Post by cybernaut on Apr 2, 2007 3:14:35 GMT 8
Please note that this review is in no way a finished work. Others may add to it, especially comparison pics with other Megatrons and other info. Your comments and suggestions are greatly appreciated
Highly anticipated, much awaited, Takara/Tomy's Megatron has set a lot of Transfans drooling. Now it's here... Does it live up to the hype? Here's what I think...
Packaging
Masterpiece Megatron comes packaged in a simple cardboard box (as all Masterpieces did...), with photographs of Megatron in both robot and gun modes, including pics of the accessories that come with him. I can't read Japanese, so I'll stop here...
.
Megs is packed in a clear plastic tray(not shown) along with his (rather large) arm cannon / gun mode scope, energon flail, energon saber (from TF:TM), blaster (also from TF:TM), a Kreemzeek figure, the instruction booklet and a tech specs card.
Robot Mode
Standing beside (and back to back) with 20th Anniv. Optimus Prime, Megs stands a little over a foot tall. Ignoring the barrel, he's still taller than Prime by a few mm's... However, Megs is a whole lot thinner than Prime, almost skeletal, probably due to design considerations of him changing into a gun...
He's a panel-former, with lots of folded-up gun parts visible, especially those notorious gun parts on both his shoulders and hips. There are excellent moulded details such as panel lines and circuitry and mech detailing. The detail of the chest area is superb, especially the raked metal texture of the breast part. The head sculpt is undeniably Megatron.
Megatron, side and back. Masterpiece Megatron's a VERY flimsy toy. There's very little die cast (the feet and the "spine thingy" which connects his extremities). Everything else is plastic (which, for some reason, seems softer than the one used on Prime), meaning the risk of parts-breaking and snapping is very high. The panels on both shoulders and on both hips fall / snap-off all too easily, connected via ball joints and they fall off if you hold them wrong...
While Megatron is articulated enough by Masterpiece standards, most of it is hampered by very fragile plastic and a lot of OVERLY TIGHT ratcheting joints and REALLY LOOSE ball joints. While the head turns on a solid ball joint, the shoulders are on ratchets, which are tight in some parts and floppy in some places. They don't seem to be very strong, same with the double-jointed elbows. There's a lot of wiggle on the connections and the plastic feels brittle. The hand rotates nicely on a tight rotator. There's practically no waist articulation by value of the transformation, and by that same reason, he has practically no true hip-to-leg joints. Articulation is achieved by rotating and turning various folded-up parts. The knees are double-jointed but are so tight, it's as if they'd snap if they were fiddled with. Ditto on the hips to...
(I'll leave it up to another MP-5 owner to see if the toy passes Sir rohml's patented kick test, since I'm not even going to try it on mine...)
Alternate Mode - Walther P38
After a rather long process of flipping, rotating, folding, etc., Megatron becomes a (wait for it...!) gun. Like the original G1 Megs, the Masterpiece version is a Walther P38 U.N.C.L.E. pistol, slightly over sized (approx. 133%, if you study the box...) and realistically styled. The safety lock can be fiddled with, same as the trigger. The scope has a red LED that lights up when you press a button on the side (as a result, the scope is not functional i.e. you cant look through it... and not that you would since the LED might blind you
).
Transforming him can be taken in two ways... Challenging, or frustrating. I picked frustrating. A lot of the parts that you have to shift are either so tight that you're scared to put pressure on them in the fear that it might break or are so loose that they simply pop off... And the lack of structurally sound places to hold when you're shifting them makes it even scarier especially when you realize your pulling on a joint! It's as if Megs doesn't want you to transform him into any mode!
The scope, as I'm sure every transfan knows, becomes Megatron's trademark arm cannon. It's a detachable piece, and a large and heavy one at that. The thing is too heavy for its own good, since the shoulder can hardly carry the weight of the cannon. I had a really fun session trying to get him into that pose (which is supposed to be the same as the one on G1 Meg's boxart...). Still, it does look cool...
The Energon flail (which, as I recall, Megatron used only once...) is a transparent plastic spiked ball attached by a plastic chain to a connector which is clips Megatron's arm when you fold his hand in.
Megatron demo-ing his TF:TM accessories, the energon saber and some hapless Transformer's blaster... Also shown is the Kreemzeek fig, which I believe deserves merit, since the transparent yellow plastic thing really does look that good.
Conclusion
I dunno. I really does seem like I'm pregnant doging a lot about this toy... I suppose it's because I was really expecting a lot from this toy, after the excellent work on Masterpiece Convoy. While the final product does deliver, in a way, it's let down by the very same ingenious engineering that makes it such a cool gun-transforming robot. I was so excited to get this, and after spending a frustrating night transforming it (and, um, snapping off a teeny plastic catch on one of the hip plates...
), I felt let down and somehow didn't feel worth the PHP4500 that I saved for this... But your mileage may vary.
In any case, it's still a good piece, and it does look awesome next to Masterpiece Prime. Too bad a lot of issues really hurt the playability of the thing...
