Just a question. Are they?

 

Yes.

 

How come?

 

To reduce energy consumption. Smaller bodies means less fuel wasted.

 

Over the years they got smaller to conserve on energon.

Or something like that.

 

Also it helped with the population. Smaller people meant more room.

 

Oh. Was this before they went to Earth?

 

Put it this way, what will survive in a drought? Something big that needs a lot of food and water or something smaller that does not need a great amount to survive?

Same case here, but replace drought with the Great War that lasted for millions of years. Those Autobots and Decepticons takes up a lot of energy to remain active, something that is kind of limited by that point. By being smaller, they can survive on less energy.

 

Yes.

 

They're bigger than humans, but not by that much.

 

To go along with Jetbolt's explanation, think of it this way as well. It's advancement in technologies. Even though a giant ass 1976 Ford Elite is bigger, more durable and a more powerful engine than your common day Toyota Camry, the Camry gets better mileage, easier to maintain and lighter. There are cell phones that have more power and capabilities than the computers use to put people in orbit and on the moon. The Maximals and Predacons may be lighter and smaller than the Autobots and Decepticons, but there was no need for them to be massive planet destroying Phase Six robots. They weren't in a war anymore. (Supposedly.) Toward the end of Generation One we saw the birth of Micromasters, which could easily be the precursors to the Maximals and the Predacons.

However, just because they're smaller does not mean they are not powerful, as Tigerhawk and Optimal Optimus has shown us. Power's still there, it's just fun sized. Especially when you get into the technoganic aspect of it from Beast Machines, then you get into some metaphysical elements.

 

Not to mention beasts are generally pretty small, which reflects on the bot mode. Few beasts lend themselves to that 20-30 foot range most vehicular TFs get to be.

Granted arthropod-TFs (and Rattrap) are grossly oversized anyways. Sort of the reverse of jet-formers, who are grossly undersized.

 

Trick question.

It happened after the Autobots and Decepticons came to Earth and before the Maximals and Predacons crashed on it. It is also a good example of possible influence upon the Transformers from humanity. Another possible influence of Humanity in the series is the Human slang and jargon used by the Transformers.

 

yes, because having giant animals running around earth, wouldn't be a very good disguise.

 

Many of the Maximals and Predacons were far out of the size of the animals they chose as alt-modes.

 

Well, as far as giant animals go... In Beast Wars' defense, when I went to the Chicago Field Museum, they had a hall of Cenozoic Megafauna, including this giant tree sloth, and a big ass megarodent, which the first thing that popped in my head was "Holy Crap, Rattrap was a real animal!"

 

In fact, only Cheetor and Tigatron were shown to be in actual scale with their alt modes.

Megatron would've been a very small T-rex for instance. Rhinox and Primal also could have been undersized. In fact, I don't think anyone besides those two were the right size. (All the bugs were too big, ditto Rattrap and Airazor, Dinobot would be eitehr too small or two big depending on if you judge him compared to modern knowledge of raptors. Terrorsaur was probably too small, and everyone else wasn't even an actual representation of an animal)

However as said, disguise was not an issue in the cartoon. (although it did come up) Protection from build up of Energon radiation was.

You don't need to go to a museum to see giant rats. Just New York and Mexico.

 

Aren't male T-Rex's much smaller than the females? Which makes sense regarding Megatron's size, not sure if they are THAT small but it makes it a little more sensicial

 

Maximal and Predacon tech basically a combination of Micromaster and Pretender tech.

 

think of it like an iPod vs a 1950s supercomputer.