It's always interesting to see how others view the issue. I completely agree with you both. That is the ideal scenario for sure. But, in the end for me, if the parts needed to look and articulate right for all 3 modes require them to be seperate stuff, so be it.
That being said- we've seen CW Devy do pretty darn good for the pricepoint. It goes to show that with a little ingenuity, nothing is impossible. If that had a bigger budget, it would have been able to stand up to the 600 dollar versions.

Btw CW Devy is my Devastator in my MP collection

 

I am perfectly fine with Contructor-esque solutions to the problem of making toys that both function and look like the media. That said, I feel that if a little more budget and refinement went into CW Devy (ok, in the individual bots, maybe a lot more budget and refinement) he'd be MP-worthy.

Edit: ninja'd by @plastic therapy  

If TFM's Menasor was G1 flavored and not IDW I'd be all over it despite the combined mode being small for MP. I give them major props for keeping the alt mode scale and individual bot scale compared to similar existing MPs... especially for Motormaster. That to me is some top-notch stuff. The combined form simply is what it is. The animation model was colored blocks on a big charcoal frame anyway... not really appealing to me in the least and I couldn't care less if a modern toy attempt makes improvements or takes creative license as long as the spirit is there.

In my mind's eye, Devastator was always the biggest of the combiners, challenged only by Predaking. Constructor nailed the size IMO, and the upcoming box set looks to address most of the issues I had with combined mode styling (although the bot modes are beyond redemption as far as I'm concerned... ick). I went with OSKO Rex for Predaking and the size is good if not the quality. The rest of the scramble dudes had no real frame of reference other than the buildings they were crushing or wildly fluctuating establishing shots with other bots. I don't recall many definitive, consistent examples of bot mode scale, and alt mode scale is best ignored entirely.   So I'm really not too bothered if they're not all the same height on my shelf, and they don't need to tower over everything so long as they're stilll big. I'm looking forward to how these upcoming options shake out.

 

Oh, I agree the individual bots look great, and they scale perfectly with MP carbots. I just like the combiners to be bigger than the sum of their parts, as they were in the source material. I know the only way to really accomplish this without destroying the look of the individual components is to include partsforming of some kind. Which, on a combiner, is fine with me.

That gives you a lot more options than me. I just don't like the look of a combiner standing next to an MP-10 coming up to his torso.

 

Instead of spending hundreds on bigger combiners, why not spend $60 on that Voyager MP-10 KO?

 

If I wanted an MP collection that consisted of only Optimus Prime and a bunch of combiners, that would be an acceptable solution.

 

No, keep your regular MP-10, too. Display regular with your MPs, and the Voyager one with your combiners. The combiner display would be in a different scale, and the smaller Prime is just to show the difference in scale.

 

I mean, I was just using MP-10 as one example. I'd like combiners that don't look out of place with the rest of my MP collection. Plus, between Titans Return and random 3P guys that don't really fit in anywhere, I've already got too many side collections going.

But that's not a bad idea for someone who's got the room.

 

I may be in for this if it's roughly the size of their Devy this will actually be really good, and looking at the blades on Blades it looks as though they detach and combine into swords, hopefully in combiner mode he can hold them like machetes. Also something I hope for is that this is as stylized as MT ver. like how their Devy looks like a bigger ver. of Giant, that will sell me as I'm not normally a defensor fan but MT makes really good figures and that GT Devy looks like an awesome big Giant brother and with than being MMC/TFC height they'll look great next to F/N Rex and Poseidon

 

haha particularly in the case of a 6 figure combiner

 

TW Throttlebots say hello  

Thank the lord that most 3P are sticking to a matching scale size i'll never buy any combiner bigger than the Ordin, F/N Rex, Poseidon group, it hurts for me to start to see myself leaving the awesomeness of MT/FP size and there great combiners but these are getting really good though right now Gravity Builder is the only one that has truly caught my eye as warbo's brut and comp are still not quite to my liking though the MB KO might make me bite on brut and get rid of the other 3 ver. i have

 

Warbotron's Bruticus and Computron were ok, but 3 figures in I couldn't do it anymore with Bruty between the excessive partsforming of the individual bots and lack of Scramble City combining. This of course kept me from picking up their Computron as well. Ordin almost had me, but after Troll the beast modes seemed like an after thought so I sold my Troll and just focused on Unite Warriors. Poseidon and Gravity Builder are what pulled me back in, and I really hope to see even more improvements made to those companies future combiners so I can pick them up as well.

 

Yes to all that, especially the bolded parts.

Also particularly in the case of a team where the limbs are cars and the core is a semi. If you scale those alts accordingly, you're failing if you can't create a combiner without massive kibble.

 

Ordin does have kinda simplistic beast designs but they are great looking i'd say the bigger issue was not following g1 placement and i'm one that doesnt mind not having scramble city as i'm mostly gonna go with the majority media in limb location i think i'll be ok with the partsforming on Brut i mean the MB KO will end up being like $220 at most and i'll be able to have him painted to match current army paint scheme. and for those that were talking the whole alt mode size thing, onsalught's alt mode isnt real, we in the military dont have any anti aircraft trucks lol. what onslaught actually is is a 915(think small 18 wheeler truck) with a 40ft flatbed trailer. the one that warbo went with is a het and het trailer which can tow a tank, or a blackhawk, wouldn't waste a het trailer on a jeep. i don't understand why they updated only onslaught, swindle shouldve been changed to an uparmored hmmv or even an mrap and vortex shouldve been an apache and i'm ok with blastoff being a jet only bcuz i'm not big on space shuttles when they dont even correspond to military vehicles. either keep it g1 or modernize the whole group

as for defensor i cant even remember the last time i saw a cop driving a box chevy lol so i'm ok with modern updates to an extent but still keeping with the formula, i didnt mind tfc making the bike change, it was still a bike, a space shuttle and a jet both fly through the air. what i don't want is them changing the limb completely like rook

 

OK, I've occasionally heard people refer to the TW Throttlebots referred to a Puzzler homage, and I do not get it at all. There's basically zero similarity there, aside from the fact that both have six dudes. And if that's all it takes, might as well call the Throttlebots a Devastator homage.



I mean, the colors are different.
Arms - yellow and orange on Puzzler, red and blue on TW.
Legs - blue and black on Puzzler, white and green on TW.
Torso - red and white on Puzzler, orange (with some black partsforming) on TW.
Head - silver and blue on Puzzler, gold, red, and black on TW.

The cars are different. Puzzler's four sports cars, one police car, and one luxury car. TW is five SUVs and a Mini Cooper.

The way they combine is different, with Jig Saw's front end forming the Puzzler's waist and Tic Tac folded over in half to make the top of his torso. Wideload makes the entire TW torso (Goldbug just chills as a backpack, and isn't even necessary for the gestalt.

You'd also think that if TW's combiner was an homage to Puzzler that their heads would look sort of similar. Even leaving color aside, TW lack's Puzzler's large, square eyes, rounded head, nose, and mouth. TW's horns aren't a very good match for Puzzler's ears, either.

 

The Throttlebots were absolutely a "homage"... but maybe to more things than just "Puzzler". I don't consider it "Not-Puzzler" in the same way that that most 3P products are obvious renditions of their TF counterparts... but that's what "homage" usually means... original, but some nods here and there to the inspiration.

So yeah, I'll agree with you in part... they're not an updated version of the Puzzler character... they're a "homage", which is actually a pretty loose term.

 

They're about as much like Puzzler as they are the original Throttlebots.

 

it's a joke more than anything but they do have the real alt modes like puzzler

 

That why they say homage and not updated, even jokingly. It isn't just a homage to Puzzler but there are some definite nods to puzzler

 

So does Uranos, Prometheus, Guardia, Intimidator, and Havoc.

Such as?

Frankly, you guys are using homage pretty loosely. You might as well call Pipes an homage to Optimus. They both turn into CoE trucks, both have mouthplates, and both have blue feet and heads. And that actually makes Pipes more similar to Optimus than TW Combiner is to Puzzler.

Did ToyWorld ever suggest Puzzler as an inspiration? Frankly, I think someone saw TW Combiner back in the day, vaguely remembered Puzzler was a Gobots combiner also made of cars, and the community ran with that without stopping to say, "this doesn't look a damn thing like Puzzler."

 

CNY is just about over so hopefully all the activity in this thread prompts the guys over at GT to throw out some sort of teaser/update in the next week or so. I'm curious on how Groove will look and whether the transformation is going to be a b*tch.