Dave's Lego Exo-Force Rantlet 7714 Golden Guardian See http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Lego/Exoforce81 for general line comments. Yes, this is a Golden City-storyline figure, but it's using a 7700 series serial number. Go figure. Maybe it's because this is a Toys R Us exclusive and the number got assigned to them as an exclusive last year, but not used, so they recycled it into the new year. Update 11/7/07: Code brick info added. CAPSULE It's more expensive than the Supernova, yet somehow not as satisfying. It has some cool bits, and it's nice to see Ha-Ya-To get some love on his own rather than as part of a set, but.... Still, worth getting, and recommended. $24.99 at Toys R Us. RANT The Golden City sets lack the techspec panels found in the first series, but have information online if you enter the codebrick. Unfortunately, either the Golden Guardian doesn't have anything (its codebrick instead being a random one from the first six sets) or they don't have it up yet. And it doesn't even open up Ha-ya-to on the online game (as of Feb 25, 2007). So it looks like I go back to making up my own info. If I ever see official info and it contradicts my guesses, I'll put it in parentheses afterward. (Finally checked back in November, the info was up.) This comes in a foil-enhanced box 15" (38cm) tall, 11.25" (28.5cm) wide and 2.25" (5.5cm) deep. Unlike most Lego boxes, this is taped shut rather than glued, and has a tab-and-slot bit so you can reclose it. While no store is mentioned on the front, it does proclaim itself to be a "Limited GOLD Edition", and touts the fact that the Ha-Ya-To figure has gold details. The main art shows the Golden Guardian defending a gateway, with the main tower of the Golden City behind it. The back has the usual picture of 8100-8105 in battle at the top half, a small version of the instruction book comic in the lower left, and a picture of the toy in the lower right. This pic shows the "Mega-cannon arm with firing missile" and the codebrick features. The instructions are magazine-sized, and include bag numbers...so if you want, you can just open one bag and put together all its parts, then open the next bag, etc. I probably should have paid closer attention to that before I opened up all the bags and sorted the pieces. :) The back cover has a comic with the Golden Tower under attack by the Sonic Raven, and Ha-Ya-To comes out in the Golden Guardian to fight it off. Unit: Golden Guardian Pieces: 267 Pilot: Ha-Ya-To Pilot Hair Color: Red Main Mecha Colors: White, maroon, gold Weapons: Mega-cannon, Magnetizer missile, Argon laser, short-range missiles, Razor Shield (online says Mega-cannon, concussion missile launcher, plasma blaster, twin homing rockets) Armor: 10" Zaylium armor (online says 15") Additional Features: Enhanced sensor package with radar, acoustic, sonar, thermo, seismic, infrared, telescopic, and motion sensors able to detect movement as small as one-ten-thousandth of an inch. Power Source: Magnetized oroniate Unit Designation: A.11 Unit Type: Air Nickname: Golden Warrior Code Bio: Discovered in a secret Golden City vault, the Golden Guardian is a legendary battle machine designed for first-line defense. Armed with a massively powerful mega-cannon arm and a nearly impenetrable blast shield, it has been assigned to Ha-Ya-To, who uses it to protect the Golden Tower. Although initially land-bound, the Golden Guardian is later fitted with jump jets to enable it to make rocket-powered leaps and even fly for short distances. Ha-Ya-To's battle machine is soon revealed to be only the first of an entire legion of Golden Guardians, built long ago to defend the city from attack. Build Time: About 50 minutes, 12 of that being part-sorting. Dimensions: 9" (23cm) tall at the top of the cockpit, but closer to a foot tall (30cm) including the shoulderpads. The Razor Shield is 7.5" (19cm) long, and the Mega-cannon is equally long. The feet are based with simple 4x8 peg flats. Colors: The skeleton is mainly medium gray and black. The armor on the arms and legs is white, while the torso bulking and the shoulderpads are a mix of maroon and white. The cockpit is a larger than normal piece of smoky clear plastic. The shield, cannon barrel and numerous 1x2 "vent" pieces are a slightly metallic pale gold color. The codebrick is yellow, as are the little missile tip cones on the shoulderpads. Silver flexible pipes run along inside the leg armor. Stickers: Loads of gold foil, with maroon, white and black as the other colors. The big stickers that go on the shield call it a Razor Shield. The only Japanese on the stickers is the "Golden Warrior" nickname. The stickers are not numbered. Articulation: The left arm, holding the shield, is the same sort of ball joint arrangement as in the Blade Titan and others. There's no hand, the shield is simply plugged into the wrist with a hinge joint (but not a swivel, so you have to rotate the entire forearm to rotate the shield). The right shoulder is a Knights Kingdom ratcheting universal joint, but that arm is just one big gun, so no other articulation. The hips, knees and ankles are all ratcheting universal, plus a swivel to let the foot stay flat side to side. The shoulderpads are on ball joints, but don't have a lot of room to move. There's also ratchet-hinged vanes atop the shoulderpads. The cockpit swings up smoothly on a hinge. Weapons: The Mega-cannon is the core of the right arm weapon system, with a solid gold barrel piece 4.25" (11cm) long. Atop it is a single black barrel, and both of these are tipped with the same sort of gray nozzle end. Slung on the left side of the cannon is a Technic missile launcher. The other main weapon is the Razor Shield, made from two Technic race car fender pieces (the type used for shoulderpads on the Millennium Throwbot), but they're the same piece, so the shield is vaguely parallelogram shaped. On each shoulderpad is a small missile made from two 1-peg fin pieces and a single cone. A couple of antennas flanking the cockpit seem intended to be small weapons. Other Features: Unlike almost every Lego set I've ever bought, this one had absolutely no leftover little pieces. The torso is built about like the other humanoid-shape mechs from the 8100 series. The boots are really big, like Gelgoog-big...while not actually concealing any thruster pieces, it's clear they should. Pilot Figure: It's Ha-Ya-To, but his vest is mostly chrome gold with blue pipes. Nothing more to say about it, though. Dave Van Domelen, moving the Mobile Defense Tank to a lower shelf to make room for the Golden Guardian. Sorry, Ryo.