From Newsgroup: alt.toys.transformers
Dave's Transformers Timelines Rant: Hearts of Steel set 2
Bumblebee (Steam Engine)
Megatron (Field Cannon)
Permalink:
http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Artifacts/HoS2
So, this popped up as a Comicon (San Diego) exclusive with no advance fanfare (although renders of the toys had been floating around) and miraculously didn't instantly sell out, so I was able to get it even before I finished reviewing the first set.
Additionally, back when Hot Soldiers put out their Centurion figure it
was one of the rare 3P toys I bought at full price. (Most of my 3P stuff is clearance sale stuff, or wish/temu/aliexpress knockoffs of 3P.) I won't be doing a full review for it, but I will be making some comparisons to HoS Bumblebee along the way, since Centurion was reasonably priced and people
might wish to know if tracking one down would be preferable to getting the official toy.
CAPSULE
$60 for the set.
Bumblebee: There are some hassles involved in transformation,
particularly where you have to kind of halfway do something, then switch to something else before you can complete a movement. But the result looks good in both modes, is very stable, and the vehicle mode stores the accessories firmly. Better than Centurion in almost every respect despite the two toys working from basically the same very toyetic Guido Guidi design.
Recommended.
Megatron: The huge spiky wheels on the shoulders may be offputting to some, and he doesn't so much turn into an artillery piece as into a giant armored vehicle that bears a passing resemblance to an artillery piece, so that's steampunk mad science for ya. Only a few issues with the transformation, rolls surprisingly well in altmode. Recommended.
Set overall: Two solid designs, each of which is a bit more detailed and painted than we've come to expect from Deluxes, worth the $60 price tag. Recommended.
RANTS
See
https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Artifacts/HoS1 for the history and general packaging notes. Neither Megatron nor Optimus actually got altmodes
in the comic, being left to their slumber, which made it easier to later
retcon this all as having been Shockwave experimenting with randos he'd brainwashed into thinking they were more marketable, er, famous
Cybertronians. When the retcon hit late in IDW's first G1 continuity, Hearts of Steel Bumblebee was retconned into being Centurion, who got his proper memories back along the way. The trade paperback collection had design sketches for characters who weren't used, including two for Megatron: a ball and cap revolver, and a field cannon. Obviously, we weren't going to get the first one as a toy. I suppose they could've gone with a Verne-ish tank or ripped off daVinci war machine designs, but I think the field artillery piece was a good choice. If nothing else, it forced them to make a new design, and not just reskin an existing Megatron tank design.
The box is the same as the first set, but with art of Megatron and Bumblebee fighting in front of another section of dusty and smoky industrial town. The internal fold-open box only differs in the nameplates. John Henry is not shown on the box, but Bumblebee has a hammer in part because John
Henry is one of the important human characters in the comic. (Mark Twain is also in it, but I don't think Shockwave's paddlewheel ironclad would be his sort of steamboat.)
AUTOBOT: TIMELINES BUMBLEBEE
Assortment: G1096
Altmode: Steam Engine
Transformation Difficulty: 18 steps
Previous Name Use: Plenty without the "Timelines" part.
Previous Mold Use: None
Origin Universe: Timelines
Centurion's instructions have only 8 panels, but they're done in the original G1 style of photographs and multiple steps per panel. Trust me,
it's pretty involved too.
Obvious differences right out of the box: Bumblebee has a pistol and Centurion does not, Centurion's hammer haft is much longer, and Centurion
goes with a matte canary yellow while Bumblebee has a slightly metallic
golden yellow as well as darker gray and gunmetal. They also choose
different places to heighten the detail (Centurion's head has more molded detail overall, for instance).
Packaging: Rather than have any of the figure poke through the back of
the inner tray, there's a small platform under the legs, and the feet are not transformed yet so that they don't take up as much depth. Five ties on the robot, two ties on the hammer in the lower left (it can be pulled out without cutting those ties), and two crossed ties on the little pistol in the lower right. The instructions are on Megatron's side, and do include a couple of steps for getting the legs and feet transformed.
Other than the render glossing up the slightly metallic yellow plastic
to look more strongly metallic, the render matches the toy.
