BTW, just having a quick look around their Weibo and I found this attached to a copy of the pixelated photo....

Google translation:
Reply @随静42468: @绝创 G-CREATION: 4, if there are not too many variables or special circumstances, it will probably be around April~ This aspect has to look at the coordination with the factory and the new technology. This product has added a lot of new technology that we developed ourselves. The density and completion of modeling are very high. This makes us submit the model to the factory and the nail has been touched. The model crashed directly and could not run out.

This is in response to the question "4、这款钢索预计到玩家手上还要多久?", which is being translated as "4, how long does this cable expect to be in the player's hand?". So I suspect this means an April release date, all going well, and Google's translator could be having a stroke.

According to other replies (assuming I can interpret the translations correctly) the development process has been about 8x more expensive than their previous IDW offerings, required them finding a new place to get the painting done due to the effects they wanted to achieve, and they've actually been working on it for almost 4 years already (though they believe techniques developed as a result of this figure could have cut the development time down to "one about half a year", which could mean either 6 months or 18 months, if they'd been used from the start).

Also, his name may or may not be "Steel Lock" - or that could just be a weird translation.

 

If they did make Wrath ("Steel Lock" - @Thalyn) 40cm tall in bot mode, I'd hope they would keep Optimus at his smaller height. Also, I hope they upgraded their Optimus since last year, the renders give me a Dark Spark impression, AKA AOE Optimus on low graphics. If their Minimus Prime was as accurate as can be, had all the joints (butterfly shoulders, double jointed elbows and knees, neck and head joints, ab swivel and cruch, etc), and gave it a good paintjob, I'd buy it, even if you hd to get it seperatly.

 

There's only so much you can put into a figure that's probably 4" tall, tops.

 

When it isn't mpm scale

 

MS-01B is 4.25in tall, I'm sure G-Creations can make a non-transforming figure with the listed joints; but that doesn't really matter when taking into account that G-Creations is being generous by giving us a mini-Optimus.

 

that 8x development cost has me concerned. may very well lead to a very high price tag that won't reflect what you actually get....

 

Hard to say. On the one hand it could directly translate into an increased cost on this figure, but if it means better tools going forward they may just recoup the costs with more frequent releases instead due to the new tools.

Then again, without hard numbers and knowing how much of the retail price is actually being used to cover the development, reaching a conclusion is difficult. For all we know their previous offerings had maybe $2 going back to development costs - at 8x, that's just an extra $14 to the price of the figure if they aim for the full return off the same number of units. But even that hinges on how many units they plan on producing (10,000 units doesn't seem unreasonable, but I've never released an action figure so I've no idea).

 

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=518102698972650

TransFans - [G-Creation] From official weibo. | Facebook
Here's more teaser of the figure. The paint job is very nice.

 

Oh damn; that is pro-fesh!

 

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=403777770310804

 

I might get 2 of this guy...the paint is phenomenal. Hopefully the build quality and materials are up to the same standard.

 

Very nice!

Edit: those pieces featured in the video are from the back and thighs of the Dinosaur mode.

 

Finally, the prototype appeared ...

 

Wow!!!!!!!!

 

Very curious that it's still a non-production prototype. You can see the telltale layer lines from a 3D print (probably FDM). Could that mean they're still fine-tuning the moulds, or are they painting and showing a print because the moulds are currently in use...?

 

I still hope this is true...   But I know it isn't...

 

You're replying to a two year old post, one with current information at the time. As of now, this guy is 31cm, him being atleast 40cm now would make sense since GCreation had said that they needed to downsize the figure due to it needing to be structurally stable.

 

as I feared..... soft details..... take notes from SS head

 

Looks good but honestly the head on the Studio Series version is far superior to this one.

 

What's the size of this?