Toy Review: Knock off Cybertron Seeker

01/22/11

Robots Deformation
Cybertron Seeker

While most knock off versions of Transformers toys are fine examples of the old adage, “You get what you pay for,” I do find some relatively high quality stuff now and again. Those who troll the bowels of the El Dorado that is Divisoria know that there are quite a few bootleg toys that are worth the money those pirates will charge you for them. You just have to know where to look and what to look for.

The best find I’ve had up until now has been the knock off Transformers: Animated Activator toys; Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, Grimlock, and the Seekers. Not only where they made of higher grade plastic than most toys like them, the molds used weren’t as soft and the material held it’s shape better. That meant nice, crisp details. Even with the weak spring action and the lack of the trademarked Autobot or Decepticon logo, they are some very fun toys. Not only that, but they came in all sorts of other colors.

But then I found these babies that I’m reviewing today and they are giving those Activators a run for their money!

I found this guy in Toy Kingdom. Megamall. I spent about a week thinking if I wanted to risk it, seeing as how p130.00 is about $3.00; expensive for a knock off no matter how you slice it. The box says stuff like “BEST NEW OF DESIGN!” and “OUTSTANDING FEATURES!” and “LUXURIOUS PACKAGING!” It’s been slow toy hunting after the holiday season and I was hard up for a new fix. How could I resist?

I finally decided to get one and test it out, fool around with it awhile and see if it was any good.

 

The figure is a copy of the Legends Class version of the Cybertron Seeker. The original Voyager Class Starscream from the Cybertron series in 2005 was the first toy to come out that shared the basic form seen here. That mold was later given a Supreme Class upgrade, then shrunk and reworked into Legends Class for the Legends of Cybertron toyline. The bootleggers took that Legends mold and upgraded it up to about the size of a Scout Class figure, which is about 4 or 5 inches tall.

As you can see from the back of the card, these guys went nuts upsizing the old Legends Class figures, and even some newer ones from the recent movie line. None of them look any good though.

There aren’t a lot of Legend Class figures that were really made with detail in mind. Most are so small that the transformation leaves them looking a bit malformed. The Cybertron Seeker is different though.

The conversion is mainly based on ball-joints that act as articulation in the bot mode, so it retains much of the mobility a character should have. The scale increase doesn’t affect that one bit. Shoulders, hips and knees are ball-jointed, while there are swivels on his neck and his backpack, and hinges for his ankles and flip-out weapons. There are also hinges at his elbows, but they are for his conversion and don’t help his articulation any.

All in all, very nicely done. The re-scaling does throw some of the measurements out of whack, but it’s not really noticeable unless you have it right next to the Legends Class figure.

 

 

Detail, as I said, is superb. Most of the minute nooks and crannies you can see on the Legends Class figure (if you have a magnifying glass anyway) can be seen here. The only place I think it’s lacking is the reverse side of the gun, the side near the body, which is soft and short on lines. This is sad since I was hoping to flip it over to the other side and have a dual-weilding Seeker.

Other than that, A-OK.

Material is another in the win category. The plastic is thicker than your usual knock-off. You have to becareful moving the joints the first time to clear any flashing on them that’s gotten stuck, but so far, I’ve had only one case of breakage on any of them. I do a lot of posing and re-posing so believe me when I say that the “STURDY CONSTRUCTION!” and “SUPERIOR MATERIAL!” blurbs on the “LUXURIOUS PACKAGING!” are true.

Conversion is relatively simple. Fold his legs over his thighs, fold his arms back, pull his torso up and voila! chunky spaceship surprise!

 

Now we inevitably come to that elephant in the room that I’ve ignored; the paint.

There is none.

The manufacturers have deigned to save money (much like Hasbro’s doing now) by forgoing any paint applications. Hence, the figure only colors are the vomitous yellow and orange that the plastic is cast in. There are some 2-packs from the same manufacturer with some cursory paint splashed on, but I chose this for the reason I bought more than one.

I want a squad of Cybertron Seekers.

As soon as I have 9 undamaged figures, I’ll start painting them into Starscream, Thundercracker, Skywarp, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet, Sun Storm, Hail Storm and Acid Storm. Thing is, when I went back to get more after determining that this was a good buy, I could only find 4 decent ones and one with a damaged foot. Drat.

Well, I’m out on the hunt today. Hopefully I’ll find a few more of these.