Personally I wouldn't recommend Swoop, Oilslick, or Jazz until you have the better figures. No major problems with them, I just don't think they are great. They have some of the duller transformations, though posability is quite good.

I would also recomend Voyager Bulkhead and Deluxe Bumblebee. Some people have issues with the scale problems, and some don't like Bumblebee's feet. To me these are great toys. Bulkhead is a standout. Ingenious transformation and impressively screen accurate.

 

Prowl or Samurai Prowl. His transformation is so unique for cycle-bots, not to mention that he would look great with Lockdown. The Samurai Prowl armor isn't my cup of tea, but if you get that figure, you can just remove the side car and problem solved! The armor isn't bad, just the arm that the helmet is on is freaky [they attached the helmet to an arm-thing so it would transform with the rest of the armor, but it ends up sticking out in the back and looks attrocious].

Yeah, Samurai Prowl will give you more bang for your buck.

As for the other one...Jazz is a great figure but his transformation is very, very, very simple, which is my one complaint with that figure.
...Soundwave is simple too, but he is a lot of fun and comes with Laserbeak. But he is small and takes a bit of work to get his knees to stay still enough to pose.
...Blurr's transformation is awesome and he is really poseable and the expression on his face is just great. I really like Blurr, and his vehicle mode is really unique.
...The Battle Begins two-pack thing I actually regreted buying. Megatron's tranformation was a joke, though Optimus from that is still a nice figure, with a SHOW ACCURATE axe! <-- Which was kind of what pushed me over the edge to buy it. Both figures have good play-value and look really cool. So, for you, I would suggest this. It is around 20$ American currency for two Deluxes and a DVD, I don't know what that translates into for you, but it is very nice and you would have Animated's Optimus Prime and Megatron represented on your shelf!

 

I don't fancy Samurai Prowl's armour cuz it doesn't make Prowl look agile, but Prowl alone is pretty cool. Perhaps I'll change remove head and put a cooler head.   (If I get one)

Glad you're enjoying the comics  

Wow.. conflicting suggestions here.   I don't fancy Animated Bumblebee, unfortunately. After seeing the Movie version, I couldn't find a BB that could beat it.

I like Bulkhead seriously. At first, I was thinking "WHAT ON EARTH!?". But soon, I liked his unique design. Very screen-accurate. But his smallest size is Voyager Class (excluding Activators) and he's already quite short , and that's a lot of money on my side..

I didn't really fancy Oil Slick because of the "glass head". Seems weird, but I do like the hands and feet. Very well done.  

:bowdown

Haha. I started liking Cybertron Prime after seeing Polenicus's reviews on certain Busou Shinkis and a few other figurines.

Soundwave was the first Animated figure that caught my interest actually, but I didn't buy him immediately. A couple of reasons. Maybe I'll think about getting him during the summer. Maybe.  

Swoop? Err.. Nah, no thanks. I'm not really into animal transformers xD.

--------

Again, thanks a lot for the suggestions. Everyone here has been very helpful, and I really really appreciate the help  

 

Again, I don't fancy Samurai prowl's armour, but Prowl alone is great. Haha.  

Thanks for your suggestions too  

 

I suggest Jazz if you're not partial to any character. It has a sports car alt mode, the robot mode looks cool and I think it's the best Jazz design ever. Definitely better than movie Jazz.

I'm from Malaysia too and Metro is having a sale on Deluxes, it's 44.90 now I think. I just saw a few Blurrs & Swindles at TRU One Utama today, just restocked I think. And on the subject of TF prices, RM54.90 isn't all that bad, compared to Europe and Canada. We also get Henkeis Deluxes here at less than RM80? A bit over USD20, so I think we're quite lucky we're just a bit over average on both Hasbro and Takara Tomy offerings.

 

Hehe, i'm in the same position as the OP - trying to figure out which other animated chars to get. So far have samurai prowl and love him!. Although on mine, his hip joints are pretty darn loose so it's hard to keep him upright. Luckily his feet pads are huge though, so that really helps out.

As for QC issues, each toy is gonna be a crap shoot at this point IMO. Some are tight, some are loose, some are just right.

 

Hey there, fellow Malaysian!  

True, I have to agree on the pricing bit now.. It's just that I'm still a student so these TFs are really expensive for me..

Thanks  

True, toys these days have lots of QC issues. Thanks for your suggestion  

 

Going to agree with Nachtsider again (seems to be a trend today). Swindle is good but Blurr is without a doubt my favorite fig in the entire line. I've never encountered the weak knees problem, but if mine developed it I'd go buy a new one.

There's not much to his transformation, but Waspinator is great for poseability.

 

activators bumblebee/ cliffjumper /deluxe sentinel prime

 

Blurr and soundwave are great deluxe class figures.

 

If you have to keep it limited to deluxes..then Blurr, Jetfire and Jetstorm, and Oil Slick are probably your best bets.

But I absolutely have to suggest Voyager Shockwave. Easily the best figure in the line. And probably the best and most badass design out of Animated period.

 

agreed, Shockwave is awesome.

to the OP, have you checked out the Activators? Starscream/Thundercracker and Ratchet are really good ones.

whoever commented on Lockdowns poorly posable legs, they extend. I had lockdown for months before I realized once he was transformed the legs have knees. But on mine I really had to pull the legs hard, almost scared it would break, before they came loose and slide down. (like classics jetfire or animated deluxe prime)

Made a huge difference having knees, better poses, and he was even taller!

