The late run PCCs, like Steamhammer, were exceptional. They didn't have robot modes, however, and the Commanders were by design screwy in both modes.
Well, you bring up a good point. What were people expecting? TFCC Hercules? No fucking way! Maybe that is what it is. I collect both 3rd party and Hasbro. And there is a big difference between the two. If there wasn't, I wouldn't collect 3rd Party stuff. So not sure what people are expecting, but with everything they released as of late, he is dead on. So maybe the hate should be towards Hasbro's new designers. Haha. Man, you just said you liked Arachnid for the head. You realize that right? Also, the most recent PCC were the best I think. I just didn't like them because they didn't have 3 seprate modes.
Disagree...and to me that's the biggest problem with this set. I don't think any of the 3 modes shine. As far as I can tell, they're all compromising for the sake of the scramble city, self containment feature...which who gives a shit about? I guess a lot prefer the self contained part, but why do they need to be able to be any limb? Make each one a solid limb meant for one spot and the whole thing might notta turned out so shitty.
I don't disagree that it didn't need to be scramble city, but I will disagree that the hollowness is because of that. Look at FoC Jazz or Shockwave or most of the newer Prime figures. All hollow or missing panels that would have completed the figure or filled in that hollowness.
I dunno, I think the design is pretty darn sweet. It's price point that matters. It's not my fault if someone paid $200 for SDCC Bruticus. If one thinks the figure's not worth that...fine, I agree, that's why I didn't pay that. I wouldn't have paid $200 for my FP Bruticus. It's five retail figures (or LESS on Amazon). That's what you're judging. I can't compare him to third party combiners that I can't afford anyway. I suppose if I had Giant, and he was 1/6 as good as Giant, I would still have to consider him a pretty solid buy.
Those don't really take into account individual bots... Rail Racer was made up of three mediocre bots with dull alt-modes. While he has one of the best combined modes of any combiner ever, the individual bots seem... incomplete. Tripredicus less so, though. I really like the individual modes, except for the godawful beetle. But I digress. I really like a lot of Bruticus' components. I'm going to buy Blast Off at retail because I love the way that figure looks, even though I'm getting another one when my G2 ships. Brawl looks awesome, Onslaught's grown on me. QC problems aside, Swindle looks great, if incredibly generic. The only one who actually seems not worth it on their own is Vortex. And that's impressive. In my opinion, the only combiners to have really good individual bots are the Energon ones and Landfill. Which paid for it with their combined modes. Bruticus beats those combined modes pretty handily, in my opinion.
Thing looks like a huge ass PCC, but having not seen it person, I will reserve my judgement. But its no FP Bruticus by any means, that thing is sick.
Railracer/JRX by far is the best. The Energon Combiners were pathetic, they were so bad that it helped a third party become a prominent player.SDCC Brute has its faults, but its the best combiner Hasbro has put out since Railracer, the PCCs dont count, their limbs dont transform.
I'm still quite looking forward to him. But.. I can't help but think that public reception would've been better if he was in Earth mode. Historically, those tend to do alot better. Also the economy-sized deluxe class figs aren't helping much. Oh, and JRX is topheavy garbage and Tripredicus' limbs are ever more WTFBBQ than Bruticus'.
I actually Kind of like Airachnid I actually Kind of like Airachnid I actually Kind of like Airachnid I actually Kind of like Airachnid In all seriousness, I don't consider him the best, but I have seen a big bunch of hate, I don't exactly understand why. But most of what OP said was true, with people wanting bigger and prominent combiners. And we got it, and it's passable, and people don't like it. DON'T GET ME WRONG! Everyone is entitled to an opinion, nobody can tell you what to like and dislike, but you can see they tried, it's no Hercules, but what did you expect?
Honestly, I don't really think Hasbro has ever made a good looking combiner. Combiners are just big gimmicky toys, they're meant to be simple and fun, the fun is suppose to come from combining them. I think 3rd parties are the only way to go for combiners with good proportions.
Dunno if the hollow part was meant for someone else, but I didn't mention them being hollow... I bolded your sentence with hollow in it, but because I disagreed they have good individual modes. I think the bot modes are bad designs...like the other FOC figs. The line as a whole has been a major disappointment so far...and I was begging for the line as I loved the WFC figs. Didn't the design teams change in the last year or something? I thought the previous team moved on to Star Wars or something and the Special Ed group got promoted to TFs... Or so it seems...
alot of ppl seem to forget that these "other" better combiners do not have a team of 5. rail racer and the bw ones had 3, so there was more liberty there to what could be done. more figures, more plastic, more cheating and less design. while i think FOC Brute is good, most combiners we have gotten are not that great. These things are for kids and meant to be played with. Not complaning and finding the best pose for your shelf like some on here. That is what 3rd party items are for. Those ever thinking we would get anything close to a 3rd party type figure can keep dreaming. This is gonna be about as good as it gets for a long time.
All that matters is that the kids like it. If it sells well, then Hasbro will continue onward and maybe we will get better figures. Considering they are military vehicles and retail is in bright colors it should do well I bet. I will get the G2 version and leave it in the box because I have my original G2 brut, but I don't think the fandom throwing themselves over bruticus or not will really impact the future of combiners. Sadly, Hasbro really can't compare to $300+ 3P combiners. I won't hold this against them, but it doesn't mean I have use for a subpar combiner even at 1/5th the price. That G2 packaging is just too awesome though.
I have two of the SDCC Bruticus. I have two of the G2 Bruticus on preorder. I'll likely get two sets of the Ruination redeco when it hits retail. I'll probably pick up one of the individual retail components (I forget whether it's Blast Off or Vortex whose retail deco I liked). So I'm not sore about anything regarding Bruticus because I wasn't able to pick it up somewhere (of the releases that have gone up for sale or preorder). That said...it's flawed, in my eyes. I think if the designers had been afforded the ability to do more (namely, more moving parts so the combined mode has better arm modes and firmer "foot" designs), that could've been great, but that's asking a lot to go over the budget for normal deluxes, I guess. I do find it unfortunate that Onslaught couldn't have received a Voyager, since the Voyager class is being brought back to Classics. I really wish the hands could've had posable fingers (even if three or four fingers were molded together) and were bigger. I am curious to see if a third party/unlicensed company takes a shot at an upgrade set, and, if so, whether it ends up a pure upgrade kit (a la the FP Superion upgrade) or it goes a step further and replaces one or two of the individual figures (a la the FP Bruticus figures and upgrade components). As for the individual 'bots, I like all of them except Vortex. They're not "great" figures like so many of the Classics toys have been so far, but they're largely solid to me. I do view it as a step forward though, in that we're getting a non-Legends combiner (with five entirely different components, no redecos like in Energon) that doesn't rely on drones at all (RotF Devs, PCC drones). I hope this is a step forward and that any future combiners only get better...but if Hasbro starts cutting costs (or continues to?) and goes with simpler figures instead of more complex stuff at the Deluxe size class, I'll be more concerned that future releases won't be as satisfying as we were hoping they'd be when stuff like this gets announced at first. I need more than a decent head mold to find a figure even mediocre, let alone decent.
I looked on TFWiki about Rail Racer. Someone needs to show me a picture to convince me that that...thing...is more posable than Bruticus.