Lightning made the soggy journey across the ponds and landed at my front door. I won't spend much time talking about the quality or anything of this guy because it's right on par with all of IGear's Seekers so far which is to say, as good as if not better than the official product (for example, this Thundercracker is assembled correctly). Feel free to peruse the other IGear reviews here and here in which I talk a bit more about the heft and feel of these guys. Mainly I'm sure people are interested in his color so without further ado, some color comparisons. I don't have original MP TC to compare him with as I sold him to make room for this guy. Instead, settle for a comparison between the Henkei and Generations (or RTS whichever) Thundercrackers: Lightning is a light blue. Near as I can tell he may be the same shade of light blue as Cybertron Thundercracker's blue parts? Just looking at pictures it's hard to tell but he may be lighter still. He's sky blue vs the darker, more metallic blues we've seen so far and way lighter than MP TC. Frankly, it's a bit jarring at first, but the more I look at him on the shelf, the more I like it. He definitely stands out as there's nothing quite the same color (and I mean really stands out - I don't think I have another toy the same color except maybe for Comic Pack Cobra Commander). His blue is a flat color with no metallic flake at all, unlike all the previous IGear Seekers. His gray is molded in that color and has a very mild metallic tinge to it - I'd call it Aluminum Gray if I were looking at the Testor's rack. Lastly you'll notice no stripes on his vertical stabilizers. Sunstorm doesn't have any either, but for whatever reason I didn't really notice that whereas it's odd not having the typical stripes here. This represents my only real complaint about the toy. Bot mode is no surprise either of course. He has the two wrist communicators and the new lower legs. And really - what more is there to tell? Here are some group shots: I'm probably done with these guys for the time being. The only two remaining Seekers they currently have (possible) planned is Current and the yet to be named PPO3R. I'd be surprised to see Current at this point since earlier pics of him show him being the same bright blue as Lightning here. Hopefully R is some sort of Acid Storm green, but we've never seen anything about it yet so until then I'm happy. In short, the color may not be for everybody, but don't fear the quality.
awesome, cant wait for skywarp as well. and based on that last pic, if we can get that shorter Megs it will look much better for scale!
I can't believe I hafta wait until April when Skywarp is released to get this guy,lol. I eargerly wait for this, Starscream, and Skywarp to add to my IGear Seeker shelf!
yep i just got mine in the mail today as well. he looks really good. i'm glad they didn't go even more toon accurate and make his grey/silver parts more white like he is sometimes shown. the colors look great. i may have to start displaying my hasbro skywarp now instead of the takara for a better match. lol. the only thing i don't like about this figure is that like sunstorm his wing flap hinges are molded in black (ala walscream) instead of body color like the takara cracker and warp were. that and the same thing you mentioned abou tno stripes on the tail planes. i'm sure repro labels is already on it so i'm not going to sweat that too much. one thing is....it seems like they are listening to the boards. i complained about storm's box being a bad photoshop instead of art. lightnin'gs box has art...not the best but better than a toy photoshop. the back is actually cooler...its all dark but the eyes.
Weird, I have the same MP decepticons. I guess thats how it will look when my PP03L gets here. It's been shipping for 10 days.
i guess one other thing of note is that his color scheme is significantly different from the prototype in that his thighs are grey/silver instead of blue (which would be more toon accurate). that being said, i like the way he is but odd they didn't stick with the prototype color scheme (which i would not have minded either). also the dark grey parts all appear darker....basically black now. this same different was noticed in "attack" who's dark grey became black as well. either way great figure.
Yeah - all the Igear Seekers have MP Optimus-like flip up "screens" on each forearm and they have different stickers to show who they're communicating with. I think the stickers are more or less random - my TC has Shockwave and (I think) Runamuck. There're also Ramjet, Megatron, Onslaught and Thundercracker stickers. For laziness' sake, here's not-Dirge's: Yeah - I swapped out the hip kibble from Wal-warp onto the Takara one to have the purple vertical stabs. It actually works quite well as you don't notice the flat black vs the gloss black.
i like they are the same size as the hastak versions. anyone know if the new starscream coming out from takara will be shorter than these??
MP-11 will be the same size, give or take a few millimetres. It's still based on the same mold, just with heavy modifications. It's not down-sized.
awesome, great to hear. thank you. maybe ill hold out on buying lightning and keep my fingers crossed takara re-releases all the seekers with the mods.
My PP03L showed up at the same time as an OSX update disk. Apple makes you sign for things they ship. The mailman pointed at the seeker and said I had to sign for it. It could have been lost with no reference number if I hadn't been there. Anyway, The figure does have a few issues that I did not run into with the other four PP03 figures. The face is extremely eager to slide our of the head. It's scary hard to slide the intakes, head, and wings portion down onto the shoulders. The jet mode was not pegged together correctly when I opened the box so some parts feel tweaked. The face not wanting to be in the head is annoying. the rest will hopefully work itself out. These issues only stand out because my PP03s is perfect. I bought the other PP03 figures from us dealers so I'm glad I have the box with the checklist. And I really like the new style for the box art. All things considered I'm really happy to have it. I finally have the big six plus sunstorm and starscreams ghost in the masterpiece line. wow. I'm ging to get a better camera and try to fit $1000 worth of seekers in one pic now.
Good reviews. I ALMOST picked this up myself. I had it preordered and everything with iGear, but when I saw the grey legs, I decided to pass, at least for now. I want to see what HasTak comes out with first. I've grown to appreciate the subtle differences in the MP-11 mold and am just going to wait and see what happens. I think I'd rather have a deep, metallic blue as well. This is nice - very cartoonish - but just not what I'd prefer, I think.
It's a shame IGear couldn't have done boxart similar to what they did with the Coneheads, I thought that art was really good!
before you slide them down, after you fold the midsection out of the way, you should see the philips head screws that slide along the rails. If you loosen them slightly then the whole assembly will slide better - I had a Ramjet that was way too loose, and a Dirge that was way too tight. It's a common occurrence with this mold, official or otherwise
Hm... Wonder if they would downscale these to voyager or deluxe size figures. Probably not, but could be a cool idea..
I imagine some of the smaller parts would become tiny and brittle, or otherwise unmanageable. It could probably be done, but we might have a while to go before it becomes a reality. Shame, because I think the Classics Seeker mold is a bit weak, but then again I like my Seekers to tower over the Autobot cars, a la G1 style, so I don't mind mixing these MP-sized Seekers with most of the CHUG stuff.
Yeah I saw that fix mentioned on the pp03j thread. Just got around to doing it. Took three full turns on each screw to and it's still tight but better. Tightened the #1screw on left hand too. It was spinny. I might email igear for a new head. I'm an adult collector who buys to display so my toys can get away with being delicate. But he looks literally stupid when his face slides out.
