The Energon Pub

I hope the camera angle is why Bruticus looks weird.

Why is Vortex red and tan?

BlastOff could possibly be painted into a nice custom Shockwave.

I like the cons more as a singular entity than a combined one, but maybe the angle has something to do with that...

Definitely worth a buy none the less

First off, that combined gun? It's awesome. especially since it lengthens the barrels of the cannons that normally sit on Onslaught's back. HOWEVER, the gun should be on Bruticus' back as well, so that he has those G1-ish shoulder cannons.

Everyone is whining that it looks like a PCC. Sorry, but not only does this have G1 Bruticus two toes per foot instead of stumps, but it actually has hands. The last official 5 bot combiner original mold made by Hasbro to actually have hands and not "gun fingers" or "PCC claws" was what, back in 1988?

I'm chalking this one up to poor angle, poor photography, a touch of terrible photoshop, and a heaping helping of mistransformed arms.

Blast Off looks awesome. How does those tail fins get below the nose of the vehicle to form his legs...?

Not entirely stoked on that combined mode. Pretty early though and as others have said it could be mistransformed, which i believe is the case.

I'm liking the individual bots themselves though. Blast Offs' alt mode looks awesome. If i were to get these guys i would more than likely display them in team mode, as i usually do with gestalts, instead of combined. I'll just keep my FP Bruticus combined.

I was really interested to see what they were going to do with the feet and hands themselves. It doesn't seem like the they pushed the envelope or stepped out of their comfort zone very much. No side to side swivel or articulated fingers. Although I could be wrong about the hands judging by the photo with the hand in Vortexs' leg that is splayed open. Plus they look tiny. I'll admit that i'm impressed that they have incorporated the hands into the figures instead of being a separate piece.

Most definitely an improvement from their last attempts with combiners though.

I see the image, I notice the issues, and their 'talented' photography. These 5 are still on my 'must have' list if not just to complete the FoC collection.

Bruticus' nametag:

Va'al wrote:

Seibertron wrote:

gema wrote:WTH is wrong with Hasbro's photography?

I'm not their photographer.

I know you must have thought of this before, but have you tried asking them about it?

Not sure I'd want to ... I like getting to work on whatever I want to work on but if they wanted to send me samples in advance, I could possibly be persuaded.

Va'al wrote:Seriously, you would be able to sell even Activators and Go-Bots to snotty collectors!

Was anyone persuaded into buying any Activators or Go-Bots from my galleries on this site?

Va'al wrote:Here's waiting for the weekend, with Ryan's photography.

I hope Bruticus is on display. I'll do my best to show it off properly.

AnnaChristine wrote:Hasbro are delivering a $60 5 figure, unique mold combiner that follows toy saftey legistlation.

TCC and FP are producing figures way in excess of that expense without toy safety laws to follow.

I'm gonna cut Hasbro some slack based on the fact this is a toy aimed at kids, not a collectors model aimed at adults.

While I might be a bit disappointed in Bruticus so far (but am looking forward to seeing it in person to see if the guns can attach to the back, to verify that GPS isn't a factor, etc), you do have a very good point about the toy safety laws and the cost point. This isn't a $500 to $600 toy like TFC Hercules. This will be a $60 to $80 toy. Kudos to them ... but I still think they can do better. I still think this toy has potential once we see it in person. I'm hoping this is just bad product shots. I'm hoping so hard that not only are my fingers crossed, but so are my eyes.

Swindle01 wrote:its the whole fact i can see the PPC connection style ports that puts me off more than anything else. You got those crappy ports on onslaughts wheels connecting into those -clear as day- pegs on vortex and blast off. The you got the same problem with the legs and the whole - brawl+swindles feet ARE bruticus's feet.....yeah...lame sauce

The whole figure says to me that hasbro just cant be arsed and have just done yet another crappy pcc figure. Looks as if were gona have to wait and see if any 3rd party company can clean up this retard of a birth baby that hasbro has made. Would have been okish if they had made onslaught decent enough but instead he has a crappy alt mode and his bot mode looks way to skinny and lanky. He looks anerexic and as if he needs to sit down and eat something before he passes out

There's a whole lot for people to take personal offense to here in your post, but on to the figures. There is effort... And there is a whole lot to be positive about if you take off the hate HASBRO blinders.

United, please repaint Vortex in his proper G1 colors. Puke yellw with red propellers WTF ???

Gearslide wrote:Everyone is whining that it looks like a PCC. Sorry, but not only does this have G1 Bruticus two toes per foot instead of stumps, but it actually has hands. The last official 5 bot combiner original mold made by Hasbro to actually have hands and not "gun fingers" or "PCC claws" was what, back in 1988?

Monstructor would be the last G1 US Combiner that was an original mold, but it used six giant Transformers to accomplish it's behemoth combiner mode.

Gearslide wrote:I'm chalking this one up to poor angle, poor photography, a touch of terrible photoshop, and a heaping helping of mistransformed arms.

That's what I'm hoping for also. I think this is an example of the fans getting too excited and too disappointed in too short of a period of time.

I don't like to be that guy, and I know we're really discussing Bruticus here, but I have to ask.

