Dave's Transformers Legacy Rant: Core Wave 8 (United 1)

Infernac Universe Bouldercrash (stony motorcycle trike)
Energon Universe Megatron (jet)
Beast Wars II Universe Tasmaia Kid (tasmanian devil, sorta)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Legacy/Core8

The third year of Legacy features Magmatron (BW Neo) as the centerpiece
of the diptych art, and shares a name with the 2010-or-so Japanese line that
combined Classics, early Generations, and various other stuff.
This United starts going even farther afield than Evolution did,
including the creation of the "Infernac Universe" which is a melange of Rock
Lords, Inhumanoids (from which the name comes), and according to TFWiki an
episode of Headmasters (Japanese) where there were rock people.

CAPSULES

$12 price point.

Infernac Universe Bouldercrash: Nice idea, but they just tried to do too
much on the class's budget and as a result the weapon mode is bad, the
vehicle mode is iffy, and the robot mode is worse than it could have been.
Very mildly recommended.

Energon Universe Megatron: Has fragile knees and too-thick paint in
places (and not enough in others, but that's hardly unusual for Hasbro), but
otherwise a decent homage to a character from two decades ago. Mildly
recommended unless you have fond nostalgia for Energon, in which case
recommended and I'm sorry for all the derision you probably face for
expressing such a fondness.

Beast Wars II Universe Tasmania Kid: Very good robot mode, interesting
transformation, and...well, the beast mode mold is very good, but the colors
are even worse than the robot mode requires them to be. Recommended.

RANTS

Packaging: These are the same shape and size of box as the previous
Legacy Core Class figures. The QR codes are gone (and a lot of the older
ones are no longer working). The diptych shows a lot of Beast Wars related
characters, whether BW itself, BWII, or BW Neo, and there's a 40th
Anniversary logo at the bottom of each pane. Interestingly, they decided
to make one of this wave Tasmania Kid instead of the identical Snarl from
regular Beast Wars. The character art on the packaging now has a warm glow
around it in yellow, orange, and red shades. The new logo also has UNITED in
those colors.
The Infernac gimmick for the year is Armorizers, which turn into armor
or weapons. They get their own logo in a font unrelated to the Legacy font
or the United font. The Infernacs themselves do not have faction symbols, so
I guess they're neutrals or a third faction?
The instructions continue to be mostly purple-scale, now with a sort of
orange accent color. The common backdrop piece uses the same basic crystal
like patterning as previous years, now mostly yellow and yellow-orange with
red Kirby Dots.
Because the QR codes are gone and have not been replaced by anything,
I'll use a combination of guessing and leaving stuff out.

INFERNAC: INFERNAC UNIVERSE BOULDERCRASH
Assortment: F8516
Altmode: Trike Motorcycle, Sword
Transformation Difficulty: 10 steps to motorcycle, 1 step from motorcycle to
sword
Previous Name Use: None
Previous Mold Use: None
Function: Armorizer
Special Unit: Armorizers
Origin Universe: INFERNAC
Signature Weapon: Rock Blade

"Infernac Universe Bouldercrash [...] is a Transformers Armorizer, a
lifeform made from living rocks and minerals found throughout the galaxy."
(Pulse website description)

Packaging: Rather awkwardly crammed into the package, thanks to the
backpack and non-negotiable hilt, so it's in something of a bow-legged pose.
Four ties hold the robot to the tray, two more hold the sword.

