Dave's Kre-O Transformers Rant: MicroChange Wave 2 Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/KREO/MicroChange2 Packaging: Pretty much the same as wave 1, but with dark blue along the top of the bag rather than red. Vehicon, Lugnut and Groove are featured on the front of the bag. The order of the bag codes isn't connected to the order shown on the package back or the instructions. The package back is pretty close, though. The box collation does seem to be better this time around. The webpage is now infested with pop-up animations trying to get you to play one of the Zynga-run games or something, makes it very hard to find actual information. If there's a checklist poster with bio notes and the like, I can't find it. In fact, the old posters with notes have been taken down and replaced by ones with just checklists of the two waves (plus preview). With this wave, they seem to have finally realized no one likes the flak vests. Everything in this set uses frontless stud-backpacks when a back stud is needed. Usually the 2x2 variety, but a few have single-stud. AUTOBOT: BULKHEAD Bag Number: 66 Altmode: Armored Truck While this is clearly meant to be the TF:A Bulkhead (both the vehicle mode and the use of the shoulder "winglets" in robot mode suggest this), they really picked a bad helmet for the job. A Mirage helmet would have done a better job of getting at the general head shape and the jaw cover. Instead, he has a Hound head that doesn't really work for either TF:A or TF:P Bulkhead. Most of the figure is olive drab plastic, with the hands, head and legs being light gray. It uses one of the 2x2 backpieces so the torso printing is not covered up, and there's olive drab paint on much of the front of each leg. The face has a somewhat embarrassed smirking expression. The figure has black Seeker guns clipped onto the arms, and a large enough backpack to require studs to plug into or it can't really stand. Unused parts in robot mode are two wheels (pretty standard), a 1x2 flat and the big 2x2 round-top piece used for the back of the truck. They don't really go together into anything, and the size of the round-top piece makes the unused kibble stand out. The vehicle mode, on the other hand, only leaves out the helmet, and does a pretty good job of representing the TF:A Bulkhead's armored truck mode. The feet stick out the back a bit, and there's a gap between the front grille and the roof, but it's still one of the better MicroChanger vehicles. DECPTICON: HARDSHELL Bag Number: 67 Altmode: Beetle This is definitely G1 Bombshell, or as close as they can manage. For TF:P Hardshell, the Insecticon from the first wave is a much better fit. This has Bombshell's knight's-helmet faceplate, but has Barrage's style of horn because there's no Kre-O piece that looks like the weevil proboscis. The torso is purple with unobstructed G1 Bombshell-pattern printing. The head and legs are light gray (purple printing on the legs), the pelvis and hands are medium gray, the helmet, hands, and clip-on insect legs are black. He gets a long light gray rifle, and has a big backpack of insect bits. There's two parts left over in robot mode, and it's possible to add them to the backpack without making it too much worse. The beetle mode is slightly better than Insecticon's, but just as cheaty, leaving the robot legs on the side in addition to the helmet, rifle and the core block of the backpack. Also, the insect legs are kinda weird, with the robot arms being the front pair of legs, and the clip-on legs being the rear four, so you have long legs in front rather than back. DECEPTICON: BLIGHT Bag Number: 68 Altmode: Monster Yeah, so "Blot" was either lost as a trademark or Hasbro gave up on it, because Blight is now being applied to any toy based on the G1 Terrorcon (as well as his appearance in the Mobage game, Transformers Legends). This figure is almost entirely dark blue, with light blue face and silvery gray claws (the kind held in hands). The chest has light blue printing, and there's a little purple printing on the fronts of the legs. The helmet is one of the beast type first seen in the Predacons. Robot mode leaves out three pieces, but they can easily be added to the back to make a tail. All of the pieces are used for monster mode, which really just involves moving the head to the chest and adding bits for the hunchback. The official way of doing it leaves a gap on the neck rod, but reversing the piece on top helps. Of course, with that simplicity of transformation, there's not a whole lot of difference between modes. The original Blot could emphasize differences between two bipedal modes, but this is just too small to do as much. Also, as with everything using the beast helmet, the lack of eyes printed on the helmet really hurts the beast mode. AUTOBOT: ARCEE Bag Number: 69, dude Altmode: Sportscar I'll lead off with the cheaty this time...this gets a pretty good robot mode and vehicle mode (within the limits of the format) at the expense of a relatively large pile of leftovers in robot mode and the usual ditching of the entire head/helmet in vehicle mode. Also, the instructions and package photos are wrong...the pieces on the 2x2 backpack hanger are upside down, putting the white on bottom and the pink angular bit pointing up. Placing them 180 degrees from the way the instructions have it results in a backpack much more like the G1 character model. It's still a single roof-type line rather than distinct shoulder pieces, but flipping brings it closer. This is the Neo-G1 Arcee, the stone killer with two-pistol mojo. Pink torso, pelvis and arms; white hands, legs, head and (Ironhide-style) helmet. The pistols and leg wheels are black, and the 2x2 backpack is the usual light gray. There's pink paint on the kneecaps and toes, white and black on the torso front. She does have lipstick, but her expression is one of those intense "How many Decepticons can I blow to pieces before they overwhelm my position?" deals. While the 2x2 backpack has the advantage of leaving the torso printing visible, it does keep the waist from turning. Vehicle mode adds a couple of pink flats, a blue window piece, and a 1x1 block with side stud to replace the head. There's a gap between hood and windshield, and on mine the hands are a bit warped and don't hold the wheels well, but it looks pretty good as far as MicroChanger cars go. Overall it works pretty well, but only by departing from the ideal of transformation and going into the realms of "two different kits that share a few pieces." DECEPTICON: ACID WING Bag Number: 70 Altmode: Jet This is basically Sunstorm in toxic green, but without official instructions to make the kibble blaster. And it seems intended to be Acid Storm, not sure what's up with the trademarking there. The helmet, hands and pelvis are black, the head is the usual light gray, all the rest of the robot is constructicon green. The nosecone is black and the head-replacing piece is green, with the tail/handles yellow. The printing on torso and legs is mostly medium gray with yellow cockpit windows. Oh, and the instructions say Acidwing, not Acid Wing, leading to more suspicion of last minute trademark funkiness. DECEPTICON: VEHICON Bag Number: 71 Altmode: Car This is a bit of an oddball...it's clearly meant to be the TF:Prime Vehicon, but it's medium-blue and black rather than purple or a darker blue. The torso, pelvis and hands are all a fairly vibrant medium blue, while the legs, arms and helmet are black. There's blue paint on the legs, but it's a pretty poor match for the plastic, being more of a teal. The conversion is essentially the same as Arcee's, but with slightly different details on the backpack and the car mode. The blockiness and wider front axle do suit the Vehicon car mode better than Arcee's, though. It's too bad they don't seem to be releasing sets of armybuilder MicroChangers, because this is definitely one you want a lot of. And some borrowed black arm-clip wings would let you trivially make the flight-type: swing arms back, remove all wheels, clip on wings. Oh, and the backpack can be tweaked to hold one more piece without looking too bad, leaving just the front end trio and the two extra wheels to set aside. DECEPTICON: SCOURGE Bag Number: 72 Altmode: Spaceship (G1 Scourge) And one more armybuilder. Okay, like Hardshell this is a named character rather than a generic Sweep or Insecticon, but you could still get a bunch and count them as Sweeps. While this set has arm-guns for the vehicle mode, they're not used in robot mode. They make a half-hearted attempt to use one of the vehicle bits to beef up the pistol, but it frankly looks better if you leave the "coffee cup" piece off. I was able to make a pretty nice weapons backpack that used all the vehicle kibble, though. It doesn't look very Scourge-y, but it's okay in its own right. Scourge has the Mirage helmet, in Mirage blue, which dominates the figure. Only the head (standard light gray) and hands (a slightly darker blue) are other colors of plastic on the main figure. The gun and the 2x2 roof piece on the backpack are also Mirage blue, the coffee cup pieces are black, the rest of the kibble is light gray. Good printing on the chest and legs, and he gets his beard in darker gray. Vehicle mode uses all the parts, and looks pretty good, recognizable as the Sweep "hovercraft". Might've worked a little better if the pistol was gray rather than blue, though. AUTOBOT: POWERGLIDE Bag Number: 73 Altmode: Attack Jet This set includes a red Mirage helmet. WHY? The conehead helmet is nearly a perfect fit for both robot and vehicle modes, and yet they decided to go with the Mirage helmet. o_O That gaffe aside, the robot mode uses all the pieces and does a decent job of looking more or less like Powerglide. Bright red plastic is used for the wrong helmet, the torso, the legs, and much of the jet kibble on the back and legs. A couple of connectors on the backpack are dark gray, otherwise the rest of the toy is light gray plastic. The chest printing isn't that impressive, but it's visible thanks to the 2x2 backpack piece, and they print Powerglide's animation model faceplate on the head. The gray printed on the thighs doesn't quite match the light gray plastic, but it's okay. Because of how the tail fins attach to the backs of the legs, the figure can't stand on a baseplate (except at the edge), he has to have his heels hang off the back of a brick. The jet mode also uses all the pieces, although someone messed up on the