How does a helicopter work on Cybertron? Are we to believe that the half-dead, haeavily damaged planet is somehow supporting an atmosphere?

Rated X wrote:United, please repaint Vortex in his proper G1 colors. Puke yellw with red propellers WTF ???

This isn't G1 anymore. Stop living in the past, man! Contemporize!

Just some sporadic thoughts:

Not great, but definitely not bad either.
Look to be mistransformed in combined mode. (shame on the photographers )
Colors are nice, even though Vortex is odd, I kinda dig it. Like some have said, I get a Beastie vibe with him.
Combined gun mold is meh, but I'll just fiddle with that.
He's gonna be cheaper then any 3rd party combiner.
Child Safty laws impede what we want in actual looks and design. (probably)
I'll probably keep them displayed in single bot modes.

So I think Hasbro is doing what they can with the restrictions they have and they have a winner IMO. They probably will sell these guys individually, but I wouldn't mind a box set perhaps with exclusive colors. If they did that, I would buy both set.

if i buy this it will be for the individual figures the combined mode is a big disappointment

Sadly, I don't think it's mistransformed.
If you look at the render from the trailer, you'll notice that the shoulder connectors are exposed just like in this pic, the only difference is that the ones form the render are beefier.

I believe the turret also attaches to the back, I believe it was attached in the first pic we saw of this last week.

Lets hope the arms can be improved, although I daub it. I think I'll be getting this either way, but would be happier if it turned out better in hand.

optimuscarlos wrote:

bruticus.jpg

Hey, they got half the body right. That's an accomplishment

I do have to wonder why they went and made an oddball coloration for (his) left. The colors look great when the figures are separate but they're meant to combine. Seems like someone either didn't think about the final product or didn't care xP

optimuscarlos wrote:

bruticus.jpg

Looking at them side by side, it does appear Onslaught is the problem. A larger, thicker Onslaught would make Bruticus much better.

Gotts say, though .... STILL like this more than the Energon combiners. Actual HANDS and FEET. And elbows; his arms aren't just tree trunks or abstract sculptures. And it's aimed at children, not like the 3rd party products so you kinda gotta accept that for what it is.

But, yeah .... what's up with the colors? Sometimes I think Hasbro has a contract with Takara that obliges them to use poopy colors.

Seibertron wrote:

AnnaChristine wrote:Hasbro are delivering a $60 5 figure, unique mold combiner that follows toy saftey legistlation.

TCC and FP are producing figures way in excess of that expense without toy safety laws to follow.

I'm gonna cut Hasbro some slack based on the fact this is a toy aimed at kids, not a collectors model aimed at adults.

While I might be a bit disappointed in Bruticus so far (but am looking forward to seeing it in person to see if the guns can attach to the back, to verify that GPS isn't a factor, etc), you do have a very good point about the toy safety laws and the cost point. This isn't a $500 to $600 toy like TFC Hercules. This will be a $60 to $80 toy. Kudos to them ... but I still think they can do better. I still think this toy has potential once we see it in person. I'm hoping this is just bad product shots. I'm hoping so hard that not only are my fingers crossed, but so are my eyes.

*Looks at ROTF leader Prime* Nope, don't buy the toy safety laws as an excuse... And as I said in another thread, Herc isn't as awesome as he is because they can charge ~$600 for him, he's that price because it's a small-time operation with limited runs. Look no further than FunPub repaints on what small runs do to costs...and those are just repaints with maybe a new head, not entire new molds. But to be fair, there's still hope that this thing can be pretty cool. It's probably not as crappy looking as the early pics suggest.

I'm honestly confused about some of the hate going on here. The figure is obviously mistransformed (just look at the hips) and I'm sure the double barrel gun will be able to plug into Bruticus' back to give him that back mounted cannon look. Hell, someone in the thread photoshopped the image to fix the hip and arm mistransformations and even put the double barrel gun on Bruticus' back just to give us a look at how it probably should be transformed. The figure looks great to me, and the individual bot and vehicle modes are also an above average effort.

As someone else said, Blastoff seems to be made of gold plastic (which should be cause for concern). But then again, that could just be bad photoshopping on Hasbro's part (Lord knows they're notorious for that sort of thing) and the figure could very well be a more brownish color. Hell, I'm not really convinced on any of these figures' colors and won't be satisfied until we see non edited versions of the figures.

two things

1: looks a little lanky, I think it must be mistransformed
2: ...Holy crap hasbro! Yoo are going to give us a combiner that isn't a repaint of an Energon one.

They looked terrible combined but on their own I think they are great. I will display them uncombined with the other figures. Vortex and swindle look really good.

Geekee1 wrote:That looks horrible. I don't know if they're limited by budget, time, or they're just incapable of making a good looking combiner.

I think the bean counters at Hasbro won out. The main figure Onslaught, should have been larger more like the previous universe version. I believe a smaller Onslaught is just less of a risk for the company.
We all know they made the wrong decision, but we will buy it anyway and Hasbro will feel they made the right decision by going with all deluxe figures. Overall it's not bad, it just could have and should have been better.