scale for me isn't super strict. My MS car bots are about the same height, MS ironhide is a head taller, and NA Prime is a head taller then that. which is close enough for me

 

It's a good suggestion, but there is a high probability I will NOT end up buying all the figures NA produces that has an X part. If it's a larger figure that's not priced as I'd like (and MS has a comparable version I'm already happy with), I wouldn't even bother. Also, and this is definitely a ME thing, the instant a figure has some major faux car parts on it, I'm out. So if, say, Sunstreaker were to come along and fake it MP-style, I wouldn't buy and just have no Sunstreaker in the collection. At which point I also wouldn't have the part he would come with.

So for me, it's just not a high probability of ever getting a full Autobot X to sell. This would be more for that person who got in a touch late, and just needs that one part from the first figure they never got. Not expecting a jump on that any time soon, but if it moves, awesome.

 

It would be nice if NA would at least identify which characters the Autobot X parts are actually coming with.

 

I don’t like faux parts either— it’s a big pet peeve of mine— though I thought the way it was done on MP Sunstreaker was very clever. Technically it wasn’t even faked, because they used the same part and simply transformed it. I give that one a pass for smart design.

But that chest on NA’s Bumblebee? Bugs the hell out of me (no pun intended).

 

Yeah, MP Sunstreaker ALMOST had it...but the fake-windows are still there, and they're hard to look at. They don't even fold down properly on the sides. I admit full on, that's one figure you just can't do well without faking it--or you end up with the Omnigonix look (which wasn't entirely for me). On something like a Legends figure, I don't mind the windshield and side windows being "cut out" to get the right chest shape. But I know they won't think that far.

I know Hound has those 'fake' fenders, but at least they feel more like robotic internal paneling considering how different they look. That and I'll be keeping the stars on the real ones, and a single Autobot symbol on the bot ones to make them 'different.' It really depends if it's something I can write off, or if it's just too obvious (or something like NA Arcee, where her chest IS her front car, and that's literally the only identifiable car part in bot mode...and they fake it).

 

Scale for me is important but is never shown in a way that I find acceptable. I’ve always felt that relative size should be determined by the alt modes— put those in a common realistic scale and whatever robot transforms from that is what it is. Instead, most toy manufacturers follow some approximation of the asinine Sunbow scaling, which was neither consistent with reality nor even itself.

 

Zentropy, I completely understand your point about alt mode scaling, but for me, the history of the franchise - both as its core mythos and as its deployment as a toy line - is a core component of my love for Transformers. Call it nostalgic if you want, but for me Bee and the mini vehicles should be smaller than the others, because :

1-their small size is part of their persona : Bee is the young, naive, good hearted one, Cliffjumper is the small but berserk one, Brawl is small but very powerful, etc…

2- the mini vehicles were part of the Microman change line, so they first transformed into toys, especially deformed ChoroQ for Bee and CJ.

3- Finally, that’s just how they were sold as Transformer toys too. Being cheaper, they were the one my mother could buy me occasionally, without waiting for my birthday or Christmas. That made them the bulk of my Transformer toys. That’s how I loved them.

Of course, all those criteria somewhat contradict each other, and led to somewhat ridiculous situations, especially in the Sunbow cartoon, but those very contradictions (mass shift anyone ?) are a core part of what made Transformers as a fiction and a toy line for me. In fact, I didn’t like the cartoon that much, but the mythic elements in it and its more animated, more alive designs of the Transformers left quite a dynamic impression. It shadowed my toys when I was playing them like an augmented reality image.

Of course, that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate good realistic alt modes (especially for the carbots), but I don’t care that much in scale differences if those have the same contradictions of the core material with its childish innocence - at least the one in my eyes when I received this mutant franchise - towards those problems. Those contradictions (mythical elements from the fiction, personality on the cards, materiality of the toys) are what allowed my imagination to go beyond any official narrative or drive for consistency.

Actually, that’s why I collect G1, because of its unrealistic and paradoxal designs, that the inventive engineering of toy producers have miraculously materialized. Though I like me some IDW comics, I can’t relate that much to its streamlined, more perfect but more closed, vision of the Transformers.

