Only 2 figures were purchased for Nov of 2018. Both figures are from the Power of the Primes Evolution series.

• Power of the Primes Evolution Optimal Optimus, Target, $44.99

• Power of the Primes Evolution Nemesis Prime, amazon.com, $32.99

Both these figures were presented in this special Black Friday post. There are some minor details that’s worth repeating here. Being that they are both from the Evolution series in Power of the Primes, they each have 4 modes.

Optimal Optimus

When I found this figure at Target, I wasn’t sure if I really wanted him. I enjoyed Beast Wars, but I’m a G1 guy at heart. Figures that come from other TF lines are a lower priority for me. But Optimal Optimus does look cool in the box. And I’ve been mostly impressed with the Evolution series thus far. “Just buy it!”, said my wife, as she got sick of waiting for me to make up my mind while in the store. That was all the nudging I needed. And that was smart, since I never saw this figure in store again.

Optimal Optimus is an entertaining and fun figure. He represents all 3 forms of Optimus that we see in Beast Wars. First we have the base Optimus Primal figure, which is the smaller black and white component in this toy. That’s the first mode. This component transforms into a flying hoverboard (yes you read that right) used by the next form of Optimus Primal, the larger transmetal gorilla figure. Alternatively, the smaller component can transform into a backpack with weapons for the gorilla. This is the 2nd mode. The two components then come together to form Optimal Optimus, the final evolution of this character in Beast Wars. This is the 3rd mode. In this mode, Optimal Optimus can transform into a Cybertronian jet. And that’s the 4th mode. Yes I know on paper this all sounds very hokey and gimmicky. And yes this figure is a bit guilty of all those qualities. But I’m gonna guess that BW fans love this. This is the first time in TF history that we got a single figure who can decently represent Optimus Primal in all his forms in the show. Hasbro should be applauded for even attempting this. The end result is not perfect, but each mode is decent enough on its own.

BW fans should definitely not pass up on this figure. And I do recommend this for all other TransFans that want something different and original. If you don’t fall into either of these 2 groups, then this purchase would be optional. Optional Optimus. Yes, bad puns at their best.

Nemesis Prime

Evolution Nemesis Prime is an Amazon-exclusive repaint of Evolution Optimus Prime, with some minor mold differences and the inclusion of some additional weapons. Checking my TF List, this is only my 3rd Nemesis Prime figure. The other 2 I have is Alternator Nemesis Prime, and the Thrilling 30 legend class Nemesis Prime.

The only mold difference I’m aware of is in the heads. Nemesis Prime’s head is designed to look like that of Optimus, but everything is more triangular. The mouth piece, eyes, crown, and overall shape of the face, all more extremely triangular and angled. Looking directly from the front, the face kind of resembles the Decepticon symbol. I love it! To me this makes sense too, since Nemesis is supposed to be a different character from Optimus. The smaller base figure gets a new head mold too, though I’m not sure what this is supposed to be. I have no idea who “evolves” into Nemesis Prime, or if that even makes sense.

Nemesis Prime gets quite a bit of additional weapons. The first are two large grey twin-cannons, that can be used in the large robot mode and the truck mode. Next is the inclusion of a red sword. Finally, we have a grey sword that can transform into a bird! All the new weapons alone make this set worthy of purchase on its own, even if you already have Optimus.

I need to mention that construction of this figure is not as good as Evolution Optimus Prime. It’s not terrible, and nowhere near as bad as Evolution Rodimus Prime. But I just wanted to point out that there are some joints that feel a tad too loose, and I don’t remember Evolution Optimus Prime having those issues.

I bought this figure for $32.99 on a Cyber Monday sale, from Amazon. Checking the site now, this figure goes for more than $250! Wow. TFs are like stocks. You never know how they’re gonna go. If I can go back in time, I buy a few more of these. Heck, I’ll buy more Amazon stock. Then come back to my own time and retire.

That’s it for this month. One more purchase post left for 2018, and then it’s on to 2019! Yay. Better late than never I always say.

Transform and Roll Out.
 

Black Friday + Cyber Monday == TF Shopping. Black Fridays represent everything that is wrong with America. Nevertheless, here are my TF acquisitions per this materialistic tradition in 2018.

Some quick blurb about each figure.

Front row, left to right:

Ocular Max Artifex: I never understood the relationship between MMC (Mastermind Creations) and Ocular Max. Are they the same company with a name change? Or did Ocular Max spin off from MMC? Or is Ocular Max a sub-line in MMC’s offerings? Whatever it is, Artifex is their take on a MP-style Hoist. He’s well designed with a interesting transformation. But sub-par manufacturing really hurt this figure. Tolerance issues abound with Artifex. I already broke one accessory. Artifex is OK as a display piece, but not recommended as a toy. Even at a sale price of $49.99, I regret buying Artifex.

