Toy Review: Transformers Generations Studio Series Arcee (ROTB) (Core)

Review:  #775

Name:  Arcee

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Autobot

Line:  Generations - Studio Series

Year of Release:  2023

Size Class:  Core (Wave 5)

Mold Status:  new

VEHICLE MODE:

Based upon her Rise of the Beasts appearance, Arcee transforms into a red and pink motorcycle.

Given the small size of the figure, naturally there are some compromises.  In particular, there is no effort to hide the robot hands behind the seat.

The Core size is tiny, and in my opinion, one of the worst dollar to value ratio in terms of size classes.  Above is a comparison against Legion Barricade, and Arcee is only barely bigger.

The robot gun pegs underneath the motorcycle, which also acts as a stand to prop up the bike mode.

Considering the small size and relatively complicated transformation, this is a very decent motorcycle mode.

TRANSFORMATION:

Complicated for its small size, so it can feel a bit fiddly at times due to the smaller pieces.  The back splits into two to form the robot arms.  While the legs unfold from the bottom half of the bike, and you also flip the wheels behind in the process.  The front the bike can then be folded down to form the torso.

ROBOT MODE:

Arcee's robot mode looks good, and the white, pink and red color is amazing when together like this.

She carries a lot of kibble, the front wheel is just resting on her back, along with the front of the bike.  While the rear wheels have split into two and just hang behind her legs.

The head sculpt is good, and you can make out the nice details despite it being so small.

A comparison against Core Soundwave and Legion Crosshairs, so that you can see how she fares now.

The legs are huge, given that it is the bottom half of the bike with no effort to slim it down.

She has plenty of articulation, with joints for her head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips and knees.

She comes with a gun, which she can hold in either hand, and it is shaped to cover her hand.

Alternatively, the front wheel is a separate piece that you can detach (it comes detached in the package) and theoretically Arcee can hold it in her hand as a weapon, even though it looks cheesy.

An undocumented but deliberate feature is how you can clip the back wheels on her legs together again, and she can rest on the singular wheel.

She is surprisingly sturdy on only one wheel if you get the balance right.

Otherwise, that's about it for all her features and gimmicks.

She is only in the Core size class given her relative scale to the other characters, but while the vehicle scaling is about right, the robot seems a bit too small.

On her own, Arcee is a neat figure.

OVERALL:

Arcee works well in the size class, just that the size class is a tad overpriced, so it is very hard to recommend her at full price.  Both modes are solid, so if you can get her at a fairly deep discount, then she is worthwhile.

----------------------------------------------------

For other Transformers reviews, have a look at this page and this page.

Purchase from Amazon using this link.

(As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)

Black Clover - Season 2 (2018-19)

Black Clover is based on the manga and the second season is 51 episodes long. It is set in a fantasy world where everyone can use magic. Magic is assisted through the use of a grimoire. The Clover Kingdom is protected by the Wizard King and he commands the Magic Knights. Their structure is similar to guilds. The anime follows Asta, a boy who has absolutely no magic (which has never occurred before) but he has the ability to nullify all magic with his two black magic swords. He aims to become the Wizard King and despite his disadvantages, he never succumbs to despair. He is joined by childhood friend and rival, Yuno, who is on the opposite end of the spectrum, being very gifted in magic.

After the big arc finished in the first season and it immediately commenced the next one, naturally, the second season continues right after that point. With the set up, you would have expected something huge and equally as long but that isn’t the case. The arc is wrapped up in a few episodes, although it introduces the enemy Diamond Kingdom and some of their uses, ultimately, it is not that impactful. The Diamond Kingdom had a few mentions and appearances before but we learn a lot more about their ways and their experiments in magic.

The next arc is triggered by the consequences of the events of the last season. Being a sword user and having both of his arms out of commission is a big disadvantage for Asta, so the Black Bulls knights try and find ways to heal him. It’s heartwarming to see Asta having grown to such a big and special part of their lives such that everyone puts in their all to find a cure. The teamwork displayed at the end of the last season continues here and it strongly emphasizes the teamwork and innate trust that each one has for another. Extending from that are the friendly rivalries that Asta has with Yuno and members of the other Knights, in which each of them use the other for motivation to get better and stronger.

Despite the buildup of several strong characters as villains where you would expect at least a similarly big and climactic showdown as the big villain of season one, this doesn’t happen. All too often, a supposedly extremely strong character is knocked down in the space of an episode and with something that doesn’t nearly have the same amount of thought put into it. Asta retains his happy and unwavering optimism as well as his abundance of enery. It can still get a bit too much when he doesn’t shut up but this is also the most endearing and iconic part of him. Asta isn’t Asta if he doesn’t do these kinds of things.

