I'm the same - love the scaling with Prime and is almost spot on for me.

Looking forward to getting this in hand soon... hopefully...!!  

 

I’m not sure why you think it’s limited in forward hip articulation other than that vid didn’t show him actually bend it all the way. But there’s a flap on the waist that flaps up as much as the one on Prime, I don’t see why the articulation wouldn’t be the same as it normally is with him.

Seems a bit presumptive just because they didn’t actually bend the joint all the way.

 

V2 isn't that far off from V1, so the general proportions are still pretty similar. They just needed to leave in some holes and grooves here and there so the armor has something to clip onto. It's not like that would've been an impossible feat.

 

I agree, was going to reply on it, until I saw you did allready.
I do think he will have forward motion for his upper legs, because of the front pelvis flap, but because of the thigh plates it could be a smidge less than Prime.
We will see, I'm guessing he will be released really soon.

My prediction for July releases are: Scrapper/Mixmaster, Prowl and UM v2  
Or maybe UM v2 for August.

 

And all of those I have paid up so all good.. along with MFT Blitzwing which must be close!! (Wrong thread I know.. )

 

Looking at this picture - and considered how the new UM is already a million pieces to attach to white Prime - it puzzles me that Magic Square didn't think about including at least the side windows for the cab from their OP upgrade kit.

 

I'm not gonna be picky for the articulation or the patsforming because the aesthetics and the shape are pretty damn good. Yes, it's just an armor, but I can deal with that. It still being gorgeous.

 

I think it really would be necessary to make the armor to fit and wrap around the different shapes and proportions of Prime V2.

That would've been nice indeed and I don't like the fact that this armor still has no matrix chamber.

 

That's the only thing I can complain. Anyway, I don't remember the scene of Magnus with the Matrix. I'm a fan of G1 (Ark crew and New Gen), but I never saw the next seasons on Spain (headmasters and ahead).

 

i hope you guys are right, but i was basing it on the following screenshot from the video listed earlier where it seems like the front hip skirt only bends 45 degrees. then add to that prime’s original flap and then the beefed up thigh covers, and i really don’t see much room left.

maybe we can get around this by using the ab crunch…

glad to be wrong though, so i can buy this guy!

 

The scene is from the '86 movie, go watch it right now  

 

I have it DVD and BR, I watched it twice in my life (as a kid and as an adult eons ago)... does he put it inside the chest?.

Now I have to do something this weekend.  

 

Shame on you !!!!!!!!!!

 

Finally, some pics with a car in the trailer! As I've said before, one of the main selling points of this to me is a alt mode that is scale with the alt modes of Optimus and the rest of the carbots. v1.0 and MFT's are just too small. (Though I think MFT UM might be scaled with their Octane, I'll have to check later) The lack of a matrix chamber does suck though.

Well its a little more than that. Sure, they could have kept the proportions similar so the armor would still fit (right now, there's no way they will). But from this pic:

the biggest sticking points (I found another one!) are:

1) The head. Right now, v1.0 Optimus' head is on a tiny peg, and you just switch it out for Ultra Magnus' head. v2.0 is on a neck joint so the head could look up. Now, they could just have that neck joint attach to a similar tiny peg, but I don't think they'd think its worth it just to make it compatible.

2) Now this is the new one I noticed that's the bigger deal- the smokestacks. Right now, the Magnus shoulder arm tabs into the same slots as the smokestacks, so you just remove them. v2.0 has integrated transformable smokestacks that seem to fold back. So for that shoulder armor to work, the smokestacks would have to remain removable, or adjusting the shoulder armor to accommodate the folded smokestack. Again, having smokestacks that don't fall out is one of the bigger improvements, so compromising that just so it would work with this armor is just not worth it.

So yeah, all in all, it would've been nice if this armor wasn't already defunct because they're moving on to a new model, but this armor takes advantage of a couple of deficiencies in the 1.0 to tab in. I don't blame them for no carrying over those flaws to the new model, nor adding complexity just to be compatible with this. Particularly since more people care about it as a new Optimus, not a potential UM cab.

 

Both the robot mode and alt.mode look gorgeous!! This really put their UM v1 into shame in appearance, scale, and as car carrier functionality. The only win for v1, is the non-partformer transformation and a little bit on articulation.

My nitpicky earlier was the omitting of his glass chest. Now that the pics are in HR, apparently they're using some sort of coating to make a section of his upper chest looks glossy/glass. Guess, that helps a little bit. Also, seeing the alt.mode, the toon fan in me, wish the the cab has the red bumper, lol. Maybe I should wait to see if MS releases a giftset (both cab and trailer) version that fix this as well the blue tip of the trailer front which should be white. If not, I can always get it down the road.

Yeah that scale looks great! I'm not a fan when Magnus cab is the not the same size as Prime or if the entire UM alt.mode looks too tiny just to improve the robot mode height.

Joining the chorus with others, shame on you, lol! I'll save you the time for the weekend, here's the pics. I remembered when MP22 came out and saw he had the Matrix chest functionality, the nerd inside me went wild when I was writing the toy review some many years ago, lol.

 

Still interested in seeing the NA version, but this guy looks pretty cool. Size looks good to me--somewhere between v1 and MFT. With a slightly beefed up v2 OP on the horizon, a slightly beefed up UM should work out well.

 

EXCELLENT.

 

Give us that Prowl already!

Also - is that G2 Sidewsipe new? I don't recall seeing that before.