Dave's Energon Rant: Ultra Wave 2 Landmine Updated 11/24/04 with bio note. Landquake's bio note appended at end, as I don't plan to buy a $25 recolor. Ah, the first of the "red cog" Powerlinx toys, where part of the vehicle turns into a robot and then the rest of the vehicle becomes "Brute Mode" armor. Shipping with more Scorponok (the Fleer card is probably in with this Wave 2 Scorpy). CAPSULE Landmine: Kinda weird vehicle mode with some stability issues, good robot mode, decent "partner" basemode, interesting Brute Mode. Recommended. $26.47 at Wal-Mart (a price increase for Ultras, hm). RANT Packaging: Standard Ultra-sized box as seen in Scorponok. 4 very long twist-ties hold the vehicle mode onto a raised bubble, and one more twist-tie holds the brushcutter together. 8 rubber bands tie together various parts of the toy, and that's a LOT. The missile is on its own little bubble glued to the inner tray. Two molded plastic shell pieces sit inside parts of the trailer along with rubber bands to keep things in the right places. The box has a red cog on it. AUTOBOT: LANDMINE Altmode: Battlefield Support Vehicle Function: Battlefield Support Quote: My fists are deadlier than your guns. Landmine is one of the most powerful soldiers under the leadership of Optimus Prime. His giant fists award him the strongest punch of all the Autobots. Many Decepticons have learned never to challenge him to one-on-one combat. In vehicle mode, he is a powerful construction vehicle with an enormous crane platform capable of lifting ten times his weight. Landmine's crane platform can attach to his cab in robot mode to form a super combination BRUTE MODE. This BRUTE MODE is the secret behind his powerful punch. STR 10 INT 7 SPD 6 END 7 RNK 8 COUR 9 FRB 9 SKL 9 Avg 8.125 I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that this is not an homage to the G1 Pretender Landmine (aka Lander in Japan), the hot-headed asteroid miner. In fact, if I had to attach a G1 name to this, it'd be Grapple. Vehicle Mode - Combined: This is how it's packaged, so I'll cover the generalities first before covering the individual parts. 10.5" (27cm) long, mostly a slightly brownish orange and dark gray with a few light blue pieces as well as paint in silver and pale gold. This is a halftrack vehicle with a brushcutter/cowcatcher on the front, a crane and missile launcher at the back. Based on its construction, I'd peg it as a sort of battlefield utility vehicle: clear brush and mines, tow damaged vehicles back to be repaired, and generally be shooting only when running away. The front and back halves connect pretty solidly via two pegs. Vehicle Mode - Front: 7" (17cm) long, it's sort of a semitractor of the four wheeled "yard dog" variety (i.e. Huffer), although it doesn't really look like any real vehicle. The rear wheels are much closer together than the front wheels, making this almost an inverted trike. The brushcutter at the front is 3.75" (9.5cm) wide, a shallow wedge with spikes along the leading edge. It's not a snowplow, nor is it really a cowcatcher. It may be intended as a landmine detonator. It's very dark blue plastic with pale gold paint and some silver and gray accents to make it look dirty and paint-worn. The front wheels are 1" (2.5cm) in diameter and a little less than half an inch (11mm) wide, gray plastic with pale gold paint hubcaps (the hubcap design is a cross with four circles in the quadrants, kinda like the pattern on Signal Flare's dish). They're on fenders that slope outwards a bit, and don't peg as firmly onto the body as I'd like. Light blue panels cover up the robot hip joints behind the fenders. The rear wheel chunk is small and pretty clearly just a box around the light blue robot forearms. The whees are slightly smaller (diameter about a millimeter less, width only 8.5mm) and have a different pale gold hubcap pattern that resembles a hoverfan. Yellow windows are all over the driver's compartment, and the interior is nicely detailed with a pair of chairs ahead of the robot head. There's big bus-style windshield wipers molded into the front windows. The compartment looks like it should open at first glance, but it doesn't. In fact, there's nothing under it, the core of the vehicle is hollow. A silver engine pattern is molded into the top of the hood, but the hood is only a millimeter or so thick (a shell). An Autobot symbol is molded into the roof and painted red on a white background. The spark crystal block is slightly behind this, on a gray-painted section of the roof. Triple smokestack units are at the rear of the cab (robot