Since, unlike the G1 interpretation of HeadMasters, the Titan Masters were supposed confer some sort of power boost or upgrade upon the larger figures, but neither the packaging nor the instructions actually detailed any of this (although Hasbro did release a digital mini-comic/bio booklet to fill in the blanks) it was pretty much left up to the imagination of the individual what these replacement heads would do for any of the larger toys.
The triple-changing accessories to provide a bit more play value, as their weapon modes could be wielded by the larger robots but, on the whole, they seemed a bit pointless. The only reason I bought these two was to turn them into Overlord's Powermasters via an upgrade kit made available at TFNation 2017 by the Nottingham Robot Company. Since that didn't pan out, I may as well give them their own little write-up...
Apeface
Vehicle Mode:
We start off strong with a fairly faithful, if rather simplified version of G1 Apeface's vehicle mode, molded in purple and black plastic, with grey and red paint on the nosecone. There's a fairly decent amount of sculpted detail, but it's immediately obvious that the intakes/wings/afterburners parts on either side will be serving multiple purposes as there are little hands sculpted in towards the back.
Apeface himself slots neatly into the top of the vehicle forming the bulk of its internal mass, but it looks rather silly because his entire body is visible from above.
Beast Mode:
G1 Apeface was one of the two triple-changing Decepticon HeadMasters - I only ever bought Snapdragon - with his name hinting that his beast mode was that of a robotic gorilla. This form may not be quite so successful as the Titan Master's vehicle form, but it's surprisingly decent, if a little empty from behind. The paintwork here amounts to grey over his chest and a strip of red on his visor - the gorilla head here being part of the body rather than an alternate form of the Apeface Titan Master figure. It's a shame the face lacks the original's purple mouth, but I guess the paint budget only allowed for two colours...
The arms are articulated for almost 360° rotation at the shoulder - hindered only by the purple flaps sticking out of the back - and, thanks to a pair of nubs representing his beast mode feet, he's able to stand well with one arm raised.
The space in his back features a couple of Titan Master foot pegs, so Apeface can stand on the beast's back, effectively riding himself.
Weapon Mode:
TargetMasters were always pretty clumsy and clunky, but this one raises the bar for silliness. With the arms/wings rotated 180° and a 5mm peg flipped round, you end up with a ridiculously wide and cumbersome double-barrelled gun that resembles a spacecraft with a robotic gorilla on its underside (is that better or worse than a jet with a robot on the underside?). I'm not even sure if the Apeface Titan Master is supposed to remain plugged in to this form but, since there was no 'full size' version of the figure, he's got nowhere else to go...
Titan Master:
In and of himself, the Titan Master mini-figure that is Apeface seems a little pointless... but, like most of the others, he's reasonably detailed if rather lacking in the paintwork department. Molded in the same purple and black plastics as the vehicle, he seems to be a miniature representation of the complete G1 Apeface toy - at least as far as his head and chest are concerned. The figure's head is reflected - larger and with paint - in its Titan Master head mode - an excellent adaptation of the G1 version, keeping to the look of the box art rather than the underwheming toy.
Overboard
Ground Beast Mode:
Where Apeface's accessory manages to look familiar in both its main forms, Overboard only really looks like his G1 self in one of his beast modes - specifically, this dinosaur which vaguely resembles G1 Overkill. Of course, Overkill was one of the later cassetticons, never released in the UK, and came packaged with additional chrome weapons, where this thing has to make do with his weapon mode's 5mm peg as a sort of overhead cannon thing. He's also lacking G1 Overkill's snout horn
Paintwork here is just as limited as on Apeface, if not moreso - the upper section of head is painted off-white, with the eyes picked out in yellow. His 'tail' - being also his flying beast mode head - has a couple of spots of red paint on its eyes, but that's not nearly as distracting as the simple fact that the tip of his tail is clearly a robotic bird head. The rest of him is largely plastic shell, molded in off-white and dark blue plastics, with the Titan Master figure clipped inside his chest forming his lower jaw and his stubby arms, which seem rather too far down his body. The jaw can open, though it's at the expense of the beast mode's structural integrity, as the torso plates only stay plugged into the neck when the Titan Master's heel is pegged into the roof of the mouth, keeping the neck at the right angle. The arms, too, are rather restricted in their movement due to the torso panels holding him in place and the legs, while mounted on ball-jointed hips, aren't especially mobile, even for transformation, partly due to the pegs that keep his legs at a fixed angle for weapon mode.
Flying Beast Mode:
There are so many ways in which this is just not convincing... The legs remain unchanged from his dinosaur mode, though the sculpted detail means they can be interpreted as having been physically changed between forms, while the wings are awkwardly shaped and not very mobile, despite each one being mounted on its own ball joint. Worst of all, though, this flying beast's 'tail' is the top of his dinosaur mode's head, with its teeth pointed upward.