Mech Fans Toys Grmlock: I don’t know much about Mech Fans Toys (MFT). They came out of nowhere. As far as I know, all their products are 4th party (read: knock offs of 3rd party products). MFT Grmlock is their knock off version of this figure, though with better paint (I think). He’s not bad, but gives your hands and fingers a good workout when transforming because the joints are so freakin’ tight. Grmlock is my 2nd dino from MFT, the first being Slurdge (you can guess who that is). And Grmlock is not a mis-spelling; it’s purposely spelled that way, this being KO and all. Grmlock was bought at $24.99, it’s usual price.

PotP Optimal Optimus: I found this at Target at its usual MSRP of $44.99, the day after Black Fri. This figure is pretty rare, even as of this writing. I only saw him this one time in store, and online dealers totally jack up his price. I thought long and hard in the store if I really wanted Optimal Optimus. I bought the figure after some nudging from my wife (think she just got sick of waiting for me to make up my mind). He’s okay. Not bad, but not great.

X-Transbots Toro: I got this from a eBay seller. Lately, eBay has been offering 10% or 15% off coupons at fairly regular intervals, and I took advantage. I used one for Toro and it brought the price down to less than $50. Toro is a great figure! He looks good in both modes, comes with a plethora of accessories, has a interesting transformation, scales well with other MPs, is well built, and boasts some of the best paint and finish I have seen in quite some time. Some fans knock Toro for it’s fake chest windows, but it’s something I can easily overlook because everything else is so well done. Highly recommended.

Back row, left to right:

Studio Series Grimlock: The 2nd Grimlock on this Black Fri, SS Grimlock was bought from hasbrotoyshop.com via eBay for $39.99, with another 10% coupon added for good measure. My wife never comments on my Transformers, but even she gave SS Grimlock an endorsement. These are her words: “That dinosaur looks great! Really sharp!” So there you go. Personally I’m not terribly impressed with the robot mode, but you get this figure for the dino mode and it delivers.

PotP Predaking: This is the big enchilada this Black Fri. He’s normally $159.99. ToyDojo was offering this guy at $99.99 for the sale, so I bought one for the win. And I’ll re-iterate what many TransFans have said: you get this for the combined mode! This Predaking looks so good and is so stable, I would rate this combined mode better than Feral Rex by MMC. However, the individual bots range from mediocre to unimpressive. Most of them have really weak beast modes. The leg bots feature giant back kibble (the Predaking thigh parts) in robot mode. Razorclaw feels like the smallest of the 5, despite being the chest and the leader. But again, the Predaking combined form is where this set shines. When displayed in its full combined glory, this set is worth every penny.

PotP Nemesis Prime: Nemesis Prime is an Amazon exclusive. On Cyber Monday, they had a deal for this guy at $32.99. I already had Nemesis Prime in my cart previous to Cyber Monday. I waited to see if there would be a Black Fri deal, but nothing. Then Cyber Monday happened, I saw the sale price, and bought with haste. I like this figure. Yes, he’s a repaint of PotP Evolution Optimus Prime (which I have too), but he comes with more weapons and has re-worked heads that more accurately depict Nemesis Prime. On my copy, his joints don’t feel as tight as the ones on Optimus, especially the hip and ankle joints. But your mileage may vary. Even as a repaint, Nemesis Prime is worthy of your purchase.

Sometimes I wonder if a society like what is on Cybertron would have a Black Friday equivalent. It is often implied that Cybertronians do have a class structure, at least prior to the war. But you don’t ever see Cybertronians shop. What is their system for distribution of goods and resources? For the Autobots, one can only guess. Decepticons just take what they want.

Transform and Roll Out.
 

Hasbro loves their repaints. And I’m a total sucker for them. Below I present my multi-colored legend class Generations truck figs that represents various G1 characters.

• Optimus Prime, red
• Nemesis Prime, black
• Pipes, blue
• Huffer, orange

One more fig and I can have a Power Rangers team. Or a Voltron team.

Enjoy the pics.

Nemesis does not come with a weapon, in case any of you are wondering.

Transform and Roll Out.

October always seem to be a busy month in terms of TF activity. In October of 2012, I set a personal record for most TFs purchases in a month. This month I may have set another new record, of a related but slightly different category. So sit back, relax, and enjoy. This will be a long post.

• Age of Extinction Drift, Toys R Us, $24.99

• Age of Extinction Optimus Prime Evolution 2-Pack, Toys R Us, $44.99

• MakeToys Quantron, tfsource.com, $399.99

• Generations Thrilling 30 Jetfire, bbts.com, $46.99

• Fans Toys Scoria, bbts.com, $199.99

• Transformers Prime Beast Hunters Cyberverse Optimus Prime, bbts.com, $4.99

• Skrapnel with Reflector and Tailgate with Groundbuster, bbts.com, $21.99

• Nemesis Prime with Spinister and Cliffjumper with Suppressor, bbts.com, $21.99

• Generations Thrilling 30 Waspinator, Skids, Goldfire, Dreadwing, bbts.com, $59.99

• Generations Thrilling 30 Crosscut, Nightbeat, Windblade, Jhiaxus, bbts.com, $59.99

Age of Extinction Voyager Drift is a repaint of Skyhammer from Dark of the Moon. It appears they keep using this mold for Movie-verse figs. Skyhammer is one of my favorite figs from DotM, so I had to have this Drift. The figure is exactly the same, other than the head mold, the blue paint scheme, and the swords. Drift’s swords are kinda cool. He can use them separately in each hand, or have them combine into one huge sword.

I bought the Optimue Prime Evolution 2-Pack purely for the repaint of the Classic Prime mold. I love that figure, and this shiny new paint had my attention. The other Prime figure here is a repaint of Evasion Mode Optimus Prime from Age of Extinction. In retrospect, Evasion Mode Prime is one of the only few good figures from TF4, so I’m glad I have this repaint. I did not open this 2-Pack. The collector in me will probably just hold on to this as mint.

When I first head of MakeToys Quantron, I already made up in my mind that I had to have it. Quantron is an homage to the Technobots of G1, my favorite Autobot combiner team to come out of that era. Sure the Aerialbots are the most famous, but I think the Technobots are the coolest. I still remember buying Afterburner, my first fig from this awesome team. I loved his futuritic motorcycle mode. MakeToys Quantron wasn’t cheap. And I’m ashamed to say that as of this writing I still have not had the chance to play with this at all. I barely opened the box a few weeks ago to inspect the contents. Life as a working adult is way too hectic, and all of you reading should rue the day when you don’t have the time to immediately enjoy a $400 toy. But I promise to get to Quantron soon. All reviews I have seen gave it high marks. I know I will not be disappointed.

I have repeatedly mention how cool Generations 30 Jetfire is elsewhere in this blog, so I won’t do it again. Just know that he is awesomeness manifested in physical form. Go out and get yours now.

Masterpiece scale Dinobots is something that many 3rd parties are jumping into lately. These figures are usually $200 each… not cheap by any means. They all look pretty nice. But if I’m to get one, I want to go with a 3rd party that I trust. And so comes Scoria by Fans Toys. I was thoroughly impressed with Quakewave, so I had to give their interpretation of Slag a shot. Scoria does not disappoint. In robot mode he’s big and beefy. Construction is solid, and the transformation to dino feels familiar and refreshing at the same time. Scoria looks awesome in dino mode. I wish I have some pics handy to show him off. Maybe I will in a separate blog post.

I got TF Prime Beast Wars Optimus Prime purely because he was on sale at BBTS. I saw the fig quite frequently on the racks at stores like Walmart and Target and have always wondered if he’s any good. He’s not. A required purchase this ain’t. I already wasted too much time writing about this figure.

Nemesis Prime and Cliffjumper are just repaints of Optimus Prime and Bumblebee, respectively. So I won’t talk about them too much. Skrapnel (or Shrapnel) is a cool little G1 Insecticon. This is probably the first time in a long time that Hasbro has made a G1 looking Insecticon. Tailgate is using a mold that will be repainted into Windcharger. This mold is ok. I got this to have a distinct mold for Tailgate, because I think the Reveal the Shield Windcharger is a much better mold and that will be my Windcharger.

The remaining deluxe Generations Thrilling 30 figures I’ll just quickly mention. Goldfire, Nightbeat, Dreadwing, and Jhiaxus are repaints of a figure in the same lineup. I really like Jhiaxus though. I’m liking the color scheme, and Hasbro reworked the mold to be different enough that it feels like a distinct figure. Windblade is a brand new mold. She looks pretty cool in both modes, but the figure itself is kinda flimsy. Waspinator is very cool! This is probably the coolest Waspinator that Hasbro has ever made. I like the wing gimmick. Skids and Crosscut are repaints of each other, though this mold is the first time we’re getting them. I was really looking forward to Skids, since many reviews praised the figure. The car mode is nice, but the robot mode has some poseability issues. There’s so much going on in robot mode that all the features start to block on itself. Still, all the weapons on Skids (and Crosscut) does make for a nice looking figure, when you can get them to pose the way you want.

Ok… that was a lot of figs! 27 total by my count. 23 if you don’t count the Mini-Cons of the Generations Thrilling 30 legends figs. My previous record for single TFs in a month is 24, so this month does surpass that if Mini-Cons are included as separate figures. However there’s one thing that this month sets a record for… and that’s the amount spent! Adding all these up, the total TF spending this month comes to a whopping $885.90! Ouch. That’s a bit much by anyone’s standard. Quantron and Scoria accounts for $600 by themselves alone. I really need to start selling off whatever I don’t play with anymore. Time to list more stuff in my Sales Section.

October is the last month of extravagant TF spending for 2014. Things will die down for the rest of the year.

Oh, one more thing, at the end of Oct 2014 I took another pic of my orange TFs. Check it out.

More to come… Transform and Roll Out!