#technobattle

Technobattle! Round 5

In the CW corner: Hasbro had already had one shot at Scattershot, releasing a voyager late last year.  While that release was mostly red with some offwhite detailing, the new Scattershot replaces a bulk of the plastic colour with a wine/claret shade and bright red paint.  It’s staggering to believe that there is no red molded plastic on this thing at all.  All of that red, even on the wings, is painted.  On top of that, Computron’s chest and cannon are a fetching fuschia shade; neither fuschia nor claret are really colours we see on Transformers.  It’s very striking.  The blue paint apps are also a great highlight in each mode.

In the UW corner: Takara again strives for cartoon accuracy with a bright white and red Scattershot.  They’re also gone the extra mile to create new tooling, granting Scattershot a new chest and twin guns and Computicon a new chest and an excellent new head.  Scattershot’s darker parts lean towards brown.  I’m far less enamoured of this colour layout, especially in the underwhelming vehicle mode.  As with Strafe and Afterburner, there’s something about the brilliant white that is incongruous on a well-worn battle robot.

Final verdict: This was a tough call.  CW Scattershot is a creative new colour layout on an otherwise re-headed Silverbolt, while UW Scattershot is a somewhat flat cartoon palette on some much-needed new parts.  In an ideal world, I’d like the CW colours on the UW... but as it stands, UW doesn’t do enough to wow me, and the CW’s fuschia and claret win the day.  Tune in tomorrow for the victory lap!

Technobattle! Round 4

In the CW corner: Brawl is an oddity among Combiner Wars molds in that he seems to have no additional head or alternate shell; in fact, the only thing that comes close is the drill piece first included with BotCon Ram Horn.  The drill piece sees another use here, paired with a vague imitation of Nosecone’s toy colours and it... simply doesn’t work.

In the UW corner: Takara wisely chose to retool the Rook mold, replacing the APC’s main body with a new drill assembly and adding treads, additional weapons and a cartoon-based head.  This is topped by a pleasant array of oranges and browns, paired with Nosecone’s traditional white chest.

Final verdict: This battle was between one of the worst CW molds and one of the best, so it’s no surprise that the best toy won with UW Nosecone beating out his Western cousin.  The scores are now 2:2.  Tune in tomorrow for the deciding vote!

Technobattle! Round 3

In the CW corner: when Takara’s Groove was first revealed, people wondered whether it also had tooling for Afterburner.  It did, and Hasbro’s Afterbreaker is that Groove with a new head and futuristic windshield.  His orange calls back to his original toy release, and the green translucent plastic is an unexpected but delicious contrast.

In the UW corner: with Hasbro onto a winner, and Takara using the same mold, this must be a tough contest, right?  Wrong.  Afterburner is cast mostly in an unattractive primary red.  The two-tone combiner peg means a designer looked at this and decided it had too much white and gated some red into that particular mold set.  He is so plain and dull.  His new weapons are too tall and unwieldy to really do anything with, and don’t properly stow on the combined mode either.

Final verdict: It’s weird that two toys that are so physically similar can elicit such opposite reactions, but there we are.  While I’m hesitant to call a toy “cheap”, the red of UW Afterburner does feel like it’s from a toy way below this one’s intended age demographic.  A major complaint about UW Computicon is that, save Nosecone, he’s a sea of red.  CW Afterbreaker is much-needed orange contrast.  Hasbro wins this one.

Technobattle! Round 2

In the CW corner: this redeco of Streetwise aims for vehicle mode accuracy and damn near hits it.  The original Lightspeed toy was entirely red with an off-white canopy, explaining the large void of colour around the car’s windows.  However, plastic colour distribution and unpaintable plastic causes Lightsteed’s robot mode to bear little resemblance to his 1980s counterpart.

In the UW corner: Takara chose to make their Lightspeed from the mold originating with Breakdown, using the underused Wheeljack version of the tooling.  In a decidedly un-Takara decision, the deco is not just head-to-toe one shade of red, adding in maroon molding and paint apps for contrast.  Lightspeed’s new head is a bit oddly-shaped due to necessity of the mold, but does feature an awesome swept-back visor.  The twin guns are an excellent touch.

Final verdict: Lightspeed was the only Technobot toy I owned growing up, and also had a prominent scene against Mindwipe on my well-worn The Rebirth VHS.  Consequently the new toy had shoes to fill, and while CW Lightsteed heads in the right direction with the vehicle mode deco, UW Lightspeed wins out on general resemblance in both modes.  Plus, the car mode is just cool.

Technobattle! Round 1

In the CW corner: Hasbro’s version of Strafe is an inventive retool featuring parts of both Air Raid and Skydive.  Looking at him, it feels as if more parts are retooled than they actually are.  It’s a definite contrast to the previous versions of the mold.  Strafe is also compatible with Scrounge, a Cosmos with a retooled head based on the short-lived Marvel G1 character.  Scrounge himself comes with Cybaxx, a Targetmaster.

In the UW corner: Takara’s Strafe is an extensive retool of their previous UW Blast Off.  At its base the vehicle mode is a compact tube, with new wings, rear and fuselage to differentiate it from its moldmate and additional 5mm accessories to further distance it.  Outside of its legs and pelvis, all of Strafe is cast in white plastic and extensively decoed to the specifications of Strafe’s cartoon palette.

Final verdict: For me, UW Strafe’s higher level of complexity and number of parts make it incongruous with the rest of my combiner limbs.  Add to this its lacklustre arm and leg modes and flimsiness of the nosecone, this mold is certainly going to be an acquired taste.  CW Strafe sticks to a tried and tested transformation pattern due to budgetary constraints, but it works for me.  CW Strafe also boasts a more diverse array of colours, and the inclusion of obscure fan-favourite Scrounge is icing on the cake.

Unite Warriors Computicon

Combiner Wars Computron