Gotta love his movie titles.

 

I sort of give Starscream a pass here because the undercarriage is 95% cartoon accurate and I've become desensitized to jet kibble. The Seekers were permitted a much cleaner jet tooling with the MP-3 version, so it's not like it's entirely impossible. The kibble on MP-52 was entirely intentional.

To me, the train kibble here is more like if the MP car-bots had robot parts tacked onto the outsides of the doors.

It mostly just comes down to precedent. For jets, the "glamour" surfaces have mostly just been relegated to the topsides and the cockpit profiles for pretty much the entirety of the TF toyline. Other vehicle types don't have that luxury to fall back on, and we generally expect them to look good from all angles except the bottom.

 

I suppose.

 

These aren’t renders, these are physical prototypes. As in, something you can actually put together and know works in all 3 modes. 3D models got FT nowhere considering they halted the releases of their combiners because they can’t figure out how to have them stand. They are much better at planning it out so far.

 

Oh man, these are really coming along. Thank goodness. I'm down for at least two sets.

 

So do we know for certain if these guys are All Built In like MMC's Assaultus?

 

Doubtful with his head and hands. They're all one piece when you look at them.

 

Aren't they just a rebrand of Zeta?

Zeta's MO is pretty additional parts centric

 

Absolutely not, this thing is Zeta through and through as it was their's until Unicron happened, in which Moon Studio I think was their mad dash to try to stave off Takara from sending them another C&D cause of THEIR Raiden. And Zeta's always gone the partsforming route.

 

...this. Radiatron is like Zeta/TW's Constructor. You have the six bots that form the body and the chest and hands and guns are accessories. It's the way it should be. The only real aspect we have to worry about is how well the hips will perform with that middle bot with the hip performing double duty for the bot and combiner. This has always been a source of weakness because of different strength requirements for the same joint/area. This combiner certainly looks beautiful. At this point my worries are the hip area, quality, and paint. I want us all to get something great because this combiner has that potential. I would love to see a Road Caesar, Landcross, and Liokaiser after this one from Zeta.

 

Not any more, they are stepping up their game.

I believe only the hands are partsforming pieces, which is ok. The rest is "all built in" or accessories that have double function, wings, chest plate and feet guns.

 

I wouldn't call it stepping up their game, just a different approach.
Which I think is dumb cause there's clearly love for partsforming combiners.

Especially if this guy is less stable than their previous three if it does lack partsforming.

 

These two are also different approachs to the same problem, transportation, and the cart is surely more reliable than the car.




In the case of transforming toys, big partsforming pieces are like the cart and the oxen, reliable but primitive. Sometimes you want to improve and do risky, bold but impressive technological advances.

It also depends on what you want, impressive engineering or just a simple beautiful display piece.

 

So wait, do we have release dates or preorders for any of this set? 0 connection to Raiden but train transformers ftw

 

PO’s have been out

 

Pre-orders are already up, set is being released in pairs, with the first likely being released next month should schedules be accurate.

 

What places are selling them in pairs?

 

He said "released in pairs".

 

The ox and cart is from combiner wars making an over sized torso bot share the same small rachet thighs as the combiner thighs. Leading to unstable, and out of proportion combiners.

The 2000s innovation that was bold and risky that lead to more stable, and more proportioned combiners was pants forming. Allowing for larger height, better thigh rachets, and more innovation with a sliding waist to distribute the weight so you can have more poses.

I hope zeta can do with this one good, but if they go like xtb and make it over engineered mess with a miserable transformation, weaker rachets, and no waist slider, I would consider it a step back.

 

Yeah, going back to the 80's technology was the best solution!