Toy Line : Transformers Generations Selects
By : TakaraTomy
Year : 2021
Class : Leader
Price : RM 265 (From Toys Empire)
STAR CONVOY - As far as I know, this is the final and most powerful incarnation of the beloved G1 Optimus Prime. He was never animated and his stories were told though comic panels in some Japanese TV Magazine. The order of the Japanese G1 timeline is pretty much the same with the regular English release up till season 3. They ignored the "rebirth" story arc that was season 4 for the rest of the world. Instead they made Headmasters, Masterforce and Victory. After that with waning interest in transformers, the next story arc, Transformers Zone only had ONE episode made. The rest were made in comic form which will eventually lead to the Battlestars saga where our buddy star convoy here belongs. Resurrected from death (AGAIN) by the leader of the Zone Story arc Dai Atlas when he jammed the Universal level Zodiac energy into Convoy/Prime's chest and boom..He is now Star Convoy/Prime. (fooh that was a long one wasn't it?)
Vehicle Box
First up is the box. It comes in a black sleeve covering a brown box. Can you feel the premiumness it's emanating??? I sure can :P No idea why in Japanese releases, brown mailer box means premium, even more so with a sleeve. But heyyyy, here it is for all your box perverts. The Black sleeve has a line art of Star Convoy on it.
Vehicle Mode
Star Convoy is a red, blue and silver truck ( I know I was surprised too :P) It's basically a slight remold/retool of the old Power of the Primes Optimus prime. You can see the silver matrix in the the cab. And the original Star convoy came with a micromaster of Hot Rod. Getting that is virtually impossible now. But I do happen to have the WST Hot Rod which works just as well if not better. WST Hot Rod is also my preview review
https://sarangmaksiat.blogspot.com/2022/05/hot-rod-worlds-smallest-transformer.html
It rolls just fine but other than being a truck, it doesn't do anything else . The container doesn't even have storage for smaller vehicles.
Optimus Prime Robot
The core robot is basically Optimus Prime/ Convoy. The POTP version came with Orion Pax, here we get OP himself. The core robot is classified as a deluxe and has all the basic modern articulation you'd expect, except for a waist joint. And if you're an old fossil like me, you'd probably notice the design of the core robot and why it feels so familiar. It kinda resembles action master OP, right down to the yellow eyes. Looks ok from the front, but from the back, while not totally terrible unlike other bots (koff any version of arcee koff) its still not ideal. But alas it is the design and mold limitations.
Base Mode
One of the things with Zone and Battlestars and Zone bots were base modes for the micromasters. The other being that they were motorized and can move around. The Motorized function is of course not available in this day and age. With the selects version, the base mode can still be done but the smaller size means he doesn't have as much real estate as the original and also prices of plastic ( and everything else in the world) has gone up so he doesn't come with as much stuff. But yeah the base mode is still doable but it feels empty. There are ports on bot, so if you have any spare guns or a few of those battlizers or C.O.M.B.A.T bots and stick it all over the base mode. And just to show how much play feature we lost compared to the 90s here's a pic of the original G1 base mode.
So yeah, but at least these days we get better articulation....Yay....
Star Convoy Mode
Here it is the combined mode, Star Convoy. It is good looking, and it looks like Star Convoy from the comics. In this mode you have the shoulder cannons and a huge golden star on his chest. Face sculpt is also definitely recognizable as prime. Poseability is great, so fight scenes are definitely a thing you can do.
Accessories
Star Convoy comes with a gun that can split into 2 and the Silver Matrix which you can combine with the guns to make some kind of Matrix blaster.
The guns are also compatible with any energy effects you have.
Things to watch out for
On my copy at least, these things happened :
1. Slightly loose hips and ankles
2. The silver Matrix wasn't painted fully. If you look at the pics there's a dark spot at the center. I fixed it with a silver Gundam Marker EX.
3. Connection of the silver matrix to the guns is not very secure, in fact it just comes off super easily if you look at it funny. I fixed it by using some tape around the peg on the Matrix. This has made it a bit better, but it still falls off if you're not careful.
4. Back heavy and the weak ankles made this a little annoying.
Conclusion
Overall it is a truly nice robot. A nice rework of the POTP prime mold. The problems listed above does detract from it a bit. But overall, it gives you a star convoy at a more affordable price, since hunting for the vintage brick or even the reissue is almost impossible now or if you find it, its going to cost you a few organs. But all in all you get the most powerful version of Prime in the lore and its a fun modern day leader class figure to play with. An easy 7/10
More pics below
Pictoria
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