shoulders), and they can be rotated into various positions. Vehicle Mode - Rear: This is a sort of tank drone 5.5" (14cm) long and 4" (10cm) wide with dark gray treads, dark blue side panels, gray crane parts, blue missile launcher, and dark orange everywhere else. There's pale gold paint on the side panels, silver on the treads and crane pistons, and yellow on the sides of the "front" (which is at the rear in combined mode). Small wheels on the treads don't roll all that well on most surfaces. Undocumented feature: if you want to run this guy around on its own, it looks better if you fold up the side panels to become "fins" at the back. This also frees the weapons to move a little more. There are two items mounted on this section: the crane and the missile launcher. They're on an octagonal base 2.25" (5.5cm) wide that can turn 45 degrees vector up (counter-clockwise looking from the top). It turns for Brute Mode, and doing so unlocks two other sounds I'll describe later. Oh, and none of the sounds on this toy are mentioned in the instructions. The crane is orange plastic with a lot of gray parts and a non- functioning spool at the back. The crane can elevate to straight up, and rotate 45 degrees either way. There's electronics inside it, so they couldn't let it spin freely, you see. There's a dead hardpoint on either side of the end of the crane. The hook is the same very dark gray seen on the smokestacks of the front half, with an interior diameter of 9mm. It's at the end of about 5" (12cm) of string. Pushing a button on the base part of the crane causes the string to retract, but not with a whole lot of force (it can't lift the average Mini-Con, for instance...might handle Ramjet). Pushing the button hard enough will trigger an electric winch sound that lasts just under 2 seconds. The main length of the crane will pop off near the base much like Inferno's gun pops apart. I suspect this is a drop test sort of thing, to have it snap at the joint rather than at the fixed hinge or some other place where the wiring is connected. The missile launcher is made from light blue plastic in a dark gray base and with dark grat trigger and tip. The missile is the same very dark gray as the crane hook. It can elevate 90 degrees and turn all the way around, although the crane blocks a lot of that motion. It has about 30 degrees of "loose" movement before you have to start using more force to turn it. The missile itself is 3" (7.5cm) long. And fires off at inopportune times...I'm glad I wear thick glasses. If you rotate the octagonal platform, a button on top of it and partially hidden by the missile launcher will now be positioned over its actual trigger. Pushing this down (which happens when constructing Brute Mode), a sped up G1 transformation sound runs for about half a second. While this button is held down, a third button on the underside of the core chunk becomes active, and pressing that will make a missile firing sound. This sound is intended for Brute Mode, but I'm mentioning it now because you can get it to go off. It's worth noting that neither of these sounds trigger while the octagon is in vehicle configuration, and you can't get the octagon in this config unless you move the side panels away. Battle Platform: The treads, side panels and orange front of the drone swing down to form legs, turning the drone into a battle platform. The octagonal base is now 4" (10cm) above the table, with the crane and launcher mounted atop it. It looks better if you rotate the octagon to make the crane and launcher a little more separated. As others have pointed out, it's not much as a piece of cover, but presumably it makes for a more stable firing platform. Transformation - Robot: Forward transformation is pretty simple, your basic "blossoming" style in which you just pull out everything that can be pulled out, then lock a few bits into place. Going back to vehicle mode is a bit trickier, especially putting the brushcutter back together, which is a real pain. Oh, and the hips come forward very much like those on Silverbolt/ Windrazor (flying wolf Fuzor). Some transformation bits require strong fingernails or a pry tool. Also, you have to press in on both tabs in the forearm to get the fists to go in or out, they lock in place otherwise. Robot Mode: 7.5" (19cm) tall, dominated by orange, but with a lot of light blue, dark blue, gray, pale gold and silver. The roof of the cab is now the chest, and the smokestacks are mounted on the front of the shoulders. There's a red cog Powerlinx symbol on the left forearm. There's no hardpoints on this part, but several pegs on the forearms are the standard 5mm diameter. There's peg holes flanking the head, but they're only 4mm in diameter, sadly. So no mounting Divebomb's weapons as shoulder cannons. The fists have 5mm pegholes, although Landmine does not come with any weapons that can be detached and held in his hands. Just more of Hasbro's committment to promoting accessory-swapping in this line, bravo. The head is dark blue plastic with a red face and clear yellow eyes. A clear yellow visor covers the top half of the face. In fact, the top half of the head is clear yellow with a lot of paint apps, but good lightpiping with strongly glowing eyes as a result. The head turns, but the waist doesn't. The shoulders are universal ratchet joints, there's upper arm swivels, ratchet hinge elbows. No wrist movement, though. The legs follow the same basic plan: universal ratchet hips, thigh swivel just above the knee, ratchet hinge knee, no real ankle articulation (although the heel spur can move, it doesn't affect much). There's hinged skirt pieces on the sides of the hips, and the pelvis pieces don't really get in the way of the legs much. Hmmm, correction...the toes do move, swinging side to side on their top pegging. This is indeed a useful point of articulation, since you can get the foot to lie a little flatter in more dynamic poses. Transformation - Brute Mode: Push in the fists on the robot. Then pull the treads off the drone, keeping the orange claw bits attached. These clip onto the forearms as brutish arm extensions with claws, rar. Pulling straight out doesn't really work, you have to twist sideways a bit to get the treads off. Now take the remaining bit and rotate the octagon so that the extra sounds work. Lift both the crane and launcher to full elevation and position the side panels as fins. Now spend several minutes struggling to get the pegs on the back to lock into the holes on the octagon, made difficult by the fact that the pegs aren't locked at a specific separation. It's a lot easier if you squeeze the rear wheels together while doing this. Attaching the backpack will trigger the transformation sound and hold the button down. Brute Mode: The Brute Mode has no leg extensions, so it's no taller at the head. However, the backpack fins rise to 10.75" (27cm) above the table, and the armspan is about 13" (33cm) with claws extended. The color combination, stance and backpack fins combine to STRONGLY evoke Optimal Optimus. The pegs that connect the backpack also lock it in place, so it won't rotate out of position. Poseability is only slightly impacted in this mode. The arms are a little restricted, and the head can't turn too much because of the crane on the right and launcher on the left. Plus, of course, the extra weight can make it a bit trickier to stand it in dynamic poses. The two claws on each arm move independently, although there is not a movable thumb claw. Small objects, like missiles, can be gripped against a sort of "panda's thumb" on the wrist. Also, the pegs that hold the claw parts together in vehicle mode are 5mm, so the right claw has two standard pegs and the right claw has two standard holes, letting Brute Mode hold energon weapons. I like the idea of the Brute Mode, and I hope it gets used more in this line (Deluxe-level Tow-Line has a drone partner, but doesn't seem to connect with it for a Brute Mode). Overall: The vehicle mode has some stability issues and looks kinda questionable, but there's a lot of play value in the splitting and recombining stuff. The main robot is a solid toy, and the Brute Mode is a good addition. The sounds don't trigger accidentally like on Scorponok, which is a plus. Dave Van Domelen, may do a preliminary kite review next, but can't wait for it to clear up enough to fly the kites.... Landquake's bio note: AUTOBOT: LANDQUAKE Quote: Behind my sensitive exterior lies a hardened fist. This incredibly powerful AUTOBOT possesses a physical design similar to his brother, LANDMINE. Unlike LANDMINE, LANDQUAKE does not enjoy one-to-one scrapes with DECEPTICON enemies. He believes that fighting is a waste of time. Instead, he prefers to help the OMNICONS mine energon. During many excavations, LANDQUAKE has used his powerful fists to crack open energon-rich rock deposits in extreme climates like the Arctic. When there is a call to battle, however, he will not hesitate to use his brute strength to thwart an enemy attack. Many DECEPTICONS have learned that angering this gentle giant can prove to be a "ground-shaking" error. STR 10 INT 8 SPD 7 END 6 RNK 8 COUR 9 FRB 9 SKL 9 Avg 8.25