Robot Mode: So, the high concept here is a humanoid made of living rock,
so most of the detailing is "rock" rather than "mechanical," although the
wheels on the ankles and backpack look mechanical. Even the faceplate has a
little imperfection in it to try to make it look more like rock than worked
metal. There's red in many of the cracks, presumably meant to look like lava
oozing out of cracks in the rock. Probably the most glaring not-rock element
is the stick up his backside. Literally a mechanical-looking shaft emerging
from his back and hanging down almost to the ground, no joint on it. This is
the spine of the vehicle/weapon mode and includes the 5mm peg for the sword
grip. Hm, one detail I noticed later is that the abdomen has a little bit of
molded cycle wheel, as if the chest is a fake windshield...and some of the
other details on the chest vaguely match up with the sword hilt/windshield
bit too. I guess they can't resist fake vehicle chests even when there's
absolutely no reason to do so.
3.5" (9cm) tall in mostly brown, some red cracks, and a copper
faceplate. There's actually two shades of brown paint, although they tend to
blend together under normal room lighting. A slightly maroon brown paint is
used for the head, sternum plate, torso core, forearms, boots, sword-like
weapon, and the main part of the backpack. A lighter, warmer brown is used
for the top of the torso, shoulder roots, upper arms, pelvis, thighs, and
wheels.
The main paint color is red, used on the various cracks on the head,
torso, boots, and weapon hilt (windshield piece). It's also on the blade
itself, the eyeslit, and the bits of windshield glass (although those are
more of a dull matte finish and the rest are gloss). The faceplate is
copper, and the wheel forks on the backpack are painted to kinda match the
lighter brown plastic (the UV glow is vastly different).
The neck is a ball joint and the waist is a smooth swivel. Technically
the entire top of the torso is also able to turn slightly on a transformation
joint. Ball joint shoulders, elbows, hips, and knees.
The fists can hold 3mm pegs, the bottom of the spine ends in a 5mm peg,
and the hubs on either side of the backpack wheel are sort of 5mm sockets
(slightly under 5mm so probably not intentional, but some pegs can be forced
in).
The sword is more of a punch blade unless you use its deployment hinge
to lift it up 90 degrees. In fully deployed mode, it's just under 3" (7cm)
long, with a 3mm peg under the hilt basket part.

Transformation: There's a lot of rotation of parts here. The waist
needs to rotate 180 degrees, but the spine piece makes this awkward. The
sternum plate and backpack fold up all the way so that the upper torso can
rotate 180 degrees as well, this works more smoothly than the waist. Then
it's a matter of bending the arms and legs as necessary to tab into place
(tabs on the inner ankles go into slots on the spine). Slots on the forearms
rest on tabs on the spine, but they're mostly held in place by the knees on
either side. Without the weapon, it's still sort of a vehicle, but it really
needs the weapon for the windshield. There's a tab on the backside of the
blade that doesn't actually go in a slot, it just sort of wedges between the
forearms and pushes them off their tabs.

Altmode: It's a sort of rocky street rocket motorcycle in front, with
two wheels in back making it more of a trike, and then there's the blade down
the middle of the top leading to what one might call an uncomfortable riding
experience. The back end looks more like a bicycle trailer or ricksaw
though, with skinny wheels. Sadly, the color choices make it look more like
a bloody turd than volcanic rock.
4" (10cm) long, basically the same colors as robot mode but with the
head covered up. I'm not even sure why they bothered painting the front
forks, the difference is negligible except under rather bright light. It
rolls pretty well on the three wheels, and the blade can be folded out for a
sort of ram spike. The 5mm peg at the end of the spine piece now sticks out
the back, and I suppose when the blade if folded forwards the fists' 3mm
sockets are usable. I'm not sure if the almost-5mm sockets on either side of
the front wheel were intentionally 5mm-compatible or not.

Sword Mode: This is the cycle with the blade flipped out, then held by
the peg sticking out the back. A bit over 5" (13cm) long, with the blade
only sticking out past the front wheel by a little. The grip peg in back is
only 3mm LONG, so a lot of figures with molded thumbs won't be able to grip
it properly.
This is nearly a total fail as an "Armorizer" whatever that's supposed
to mean. It's a bad weapon, it's literally just swinging a motorcycle at
someone. I'd remove the spine piece entirely if it wasn't required for
stability of the vehicle mode.

Redeco Thoughts: I mean, almost all new molds get redecos eventually,
right? This one can't really be done as an existing character (the fact he's
not named after a Rock Lord already suggests they don't have access to that
IP). Perhaps a gray version as another rock dude.

Overall: I appreciate trying something different, but I think they asked
too much of a Core Class design budget here. Other than the unfortunate
color choices, all of the problems of this mold arise from trying to force
the sword mode.