The Energon Pub

[Hydrargyrus]

So:

First of all, I'm not really nostalgia-influenced, so I probably won't be paying to import these.

Secondly, I'm colorblind as well, and thought Kup was gray until you all started complaining about Hasbro's. It does make more sense for him to be a duller color, being somewhat combat-oriented. I also love the facial detailing on TT Kup.

I do think that there could be some camera-error/prototype/unfinished coloring here. Just hopeful.

I really thought you guys would love these, but who am I to expect the fandom not to complain?

[Seibertron]

I popped in my DVD to see if I could come up with better colors from that episode of Five Faces of Darkness Part 2. Unfortunately, the colors in that entire scene are really off. In the screen cap posted in this topic, you can see how off Ultra Magnus' colors are as well, in particular his reds which are much darker than they should be. Spike had weird skin tones as well. In general, the entire scene is a darker palette than it should be, whether intentional or not. Kup is tealish blue green. Takara has gotten him right in the past. This is a really odd choice and I agree with William-James assessment above.

Also not a fan of Hot Rod's color scheme either but it at least has precedent from previous incarnations of Hot Rod, whereas Kup does not.

[william-james88]

Also not a fan of Hot Rod's color scheme either but it at least has precedent from previous incarnations of Hot Rod, whereas Kup does not.

I still find it realy odd how they are trying to replicate the effect of a foil sticker by painting clear plastic, turning it into a stained glass window. Its a lot of work that doesn't really result in much.

[fenrir72]

Sharkticon's deco looks great. Not loving the Dali mustache on the Sweep.

I'm impressed that they created Targetmasters for Hot Rod and Kup. Wish they'd remove the Headmaster gimmick for the eventual Decepticon jets, but that's not going to happen.

There's gonna be some Headmasters Seekers?

You know he meant Triggerhappy & co, right?

Btw, on Cha's colors, I have a sinking feeling it just might be the camera shot that's causing the confusion.

There is is phenomena when the color on a camera/screen is slightly different from the real stuff.
Case in point G1 Ultra Magnus. In the catalogs and screen, he comes out as dark blue ish yet the real item he is royal bluish kinda green unlike the MP UM which is just as blue as the images.

I might be wrong as I am just positing a theory.

It's happened before with other figures. Funnily enough, United Sergeant Kup that came with clear blue Hot Rodimus and Scrap Yard looked blue in his stock photos, but that was a photography mishap.

Oh, those jets. Thanks

[fenrir72]

Is it too late for Takara to tweak the colors on Kup and Roddy?

I doubt it. Hb Hotrod got released last February 2017 in Asia. It must have been assembled 6 months prior. So most probably the factory now is focusing on the JP market release by now.

[Wolfman Jake]

I had an interesting thought. What if these new Firebolt and Recoil molds Takara has made aren't really "new" at all, that is, they haven't been designed solely by Takara just for this purpose. They may, in fact, be an early release of a couple of molds that will eventually be sold in Hasbro's "Power of the Primes" line, replacing the Titanmasters with Transforming vehicles/beasts/weapons price point of $5? The size/mass looks about equivalent to a Titans Return Titanmaster plus accessory. I'm pretty sure that "Targetmasters" were recently named as the successors to the Titanmasters by Hasbro at as well. Expect Hasbro to release these later, possibly using different names with different decos, under the "Power of the Primes" imprint next year.

[william-james88]

I had an interesting thought. What if these new Firebolt and Recoil molds Takara has made aren't really "new" at all, that is, they haven't been designed solely by Takara just for this purpose. They may, in fact, be an early release of a couple of molds that will eventually be sold in Hasbro's "Power of the Primes" line, replacing the Titanmasters with Transforming vehicles/beasts/weapons price point of $5? The size/mass looks about equivalent to a Titans Return Titanmaster plus accessory. I'm pretty sure that "Targetmasters" were recently named as the successors to the Titanmasters by Hasbro at as well. Expect Hasbro to release these later, possibly using different names with different decos, under the "Power of the Primes" imprint next year.

Ha, smart! That is the latest rumour, that we are getting new smaller tfs next that dont turn into heads. This is maybe seeing them before they come out with other toys from hasbro.

