Cybertron by far.

 

Animated /thread.

 

Beast Wars sticks out in my mind because it was the first series that actually had characters that looked like their toys. I remember being so impressed that I saw the same ball joints and hinges in some of the later-season models.

Energon and Cybertron seemed to base their CGI models on the toys, and Animated can't be beat for non-CGI show accuracy, but I'll always remember being floored by Beast Wars.

 

This. Right down to screws if I remember right.

 

Buster Optimus Prime the mold is spot on the colors are just great except for the blue outlines mine has but other than that it works for me.

 

ROTF Leader class Optimus Prime (regular and Buster) and ROTF Voyager class Starscream!

 

Cybertron, but they were kinda cheating.  

 

Besides stuff from the TV series, which are usually pretty accurate, I would Say ROTF Leader Prime, ROTF Cyber Ops and HA Bumblebee, and I think HA Barricade looks pretty damn close.

 

There's different methods, each with their own ranges for 'show-accurate/toy-accurate'.

* Animated version based as directly as possible off toy design (several anime shows, but especially Energon and Cybertron)

* Animated version based off toy, but with modifications to make it easier to animate, better looking, or more appealing/relatable. (G1 and Beast Wars)

* Toy and animation designs developed seperately, based off common source material, such as concept artwork (Beast Machines)

* Collaborative design, with toy and animation design teams working together to keep consistent and to avoid one party doing something the other is unable to follow (Animated, presumably live action movie to an extent)

* Toy design based off already finalized media design, probably with compromises to enable a transformation to an alternate mode. (certain toys from Beast Machines, Movie/ROTF, and various Classics/Universe/Masterpiece items)

If direct similarity between show and toy is the only goal, pretty much anything from the first category will do.

 

Cybertron, because the cartoon models were made after the toys.

 

animated imo.

there are a handful of obvious differences - starscream's guns/launchers for one - but none of them get in the way of the toys looking pretty damned close to their on-screen counterparts, without the onscreen characters clearly being GC representations of toys. if that makes any sense.

 

I'd say most of Animated, since Cybertron had the models be almost exact copies of the toys (including the details like buttons and levers that while they did stuff on the toy, would be totally pointless on an actual giant robot). Animated, however, did have to take the toy design from the show design, and most of the mainline toys are pretty spot-on to their cartoon selves (minus the silver/gold symbols on most of those). Heck, even Electrostatic Soundwave is accurate to how Soundwave appeared in fake-Detroit in "Human Error".

 

After thinking about it I'd say Cybertron more so than Animated because the transformations are more screen accurate.

 

Heck, the stock animation transformations were practically animated instructions sometimes.

 

Cybertron first. They really did just use the toys for their animation models. Among other somewhat laughable details, we had Primes mouthpiece slider on his back, hinge joints with screw holes, furthermore as memory serves, absolutely no cheating when it came to transforming. The series was practically stop motion toys with an animated background for accuracy purposes.

Energon second. Again, everything was pretty much the toy in animation, but the attention to detail and scale were less strictly observed, but still spot on. The series did an interesting cheat in that they fluctuated Megatron/Galvatrons scale; when with everyone else, he was the "ultra" sized Superlink figure, but when he fought Prime, he was upsized to Energons Leader size to make the battle between them be of similar sized characters. That aside, everyone looked like their toy, for better or for worse.

Animated as a very close third. While everyone looked like their toys, there were some minor bits that were smoothed out for Animated, Earth mode Megatron lost his back thrusters and transformation with his lower cockpit, gun, and head were different, the Seeker guns changed design, Ratchets magnets were diferent, etc.

 

Cybertron figures

 

MP Prime.

 

C'mon guys.... we ALL know that the Beast Machines toys were the most screen-accurate    

I was always impressed with how the R.I.D figures looked a lot like their animation versions, even down to the similar transformations (in most cases).

Animated's toys looked a lot like their on-screen counterparts too.