On the upside, the legs are a bit more useful because, in this orientation, they clear the weapon mode pegs that hindered them in dino mode. Also, for added play value, the Overboard Titan Master figure can plug into the root of his tail to ride the flying beast, but he sticks up between its wings, further restricting their movement.
This form also has the least visible paint - Crashbash at least had a painted neck, while Clobber had a silver-painted head... This one looks very plain, not to say unfinished, since its only decoration is the red of its eyes.
Weapon Mode:
As with Apeface, the weapon mode looks pretty daft though, on the upside, it's fairly plain that the Titan Master figure should not be inserted into this one, or it'd just look like the dinosaur form with its tail folded up.
While the bases of the feet cleverly include sculpted gun barrel details, the base of the bird mode's neck, once revealed, also exhibits signs of its intended usage as a weapon. That said, it does feel as though some sort of 'ammo pack' accessory should have been included to bulk out the middle section, as it now looks very empty. I'd also have thought a little paint in the rectangular, central barrel would have been useful to highlight its presence - the dark blue plastic really doesn't help the sculpted detail pop out.
Titan Master:
As a straight repaint of Crashbash, the Overboard Titan Master looks like a miniature version of the G1 mini HeadMaster Squeezeplay, but in off-white and dark blue. The figure's head sculpt is fantastic and the body detailing is quite interesting - almost looking like organic, somewhat insectoid armour... he just needed a bit more of a paint job.
The Titan Master head mode is, again, a straight recolouring of the original where the likes of Clobber re-used the transforming accessory and mini-figure, but gave the head mode a new faceplate designed to resemble Grimlock. The face is painted off-white, to match the plastic, with the eyes picked out in red. The sculpted detail of the helmet is quite intricate on the central crest, and this is one of the few faceplates I've seen that effectively uses the visible details of the Titan Master's arms as part of the overall 'helmet' design. The face could just as easily pass as a Femme-Bot due to its slightly pouty lips, though the chin spike isn't the most feminine of features.
Being such small, simple toys, transformation of each Titan Master's accessory/partner tends to be a two-step affair: changing from Apeface's spacecraft to beast mode involves simply rotating the wings/arms forward about 45° and, having removed the Titan Master, flipping the nosecone onto his back, while converting him into his weapon mode requires only that the wings/arms rotate forward 180° and the 5mm peg is swung down between his feet. Meanwhile, Overboard's dino-to-bird transformation means the legs rotate about 180° around the hip ball joints and the dino torso is split open to create bird wings and allow the Titan Master to be removed, while weapon mode requires only straightening the legs, pegging them in and flipping up the 5mm peg on the dinosaur's back.
Neither the Titan Masters nor the accessories are particularly well articulated - the usual arm and head movement on tiny ball joints, with joined, pinned legs for the former, and limb movements - legs and wings on Overboard, forearms only on Apeface - via either ball joints or pegs... Really nothing spectacular.
I didn't see the point of these 'extra' Titan Masters before buying these two, and still don't... They're either a missed opportunity, or a cyncal cash-grab on Hasbro's part. Many were given recognisable faces, some even with their G1 names or close equivalents, but there were duplications both within the line (Brawn was also released as a Legends class figure), within the Power of the Primes chapter (Clobber being Grimlock, Ptero being Swoop, Repugnus getting a Prime Wars Trilogy Special Edition Deluxe via Amazon) and even within War for Cybertron: Siege (Skytread).
As I mentioned, though, I only bought these two solo Titan Masters with a view to using the Overpower Upgrade Kit which I picked up at TFNation 2017. Sadly, that turned out to be a bust for several reasons. The kit looks decent enough, with its almost chrome-like gold and silver paint, but at least one of the Powermaster backplates was made of two parts glued together, and the glue broke apart on mine. Plus, the material used (some kind of 3D Printer resin) was a bit too tough, and the screws provided were not self-tapping, so I had great difficulty getting them to fasten. Lastly, the block provided for Overlord's head (for those wanting to use Dreadnaut as one of his Powermasters) didn't fit the neck socket and, other than gluing, there seemed to be no way to actually attach Overlord's face.
Then again, it transpired that these two figures weren't a good fit for his chest sockets anyway... but none of the Titan Masters were, as far as I could tell. Something about them would catch in the sockets, making them very difficult to remove. Weirdly, Prime Masters are a much better fit so, were it not for their strange colourschemes, they'd work well enough either in their stock form or with the replacement backplates... Though I certainly couldn't recommend the Overpower Upgrade Kit when a number of simpler, single-piece options are available on Shapeways.
No comments:
Post a Comment