But hey, I also collect Iron Factory models, so creative consistency don’t bother me either.

 

Transformers is robots first, their alt mode is just a disguise and mass shifting is a thing.

 

I don't like faux parts but I will accept them if the alternative is a compromised bot or alt mode. Sunstreaker just can't be done right without faux parts - you'd either end up with a huge chest in bot mode or a tiny roof and windows in alt mode. I agree with @Zentropy that I appreciate how the MP used the roof as his bot mode chest, just flipped around and I also like how MP-44 and MS-02 use Optimus' windows flipped around so they're only semi-faux. I really didn't like MP-52's fake chest, especially since Starscream doesn't really need it to look right (though even DS-01 faked parts of his chest cockpit but at least most of it was real).

 

I think I have less tolerance for fake parts on an expensive masterpiece toy than on a legend-class figure. With engineering technology what it is these days, the producers of larger figures have no excuse for fake parts. If parts change size between bot and alt mode, then by all means make them collapsible or something.

But with legends stuff, I dunno, here’s a figure that’s only a few cm tall, there’s only so many hinges and panels you can have. I have way more sympathy for the fake chest on NA Bumblebee than I do for the one on FT Cliffjumper, for example.

 

I don't mind the fake parts at all. For me it's bot character first, good proportions, good articulation, in relative botmode scale, sunbow accurate and then alt mode and altmode scale.

If fake parts, parts forming or whatever other 'cheats' are needed to achieve this, so be it. G1 always had parts forming so I don't mind that at all. The fake parts can be a bit meh, but in the end I display all figures in bot mode so I really want a good looking bot.

 

But then Bumblebee wouldnt be any shorter than a regular car bot. A Beetle is not really a small car

 

cmon show z!! release him!!

 

Aspects of the franchise that I see as unfortunate flaws.

I can completely respect your view— even if I wholly disagree with it— because your opinions are devoid of a self-righteous tone. You’re just saying “this is what I like and don’t like” rather than “this is right and this is wrong”. I totally respect that.

Exactly. You get it!

The G1 toy Bumblebee and the other mini-bots were essentially what “legends” or “core” toys are today. They were made at a different (and deformed) scale, but rather than translating them into the scale of the other toys when making the cartoon, the artists simply kept them the same.

If alt mode scaling was consistent, Bumblebee would be bigger than Wheeljack and Hound. Gears and Huffer would be bigger than Trailbreaker, and Ironhide and Ratchet would be considerably smaller bots.

I realize that for many fans, the (unrealistically skewed) Sunbow size chart is the gospel. I haven’t liked it since the very beginning, because it never made any sense.

 

The Toy bio is the core reason why Bumblebee is said to be really small compared to all other Autobots. It’s in all G1 media Toy, Toon and Comic that Bee should be that small compared to everyone else. He might have been at the legends price point back then but that was his intended size for toy lore scale too. Sunbow just took inspiration from Bob Budiansky bio work for Hasbro that he made when he got the toys in hand.

 

I didn’t say it was wrong to see it that way— the franchise has obviously embraced the idea. I just don’t like it, and for very logical reasons.

 

But you always say I like it like it was with the toys. Where really you kinda don’t, you like it as the head canon you made as a kid.

Not saying that’s wrong but I don’t necessarily see it as a I prefer toy over toon when it comes to the lore of the character. You just like transforming toys.

 

I’m glad you’ve straightened me out on my Transformers preferences. Next time I’m undecided on an opinion I wish to share here, I’ll run it through you first in a PM so you can edit it for accuracy.

Seriously, I just think there were a lot of illogical work-arounds in the fiction that arise from the fact that no one really cared back when Transformers began— they were just trying to create a story good enough to sell toys, and now people just shrug and accept inconsistencies as lore. I’m not the type of person that accepts things “just because”.

And yes, I do generally prefer toy over toon, but usually that’s just the aesthetic. I like fiction, but I like it to have some rational basis and substance. I can’t completely discard logic just for the sake of entertainment. And my TF head canon will always take precedence over any official depiction.

 

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