Robot Mode: Rivet-covered steampunky Bumblebee who very obviously turns into a train of some sort. Where Optimus had one big smokestack that turns into a gun, BB has two smaller smokestacks that become forwards-facing
cannons on his big shoulderpads. A particularly nice touch in the comics design is that his signature horns are now big bolts sticking out of the
helmet and secured with big hex nuts, but this iteration lacks any attempt at threads on the bolts. (Centurion has stacked rings rather than an actual threading spiral, but it still looks a lot closer to spec.) The upper torso looks like a big water tank or something, but see vehicle mode below for
other ideas. The toes are halves of the cowcatcher, the wheels are on the outer faces of the boots, and there's obligatory open panels on the shins
with molded random gears for the aesthetic. The center of the chest has an opaque porthole-style design, and there's wheel-dogged ports in the nipple locations (wheel spins, door opens, John Henry pokes his head out). There's also a locking wheel molded into the panel behind BB's head, which would be
on the inside face in vehicle mode, further suggesting that people are meant
to be inside his chest. This one they can lock from inside. The back is pretty open and hollow, since the deckplates are just thin running board
wings and don't offer any coverage (unlike Centurion's). The upper back at least has the rear bumper plate to cover the hinges.
4.5" (11.5cm) tall, compared to Centurion's 5" (12.5cm), in a slightly metallic golden yellow and dark gunmetal, with a little silver and gold. Slightly metallic golden yellow plastic is used for the head, door panel
behind the head, bumper panel on the back, upper torso, abdomen front, shoulderpads, forearms, pelvis, feet, wheels, and the headlamps on the lower shins. Dark gunmetal gray plastic is used for the collar area, inner back section, running board wings, upper arms, fists, weapons, thighs, boot cores, ankle joints, bars connecting the wheels, hammer, and pistol. (Centurion
goes for one more plastic color, using bronze plastic on those connecting
bars, and uses a G1-Bumblebee canary yellow and a slightly less dark
gunmetal.)
LOTS of dark gunmetal paint on the shoulderpads, and fortunately no attempt at yellow paint since that never matches well (as Centurion demonstrates). There's also gunmetal in the molded gaps of the cowcatcher toes, and on the molded detail of the backplate. The tops of the
shoulderpads have "BEE" printed on them in gunmetal, although the middle E on each is interrupted by molded detail. Silver paint on the face, the abdomen, most of the hammerhead, a ring around the barrel of the pistol, the molded
fake ratchet knee joints (there's also fake molded ratchet hips, but those
are not painted), and the exposed random gears on the shins. The eyes and
some little not-headlights on the lower chest are painted bright blue. The central chest porthole-like detail and the hatches flanking it are painted bright gold. The radiator sleeves on either side of the head are painted copper. There's a red Autobot symbol printed in the center of the chest, on
on each side of the hammerhead, and half of one on the end of each
shoulderpad. He leaves zero doubt what side he's on.
The neck is a ball and socket joint with the socket in the upper torso, the waist is a smooth swivel (and when turning it the hollow lower back is realllly obvious). The shoulderpads are hinged and can get out of the way of the ball joint shoulders. There's also transformation hinges on the
shoulders that let them sag. Bicep swivels, hinge elbows, and the wrists
bend down on transformation hinges (useful for "pointing the hammer at
someone" poses). Pinned hinge and swivel hips, mid-thigh swivels, hinged knees. The knees aren't ratcheting, but they do have molded detail that
would have supported ratcheting if the upper boots were molded to match...and which oddly is not contiguous with the ratcheting detail molded above the knees. The ankles are a double hinge strut that allows front to back articulation as well as a side to side hinge at the bottom, vastly superior
to Centurion's ball joint heels. The metal-patterned panels hanging down in back that flank the boiler in vehicle mode are hinged and can be lifted up as little wings, albeit only aesthetic ones as BB can't fly in this series.
The hands can hold 5mm pegs, there's a 5mm socket on the upper back covered by the rear bumper plate, and that's pretty much it. Oh, there's 3mm studs on the inner faces of the elbows as part of transformation (the hubs of the rear wheels peg onto them), but there's otherwise not a lot of use for putting fire blasts on the elbows. The back socket can sort of be used for storing the pistol, but unless you just remove the bumper plate entirely the socket is too blocked off for much.
Where Centurion has a long-handled hammer with a just slightly under 5mm diameter haft that would let it be held in both hands at once if the arms and wrists would cooperate (they don't), Bumblebee goes with a shorter steel- driving hammer that is held by the very end. It's a little long for that
kind of grip, to be honest. Still, at least it stores securely in vehicle mode. Aesthetically, it has a hollow side to the hammer head, but while Centurion's hollow side is on one side, this hammer's hollow is on the underneath, so it's not as obvious. A little under 1.75" (4.5cm) long with a hammerhead that's a riveted cylinder 22mm long and 9mm in diameter if you
don't count the rivets. The instructions offer no storage suggestions for
the hammer in robot mode, but it fits neatly into the gap in the back with
the handle hanging down and getting in the way of waist movement.
http://www.dvandom.com/images/HoSBBweapons.JPG also shows the pistol stores on the back.