Also look at this great image. I dont think anyone would complain with this:

[SW's SilverHammer]

Seriously, please don't ruin this for me, kup's always looked like a piece of **** to me, and this is the first one plan on buying, and only because he's in a dapper grey.

[Sabrblade]

It'll be interesting to see what kind of storyline (*cough* excuse *cough*) they come up for the Transformers Legends manga to explain away Kup's weird color scheme. You know they will.

In Japanese: "We are gathered here to pay our respects to our fallen friend and comrade..."

[Wolfman Jake]

Also look at this great image. I dont think anyone would complain with this:

That's so much better, but still short of the mark. A little more saturation and that would be very acceptable for Kup's coloration.

[Sabrblade]

Hmmm...





Or

[Megatron Wolf]

Wow compared to this hasbros hot rod looks like garbage, takaras is a work of art. I will admit im not to keen on the clear plastic, the flame should really be colored in but every thing else is fantastic. Being able to hide the engine should have been a no brainer but as usual hasbro has to be cheap and lazy. Dont get me wrong i do like hasbros figure but takaras is 10 times better. Ive been debating whether or not to paint hot rods legs black, after seeing this i know what im doing tomorrow. Think ill slightly mod the paint i did on the head master as well, i already painted him up to look like hot rod but i really like what takara did here. Kup though not digging it, love the head but not the gray. I know its closer to the cartoon but ive always liked the toy colors better.

[Wolfman Jake]

Kup though not digging it, love the head but not the gray. I know its closer to the cartoon but ive always liked the toy colors better.

But, it's reeeeeeally not close to the cartoon colors, though. Gray is not teal, no matter how desaturated the color of teal or the shadowing from odd lighting effects.

[SW's SilverHammer]

Hmmm...

Or just hear me out,

[Deadput]

I know its closer to the cartoon but ive always liked the toy colors better.

Except it's not even that Kup has never been grey besides some lighting issues a couple times in the show.

Even if we did not turn his head teal the Hasbro figure would look closer to the show then this does which is why I'm not even buying the figure to be "Kup" he is going to be Armorhide once I get a different head for him maybe I'll paint a Hasbro Hot Rod head black/grey since I'm buying Takara Hot Rod and replacing his head with the Rodimus head from the Toys R us boxset which will leave me a left over Takara Hot Rod head which I'll put on my Hasbro one.

For me Hasbro Hot Rod is going to be Hot Rod while Takara is going to be Rodimus

Wow compared to this hasbros hot rod looks like garbage, takaras is a work of art. I will admit im not to keen on the clear plastic, the flame should really be colored in but every thing else is fantastic. Being able to hide the engine should have been a no brainer but as usual hasbro has to be cheap and lazy.

The Hasbro one looks garbage?

The paint for the arms and head are great but the mold for the chest on this figure looks worse then Hasbro in fact take the Takara limbs and head place them with Hasbro Hot Rod's torso it would look amazing.

How the heck is Hasbro lazy for not hiding the engine when that's a design choice like with the classics Hot rod it's meant to be that way?

[Deadput]

Darn Kup is sold out at Ages 3 and up will preorders be back in stock at all or do I have to go with Big Bad Toy store?

Why not get them from here, its at least $15 CDN cheaper once you include shipping.

http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail ... 3&page=top

And they are all available at amazon.jp but the price isnt that great.

Thanks boi I have all three on preorder.

Still waiting for my Leo Prime even though I already paid for him since I decided to order him together with God Bomber now I wish I could separate the two so I could get him.

[Sabrblade]

Kup though not digging it, love the head but not the gray. I know its closer to the cartoon but ive always liked the toy colors better.

But, it's reeeeeeally not close to the cartoon colors, though. Gray is not teal, no matter how desaturated the color of teal or the shadowing from odd lighting effects.

The deco is closer to the cartoon color layout, though.

[Wolfman Jake]

Kup though not digging it, love the head but not the gray. I know its closer to the cartoon but ive always liked the toy colors better.

But, it's reeeeeeally not close to the cartoon colors, though. Gray is not teal, no matter how desaturated the color of teal or the shadowing from odd lighting effects.

