FansProject Crossfire – Bruticus Add-On Sets: Munitioner and Explorer

Posted in add-on, Bruticus, Fansproject, review, Toy Reviews, Transformers on October 8th, 2010 by VitaminZinc

This toy is awesome. If you have the Return of the Fallen Bruticus then you HAVE to get these add-ons. No, really. You have to. If you don’t have it, you might even owe it to yourself to buy a Bruticus and get these anyway. Of course, even without the original Bruticus it’s still worth it just because FansProject did such an amazing job on Munitioner and Explorer. Now, to avoid infringement they were called this. Munitioner is supposed to be Swindle, and Explorer is Blast-Off.

It’s way bigger than the Superion Add-on that came out last year. Head-to-head, I’d sat there’s about an 1.5 inches difference in them. If we’re talking about the whole figure there’s a huge difference due to the cannon on Bruticus’ back. It also seems way more poseable and versatile than Superion. Of course, that makes sense since this add-on kit costs $100 (between the Munitioner and Explorer) opposed to Superion’s $50. Even the hands on Bruticus are poseable. Each individual finger has joints.

It comes with an arsenal of weapons. Each individual figure gets heavily armed. And pretty much all of these weapons fit into the alt modes, as well as the combined mode in some way. It’s pretty ingenious how they did it.

Perhaps the only drawback of these figures is the fact that individually they’re so much better than the Hasbro ones that it makes you kind of wish that FansProject had redone all of the figures–Price be damned.

Cutting this review a little short, but once again, FansProject has made a topnotch add-on set that certainly doesn’t disappoint in the least.

Pros:

  • Great upgrade set to make Bruticus into an amazing awe-inspiring G1 tribute figure.
  • The individual figures made by FansProject are better than the Hasbro ones.

Cons:

  • Cost. $50 per piece ($100 total)
  • Getting a Bruticus set in the after-market is expensive.

Fansproject Warbot Defender ("Springer") Review

Posted in custom, defender, Fansproject, review, springer, Toy Reviews, Transformers, warbot on April 7th, 2010 by VitaminZinc

IMG_0492Warbot Defender is a custom Transformer by Fansproject. They’re the same customizers that made the City Commander (Ultra Magnus add-on), and the Aerial Appendage Add-On (Superion Add-On). I have to say that I’m amazingly impressed by this figure. Well, that is, after I spent 30 minutes trying to figure out the damned arms. But, I will get to that later.

The price on this figure is $85 or something like that. Plus shipping. So, it’s a bit expensive for the average Joe to pick up. To those that are used to the higher prices of custom toys, and know how much these things go for in the after-market when they’re all sold out, then you know it’s worth the $90. Of course, that being said, I’m sure that BBTS will never run out of these and it will always be that price and will go on clearance and I’ll be sad and out of money I could have saved. Cause that’s just how things go with me. (Seriously, I’m supposed to be saving cash for Botcon in roughly 3 months. Holy shit!)

As far as the quality is concerned, this is a very very VERY nicely done figure. I have to give props to the QC team for Fansproject. On my particular figure, everything looks perfect. There’s no smudges, no badly applied paint, or issues whatsoever. This looks like a professionally painted figure. The box it even comes in looks amazingly professional. It’s much like the Alternity figures plastic boxes. You can open it, mess around with it and then put it back in the box and feel okay about it. (Although some people love to keep their toys in the box… I don’t know how, but they do it…)

The toy itself is an obvious likeness of the G1 character ‘Springer’. Hasbro probably isn’t ever going to go back to that figure, so Fansproject felt the need to give this classic figure a worthy representation. He was an Autobot triple-changer. Robot mode, car mode, and helicopter mode. The car mode on this is more likened unto a tank, which is an acceptable change. And, just like the G1 version, the vehicle modes are very Cybertronian.

Out of the box, you get it in robot mode. You also get 2 pistols and a collapsible sword/copter blades. The guns feel very solid and like they’ll last forever. The blades, however, are a bit on the thin and flimsy side. I feel like they could break at any moment. So, I’ve been treating them with a lot of caution.