The pistol looks kind of like the top of an old-timey butane torch with
an adjustment dial on back. It's very small, only 23mm (under an inch) long with a 5mm peg grip. The barrel end goes with detailing over being a 3mm
peg. The hollow slots on the sides are a little too narrow to fit over the fake wheel-like details on the forearms, and there doesn't seem to be any official storage in robot mode either, unless you use the back socket above.
Transformation: Centurion is pretty annoying to transform, mostly
because a lot of the hinges are so stiff it feels like they'll break rather than bend. Bumblebee was not immune to the "will it break?" problem, but pretty much limited to getting the head to go into the torso, which works
about the same as on Centurion. I think there might've been some sprue
flash, because after the first time it took far less force to get it in and out. The basic idea is that the toes point down, the legs clip together, the mid-spine folds back the arms fold behind the back into gaps in the shoulderpads and the shoulderpads fold together in front so the shins can
come up and tab onto the,. The head just shoves down inside the chest once
the arm roots have been rotated enough to free up the space. In practice, a lot of steps have to happen out of what I consider an intuitive order. Still less hassle than Centurion's transformation, though.
The only part that actually did come off the first time I transformed
this to train mode was the rear bumper panel, which is made to easily snap
back in place. (Centurion lacks this panel, so you can see the robot fists from behind.) It's tricky transforming back without popping this panel as well. The shoulderpads have to end up around the abdomen, and it's no small task getting the arms out of the way in the process, but the legs are quite easy. The forearms end up snugged against the hips, and the wheel pieces rotate around to peg onto the little studs near the elbows.
Storing the hammer requires splitting the legs apart a bit and pressing them together around the hammer, but it's actually secure unlike Centurion's.
Going back to robot mode I found a lot more parts popping off, since
some parts just act as crowbars if you don't do things in the right order. However, because of the rigorous child safety measures, parts pop off without me worrying about breakage...I merely have to worry about them flying off
into a dark corner and never being seen again.
Aside from details like the drive pistons going with the feet rather
than staying on the legs, the deck plates being a larger part of the back,
and a pretty noxious choice of when you absolutely MUST fold an interior
panel to get the arms to transform, Centurion transforms about the same way. That's to be expected, given Guido Guidi's penchant for toyetic designs. The whole process on Centurion is made significantly more difficult by the much stiffer joints and more rigid plastic, though. Where Bumblebee's transformation has some moments of irritation, I'd really rather not ever transform Centurion again now that I'm done comparing the two toys. It can just stay in robot mode.
Altmode: While Optimus Prime's altmode at least pretended to be some
sort of normal-for-the-time train, the engineer's compartment here is a sort
of cloche or pillbox that at first glance looks like it might just be a big boiler, but which does have a door in back with an invisible-in-this-mode locking wheel inside and the robot mode's fake chest headlight details may be tiny armored windows for the engineer to peer out through. Anyway, they did
a very good job here hiding all the obvious robot bits, you have to flip the toy over to see anything that isn't a plausible train part (or a hinge). By comparison to Centurion, it's mostly a matter of deciding which parts should
be bigger or smaller or get more attention. The drive pistons are much
smaller since they're part of the same piece as the (pauses to look up terminology) coupling rods (those rods that connect the wheels) rather than being part of the robot foot, the boiler section (shoulderpads) is smaller
than the overall size difference would require, and the cooling sleves in
back have more detail in addition to some of the differences in paint
choices. Where Centurion sprang for a different plastic color for the
coupling rods, Bumblebee didn't. The biggest qualitative difference is the bumper plate, which has coupler bumper disks as well as a big decorative
gear. Like Centurion, but unlike Optimus, the wheels are proper railroad wheels (Optimus has something more like wagon wheels in their footprint).
3.5" (9cm) long, which is barely shorter than Optimus Prime's vehicle mode. Centurion is 3.75" (9.5cm) long, same as Optimus. It's 2.25" (5.5cm) tall compared to Centurion's 2.5" (6cm) and Optimus's smokestack-aided 3.25" (8cm) tall. Same colors as robot mode, just shifted around. The half
Autobot symbols on the shoulderpads are now combined into one whole symbol.
The headlamps are more prominent now, with silver-painted lenses, and the bumper plate has gunmetal paint on the raised details.
