I've always figured the original series was American-made. However, a few years back, a friend of mine disagreed with me and mentioned that it was made in Japan.

So, was it made in Japan?

 

commisioned by american, animated by japanese (as were a lot of cartoons then).

 

correct me if I'm wrong. But did this split up when RiD came out (G1 to Beast Wars were still animated in Japan?)

 

Beast Wars was animated in Canada
RiD was Japan, then imported to America and redubbed

 

Don't anyone forget that.

 

The original series was animated in Japan, but it was written in the US. The voice work was done in the US as well. Then it was dubbed for Japan.

 

G1: written in America, animated in Japan, original voice acting done in America. Translated and dubbed into Japanese.
Beast Wars and Beast Machines: written in America, animated in Canada, original voice acting done in America. Eventually translated and dubbed into Japanese.
RiD: writing, animation, and original voice acting all done in Japan for a Japanese audience. Eventually translated and dubbed into English.
Armada and Energon: writing, animation, and original voice acting all done in Japan for Japanese and US audience. Poorly translated (occasionally very poorly - I'm looking at you, Energon) and dubbed into English.
Cybertron: writing, animation, and original voice acting all done in Japan for Japanese and US audience. Competently translated and dubbed into English.
Heroes: writing done in America, animating likely done somewhere in Asia, original voice acting done in America.

Headmasters, Masterforce, Victory, Zone, Beast Wars II, and Beast Wars Neo were all written, animated, and voiced in Japan.

 

With MASSIVE character and storyline changes, and the addition of goofy accents.

 

And censorship.

 

Don't forget the Koreans! The G1 episodes they did may not have been the most well animated Transformers episodes ever (to say the least), but they animated a large portion of season 3 and the entirety of the short-lived season 4, so their contribution should not go uncredited in this thread.

 

I think BW & BM were voiced in Canada as well, Vancouver to be specific. Not sure about the writing.

Armada/Energon/Cybertron I think were all dubbed into English in Canada too, (Vancouver again).

 

I'm almost positive that the writing staff for BW/BM was internal to Mainframe (the animation house that did the show).

 

Bob Forward and Larry Ditillio, who were responsible for most of the scriptsas well as overall Story Editors for BW are American based writers who freelance for many companies. Same goes for Bob Skir on Beast Machines.

 

I'll add that RiD, originally Car Robots, was never meant to be a US series or show, and wasn't even announced that it would be brought over until long after it had finished in Japan.

Also, Energon and Armada both suffered due to using unfinished animation as well as bad dialogue (And at times, "bad" voice acting), while Superlink (Japanese Energon) used finished animation. Plus, it was animated to fit the Japanese Dialogue, and some of the concepts were dropped/changed in the translation, making things a further mess for Energon. For example, there was a running issue where Mega Zarak (Scorponok) refused to properly address Galvatron (Megatron) as a lord, which usually resulted in him getting beaten for his insolence, and would only address Alpha Q the way Galvatron wanted to be addressed. In the US version, Megatron just came off like a jerk who liked to hit people and Scorpy as a weirdo.

 

how about toy-line wise? who designed the toys of each series?

 

Most of the early G1 Transformers toys (Mostly year 1 & 2) originally came from 2 Japanese toylines from Takara, namely the Diaclone and Microchange line (an extension of their Microman line) (A few toys also came from other companies like Bandai, look at G1 Jetfire!) Originally they were intended to be piloted mecha, like most other Japanese Mecha series, hence why most of the early G1 toys have cockpits which you could fit small little pilot figures inside.

Hasbro saw the potential of these toys and licensed them from Takara, rebranding them as Transformers as well reconstructing a whole new backstory for them, making the individual robots sentient characters rather than piloted mecha. They commisioned Marvel to come up with names, character backgrounds, story settings etc. , applying them to the tech specs that came with toys, the comics and the cartoon, thus Transformers was born.

Later on Takara brought the Transformers brand back over to Japan and the line garnered more success than the original Diaclone or Microchange lines. Hence the beginning of a new relationship. From then on, starting with a few in the Year 2 line and more prominently by year 3, Transformers would be a collborative effort between the two companies. Even up till today, the usual process is that Hasbro would come up with the Transformers designs (Look up Aaron Archer, formerly Orson in our TFW2005 forums), and the Takara (Takaratomy) end would be responisble for the engineering, and they'd share costs on manufacturing.

Of couse there are exceptions to the rule, most of the Japanese exclusive Transformers series like BWII, Zone (Also including Car Robots which later became RiD here) were totally designed and engineered by the Japanese for their market.