There’s a short comic that gives the ‘story’ of this guy, and then it goes into a comic-style set of instructions on how to transform him. The instructions really didn’t make sense to me at all until I figured out how the pieces were supposed to be. Then, it was just a matter of moving things around til they fit in place. Let me mention, the only issue I had was with the arms. There’s so many swivels and such required for the transformation that it can get a bit confusing. Especially since the shoulder sits on a double-hinge sort of thing. If you pick this toy up, maybe that’ll help you to some degree and save you some time.

Size wise, it’s about 6 inches tall. About the size of a deluxe-class figure. It fits in very nicely with the size of Ultra Magnus’ City Commander Armor, as far as scale goes. It does have some issue standing up, which I think could have been fixed by adding a heel of some sort. But, if you pose him right, it’s not an issue. He just can’t be standing straight up or he topples. This figure also has die-cast on him. Which, when I heard about that, I was very worried. I had some flashbacks to Alternators and how scratched-to-hell they would get. Ugh. BUT, you really can’t tell which pieces are die-cast on Defender at first glance. I assume they added the die-cast to balance it somewhat. I’m not really sure, but it works. I can’t complain about it. Btw, the die-cast pieces are the chest and the tail-fins. In helicopter mode, the tail-fins click together to form the… tail… obviously. But, there’s luckily a piece of plastic between them to keep the metal from rubbing together.

Pros:

  • Accurate representation of Springer.
  • Solidly built and painted toy (as is always the case from Fansproject)

Cons:

  • Price is a bit high at $85 (but so worth it~)
  • Blades are kind of thin.

Final verdict:
I really like this figure. I think it’s a very good tribute to “Springer.” Despite being a custom, I don’t feel like I’m going to break it, which is a plus. If you’re a fan of the G1 toys or of the character of “Springer,” then I think this is a solid buy.

‘Aerial Team Appendage Add-On’ Kit for Superion

Posted in add-on, custom, Fansproject, figure, review, superion, toy, Toy Reviews, Transformers on November 18th, 2009 by VitaminZinc
Superion

Superion

Next on my review list is the ‘Aerial Team Appendage Add-On’ Kit. This add-on is meant for Superion, which was a Target exclusive. Let me just start off by saying, I saw this in stores and laughed at it. It looks so damn stupid as-is. There is literally no reason whatsoever to buy this without the intent of picking up this add-on kit. I have pictures of the original mode of this down at the bottom. It’s just… argh. It’s angering to see something this ‘durpy’.

Needless to say, there was no hesitation to pass on this because I wasn’t as into Transformers as heavily as I am at the moment. I basically just bought the Transformers: Animated toys, and that was it. To buy a toy like Superion would have been a waste of money–not to mention, it’s considered a Movie toy. I hate the movie toys. I’ve never bought one–aside from Superion and Bruticus–when I heard FansProject was making add-ons for these. Kind of a peer pressure buy.

Seeing the pre-order for this on BBTS.com made me think, “Oh, that looks kind of neat. I don’t remember it looking nearly that… Oh. my. gawd… That thing is hideous.” Maybe it was my reaction to how much of a difference this add-on makes that made me want it. It’s like Extreme Robot Makeover. HOWEVER, I’m not too keen on how much this set cost. Supposedly it’s a very limited run, but I find it hard to believe this should have cost $45.

It basically fits together the same way the durpy version goes. The durpy version is supposed to have the limbs alternated. One jet for a leg, one for an arm. One plane for an arm, and one for a leg. It’s able to stand up better like that since the planes are a bit too wide to stand up without the ‘knees’ rubbing, but the way it does the hands and feet looks dumb. This version keeps some semblance of symmetry and has the jets be the arms and the planes be the legs. It can take a much wider stance with the add-on feet, so the ‘knees’ aren’t rubbing together.

