The Energon Pub

[Bigchin]

I'm circling the Universe (I think) Constructicons at Toys R Us... the mini ones that make up a mini Devastator. It'd be 12 quid for the set, which doesn't seem too bad to me, especially as I'm loving mini figures right now.

Anyway, coupla questions:

Any love for these guys?

And why do some of them have different names to the original crew? What sort of name is Buckethead?

[decepticonjon]

they're okay.. i got them on a whim back when kbtoys was having a clearance. not much movement. not sure on the names, but it's worth @ 40 bucks us dollars give or take

[waaaaghlord]

They're excellent. I've got three sets of the Universe versions that area slightly different shade of green to the ones in Energon packaging that saw a European release displayed with vehicle modes at the front, the individual bots straight behind these and the combined form in the rear. I grabbed them when Home Bargains were carrying them for £1 per bot a while back. Three sets for the price of one full price set of the Energon versions, woot!

The names are different on some of them because Hasbro couldn't get the trademark back on some of the original names at the time.

If you have any WSTs they look fantastic with these and are sturdier than the KO WST sized G1 Dev. Also it's worth having a look at Reprolabels. They have a sticker set to pimp these guys up with and G1ify them a bit.

[Bigchin]

Thanks guys. You might have just given me that tiny nudge I needed to spend yet more money on Transformers! My girlfriend will thank you!

The names are different on some of them because Hasbro couldn't get the trademark back on some of the original names at the time.

Ah, right. I'm only just getting back into buying the toys so this is new to me but hasn't this happened quite a bit? I wondered for ages why reissues had names like 'Autobot Jazz'. Bit dim of Hasbro, isn't it?

[waaaaghlord]

Part of the problem is that back in the 80s nobody could really have guessed that we'd still be here 20 years on. Hasbro have let a lot of names slide since the early days and if a name is fairly generic or has been used in a toy line belonging to another company then it can be hard to reacquire the copyright. Things like 'Autobot Jazz' are one way around it, new names are another. You'll notice that some names keep cropping up in almost every incarnation of TFs these days (Optimus, Megatron, Starscream, Hot Shot etc). They constantly reuse names partly because they are familiar to existing fans and partly to maintain the copyright while they have it.

[DREWCIFER]

Yeah, I have them. They are fun. I have them with my other MM Gestalts(see sig).

I was debating on getting the Japanese version. Same toy with slightly different colour scheeme. The good thing about the Universe version is that they have faces painted on, the Jap ver. doesn't.

If you are interested in the Jap. ver. of these new MM's:

http://www.geocities.com/oblivionsgallery13/micromasterstory.html

or, to see the Jap. figs. w/the chase ver.

http://mykooltoyz.tripod.com/re-issues.html

Start with Sixliner and go through the next ones, to get the whole picture.