 

I'd recomend Samurai Prowl, Swindle, Soundwave, or Sentinel Prime.

S. Prowl since he's got the arm blade, the armor only restricts head movement (solved by un-poping the ball jointed helmet I think), and he's totaly good without the armor (he doesn't have the ninja stars, though...)

Swindle, well, he's Swindle. He's got alot of guns, looks alot like his G1 cartoon counterpart, and he sounds like Adam West (I know the voice actor for him, I just can't remember his name!), what's not to like?

Soundwave is a 1 1/2 for one deal, since you get Laserbeak as well who turns into the guitar so SW can rock out. Soundwave himself has a rather complicated TF process, his chest "door" being the hardest, but he's very show accurate. The doors have pegs that allow Laserbeak to sit on them, or if SW wants to turn it up to 11 (Spinal Tap joke), there are pegs on Laserbeak's "wings" that allow Soundwave to hold Laserbeak in guitar mode.

As for SP, well, he's a prick, but still very show accurate. Plus, for your comic, you can have Astrotrain blast the crap out of him with his overpowered gun.

 

The only two I'd recommend are Grimlock and Waspinator.

 

Either Prowl or Soundwave.
I'd rate regular Prowl above his samurai incarnation because of his better head, colors and functional throwing stars.

 

Deluxe Lockdown

 

Man, what a hard decision.

Given your criteria, I would suggest:

Samurai Prowl: You get 2 Prowls for the price of one. Regular Prowl and Samurai, so you can take whichever you'd like more and go with it. Plus you can add in the wheelblade and "forget" the armor, should you choose.

Blurr: He's like Lockdown in a lot of ways, very cool, great transformation, tall robot mode. I don't have issues with the knees at all either, I think that may have been an early run issue, as most people who got them later don't seem to have the problem.

Swindle: He's a lot of fun, especially with his color changing cannon and all those extra weapons. The only caveat is if you don't like his hands (being clear purple and so "big"), otherwise he's a lot of fun.

If you can splurge:

Shockwave. Seriously, he's just fantastic. If there was a single figure to represent everything right about Animated, I'd say Shockwave would be it. (If it may bias you further, check out Vangelus' YouTube review.)

Voyager Bulkhead. He's actually so much fun, it's shocking.

As mentioned, the Activators are a good way to go as well:

Thundercracker/Starscream is a fantastic mold, I'd almost have prefered this mold at a larger scale to the Voyager we did get.

Cliffjumper/Bumblebee, Ratchet, Grimlock, and Megatron are all good Activators IMHO.

 

^
This. I just bought Swindle and I have to say he's very cool.
Waspinator's really good too.
And then their's always Jazz. =D

 

The TF are expensive here too, is at least $20 for a deluxe and $40 for a voyager leaders are $80

I recomend the twins, they are very posable, lots of personality, the plastic quality is great, they combine, they come with a comic and the transformation is simple, I like them a lot since they look like Megaman characters LOL

And I like to display them in macross/robotech mode

 

Firstly, thanks for the suggestions.  

Mmmm... In my opinion, Soundwave is the superior of the four.. Haha. I guess I'm too fussy about design. I never fancied Sentinel Prime's design, what more his attitude. Yet, he makes the cartoon ever more interesting, which I admire.   but yeah, definitely not going for SP.

  That's a good idea there. Just hope that AT doesn't blast himself first xD

Yeah, that's the 2nd main reason why I rather go for normal Prowl - the stars. Other than that, I never fancied his Samurai Armour.. If I were to choose more posability but no stars, and less posability and stars, I'd go for the latter.  

I haz Blazing Lockdown  

I know. I was fiddling around with his transformation and figured it out the 2nd time I transformed him after looking at the instructions (I don't look at instructions when I transform TFs for the first time). Pretty cool and he's very tall.   It would of course be loads better if his knees could bend more as his arms are already so posable.  

True. That's the good thing about S. Prowl. But because he doesn't have ninja stars, I'm quite disappointed. It would've made a whole lot of difference if he had.

Seriously? Okay, that explains why so many members I've met don't have the knee problem. I think I just found out with TF I should go for.  

Mmm.. Nah, never fancied his design. If you're talking about weapons, it's gotta be a LOT. For example Movie Brawl or Cybertron Hot Shot, or for non-TFs that'll go to Gundam Heavy Arms Custom.

I like the idea that Shockwave has four different forms: Crane, Tank, Autobot Longarm and Decepticon Shockwave. So, for a Voyager he's a win followed by Safeguard IMO. Then again, since I really digg the Movie designs, liking Shockwave is quite hard for me.. It's not that he's a bad character, no. I like him in the cartoon series. It's again the money problem here. So I have to pick the best of the best in that sense..

Just to make it clear, it's not that I don't like Shockwave. I think his 4 modes is awesome  



As for Activators.. Hmm.. Nah, not into them..

Wow.. Looks like I'm really not the only one suffering (duh!).

I like the twins in the cartoon, but if Hasbro had given them proper hands I could've bought them. And the idea of combining them into Safeguard is too awkward for me.. The colour contrast is not right and his posability seems limited.

But individually, I believe the twins are very good and my only complaint are the hands. The head designs are pretty unique and it actually doesn't look so bad. I have to congratulate the designers on the head designs.