Transformers Purchased in August 2014
August is typically not a good month for finding new Transformers. In both 2012 and 2013, this month proved to be unproductive for TF hunting. Not so for 2014. Feast your optic sensors on all the goodies acquired August 2014.
- Generations Thrilling 30 Roadbuster, Target, $22.99
- Generations Thrilling 30 Sky Byte, Target, $22.99
- Generations Thrilling 30 Tankor, Toys R Us, $14.99
- Mastermind Creations Talon, CapturedPrey.com, $71
- Transformers Prime Beast Hunters Optimus Prime (Japanese release), amazon.com, $38
- Transformers Prime Beast Hunters Optimus Prime, ebay.com, $21.95
- Age of Extinction Lockdown, Toys R Us, $16.24
- Age of Extinction Bumblebee 2-pack, Toys R Us, $16.25
- Masterpiece Sunstorm, Toys R Us, $76.48
Let’s go over some stats first. 9 purchases for 10 figures total. 3 online purchases and 6 in-store purchases. 3 Generations figs, 3 AoE figs, 2 TF Prime figs, 1 MP fig, and 1 third party fig. 5 are Autobots, and 5 are bad guys from various factions (Decepticons, Predacons, Independents). Pretty good distribution overall.
The Generations Thrilling 30 figures were a pleasant find. In the previous months, there weren’t any TFs on store shelves other than offerings from Age of Extinction. So seeing something from my favorite TF lineup is a sight for sore optics. Roadbuster was one figure I have wanted Hasbro to release for some time now. The Wreckers are always fan favorites, and Hasbro’s Roadbuster takes it one step further to completing this lineup (here’s to hoping they will do Broadside). There has been some third party Roadbusters, but I don’t want to pay those kind of prices on every fig. Hasbro Roadbuster is a solid figure. I like both the robot mode and alt mode. Transformation is simple yet fun. Appearance wise, Roadbuster retains his unmistakable G1 look. He’s got weapons galore! He will give AoE Hound a run for his money.
Sky Byte are Tankor are characters that I do not recognize. Out of all my Transformers, I don’t have any figures that transform into sharks, and that makes Sky Byte one-of-a-kind in my collection. The shark mode is pretty good too. In robot mode, Sky Byte could pass for a G1 Pretender Shell. Not exactly my cup of energon, but I can see some fans dig this. I am not at all familiar with Tankor. And no, this is not the Universe triple-changing Tankor that is a homage to Octane. This is a separate character, which I could tell you nothing about. This toy is… unique to say the least. He doesn’t particularly impress me in either mode. His appearance does not seem to fit into any of the TF continuities. This figure reminds me of an old 80s figure that I have. That figure is not a Transformer or a GoBot, but some other 3rd party line that was looking to cash in around the same time frame. I still have that figure at home somewhere. Maybe I’ll dig out that figure some day and compare it to Tankor in the future at some point.
The only 3rd party figure this month is MMC Talon, which is an homage to G1 Divebomb of the Predacons. If memory serves, I pre-ordered this all the way back in January of 2013. Back then I never even heard of MMC. All I learned was that some new 3rd party is doing Predacons, so I pre-ordered instantly. Talon was supposed to be the first figure released in that lineup. But then I heard that something less than perfect happened with the manufacturing of the wings, and MMC really wanted to get it right, so they delayed it’s release. Props to MMC for their dedication to perfection. I haven’t actually played with Talon that much. He comes packaged in robot mode. Transformation to bird mode is pretty simple, if I remember right. I had both Bovis and Fortis before Talon arrived, and Leo Dux and Tigirs soon followed Talon’s release. So when that happened, I quickly transformed Talon to arm mode to form the fearsome Feral Rex (aka Predaking)! As of this writing I still have them combined. I think I will separate them soon, and play with them individually some more.
This month I got two Beast Hunter Optimus Prime figures from TF Prime, both the Japanese and US release. You might wonder why I did that. Back in May of 2013, I bought the US version of the fig. I really like this fig. Both modes are nice, transformation is fun, and overall construction is sturdy. But furthermore, I bought this fig immediately after meeting the girl who would become my fiancee. I still remember that day well. We met at Starbucks and chatted for 3 hours. And in true TF geekness, right after I met up with her, I went to the nearby Walmart to hunt for TFs. That’s when I picked up this Beast Hunter OP. So yeah, this figure has sentimental value for me. Fast forward to July or August of 2014. I had the sword plugged into the right fist, which is a super tight fit. When I tried to remove the sword, the handle broke off from the sword, and now the handle is stuck in the fist. Apparently this is a common problem. My buddy Gemini had the same issue, and he had to heat up the fist to get the sword out. I wish I did that instead of trying to force the issue. Anyway, the fig is now imperfect. I don’t like any of my figs being imperfect, especially one that holds so much sentimental value for me. At first I looked at possible fixes. I know I can get a third party sword (which is better). But the handle is still stuck in the first, and there’s no way to remove it. And I can’t find any third party hands for this fig. So in the end I decided to bite the bullet and just get a new one. At first I got the Japanese version from Amazon. I chose this over the US version because of the more show-accurate blue sword, and to get the feeling I’m not buying the same thing again. But then I saw a US version of the fig on ebay for a good price, so I bought that too. I guess I went a little overboard.