The deco is closer to the cartoon color layout, though.

True, but I think the wrong color is a much bigger deal than a cartoon perfect color/paint mask. If Takara released an Optimus Prime with a cartoon accurate color scheme, except that everywhere he was supposed to be red, he was instead yellow, I don't think you'd be praising the color layout as much as you would be foaming at the mouth over the "stupid wrong yellow coloring."

[RodimusRex]

I popped in my DVD to see if I could come up with better colors from that episode of Five Faces of Darkness Part 2. Unfortunately, the colors in that entire scene are really off. In the screen cap posted in this topic, you can see how off Ultra Magnus' colors are as well, in particular his reds which are much darker than they should be. Spike had weird skin tones as well. In general, the entire scene is a darker palette than it should be, whether intentional or not. Kup is tealish blue green. Takara has gotten him right in the past. This is a really odd choice and I agree with William-James assessment above.

Also not a fan of Hot Rod's color scheme either but it at least has precedent from previous incarnations of Hot Rod, whereas Kup does not.

I suspect it's an "off" choice because Takara has further decos of these molds planned.

They did something like four decos of Classics Rodimus. Two of Universe Kup, as I recall.

So I suspect they opted to release "Targetmaster" decos based onmore obscure/divergent color schemes first... And that we'll see at least one more Kup deco using this retooling and probably two or three more Rodimuses.

They tend to avoid Hasbro redecos but they redeco Rodimus like crazy.

Wouldn't be surprised to see Octane/Laser Prime get an eHobby G2 Magnus deco based on his prior Japanese G2 Magnus release from eHobby.

[Hydrargyrus]

Seriously, please don't ruin this for me, kup's always looked like a piece of **** to me, and this is the first one plan on buying, and only because he's in a dapper grey.

If I was into Kup, I would wholeheartedly agree, now that I know he's been ridiculous (pastel? e.g. Light, desaturated...) colors for the past 30 years.

Also, I legitimately could not tell that the colors had been tweaked on that picture.
And, technically, if you desaturate teal enough it will eventually become gray.

[Albatross250]

Takara's Kup almost nailed it but the
Colors are......

[Wolfman Jake]

And, technically, if you desaturate teal enough it will eventually become gray.

Technically, if you desaturate ANY color enough, it will eventually become some shade of gray.

[william-james88]

And, technically, if you desaturate teal enough it will eventually become gray.

Desaturising any colour enough will give you greyscale.

Just curious is anyone here actually saying that Takara's Kup is better than Hasbro's because the colour is more accurate to the character?

[Jelze Bunnycat]

Just curious is anyone here actually saying that Takara's Kup is better than Hasbro's because the colour is more accurate to the character?

I wouldn't necessarily say better or worse, just a different take. Just why that take though?

I had an interesting thought. What if these new Firebolt and Recoil molds Takara has made aren't really "new" at all, that is, they haven't been designed solely by Takara just for this purpose. They may, in fact, be an early release of a couple of molds that will eventually be sold in Hasbro's "Power of the Primes" line, replacing the Titanmasters with Transforming vehicles/beasts/weapons price point of $5? The size/mass looks about equivalent to a Titans Return Titanmaster plus accessory. I'm pretty sure that "Targetmasters" were recently named as the successors to the Titanmasters by Hasbro at as well. Expect Hasbro to release these later, possibly using different names with different decos, under the "Power of the Primes" imprint next year.

And that's a very good point. I did some checking on the Targetmasters' detailing:



"Recoil" kinda resembles Peacemaker, partner of Pointblank:


Transformers G1 1987 Peacemaker Gallery

Can't really place "Firebolt" though, though he has elements of Fracas and Caliburst. Maybe it's just me...

[Deadput]

And, technically, if you desaturate teal enough it will eventually become gray.

Desaturising any colour enough will give you greyscale.

Just curious is anyone here actually saying that Takara's Kup is better than Hasbro's because the colour is more accurate to the character?

What about grey do you get another 50 shades of grey?

Anyways you could say it's accurate to his eventual corpse caused by old age eh?

I could imagine him dropping dead while telling a story to Wheelie and Danial and crushing the annoying one.