The Energon Pub

by **Riotflea** » Thu May 17, 2007 11:07 pm

http://www.maj.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=142660

I made this topic before, but it was before the data purge here.
AND, I had no proof to back up my claims.

Just moved, and found what's left of them in a toy bin!

First up, a model of Megatron:
http://www.maj.com/gallery/JINZONINGEN7 ... toy001.jpg
http://www.maj.com/gallery/JINZONINGEN7 ... toy002.jpg
http://www.maj.com/gallery/JINZONINGEN7 ... toy003.jpg

I also used superglue on him, messing up horribly.
These models were VERY fragile and tiny.
What an ugly bastard of a face, ain't it? And no, he didn't have his mega-cannon either.

Second, a toy-accurate rubber decoy of Ravage:

http://www.maj.com/gallery/JINZONINGEN7 ... toy002.jpg
http://www.maj.com/gallery/JINZONINGEN7 ... toy003.jpg
And this might just tell me the company name:

Also, I had a tiny olive green model of Laserbeak as well as a toy-accurate, yellow rubber decoy of Bumblebee. And let me tell you... the guns on Laserbeak were SO thin, and these already were really fragile pieces... his completeness was doomed practically before I took the parts out of the box.

I bought them at a convention, oh, something like 2 and a half decades ago. The boxes were mostly white, in Japanese, had a pic of Starscream on some, Optimus (Convoy) on others (or maybe they were double-sided?) and had, in English, "Desutron" or "Saibaturon" (sic?) going down the side in red.

The gum that came with them was these yummy green mango balls if I remember correctly.

SO... any idea what company produced them or if ANYBODY has documented them, visually or in text ANYWHERE?

On a 100% unrelated note, any data on this would be nice too:
http://seibertron.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5643&sid=

by **Riotflea** » Sat May 19, 2007 2:47 am

Heh... I guess it's safe to say NOONE is going to have ANY further info or pics on these, are they?
X D

Damn.

Like Exulted Unicron on Facebook · by **Exulted Unicron** » Sat May 19, 2007 3:26 am

I've never heard of these rubber Gumbits decoys before. I always thought they were pinky-red and came with certain toys in the 85 and 86 lines

by **Riotflea** » Sat May 19, 2007 4:03 am

Yeah, those were later and more popular decoys.
You got them as pack-ins with many blister-carded TFs.
In Italy, they also came alone on a card with a circular blister, containing around 4 or so (something like that).
In Japan, they also came in boxed sets with playing cards (get it? 52 different decoys?). Unlike us, Japan got laserbeak.

THOSE decoys were more artsy, combining elements of the characters more from the show. They came in red and purple, along with some faction members being cast accidentally in the wrong faction's colors. (In one or more countries, they also had pink, M.U.S.C.L.E. Thing / Kinnikuman colored ones).
Likewise, the numbering system stamped on them was not consistent on a global basis.

These ones, at least the 2 I had, were made LONG before those and were sculpted to look like the actual toys (to a fault... an ugly fault).
I'm GUESSING they came in other colors, as the model kits did.

But again... NO IDEA.
:shock:

Like Exulted Unicron on Facebook · by **Exulted Unicron** » Sat May 19, 2007 4:06 am

it seems to me, like Hasbro did with G.I. Joe in 2003 and 2004, takara sold the rights temporarily to a gum company for them to produce a set of Decoys

these will be heavilly collectible and most likely rare as hell

by **Riotflea** » Sat May 19, 2007 5:32 am

No doubt. They're freaking microscopic and the models are super-fragile as a result.

AAARGH, this stuff BUGS me!
I HATE when things from history are lost, destroyed or completely forgotten!

Oh, those painful, ill-recorded days before the internet...

V__V

Like Exulted Unicron on Facebook · by **Exulted Unicron** » Sat May 19, 2007 5:45 am

I guess there's nothing much known about them since they're so fragile, they've all been destroyed

News Credits: 1082 · by **Tigertrack** » Sat May 19, 2007 6:00 am

Try a PM to Jelze, he is quite good at finding information on rare TF items availability.

As far as I know, well, I'm as stuck as you. Are they perhaps...I'm having trouble finding thte right words...the things suold in gumball machines???

Like Exulted Unicron on Facebook · by **Exulted Unicron** » Sat May 19, 2007 7:18 am

nope...they're similar to GumBits toys. Packet of Gum, with a toy inside

by **Riotflea** » Sat May 19, 2007 1:57 pm

Yeah, exactly.

They're not gashapon toys. They came in boxes with 2 compartments... one for the gum and one for the model or rubber decoy.

Honestly though, for the life of me, I can't remember if there were 2 different types of boxes. I'm thinking it might've been, one coming in parts you had to assemble.

I know the box art for Optimus and Starscream were used, so perhaps one was used for the eraser guys and one for the model guys.

Curse my brain, I hit the limit of my knowledge on these things!

I have no more to say!

(...wonders if he can translate japanese lettering of Ravage's tail::)

News Credits: 1082 · by **Tigertrack** » Sat May 19, 2007 4:00 pm

Riotflea wrote:Yeah, exactly.

They're not gashapon toys. They came in boxes with 2 compartments... one for the gum and one for the model or rubber decoy.

Honestly though, for the life of me, I can't remember if there were 2 different types of boxes. I'm thinking it might've been, one coming in parts you had to assemble.

I know the box art for Optimus and Starscream were used, so perhaps one was used for the eraser guys and one for the model guys.

Curse my brain, I hit the limit of my knowledge on these things!
I have no more to say!

(...wonders if he can translate japanese lettering of Ravage's tail::)

You could ask 'Stormrider'. I believe he is fluent in different japanese languages.