There's no real connector points, the smokestacks are 4.4mm in diameter and their holes are about 1.5mm. The robot fists are accessible on the underside if you have a pressing need to attach a train to a flight base. It rolls along nicely on the pinned/screw-held wheels. My Centurion's wheels squeak, but that might be due to slow rusting in moderately humid air, I honestly don't recall is they squeaked right out of the box.
Overall: About the only thing I really like better on Centurion is the head mold. In every other way, it's as if the Hasbro designers got their
hands on a Centurion and figured out how to avoid most of its mistakes (which may well be what happened, although I'm sure officially they just started
from Guidi's designs and never touched the Hot Soldiers toy). Bumblebee
still has some irritating bits here and there in transformation, but not
really outside the middle range of Hasbro toys aimed at the older collector.
If you actively don't want the Megatron, this is not a "worth $60" toy, but frankly you probably want the Megatron too.
DECEPTICON: TIMELINES MEGATRON
Assortment: G1096
Altmode: Field Artillery
Transformation Difficulty: 17 steps
Previous Name Use: Plenty without "Timelines".
Previous Mold Use: None
Origin Universe: Timelines
Packaging: Megatron also has a little table behind his legs to avoid needing to have the figure stick out the back of the inner tray. Each spiked shoulder wheel is enclosed in a clamshell of clear plastic with two ties crossed over the top. In addition to the four ties on the shoulder wheels, four more hold the robot to the tray. The cannon is held to the lower right
of the tray by two ties (it's possible to get the cannon out without cutting the ties).
It's hard to tell because the relevant part is in shadow, but I think
the render assumed that the cannon connection piece on the right forearm
would be dark gray instead of light gray. Otherwise, the render matches the toy.
Robot Mode: Okay, of the four HoS toys, this is the most blatant in the "glue some gears on it" style of steampunk aesthetic. For the most part,
it's a relatively standard gun-like Megatron robot mode with rivets and done
in darker gray than usual, but then there's the cowcatcher halves on the
fronts of the thighs. With random gears molded behind the bars, and more
gears molded onto the butt. And big half wheels of cheese or something
slapped on the forearms with big studs added. And big studs on the upper chest. And then these giant wheels on the shoulders that have lots of studs. Trying to put more punk in the steampunk, I guess? Mind you, the altmode
isn't exactly giving them a lot to work with. While train engines could be very highly decorated and fancy, this guy turns into a gun carriage. With a few exceptions for parade duty, those tended to be pretty simplistic and utilitarian even in Steampunk Times, since they had to be hauled across muddy battlefields and frippery would tend to break off pretty quickly. Thus,
while the other three look like vehicles that turn into robots, this is definitely a robot that kinda turns into a vehicle-like object. Not bad, per se, but I get a serious vibe of Megatron walking up to the others saying,
"Hey, I heard you guys were doing steampunk, so I decided to try it out!"
And then everyone made the sort of supportive but noncommittal sounds you
make at a novice cosplayer who's really proud of their cardboard box armor. Starscream's torn between sucking up and openly sneering (and then hiding behind Optimus).
Oh, and because Megatron gotta be extra aggro, there's small blister turrets on his legs pointing out to the sides, and his arm cannon has a small cloche-style turret on top of it. None of these move, they're all just
molded detail, but they're meant to drive home the scale here...even if the smallest cannon is meant to look like a 3-pounder, the entire TURRET of it
fits inside the barrel of the main gun. (1:100 scale is plausible here, so that'd make the main gun's barrel aperture about 60cm...it'd hurl a spherical cannonball of almost a ton.)
5.5" (14cm) tall at the head, while the big spiky wheels on the
shoulders make it up to almost 6" (15cm). Mostly very dark gunmetal (darker than on Bumblebee) and light gray, with some silver and a little red and gold (same as BB's accent gold). Light gray plastic is used for the piece that's the collar area and the center third of the back, the shoulder joints, the elbow area, the fists, the big spiky half-wheels on the forearms, the cores
of the hip joints, the thighs, the feet, the mushroom peg axles of the
shoulder wheels, and the little wheels on the kneecaps. The rest is very
dark gunmetal plastic.
All of the studs molded on the wheels and the torso are painted silver,
as are the big wheel hubs, the robot face, and the fronts of the abdomen flanks. There's dark gunmetal paint (same shade as BB's) in details on the fronts and backs of the thighs. The eyes and the sides of the abdomen are gloss red. The cannon breech and the ring around the secondary turret on top of the cannon (yes, he has a smaller cannon on his cannon) are painted light gold. A big purple and silver Decepticon symbol is printed on the center of the chest.
The head is on a ball joint with the socket in the raised neck collar,
the waist is a smooth if somewhat stiff swivel. The shoulders are pinned
hinge and swivel joints, with the big wheel axles being on their own hinges
to mostly get out of the way...it also means the wheels can be raised to horizontal and they get close enough to grind away at the sides of Megatron's helmet. There's bicep swivels above the double hinge elbows, in robot mode
the lower hinge is supposed to do most of the work. No wrist articulation,
the transformation hinges for them are locked down hard. Pinned hinge and swivel hips of the type that have the right and left thirds of the pelvis as part of the hip, upper thigh swivels, hinge knees that bend almost double,
toes can point down and there's a little sideways wiggle room.
The fists can hold 5mm pegs. Each of the half-cylinders on the forearms has a very tight 5mm socket on top, and the right one has a secondary panel that folds over the top of the forearm with the 5mm socket that the cannon's peg is supposed to go into. No other standard connectors, the screw holes on the back are just a little too narrow for use in storing the cannon on the robot's back...the cannon goes on the forearm or in a fist, that's it.
The cannon looks less like a Civil War era artillery cannon and more
like naval cannons of the era, being a bit more bulbous near the breech to handle the heavier powder loads that naval cannons and fixed emplacement cannons tended to use. (Field artillery was necessarily lighter so it could
be pulled around quickly by horses, saving weight by simply not being as
thick and therefore not able to handle as much powder.) I wouldn't put it
past Megatron to want to copy the biggest cannon he could find, though, regardless of how out of place it might've looked on his carriage. It's 3" (7.5cm) long with the peg near the back, the tiny turret on top a bit ahead
of the peg, and a barrel opening of 6mm (some Fire Blasts can be just sort of crammed in, if you want). The breech cap looks almost like a rocket thruster nozzle, so maybe the altmode is meant to be rocket-propelled?
Transformation: Not too bad, other than the hassle of getting the double elbow joints to bend in exactly the right way for all the little tabs and
slots to line up. The head stows in the torso, the fists hide in the
forearms, the arms fold up so that the spiked semi-cylinders on the forearms can unfold and go on the back as cannon brackets, and the legs fold up into
the "tail" of the cannon carriage. While I didn't need the instructions, I didn't notice the first time that little mini-cannons can fold out of the
wrist stumps once the fists are folded away.
Going back to robot mode is pretty easy, the stiff elbow joints are
still a problem but not nearly as much of one.
Altmode: So, given all the little turrets and secondary guns, this is meant to be a GIANT artillery carriage. More like the failed giant-wheel
tank designs the Russians worked on in WWI than a towed artillery carriage.
The boot guns are now on the sides of the back part with horizontal traverse, protecting his flanks, and little gun barrels folded out from inside the forearms to point forwards and shoot anything not worth the attention of
either the main gun or the main gun's gun. The main gun is held between
those half-cylinder pieces, which I suppose are intended to look like a way
for the barrel to elevate, even though it doesn't actually have that point of articulation. The bent legs in back look like...bent legs, really. Too
bulky to be the actual harness attachments for a mobile artillery piece, not
to mention those defense guns on the sides that shout "WWI Tank" aesthetic. Mind you, due to the scale issues mentioned earlier, you'd need the Fuunsaiki mobile armor to pull it anyway.
2.75" (7cm) tall and about 5.75" (14.5cm) long from muzzle opening to
the trailer tail, it's the same colors as robot mode, although some of the silver and red are hidden. The only new plastic is the little guns that fold out from inside the forearms, and they're light gray with no paint on them. They're not made for 3mm Fire Blast attachment, but sufficiently stretchy
ones can be jammed in place and stay put.
Thanks to the large main wheels, this rolls along better than most car
and truck altmodes, although all the studs on the wheels mean that on
slippery surfaces like desk veneer it is more likely to just slide. The
center of mass is well behind the main axle, so there's no danger of it
tipping forwards. There's no intentional articulation beyond wheels
spinning, but the shoulder struts still work so you can fold the wheels together in front like a shield (the little gun barrels in front keep the wheels from turning if you do that, for extra stability).
Overall: Yeah, a steampunk tank might've made more SENSE than a giant artillery piece that's functionally a tank anyway, but it's nice to see them stretch away from the regular tank family of altmodes (be they treaded or hover, full deck or H-tank). We sure as heck weren't gonna get a pistol, so this is a nice change. The transformation has some tricky bits, but not too hard to master. Otherwise, we're down to aesthetics and a tolerance for somewhat goofy designs.
Dave Van Domelen, hopes these sell well enough to convince Hasbro to do more, beyond just Seeker redecos.
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