Home News
Reviews The List
NYTS Links
Dictionary Gallery
Meat and Potatoes; 4.9
Perks; 4.0
Homer Factor; 4.9
Cyclonus transforms from a loaded, high-tech attack helicopter (Think MI-24 Russian attack chopper with MORE weapons) to a 5" robot. Crumplezone is a Minicon tank that transforms into a robot. Both pieces are mostly light blue and dark purple with grey high-lights. Both also have very solid articuatlion.
Crumplezone can also fire missiles and cause two cannons to pop-out when connected to Cyclonus' power-links. Finally, Crumplezone can also attach itself to Cyclonus' nose and create a very cool attack mode.
The meat and potatoes of this figure are very solid. Hasbro took the lessons from Beast Wars and gave this piece an awesome sculpt; lots of details in panel lines, vents, the works. The figure over-all has a great high-tech look. The articulation is also solid; knees, shoulders, elbows, hips are all accounted for. Granted, not as great as the ball-and-socket joints on Beast Wars, but still good, and probably better for a figure that transforms into a helicopter and back. Even the painting is decent; the light blue and dark purple work surprisingly well on the piece.
Cyclonus' Mini-Con partner, Crumblezone, is also very well done considering how tiny it is. Not awesome articulation, but the hips and 'shoulders' do move, and the detail on the tank is very solid with more panel-lines and vents all over the piece.
Oh, one problem; this thing is surprisingly small. It's not as small as, say, the deluxe version of Jetstorm, but I was hoping for something the size of, oh, say 7" in robot form, not 5".
Perks... well. Good news, the transformation is excellent; not super-complicated, like some Beast Wars pieces, but still a dramatic change from butt-kicking, super-armed chopper from Hades into cool robot. Even the the transformation of Crumbzone from tank to robot is neat but simple. The merging of the two is also very coo; Crumblezone folds over and becomes an additional cockpit that attaches directly to Cyclonus' nose.
The Mini-Con actions though, aren't very spectacular. The way it works is every spot with a Mini-Con activated device has a giant 'post' on it. Buried in the post is a tiny metal rod that is the 'button' that activates the device, whether it's a missile, shield, whatever. The Mini-Con has a little divot with a peg inside. You press the Mini-Con right on the post, the peg pushes the metal rod, and there you go. ... I know, I wasn't that impressed either. This might be more impressive on bigger pieces, like Optimus Prime, but on Cyclonus all you're doing is launching a missile and causing some cannons to pop-up in robot mode. You could have just left buttons out for the same effect. Not a huge deal.
Homer Factor is still big for me. After waiting for re-issues from Japan, Hasbro jumped back on the Transformers bandwagon AND brought back the vehicles that made G1 so sweet. Throw in the tricks learned from Beast Wars, and you have something very promising.
Over-all, it's a good figure; a nice transformation, great sculpt. Unfortunately after all the hoopla about the Mini-Cons, all this figure has is basically a glorified Targetmaster. Hopefully the other pieces from this line will have something more dramatic to show us. meanwhile, the piece is still a good piece of work, just don't expect to be awe-inspired.