What would normally be part of the arms is now the shoulder–which looks great. He’s an all-aeronautical Transformer combiner, so to have jets as shoulders makes sense. What’s normally an arm for the stand-alone flips down and you’re using that ball joint to give him more mobility of the limbs. A ‘forearm’ is placed over that stand-alone, and then a fist is attached at the end into a peg. It works surprisingly well. He also comes with a visor, which helps him looks more like the G1 counterpart. It stands at about 10.5 inches tall–to the topmost point of the shoulders.

I wish I’d have thought to take some pictures of the stand-alone figures with the accessories, but to me that wasn’t the appeal of this. It’s great they made everything fit together and work as one cohesive unit, but the only reason I got this was because it was a combiner that was getting the FansProject treatment.

For those that may have picked up Superion directly from Target, I’m sorry. I feel your pain indirectly–since I basically paid the retail price for it, but on eBay. So, that was $35 spent on the durpy toy. And then $45 to make him look cool. Why does this math not make sense? Don’t get me wrong–It looks so cool. On a scale of 1 to 10, Ultra Magnus would be a 9.5. The Superion add-on would be about a 6–drunk 7–so to speak. The price tag is just too high for this considering how much Ultra Magnus is. I’d have paid $30 tops for this. If it goes on sale on tfsource, or bbts, then go for it. You won’t be disappointed FOR THAT PRICE. If you’re going out to specifically get this toy just to get the add-on (like I did), then you should save your money. Not worth the price unless you’re very into Superion. What’s sad is that when they come out with the add-on kit for Bruticus Maximus, I’ll probably buy that as well. Blargh.

Pros:

  • Figure looks awesome with the add-on. Very much so accented by the fact that it looks DUMB AS SHIT otherwise.
  • More G1 accurate… If you’re into that kind of thing.
  • Fits in amazingly well with the single-vehicle mode as accessories.

Cons:

  • Price. $45 is a lot to pay for some appendages, a gun, and a visor.
  • The figure is worthless without this add-on.

‘City Commander’ Ultra Magnus Add-On

Posted in add-on, city commander, custom, Fansproject, figure, toy, Toy Reviews, Transformers, ultra magnus on November 18th, 2009 by VitaminZinc

I got my ‘Pile of Loot’ from “Big Bad Toy Store” yesterday. It was a happy day, so I’ll be posting some pictures and my opinions on each of the things I got.

First on the agenda is ‘City Commander’ Ultra Magnus. As I said in my preview, I was really stoked to see this. All of the previews I watched made this seem very cool. It did not disappoint. Well, maybe it did disappoint some. I kind of imagined it would be a little bigger. With all the armor, it comes to 8.5 inches tall–to the top of the shoulders. It’s about the size of a normal ‘Leader’ Class figure. Really not all that big of an issue to me, but I was expecting something more of the size of the original Ultra Magnus trailer.

For the price of right at $90, it’s kind of worth it if you’re really really into Transformers, and already have an Ultra Magnus sitting around. With the re-release of this add-on, the eBay market is now averaging around $40+ for just the figure. So, all-in-all, it makes this figure ~$130. So, honestly, you’re not going to get this figure unless you’re really into Transformers to begin with.

It’s kind of a shame that Hasbro didn’t make some kind of add-on like this themselves. It would be much cheaper if it wasn’t being made by a third-party, but at the same time, I don’t think Hasbro would listen to the fans as much, or at all. The original add-on didn’t include the missiles for the shoulders, or the white, transforming gun for both modes. Fans pointed out it would be much more G1-accurate if he could have missiles and a gun, so FansProject did an addition to their add-on that updated their original.  Pretty fancy, and shows that they listen to what people say. After all, they are getting $$$ from us, so it only makes sense they should listen. Good for them. So, to break it down… even though my cons will outnumber the pros, the pros are far greater if you’re a Transformer fan.

Pros:

  • A very cool re-imagining of the G1 version.
  • Collectible third-party add-on.

Cons:

  • You have to have an Ultra Magnus to start with.
  • The price is a bit steep at $90.
  • Not as big as I’d hope for the price tag.