The AoE figures this month are Lockdown and the two Bumblebees. After watching TF4 with the GF (before she was my fiancee) at the theater, she remarked I should get the black Lambo. Of course she was referring to Lockdown. At the time, I wasn’t even sure if Hasbro would make a Lockdown in the AoE Generations subline. But they did eventually. The figure is not bad. The vehicle mode is nice, but I feel it could have been more black instead of this weird brown/grey color. Robot mode is ok. Arms are a bit too long in my opinion. The deluxe Camaro Bumblebee is not too shabby, but it really doesn’t offer anything new after all the deluxe Camaro Bumblebees that have been made in the first 3 movies. He’s not the best construction-wise, though. I already broke off a shoulder piece that forms the front corner bumper. The little Bumblebee that came in the 2-pack is a repaint of the Generations Thrilling 30 Bumblebee. This Bumblebee is the one I featured in my last post.
Last but not least, there’s Masterpiece Sunstorm. He is a repaint of the new MP Seeker mold with absolutely no new additions or enhancements. This mold was only released twice previously in the United States, once as Thundercracker and once as Acid Storm. These two were Toys R Us exclusives, and Sunstorm also continues that trend. As Sunstorm, some fans have complained of construction issues, specifically that the wings don’t stay attached to the back in robot mode. But mine seems just fine. I have done enough gushing over this mold in the past, so I will not repeat that here.
OK… that was quite a lot of TFs. Next month it slows down. Can’t have this many figures every month, or I’ll go broke.
Transform and Roll Out.
Figures from the TF Animated line are usually not at all difficult to transform, and Sunstorm is no exception. But he’s a classic case of bad instructions misleading the transformation process when it would be simpler to figure it out yourself. Going from robot to jet, I had a feeling the arms would go between the legs at the bottom towards the back, VF-1 style. But the instructions never indicated that you should do this. I wasted a good 20 min trying to do it like the instructions, but the arms just kept getting in the way. Then I finally gave up and simply started placing parts at where I think they should go, and lo and behold the jet mode practically formed itself. Once you know what to do, transforming Sunstorm is a breeze. But the bad instructions earns him a spot on this list.
Figures from both Michael Bay films are usually on the difficult side, partly because their designs are so radically different from what TransFans are normally used to. Love or hate the Movie designs, the toys themselves did do good of capturing the Movie look, but this meant some very unorthodox implementations in the transforming mechanism. Movie Ironhide gave me a lot of trouble on my first try because he’s got this funky thing you gotta do with the chest part that didn’t seem all too intuitive. At first I thought it was only me, but then 
Alternity Cliffjumper is complex with lots of moving parts, but overall he’s not too bad. The only real issue is in the legs. There’s just so much there and its all compacted into a relatively small area which makes it hard to figure out. The instructions did not help me in this area and I found watching Youtube vids of other people transforming him to be a big help. I gave him 
MP Optimus Prime is really not that difficult. I’ve done one round trip (from robot to truck and back) and I really didn’t see any issues, and I feel I can do it from memory if I need to. But he’s on here purely because of the complexity of the figure in terms of the number of steps you have to do to transform him. This is not a figure you can transform fast (at least not for me), because there is so much involved. In essence, not hard to do, but a lot to do. MP-04 is the best Optimus Prime figure ever made hands down, and I expected nothing less from a 
OK, now we’re getting into figures where things can get really frustrating. Galvatron is the only deluxe figure I put on this list, and that’s saying something. There are other deluxe figures that have challenged me (ROTF Sideswipe, Classics Tankor), but Galvatron takes the cake. He is by far the most complex deluxe figure I have ever seen in terms of number of moving parts and steps required to transform. Hasbro really crammed a lot into a $10 figure, and in this case I really can’t say if that’s a good or bad thing. My theory is that Galvatron was originally designed to be a Voyager class figure (which explains the pieces and the complexity), but for whatever reason Hasbro decided to make him deluxe. Adding to the difficulty is that a lot of pieces are designed to come off to prevent you from breaking them. If you are transforming him for the first time, I guarantee some parts will cast off (and I don’t mean in the good way like anime figures).
