Dengenki Hobby Magazine - Updates

The May edition of the Japanese magazine, Dengenki Hobby, is now on newsstands. It is filled with lots of exciting information regarding upcoming Transformers. Read below for translated text and pictures. (All translations were done at Seiberton.com.)


Masterpiece Megatron The great tyrant has arrived. Will be released at the end of March.





Transformers Sports Label
The Transformers Sports Label will be released at the end of April. The first sets of shoes were a collaborated effort with Nike. Nike was their first wave partner; however, partnerships with other sport brands will be done in the future. The shoes are 1:2 scale of the Nike Free 7.0 shoe. The shoes are not wearable. To transform them, you must first unlace them. The soles form the backs of the robots. And in robot mode- Optimus Prime & Megatron both wear the Nike 7.0 shoes themselves. The toys will be boxed in Nike style shoe boxes.








Transformers Movie & Movie Toys
The movie will be released in Japan on August 4, 2007. Advanced movie tickets are now on sale in Japan. For a limited time, if you purchase an advanced ticket you will receive a transforming pen (see photo). Details about the movie characters will be released soon.

The Transformers movie toy products will be available in Japan. This month, the Optimus Prime movie toy is featured. He is modeled after a W900 vehicle. Takara had difficulty designing the movie toys. Typically the designers start from scratch with ideas, transformations, and various modes. But in this case the process was different. The Takara designers were given the movie designs first and then had to engineer the transformations to fit the designs. A different movie toy will be featured in Dengenki Hobby next month.





Transformers Music Label
Soundwave, Frenzy, and Rumble will be released in the middle of July. A miniSD card can be placed is Soundwave’s chest to listen to music.

Rumble and Frenzy will appear white when in their alternate modes; but when they transform into their robot modes – they will retain their G1 color schemes. Rumble & Frenzy can also play music while in their robot.





Binaltech Black Convoy BT-17
The Binaltech eHobby Exclusive, Black Convoy, sold out quickly, early in the morning at the
Tokyo Winter Wonderfest, in February. Also showcased at the conference- KISS Players Cassettes and Masterpiece Megatron.





Beast Wars
Beast Wars first wave has now been released, which includes TM-01 to TM-08. The Beast Wars figures were repainted to closely match their animated counterparts. A greater variety of colors were used and more brush strokes were applied. Takara originally marketed the repainted figures towards children. But now it has become evident that collectors are interested in these particular repaints as well.

Each figure includes a DVD with one Beast Wars episode. The episodes vary. See below for details.

TM-01 Episode #2 “Knock out Destron”
TM-02 Episode #4
TM-03 Episode #5
TM-04 Episode #6
TM-05 Episode #9
TM-06 Episode #10
TM-07 Episode #11
TM-08 Episode #20





Next month TM-09 Rhino, will be released. It will be released at the end of April and will include a DVD with the Episode #3.



Takara Website
Takara has updated its Transformers website. A new feature allows you to access the website through your mobile phone. Use your cellphone to read one of the codes below to directly link to Takara Transformers website.





KISS Players Comic
Each month a KISS Players comic strip is featured in Dengenki Hobby. The short strip often reveals new characters that sometimes get marketed as toys. (The following translations have been summarized and paraphrased in order to make sense.) *Note- Japanese comics read right to left.

Click here to see the comic strip (Note it may not be appropriate for young viewers).

Last episode – The KISS Players Melissa, Syao Syao, and Atari were greeted by the mysterious Sparkbots, who transported them back in time.

This Episode: 15 Go Go

Brave Maximus got caught in the time vortex left behind by the Sparkbots. The girls decided to split up in order to help Brave Maximus. Each girl went with a separate Sparkbot. Brave Maximus finally erupted from the time warp 400 million years later. The robots on the planet saw Brave Maximus erupt from the time warp and replied – “I hope he brought us something good”.

Elsewhere, Syao Syao and the Sparkbot, Angela, come face to face with another time traveling robot. Syao Syao screams – “who are you with the scary face!” The mysterious robot replies “I am not scary.” - Stay tuned for next episode.