3 Megatron Heads out of 5 ...
20th Anniversary Prime vs. Masterpiece Megatron. Enjoy!
Highly anticipated, much awaited, Takara/Tomy's Megatron has set a lot of Transfans drooling. Now it's here... Does it live up to the hype? Here's what I think...
Packaging
Masterpiece Megatron comes packaged in a simple cardboard box (as all Masterpieces did...), with photographs of Megatron in both robot and gun modes, including pics of the accessories that come with him. I can't read Japanese, so I'll stop here...
.Megs is packed in a clear plastic tray(not shown) along with his (rather large) arm cannon / gun mode scope, energon flail, energon saber (from TF:TM), blaster (also from TF:TM), a Kreemzeek figure, the instruction booklet and a tech specs card.
Robot Mode
Standing beside (and back to back) with 20th Anniv. Optimus Prime, Megs stands a little over a foot tall. Ignoring the barrel, he's still taller than Prime by a few mm's... However, Megs is a whole lot thinner than Prime, almost skeletal, probably due to design considerations of him changing into a gun...
He's a panel-former, with lots of folded-up gun parts visible, especially those notorious gun parts on both his shoulders and hips. There are excellent moulded details such as panel lines and circuitry and mech detailing. The detail of the chest area is superb, especially the raked metal texture of the breast part. The head sculpt is undeniably Megatron.
Megatron, side and back. Masterpiece Megatron's a VERY flimsy toy. There's very little die cast (the feet and the "spine thingy" which connects his extremities). Everything else is plastic (which, for some reason, seems softer than the one used on Prime), meaning the risk of parts-breaking and snapping is very high. The panels on both shoulders and on both hips fall / snap-off all too easily, connected via ball joints and they fall off if you hold them wrong...
While Megatron is articulated enough by Masterpiece standards, most of it is hampered by very fragile plastic and a lot of OVERLY TIGHT ratcheting joints and REALLY LOOSE ball joints. While the head turns on a solid ball joint, the shoulders are on ratchets, which are tight in some parts and floppy in some places. They don't seem to be very strong, same with the double-jointed elbows. There's a lot of wiggle on the connections and the plastic feels brittle. The hand rotates nicely on a tight rotator. There's practically no waist articulation by value of the transformation, and by that same reason, he has practically no true hip-to-leg joints. Articulation is achieved by rotating and turning various folded-up parts. The knees are double-jointed but are so tight, it's as if they'd snap if they were fiddled with. Ditto on the hips to...
(I'll leave it up to another MP-5 owner to see if the toy passes Sir rohml's patented kick test, since I'm not even going to try it on mine...)
Alternate Mode - Walther P38
After a rather long process of flipping, rotating, folding, etc., Megatron becomes a (wait for it...!) gun. Like the original G1 Megs, the Masterpiece version is a Walther P38 U.N.C.L.E. pistol, slightly over sized (approx. 133%, if you study the box...) and realistically styled. The safety lock can be fiddled with, same as the trigger. The scope has a red LED that lights up when you press a button on the side (as a result, the scope is not functional i.e. you cant look through it... and not that you would since the LED might blind you
).Transforming him can be taken in two ways... Challenging, or frustrating. I picked frustrating. A lot of the parts that you have to shift are either so tight that you're scared to put pressure on them in the fear that it might break or are so loose that they simply pop off... And the lack of structurally sound places to hold when you're shifting them makes it even scarier especially when you realize your pulling on a joint! It's as if Megs doesn't want you to transform him into any mode!
The scope, as I'm sure every transfan knows, becomes Megatron's trademark arm cannon. It's a detachable piece, and a large and heavy one at that. The thing is too heavy for its own good, since the shoulder can hardly carry the weight of the cannon. I had a really fun session trying to get him into that pose (which is supposed to be the same as the one on G1 Meg's boxart...). Still, it does look cool...
The Energon flail (which, as I recall, Megatron used only once...) is a transparent plastic spiked ball attached by a plastic chain to a connector which is clips Megatron's arm when you fold his hand in.
Megatron demo-ing his TF:TM accessories, the energon saber and some hapless Transformer's blaster... Also shown is the Kreemzeek fig, which I believe deserves merit, since the transparent yellow plastic thing really does look that good.
Conclusion
I dunno. I really does seem like I'm pregnant doging a lot about this toy... I suppose it's because I was really expecting a lot from this toy, after the excellent work on Masterpiece Convoy. While the final product does deliver, in a way, it's let down by the very same ingenious engineering that makes it such a cool gun-transforming robot. I was so excited to get this, and after spending a frustrating night transforming it (and, um, snapping off a teeny plastic catch on one of the hip plates...
), I felt let down and somehow didn't feel worth the PHP4500 that I saved for this... But your mileage may vary.In any case, it's still a good piece, and it does look awesome next to Masterpiece Prime. Too bad a lot of issues really hurt the playability of the thing...
3 Megatron Heads out of 5 ...
20th Anniversary Prime vs. Masterpiece Megatron. Enjoy!
Well, it still locks fine, but it's still damage...sniff!
