wave detection Vulnerabilities: - Stubborn - Oldest Autobot in action - Slow Also, two "security puzzles" are available without any codes. They give the following characters: NAME: AUTOBOT RATCHET Allegiance: Autobot Function: Robot Doctor Color: Yellow and red Earth Disguise: Hummer H2 model emergency vehicle Special Assets: Information on Autobot Ratchet is still classified at this time Weaknesses: Unknown at this time NAME: BARRICADE Allegiance: Decepticon Function: Hunter/Scout Earth Disguise: Police Car Colors: Black, Grey & White Special Assets: - Can be disguised as police or other authority figures - Speed - Advanced driving skills Weaknesses: Unknown at this time And yeah, they're not exactly consistent in their use of section labels or even what things are mentioned. There are four more codes I do not have. If you've gotten any codes other than STRIKE and PROTECT, please let me know! The icon builders let you make 50x50 or 80x80 icons using art from unlocked characters. The wallpaper builders use different art and a selection of several backgrounds, downloadable in three sizes. I decided to try guessing some codes. FREEDOM works, and gets this: NAME: OPTIMUS PRIME Allegiance: Autobot Function: Autobot Leader Personal Motto: "Freedom is the right of all sentient beings." Earth Disguise: Semi-Truck Colors: Blue body with red/orange flames Height: 28 feet Special Assets: - Fearless - Leadership - Smart - Compassion - Constructed with a polarized, magno-dipped tungsten casing Arsenal: - Lifting strength exceeding 4,000,000 pounds (that's 5 Empire State buildings) - Punching force rated at 12,000 pounds per inch [sic] - Outstanding vision Vulnerabilities: - Too compassionate and concerned with the safety of others Conquest, conquer, seeker, search, destroy, defend, matrix, allspark, smallest, enemies, ashes, tyranny and peace are all invalid codes. Update 5/19: LOYAL is the code for Bumblebee. And I'll note that the time you have to solve a given puzzle decreases based on how many codes you've already unlocked...20 seconds is BARELY enough time to get all the pieces in place once you know exactly where they go. NAME: BUMBLEBEE Allegiance: Autobot Function: Autobot messenger & spy Earth Disguise: 1970s and 2009 classic American sports car Colors: Yellow with black and gray stripes Height: 16 feet Special assets: - Versatility - Hard to capture - Smaller size allows him to hide and blend in for spying missions - Fuel efficiency, valuable in times of low resources - Best vision of all the robots - Can spot a 10" by 10" object from 48 miles on a clear day Weaknesses: - Gets in trouble over his head Odd that his inability to speak isn't mentioned. Now, all I need is the code for Starscream. And the patience to solve his puzzle at max difficulty. Or just to solve it on a different machine where it's my "first" puzzle. :) Update 6/8: Starscream's code is MISLEAD. Solving the last puzzle had to be done in 20 seconds, but I got no additional content for having all the puzzles solved. Of course, I could also just download the screensaver that went live today (or maybe I had to unlock enough codes to get it), which has all the profiles plus some extras. Took photos of my screen and transcribed. NAME: AUTOBOT JAZZ Allegiance: Autobot Function: Special Operations, Saboteur Personal Motto: "If you can't do something with style, it's not worth doing at all." Earth Disguise: Silver and Gray American sportscar Special Assets: - Extensive Earth knowledge - Near-perfect recordable memory - Coolness under pressure - Versatile Arsenal: - Reaches sub-light speeds in vehicle mode - 180 dB stereo noise disorienting device - Able to disconnect fear receptors Weakness: Easily distracted NAME: DECEPTICON FRENZY Allegiance: Decepticon Function: Decepticon spy & soldier Personal Motto: "Sow panic and surrender will bloom." Colors: Megal gray, chrome Earth disguise: Everyday mechanical devices (e.g. boom box) Special Assets: - Ability to disrupt electrical functions - Can hear sounds that other Transformers cannot - Able to see radio waves Weaknesses: - Only 5 feet tall - Relatively weak by robot standards - Too destructive for his own good NAME: STARSCREAM Allegiance: Decepticon Function: Megatron's right-hand robot Personal Motto: "Conquest is made of the ashes of one's enemies." Earth Disguise: F-22 Raptor jet Special Assets: - Ruthless and capable - Flying speed reaching Mach 2.8 - Surprise attack specialist Arsenal: - Self propelled cluster defense system range 40 miles with 10,000 sq. ft. impact zone - Fuel intake valves allow him to function longer and more quickly, using less energy Weaknesses: - Some cowardly traits - Vanity - Gyro circuis overload during nose-dives causing dizziness - Believed to be plotting against Megatron Dave Van Domelen, notes that a Maxed Out meal contains about as many carbs as he should have for any two meals....