The amount of filler content has gone up and they are not spaced very well. There are the usual episodes between each arc but then it decides to put some filler or a recap episode right in the middle of a battle, or straight after a cliffhanger of sorts. It’s jarring and destroys the suspense and atmosphere that it had managed to build up. This affects the season finale because the final episode of the season is… a recap episode. This is really annoying, and it would have been better if they could have structured and placed these filler episodes better without breaking any of the storytelling. This is because these filler episodes seem to miss more often than not.

The arcs for the reason of the season may not seem like it at first, but they are all related in one way or another. They go by equally fast but it’s not a bad thing. There’s your typical arc where it pits characters against each other and it uses this to show off the abilities of all the characters we already know, as well as new ones. The point of this is so that when those characters show up again, we are already familiar with them and have at least some sort of attachment, however minimal. The theme of the season seems to be how much the characters have grown stronger. Nearly each of the members of the Black Bulls have someone that they can show off again and surprise them. This can lead to interesting battles where they use their abilities in ways we haven’t seen before.

The pairings of characters is good and bad because it covers off each of the characters, but it has to rush some battles while spending more time on others. This can lead to uneven pacing and seemingly rushes to the ending. After dragging out things in the beginning by covering each of the battles, it then truncates the final ones. It’s not bad but considering the buildup, it seems wasted when Asta finishes his last battle with a quick and somewhat unsatisfying strike. Some of the battles in the season shifts in animation style and this isn’t necessarily a good thing. The animation quality overall is okay and there are the usual tricks of limiting the movement in certain scenes to save on budget. There are a lot of places where the character models are off but there is just enough quality to keep it fun to watch.

Despite the hiccups and the constant switching of perspectives at the worst possible time, the final arc throws many curveballs that you would not expect. It does feel that the past 80+ episodes were building up to this point as it was the big overarching arc. It gets crazy in terms of plot development, and it does things that you would not expect and thought would have been sacred. It gets to the point where you don’t know how it can get resolved without significant negative consequences. The anime doesn’t completely shy away from the darker things, and innocent civilians do die. Unfortunately, the season ends on a cliffhanger with plenty more story content to go, so that somewhat sucks.

Overall, the second season of Black Clover, despite the sheer amount, and the poor timing, of useless filler and recap episodes, is still enjoyable. There are ups and downs to the season, but on the whole, it is better than average. The season packs in a lot of story arcs and it manages to link them all together so that it doesn’t feel like any one of those is wasted time. It is a shame that they couldn’t have finished the final story arc within the season but the plot moves forward so much, with so many developments to digest, that you can’t help but be excited for where the story will go next.

--------------------------------------------------

For other anime reviews, have a look at this page and this page.

Kawaii Deathu Desu (Switch)

Kawaii Deathu Desu is a beat ‘em up game with a very simple control scheme. While it is easy enough to learn and play, the game doesn’t have a tutorial, at all. You’ll have to figure out the menus and controls yourself. The same goes for the premise, you’ll need to read the description on the store page to know what’s the background of this game. It’s basically that supernatural beings are reincarnated as Japanese idols. During their performances, they are swarmed by fans and they take this opportunity to reap as many souls as they can. It’s a competition to them, to see who can claim the throne of the underworld.

The game only uses two buttons and they’re the two shoulder buttons. The left shoulder button will have the character attack left, while the right shoulder button will have the character attack right. Fans will run in from both sides and so you’ll need to juggle between the two sides. This is made harder when fans come in at different speeds, and certain fans will have multiple bars of health so you’ll need to hit them several times. It is hard at first, until you realise that attacking one side will move the character a bit towards that side, so you can delay the time a fan gets to you from the other side.

Each character has a health bar and they lose some of it if a fan runs into them. As you reap the souls, it’ll charge up your magic. Once the bar is full, it will automatically activate, which basically gives you a more powerful one-hit kill move that has a bigger range. The difficulty lies in juggling the crowd when huge amounts of fans swarm in from both sides and it can get hectic. It can feel cheap when the stages can depend on luck and how many fans swarm you from one side to overwhelm you, versus other attempts where it doesn’t. There’s little skill and difficulty when it is designed this way.

While the game is easy to pick up and is fun at first, the game is ultimately repetitive and shallow. You’re mashing two buttons where skill and timing is not required. The Switch is also not the best way to play using physical buttons as the shoulder buttons on the Joy-Cons are tiny and uncomfortable to quickly press in a game such as this one. Thankfully, there are touch screen controls, where you tap on the side you want to attack and it works much better that way. That being said, the game is designed more for short bursts, rather than long sessions, as your hands will get cramped if you tried to play for longer periods of time.