Hybrid G1 Optimus Prime can be thought of as a miniature version of the MP-04. But when you take one of the largest figures in the TF universe and shrink it down to one of the smallest, all while keeping much of the same complexity, the figure becomes frustrating. Hybrid Prime is not even 4 inches tall. Trying to transform such an intricately small piece would test the hands of even the most dexterous. My hands are small by guy standards, and I had a difficult time with Hybrid Prime. The overall mechanism on the Hybrid is dumbed down a little from the MP-04, but the complexity is still too much for a figure of this size. On the toy there are also these pieces covering Prime’s hands that love to fall off. To add insult to injury, Hybrid Prime’s truck mode looks unflattering at best. It kinda leaves a bad taste in your mouth when you realize you spent a good amount of time and energy to produce an alt mode that many have described as box on wheels. I did one round trip of this figure (robot to truck and back) and I’ve had enough. I will probably never transform this piece again, unless someone pays me.
As already outlined in the intro above, Alternator Smokescreen is difficult enough to bring a grown man to his knees. I first attempted this on the Alternator version, but the Binaltech versions transform exactly the same (I got both BT-07s). Smokescreen looks good in both modes so the transformation is well worth it. I’ve done 3 or 4 round trips now, and it does get a little easier with each attempt, but he’s still quite a challenge. Smokescreen kicked off the Binaltech/Alternator line, and even after a dozen or so molds later (and all of them challenging), he still remains one of the most difficult.
Of all the TFs I opened, Movie Leader Class Brawl gets the proud distinction as my least transformed Transformer. I got him around late 2007, and to this day I have not even made one round trip transformation of this figure. I got him from robot to tank, twice. Let me explain. I bought him at TRU. He comes in robot mode, and after I got him to tank mode, I realized there’s a peg that came broken (this is unlike Samurai Prowl, where 
There’s hard, and then there’s HARD. ROTF Leader Class Optimus Prime is not for the faint of heart. This is an updated figure over the 2007 Movie version. While the 2007 version was already very good, the ROTF version improves on it by leaps and bounds by being much more movie accurate in both transformation and appearance. However, this figure will test your skills as a TransFan. Keep in mind that ROTF Prime was made to be a toy, and not a collector’s piece, yet I put him at #2 on this list which means I feel he is more difficult than most MPs and Binaltechs. I applaud any TransFan who can do this piece without looking at the instructions. Not only are there a gazillion steps, each step must be performed in the right order or you wind up backtracking and undoing steps you’ve done to account for stuff you didn’t do. And once you know what to do, actually doing them is no easy task. There are so many pieces on this thing that if they’re not combined in perfect harmony, they don’t combine. I know all this sounds tough, but you feel a great sense of pride and accomplishment when you get him into that equally awesome-looking truck. If you are attempting this, just know that all the pieces on this figure are designed to come together, and with enough time and patience you will get there. I’ve done 3 or 4 round trips of this now, and each time it is still a challenge, but going from truck back to robot is not half as bad. On the box it says age 5 and up, and I’m sure there are some genius TF kids out there, but I sincerely believe this is not for the typical 5 yr old.
Masterpiece Megatron. These words alone evoke pain and fear from all TransFans, much like Megatron’s name evokes the same feeling from Cybertronians all over the galaxy. Ask any TransFan worth his Energon to name the most difficult TF ever, and 4 times out of 5 MP Meg will be the answer. The complexity of this piece is unquestioned. Like the MP-04, there’s a lot to do. But unlike MP Prime, many of the steps required to transform him is not by any means easy. MP Meg is designed to be a collector’s piece and it shows in the construction. He is more delicate when compared to TFs of the “toy” variety, but at the same time, he’s got some parts and pieces where some force is required to budge them from their place. So on one hand you need to apply pressure to transform him, but on the other you need to be careful that you don’t break such an expensive piece. MP Meg is the only TF where my hands actually began to hurt midway thru, because of the tight pieces and the sharp angles. Transformation from gun back to robot is equally as hard as robot to gun. To this day I have only done one round trip, and I’m hoping it will be easier on future attempts now that I’ve loosened up the pieces somewhat. SEANxLONG of TF Youtube fame has described this piece as “excruciating”, so he’s selling (or has sold) his. While I do agree with the adjective, I question his choice of selling it because MP Meg is the symbol of the ultimate Transformer challenge. To have this in your collection and to say you’ve transformed it and survived is proof that you belong among the elite of TransFans. Many brave souls were lost in their attempt to transform Masterpiece Megatron. The process may be harmful to pregnant women and small children. Consult your physician before attempting.