I used to love reading the bios on back of packages when I was a kid! My mum could go off shopping and leave me sitting in some toy aisle where I would go through and read every bio & tech specs! :)

 

Like Beast Wars you mean?

The Beast Wars Transformers did have proper robot heads. Some of them were inspired by their beast forms, but they were still robotic. And some had mutant heads, but that's a different concept.

 

The thing I dislike about the SWTFs heads is the way that they try to look like their pilots, but IMO it ends up looking bad. Why do these robots heads and bodies even need to resemble their pilots? Mecha don't need to resemble their pilots! I would have preferred it if they had designed the robot modes entirely independently of the pilot. It's not as if any Macross Valkyrie is designed to look resemble its pilot in Battroid mode... lest we'd see the Skull-1 flying around with a massive comb-over fringe over half it's face! Forget that!

 

"What Skull-1 needs is big-ass robo-hair!"

"Fcuk off!"

"I'll wear robo-hair!"

"I don't know that robot. Any likeness is purely coincidental."

"No father, why do you--"

"Han always shoots first!!"

**BLAM**

... that was glorious and confusing.

 

Anyway, yeah, I've just been kinda put off by the SWTF. They just don't seem to be up to par, especially for $15. For $10, maybe. But for $15, I only bought one, Commander Cody. Which is nice, but still not up to par. His second blaster is great, but his tank cannon is rather meh. And articulation is plentiful, but not always useful (his elbows are poorly designed, with the giant wheels limiting articulation). And yet, he still looks leagues better than most of the SWTFs, some of which just look vomit inducing.

As I mentioned before, they're just really not very well engineered Transformer action figures.

 

General Grievous/Wheelbike is the worst IMO. I hate how virtually all of his robot parts are visible in robot mode and the toy is the most unstable of them all - falls apart when you look at it wrong. It's the only SWTF that I ever wanted to refund and refused to keep... and I've kept Emperor Palpatine/Imperial Shuttle, which says a lot. A lot of these figures feature really ordinary transformations compared to other contemporary TF lines and their robot modes are often less than impressive to behold or play with. :/

As I mentioned before, they're just really not very well engineered Transformer action figures.

 

General Grievous/Wheelbike is the worst IMO. I hate how virtually all of his robot parts are visible in robot mode and the toy is the most unstable of them all - falls apart when you look at it wrong. It's the only SWTF that I ever wanted to refund and refused to keep... and I've kept Emperor Palpatine/Imperial Shuttle, which says a lot. A lot of these figures feature really ordinary transformations compared to other contemporary TF lines and their robot modes are often less than impressive to behold or play with. :/

I like palpatine a lot. He's sturdy and if you move the flaps up to his shoulders instead of his hips, Hes kinda neat looking.

I don't have any, but almost bought in many times during the TF movie fig drought. In the end, I didn't like most that had half their vehicle strapped to their back essentially. But some do look cool. My brother-in-law loves em and has em all, and I love the SW mighty muggs and he won't touch em.

The idea of a piloted mecha is pretty cool if you mean the vehicles turn into a robot that a figure could actually sit in... that's kind of neat... if not a little odds since the SW universe actually already has piloted mechs like the ATST... but still interesting.

 

I was under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that the little figures that come with the SWTF can also sit in the cockpits when the toy is in robot mode.

you are correct sir

 

Yeah I was thinking more about the real figures being able to mount up and ride the mechs... but I guess the vehicle mode would have to be frickin huge on some of the to not only stick a 3.5" figure in the seat but also in robot mode's... kind of like the Yamato Garlands...

 

 

 

 

I guess the thing that bugs me the most is the vehicle turns into the pilot. That just seems dumb to me. The robo/human heads... they remind me of MegaMaid... only instead of switching from suck to blow they suck AND blow. ;)

As I mentioned before, they're just really not very well engineered Transformer action figures.

 

Heads aside, some of them are better than actual Transformers.

 

-Han Solo/Chewbacca

-Death Star Darth Vader

-Commander Cody Turbo Tank

-the other dude that can carry several figures (forgot the name)

i've become a skywalker whore.... much like a lot of prime collectors

 

i'm trying to get everything skywalker... anikin or luke or vader...

 

also all episode IV-VI

 

also all jedi starfighters...

 

also... the more i get the more i find myself caving to poke'mon presure to catch them all.

Heads aside, some of them are better than actual Transformers.

Which 'actual Transformers'? (o_O) I agree that there are some non-SW Transformers which are hideously crap as toys and would be arguably worse than the SWTFs - but on the whole/across the board I would say that compared to the average standard that we get with Transformers, a lot of the Star Wars Transformers fall short of that mark.

 

I find that the SWTFs robot modes are often compromised by the fact that they're trying to look like the pilots, and not just the heads, but also the aesthetics of the body as well. And while it's cool in some aspects (e.g. how one of the panels on Vader/TIE Advanced becomes the cape in robot mode) I find it limiting. With the Millenium Falcon I thought that they were pretty ordinary for their price point.

 

...and that's the thing... I find that at best they're just rather mediocre Transformer toys. I've never come across any that I would find exceptionally good by current Transformers standards. And comparing them to other really crap Transformers doesn't really make them that good. :P That's like saying "I saw that Panda-style fighter beat the crap out of that Sport Taekwondo fighter!" yeah okay... have standards... it doesn't take a genius to beat up someone who practices an Olympic Sport martial art that isn't designed/intended for fighting. It'd be a whole different story if you said, "I saw that Panda-style fighter beat the crap out of that traditional Okinawan Karate black belt!"- now that would make me raise an eyebrow. ;)

 

Time for us all to go learn Panda style now. :)

 

Sorry, I completely forgot you think you know everything about everything. I'll try to remember next time I reply.