[It's time for the first review of Transformers Week (there are so many more to come, that my head is about to explode), and this time it's brought to us by Phillip Reed of battlegrip.com. He's taking a look at the Transformers Collection Perceptor figure, a rerelease of a classic. Read on for the rest of the review! -TAO]
Name: Perceptor
Line: Transformers Collection
Manufacturer: Takara
Scale: Do Transformers even have a scale? He’s a microscope that turns into a tank that turns into a robot.
Accessories: Rifle and missile launcher with three missiles.
Originally released in Japan, then released in the US, and then taken
back to Japan, Perceptor is a working microscope that spent a lot of
Transformers Season Two (back in the eighties, for those of you just
joining the Transformers universe) acting like he knew what he was
talking about. Perceptor was one of those annoying characters in the
cartoon but I loved him anyway; I’ve got a weakness for robots with
shoulder cannons.
6 / 10 - For a toy from the 1980s, Perceptor actually looks pretty nice. His
robot mode is far superior to his microscope mode (which has some
questionable design decisions where the arms fold up and the entire
base of the microscope looks terrible), and Perceptor has lots of
clean, smooth lines and beautifully sculpted robot details. The face is
your basic Transformers-style head from 1985 – mouth shield and eyes –
but it’s functional and recognizable so it works.
5 / 10 - I’m giving Perceptor a low mark in his paint score for one reason:
paint wasn’t really a part of this toy’s design. Every piece – except
for the face and the silver detail on the top of his forehead – is cast
in its color and any color details on the body parts is executed with
stickers (which came pre-applied in this reissue, so that was a nice
touch). The paint on the eyes, mouth shield, and forehead detail is
well applied, but there’s so little of it that the painters couldn’t
help but get it right.
6 / 10 - I’m giving Perceptor a higher articulation score than he probably
deserves, but that’s only because he has better articulation than most
Transformers toys from the eighties. Perceptor’s arms swivel at the
shoulders, his elbows and knees are hinged, and his hips swing outward
(Perceptor can do the splits). Every point of articulation on this guy
exists solely to enable his transformation; the Transformers designs
from the eighties weren’t really designed as action figures so the toy
designers didn’t add any extras beyond what it took to get the robot
from one mode to the next.
8 / 10 - Perceptor’s fun because he’s a transforming robot microscope that
works. Sure, he doesn’t have much in the way of magnification, but
twist the knob on the microscope and he can focus on whatever tiny
thing you place in front of him. He’s also fun because the designers
armed him well – Perceptor’s missile launcher is spring-loaded so you
can fire missiles at other toys in your collection – and even went so
far as to give him a pretty crude tank mode. And at 7-inches tall,
Perceptor towers over most of the mid-sized Transformers from the
eighties; who would have thought this robot microscope could give the
great Optimus Prime a run for his money when it comes to toy height?
Well, Perceptor’s actually taller than the original Prime robot.
4 / 10 - This reissue was pretty expensive, coming in at about $50, but I was
mostly paying for nostalgia and not an awesome toy. There’s no argument
that most of today’s Transformers toys are far superior designs to the
toys from the eighties, but there’s something exciting in owning a
piece of Transformers history. If I was comparing his value to that of
an original, MIB Perceptor I’d place this guy at a 10. As it is,
though, comparing him to other toys on the market today, Perceptor isn’t a good value.
Overall Score: 61 / 100 - This is an Okay Toy
[Perceptor seems like a fun toy with technical qualities that have stood up to the test of time quite well, but at a price just a bit too high.
P.S. Leave a comment on this review for a chance to win a toy at battlegrip.com. Comment must be received by midnight on June 27th to be eligible. -TAO]
-Phillip Reed
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