instructions and didn't quite get it. The two dark gray pieces from the backpack are just stuck on the trailing edges of the wings, but they're clearly meant to peg onto the backs of the legs to form the A-10's distinctive jet engines. Really, if they'd used the conehead helmet and the correct build instructions, this would have been a strong contender for the best MicroChanger. As it stands, it falls short. And sadly, there are no bright red conehead helmets out there...even if you wait for series 3 MicroChangers and steal from Thrust, it's the wrong shade. AUTOBOT: PERCEPTOR Bag Number: 74 Altmode: Microscope Robot mode only leaves out one piece, which can be trivially added to the backpack. A simple one-stud backpack attachment is used, with an articulated microscope barrel over one shoulder. Black plastic for the helmet, pelvis and hands, gray head. The rest of the figure is bright red, the backpack stud is gray, and the microscope is assembled from red and black pieces with a clear 1-stud dot for the lens. He has a red rifle. The expression on his face is made to look like snarling in the instructions, but it's more of an "Oooooh, slag!" look. Changing to microscope mode is almost a transformation without partforming, at least by MicroChanger standards. Remove the head and helmet, pull two small square pieces from the backpack and put them on the bottoms of the feet, and sit the thing down. Since the head is what holds the backpack on, it's a bit loose, even with the microscope barrel bent down onto it. Whoops...pressing down too hard on the barrel makes it fly off at high speed, and despite my apartment being very uncluttered due to having just moved in, I lost the pieces (red barrel, clear dot). And of course there's no red barrel pieces in my bits bins. Sigh. DECEPTICON: LUGNUT Bag Number: 75 Altmode: Bomber While sharing a lot of elements (including the Mirage helmet) with Powerglide, they're used in a different way for a distinctly different robot mode silhouette. Instead of arm guns he has arm pods that looks pretty dumb but are meant to be the under-wing bombs for vehicle mode. And there's no real attempt to give him a POKE, they just armed him with a clear purple cattle prod sort of weapon (Knock Out-ish). The utter lack of teal also makes it look a lot less like Lugnut, it's just warm purple and light gray with some bits of black and a red cycloptic. Since the wings don't fold back like on Powerglide, this is easily the widest of the wave in robot mode. The head, hands, legs and pods on the arms are light gray plastic, some bits stuck to the wingtips are medium gray, he rest of the pieces are warm purple. The printing on the chest is black and light gray, and there's warm purple on the legs. The head looks more Lugnutty without the helmet on. Transformation pretty much just involves taking some wingtip pieces and the tail fins from the legs and putting them on the backs of the legs. Unlike Powerglide, there's no extra piece added to lock the feet together. Oh, and no place for the weapon. I suppose you could call this TF:P Lugnut, a previous partner to Knock Out (or a later one). AUTOBOT: HOIST Bag Number: 76 Altmode: Tow Truck With a rather bashful expression, this does a pretty good job of capturing the look of G1 Hoist, although it gives him a regular face rather than a faceplate. Kelly green helmet, torso, pelvis and arms, light gray hands, legs and head. The 2x2 backpack is the usual light gray, with a 2x2 green flat attached to it, then some golden yellow tow rig pieces. The rifle is also light gray. The torso has good printing of the roof and windshield, and the green printing on the legs evokes the shape of Hoist's legs. Unfortunately, this leaves out eight pieces that are needed for vehicle mode, very cheaty. A few of the pieces can be tacked onto the backpack, but not all of them. Vehicle mode uses all but the head, helmet and rifle. As long as they were leaving out so many pieces in robot mode, though, they should've gone the extra mile and included a piece to give it a proper truck bed. It's okay, but not really worth all the extra kibble. AUTOBOT: AUTOBOT GROOVE Bag Number: 77 Altmode: Motorcycle Well, not strictly speaking a motorcycle. The hands can't come together to grip a single wheel, so the front has two wheels side by side. More of a hammerhead trike like the Can-Am Spyder. Also...ew. The head and pelvis are tan, functionally flesh-colored, making this look like a flasher cosplayer. And that's why they won't let him form Defensor with the others. That design issue aside, it's otherwise mostly white with blakck and some light gray. White torso, arms and legs; black Starscream helmet, wheels and pistol. The motorcycle handlebars are stuck up behind the head, and while there's three unused pieces those can all be stuck on the backpack if you want. The cycle mode is fairly clever, putting a wheel down behind one foot and lower the other leg with the pistol stuck in one side as the kickstand and exhaust pipe. The wheels meeting in the middle doesn't really work for me, so I just put them on the outside as an explicit hammerhead trike. The only unused pieces here are the head and helmet. Dave Van Domelen, thus ends the first review out of Missouri.