August Review Round-Up
(August 1st-16th) 128 Links!

NoisyDvL5

No, your eyes do not deceive you! Review Round-Up is back! Well… sorta. As much as I’d love to bring this feature back full-time, I’m not as made of time and insomnia as I was once! I will endeavor to bring it back as a bi-weekly feature here at IAT.

It’s been about three months since I last posted a Round-Up and I decided that I really missed it. For one, this gives me an excuse to hit up all the other great toy sites out there. It really gives me a feel for what’s popular (the Star Wars Black Reviews seem endless!) and what’s not (Classic Batman is out there, but I only found a smattering of reviews) too. The second reason is just because there are some really hardworking toy bloggers out there who could use just a little more exposure so they can take off and get credit for all the time & love they put into the site. Review Round-Up humbly tries to serve that end.

This Round-Up features the reviews from the first half of August. I trimmed the site list down to just 18 (some were dropped to inactivity, some because they’re bigger sites than 18, and some I might have just plumb forgot in the last few months! Oops! As always, hit me up with an e-mail if you know of a site that should be included). While the list is of sites may be down to 18, that group still managed to crank out 128 reviews so far this month! Wow! My “Review of the Week” tag is a split decision! The title will be shared by part one of Preternia’s Terminus Hexatron review and Xenos-Zone’s intensive look at SDCC Metroplex. Yeah, I might just have big robots on the brain tonight!

Finally, be sure to check out that mountain of Star Wars Black 6″ reviews. I think something might have hit home with my fellow bloggers!

Reviews are categorized by major brands, independent releases such as Onell or Spy Monkey are listed under the same “7th Market” heading we use for our own reviews, and smaller brands are grouped together under Miscellaneous. As always, offsite reviews do not necessarily reflect the views of IAT or its staff.

7th Market

Beast Saga / Battle Beasts

DC Comics

G.I. Joe

Imports

LEGO

Marvel

Masters of the Universe

Masters of the Universe, cont.

Miscellaneous

Predator

Star Wars

TMNT

Transformers

Transformers Unlicensed

Wrestling

Do you know of (or run) a toy site that you think I’d enjoy? Let me know!

 

NoisyDvL5

10 thoughts on “August Review Round-Up
(August 1st-16th) 128 Links!”

  3. Thanks for the shout out!

    More people need to check out that review of Acid Rain Stronghold 4 Eyes from Vault and Daytimeninja, that thing is pretty damn awesome!

  5. CatWoman – I seem to recall having this figure, but I guess she didn’t make it out of the storage loss?

    Sif – man, whoever managed to grab that MU scale Sif is a lucky bastich. I heard that wave was cancelled? something about the first two weren’t moving, then only a handful of w3 made it out around the time the dvd hit?
    we totally need her in 6″ scale, I don’t care if comic or movie at this point!

    Metroplex – one G1 TF I was glad to discover/recover in dad’s barn (along with Sixshot and several Joe vehicles!), so i don’t need this updated version. He does look cool, tho.

    Hexatron – on that note, this update looks almost too hyper-realistic. I think I prefer my G1 over this guy.

    Orion Pax – still on the fence about this guy.

    1. oops, forgot the WWE!
      giant I grabbed automatically, as Paul’s character(s) is probably the only one I try an dkeep up with, and barely at that. This character seems to get the short end of the stick, imo. His first figure I recall had that NON-removable neckbrace by ToyBiz due to a then still recovering injury, so he looked goofy and I passed on it (as did many others at that KB, I swear it sat there for two years until the place closed down!)

      This guy needs thicker arms, which would look fine on a leaner figure, but not the heavier build of Paul, Andre, and several other literal heavyweight characters.

      that head isn’t doing him any favors, and 3B was more critical of the face than I would be, but the hair is atrocious, and I think mine might actually be off-center? y’know, it actually looks like he just got nailed in the head with a ladder or something? like’s he’s dazed/stoned?

      anywho, I grabbed him with Elite Tensai (aka “Prince” Albert), who I found to be a slight improvement over his recent regular figure, just in articulation alone. the heavy soft-rubber robe was almost a bit stiff, but the figure fits neatly inside and the mask is fun to play with. I hadn’t heard Albert was back in the States, nor that he now sported kanji all over his head, so I guess I might have to find out his latest character’s story?
      (Last I did see of him, he had kanji on his torso, which now seems to be covered in the tribal ink? again, no longer watch WWE, and his being in Japan for years didn’t help.)

      1. Well, if you’re still on the fence about Orion Pax, BL, let me distil a review down to its purest for you:

        Pros: Pretty dang decent-looking in both modes. Very good articulation in robot mode. Nice miniature G1 cannon. Fun comic book included.

        Cons: Small. Bloody difficult to transform the first few times. A couple of pieces feel like they’re going to break before they move the way they’re supposed to (mostly chest and head, but sometimes leg panels). Once in vehicle mode, you have to finagle various bits of it around, otherwise the front wheels will catch on the fenders or all four wheels won’t rest on the ground at the same time. Instructions are not only vague in spots, in one place they’re just plain WRONG. (You don’t swivel the individual shins around, you turn the whole waist-down around 180 degrees.)

        Now that I’ve got the hang of him (Mostly. Sort of.), I’m glad I decided to keep him. But the breaking-in period . . . that was fraught with tension.

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