Review: #329
Name: Strafe
Brand: Transformers
Allegiance: Autobot
Line: Unite Warriors
Year of Release: 2016
Size Class: Deluxe
Mold Status: remold of Unite Warriors Blast Off
SPACESHIP MODE:
Strafe transforms into a Cybertronian spaceship with his distinctive twin cannon poking out the front. He is a heavy remold of Unite Warriors Blast Off (the Japanese exclusive new mold).
This version of Strafe is only available as part of the Unite Warriors Computron giftset (the Japanese equivalent of Combiner Wars). The clean white and vibrant red looks amazing in person. The sculpting is fantastic and accurate to the G1 cartoon series.
In terms of size, Strafe doesn't show any of the mass-shrinking as seen in current Deluxe figures. He stacks up well against ROTF Brawn and he feels nice in your hands.
While Strafe looks best with his standard robot gun, you can also peg in the combiner piece on top to store in this mode. However, the colors clash and the aerodynamic look is lost.
An absolutely fantastic alternate mode that has no flaws. Even the obvious robot arms blend in thanks to the white and strategic coloring of only the thrusters.
TRANSFORMATION:
Being a Unite Warriors exclusive mold, the transformation is a tad bit more complex than your standard Combiner Wars figure. It's still simple mind you and shares a lot of similar engineering but additional steps such as folding the wings in, pulling the chassis off and rotating small pieces all serve to make Strafe that much more interesting and fun.
ROBOT MODE:
Strafe's robot mode looks equally fantastic. More red comes out in this mode but the silver paint on his feet and bright blue eyes gives him his own unique distinctive features.
He wears most of the front half of the spaceship mode on his back though but it sits flush against his back and pegs in such that it doesn't matter.
If you wish, you can point the orange guns upwards to give him that distinctive silhouette.
The head sculpt is great with clearly defined details. The only negative is that the head sits on a tiny piece that doesn't peg in so it can flop. The head itself is on a balljoint.
In terms of size, a lot of the mass is now in his legs giving him a bulkier lower body. Nonetheless, he is still pretty sizeable.
Poseability is excellent as you'd expect a toy to be these days. He has all the standard joints plus waist swivels and ankle tilts.
Unfortunately, his hips are a bit too bad so that they can't spread to the sides that much.
Strafe comes with a small orange gun (that was pegged onto the top of spaceship mode).
He can hold it in either hand. If you really wanted to, you can also peg it to the top of his fists as a stabbing thing, but it's nice that you still get the standard proper fist holes.
His other weapon is the combiner piece, Strafe has a dual missile launcher.
He has ports underneath his left arm such that he can wield the weapon in an underslinging manner, which looks much better and more manageable.
A perfect robot mode, there isn't many flaws here to ruin the figure. It's cartoon accurate, colors look fresh and has a bit of playability, what's not to like?
OVERALL:
Strafe is a brilliant toy, and he is my favorite in the UW-08 Computron box set. While he is a remold, it is such a significant remold that he is pretty much a new figure compared to Blast Off. The spaceship mode looks great and the robot mode even better, Strafe is definitely one of the key highlights of Computron.
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For other Transformers reviews, including the rest of the Technobots, refer to this page.
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Of course, that's not all from Strafe, since he is a Technobot, he can combine with others to form Computron.
Strafe normally forms the left arm of Computron and his arm mode looks pretty good.
His arm mode is perfect in size, especially with the forearms not being too large but not too skinny either.
He can also form the leg which is basically the spaceship mode with the cockpit folded down. Note that with the small front winglets, you can fold them up or down however you like.
That's it for now, thanks for reading!