The game is a pixel art game but it can look messy and confusing at first. The menus aren’t the best, so you’ll probably miss the fact that you can level your characters up. By collecting the souls, you’re able to use them to level the characters, improving their damage, health etc. This will help you survive and pass the later stages, which are more difficult. Each stage has three modes: a Normal mode where you must beat it three times to unlock the next stage; a Hard mode which is harder; and an Endless mode, which you can play until you die. There’s no way to regain health and the differences between each stage are mostly aesthetics, as only the background and the designs of the fans change.

The souls that you collect can also be used to unlock new characters, which has different attack animations and magic stages. There are clothing options for the characters, although these are for purely aesthetics reason only. The game makes the unfortunate choice of having everything be extremely grindy. You gain souls at a pitiful rate in comparison to how much it costs to unlock things. You will need to level up to beat the next stage, so you’re stuck repeating the previous one for ten times before you can progress. When the gameplay is as shallow and repetitive like this, it is not a good thing to force the player to grind.

The harder levels just mean more enemies and that they run faster towards you. Each stage ends up devolving into fending off long enough to charge your magic. Then once you get the special attack and wipe out the waves, you continue to last long enough to run out the timer and finish the level. The game doesn’t take long to “finish”, given that there are only 12 stages. The bulk of the time is just slowly grinding for enough souls to unlock all 9 characters and upgrade them.

Overall, Kawaii Deathu Desu may sound like a good idea on paper, as the simple controls and premise can lend well to a chilled and relaxing but also hectic game. Unfortunately, the executed product is only fun for around the first ten minutes, and then because that’s all there is to the game, it’s hard to keep going to unlock everything. Even trying out all the stages at least once can feel like a chore due to the sheer amount of grinding thanks to the repetitive and shallow gameplay.

---------------------------------------------------

For other game reviews, have a look at this page and this page.

Toy Review: Transformers Generations Studio Series Gamer Edition Barricade (Deluxe)

Review:  #774

Name:  Barricade

Brand:  Transformers

Allegiance:  Decepticon

Line:  Generations - Studio Series:  Gamer Edition

Year of Release:  2023

Size Class:  Deluxe (Wave 20)

Mold Status:  new

VEHICLE MODE:

Gamer Edition Barricade is based upon his War for Cybertron game appearance, and he transforms into a Cybertronian car.

It's black and grey and definitely looks Cybertronian.  An impressive feat is that the vehicle mode doesn't have any exposed robot parts, even the back which has a large thruster instead.

Barricade is surprisingly big for a Deluxe, although he is still a bit light when you pick him up compared to his size.

This is an oddly proportioned car, since the back juts up so much.  The wheels roll and that's all you get for play value.

The robot gun can peg onto the roof in this mode for storage.

This is a good vehicle mode but it really depends if you like the design or not.

TRANSFORMATION:

The front splits into two to form the legs, with the panels that act as the feet flipping down and then you can flip the wheels up.  The back, including the giant thrusters, are one piece that ends up folding to the back of the robot mode, while the arms are formed from the side.  There isn't anything noteworthy about this transformation scheme, but it is functional.

ROBOT MODE:

Barricade's robot mode is nice, but there are some weird design choices that hold him back.

He has quite a bit of kibble, the main ones being the pieces on his back, and the wheels on the outside of his hips.

The head sculpt is fine, although with the way the eyes are sculpted, can make it seem as if he has clown eyes or is crying.

Just like in vehicle mode, the robot mode is surprisingly bigger than expected.  He does have hollow parts but it isn't too bad, the nice plastic quality more than makes up for any hollowness.

As part of the Studio Series line, he comes with a cardboard stand, depicting a scene from the game.

He is quite poseable as one would expect, with joints for his head, shoulders, elbows, waist, hips and knees.

His weapon is a gun, but the gun isn't held in his hand, rather you remove the right arm and replace it with the gun.  It's not a great look given that the gun is so skinny compared to the rest of the robot.

While the gun itself can store on his back, the instructions doesn't show anywhere that you can store the detached arm if you're using the gun.

The wheels, and the panels its on, that are on either side of the hips get in the way of the arms.  You can sort of see what the designer is aiming for when comparing the toy to the character model, but it's just a terrible way to do it and not worth the compromise.

This is an okay robot mode, let down by the kibble, and also the flat feet which just looks weird every single time it is tried on a toy.

OVERALL:

Barricade is an okay toy.  There's nothing REALLY bad about him, but there are a few questionable choices like the flat feet, the hip kibble, and the trend towards detaching and reattaching pieces for weaponry.

----------------------------------------------------

For other Transformers reviews, have a look at this page and this page.

Purchase from Amazon using this link.

(As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases)