Toy Review - Siege Micromasters (Wave 2)

[GoktimusPrime]

MICROMASTERS
Rescue Patrol: Red Heat & Barricade
Spy Patrol: Laserbeak and Ravage
Series - Siege
Size/class - Micromaster
New/remould/redeco - New
Wave - 2
Released here - February 2019
Approximate Size - 6cm
Allegiance - Autobot Rescue Patrol, Decepticon Spy Patrol
Alt-mode - fire engine, police car, panels
Main Features/Gimmicks - Cybertronian Omnifunctional Modular Battlefield Assault Technology System

I'll post photos later, but here are my thoughts on the toys...

RESCUE PATROL

Red Hot (aka Red Heat) is a retool and repaint of Siege Big Shot (aka Top Shot) and unfortunately he's inherited many of the drawbacks of that mould. This is a real shame as G1 Red Hot is honestly one of my favourite of the G1 Micromasters. The ladder isn't as well sculpted as there are no rungs sculpted onto it, but there are those zig-zag side struts so... it does look like a ladder from the sides but not from above. Weird. This is meant to be a Cybertronian mode so if they wanted to make it a long fire extinguishing apparatus rather than a ladder, that's fine, but then don't sculpt in those side struts. It looks like it can't decide whether it's a ladder or not. The ladder also causes the toy to be even more back heavy than Big Shot. The heel struts do help to a degree, but yeah, it's still prone to falling over backwards.

Barricade (aka Stakeout) is a whole new mould and is a nice enough representation of G1 Stakeout. It does pretty much what you expect it to do. It has "POLICE" written on the doors in Autobotese, which is weird as the car mode looks incredibly Earth-like. Yeah, it's officially meant to be Cybertronian police car... a really Earth-like looking Cybertronian police car! I actually wish that they'd just written in English or Japanese or some human language. If you're going to make the vehicle mode look so Earthen then just go all the way. Now the colours have white on the bonnet and doors which does make it look less G1 accurate. I initially thought that it was to make the toy look more like G1 Holy, but on closer inspection it's not. If anything it's Holy's colours reversed, so... Unholy?

SPY PATROL

The weakest of all the Siege Micromaster Patrols. Objectively speaking they are both pretty rubbish toys. The only reason I got them is because of my G1 nostalgia bias, but bias aside these are pretty crap. Their alt modes aren't cassettes but just flat rectangular pizza boxes which apparently clip onto Siege Soundwave as armour panels. Universe/Henkei Ravage craps all over Siege Ravage -- if it were possible for me to buy Laserbeak separately without getting Ravage, I would have. And honestly, the only thing about Laserbeak that appeals to me is the head sculpt, which I must admit is a pretty lame reason to buy this set.

Overall: Rescue Patrol is as good as the other Siege Micromasters, so if you liked those then you'll enjoy these. The Spy Patrol is 5 flavours of rubbish, so unless you're a sadly devoted G1 fanboy like me, just avoid it. And if not, then why are you reading this review? You've probably already made up your mind to buy it.

[Tha_Phantom]

if it were possible for me to buy Laserbeak separately without getting Ravage, I would have.

Fair point, people are either going to buy this set because of Laserbeak or not buy it because of Ravage.
I bought it and I don't dislike Ravage as much as I thought I would. I've messed with him a few times now since I got him, but obviously Laserbeak is the real drawcard here.

I did some comparison shots last night between G1 (reissues), Masterpiece and Siege.

[BigTransformerTrev]

That Ravage reminds me of the one that came with TFP:BH Soundwave

Laserbeak looks like his S1:E1 incarnation which is kinda cool

[Paulbot]

I do just want Laserbeak (if anyone just wants Ravage).

Either way both look like huge improvements over the Titans Return versions and those were double the price for the pair.

[Paulbot]

I saw these today and the cassettes are tiny. Much smaller than I expected even with the comparison photos above. They look very poor value compared to the Micromasters in their size class.

[M-bot]

Re the Spy Team - not the worst toy representations of either of those characters, but they would need to be *at most* $5 each (or $10 for the pack of 2) to make them worth the money to buy. I kinda feel the same way about the Rescue Patrol, but I’ve only seen those in package.

[GoktimusPrime]

I find even $5 each hard to swallow, because I reckon that the other Siege Micromasters are really worth $5 each, really. I find the Spy Patrol to be inferior to the other Siege Micros so yeah... less than $5 each... maybe $3 each?

I showed them to a non-TF person this morning and told her that Ravage is meant to be a panther. She told me that he looks nothing like a panther.

[i_amtrunks]

Not sure if I just picked a bit of a bad pack, but both of my rescue patrol figures are very loose and needed some nail polish on their ball joints just to keep them in their sockets. The paint work and overall look is fantastic and they would be an awesome little present, but if the looseness of my figures is more common-spread, then I cannot really recommend.

Like any toys these days, the full RRP is not worth it, but at discount? Sure!

[dirge]

Not sure if I just picked a bit of a bad pack, but both of my rescue patrol figures are very loose and needed some nail polish on their ball joints just to keep them in their sockets.

My Stakeout is okay, but Red Hot was pretty bad in this regard.

[GoktimusPrime]

Photos and further comments...

SPY PATROL

Laserbeak - alt mode comparison

And there is no comparison. G1 Laserbeak is a cassette tape. Siege Laserbeak is flat-packed Ikea furniture. Yeah, I get that they're meant to be armour panels for Soundwave, but the thing is that this makes Laserbeak and Ravage not much more than accessories for Soundwave, diminishing their stand alone playability as toys in their own right. I never had Soundwave in the 1980s - I didn't get my original G1 Soundwave until I found him for about $5 at a flea market in the mid 90s. So for a good decade I played with my Decepticon Cassettes without Soundwave (aside from occasionally borrowing a Soundwave from friends). The point I'm making is that the G1 Cassettes were perfectly enjoyable toys in their own right even without Soundwave. Obviously having Soundwave ramped up the play value, but the Cassettes still did have play value on their own. I'm really not getting it with the Siege Spy Patrol guys because ... well... they're not exactly robots in disguise and their alt modes have no other independent utility.

Laserbeak - robot mode comparison

As mentioned before, the head is the real appeal on Siege Laserbeak, which is a pretty absurd reason to go buy this set (and yet I did it ). As you can see from the inset screen shot, the head is the only part of this robot mode that resembles Laserbeak's Cybertronian robot mode in the G1 cartoon. The body is completely different. And it lacks any guns, so... no lasers... just beak? The return of the cheap looking "Hasblow grey" on both Laserbeak and Ravage isn't great either. In terms of value for money, adjusting for inflation a G1 Cassette would be roughly $15 today, so only about $5 above what these Siege Spies cost, and yet still infinitely superior value for money. This would be one of the few if not the first time I've seen CHUG figures and actually considered them to be vastly inferior to their G1 counterparts... despite being separated by over 35 years' worth of design and engineering. Toys released in 2019 ought not to be comparatively inferior to toys released in 1984.

Ravage - robot mode comparison with Henkei Jaguar

Again, just no comparison. The previous CHUG Ravage just blows Siege Ravage out of the water. And I would guesstimate the independent RRP to be about the same. CHUG Ravage came with Deluxe Class Hound. My Henkei Hound cost me about $30, so let's say that Hound on his own was worth $20, that would make Ravage worth about $10 - on par with what I paid for Siege Ravage. Henkei Ravage is giving me far more bang for my buck than Siege. Yesterday morning I showed a lay person Siege Ravage and told her that he's meant to be a panther, and she said, "I'm sorry but that does not look like a panther and I wouldn't have known if you hadn't told me."

Another comparison

Something else awesome about Henkei Ravage that should impress people like shockNwave is the more realistic feline proportions of the robot mode. Siege Ravage is just some kind of boxy tailless quadruped. It doesn't even look like a cat, let alone a jaguar.

Comparison with G1 in robot mode

Even the freakin' 1984-85 toy has a more realistic feline looking robot mode!

Comparison in alt mode

G1 and Henkei Ravage transform into cassette tapes. Siege Ravage transforms into rectangular roadkill. Okay, I get that it wouldn't make much sense for Cybertronians to have cassettes (although they all did transform into cassettes on Cybertron in G1, and a lot of the other Siege alt modes are shamelessly Earthlike anyway, so why stop there? ), but they could've made them transform into something more useful like a computer console or datapad (yeah, I know they did that with TR) etc. Again, this alt mode lacks independent utility and thus makes the toy suffer as an independent action figure. It really feels like it's just meant to be an accessory for Soundwave. The other Siege Micromasters transform into accessory modes too, but they're still nice independent figures despite that. I have no intention of using any of the other Siege Micromasters as Targetmaster weapons. It's a non-intrusive feature, but the fact is that they all work well as independent toys in their own right. Stakeout is a robot and a police car. The gun mode is nothing more than a bonus feature, whereas with the Spy Patrol it feels like their interactivity with Soundwave is far more needed for their value as toys. And any toy that lacks independent play value is in turn lacking as a toy.

Interactivity with G1 and MP Soundwave: G1 and Henkei

G1 Ravage fits inside both G1 and MP Soundwave. Henkei Ravage is too thick to fit inside G1 Soundwave, but he does fit inside MP Soundwave. Obviously this is a coincidence, but the fact is that Henkei Ravage was designed to be the same size as a G1 cassette.

Interactivity with G1 and MP Soundwave: Siege

Being smaller than G1 cassettes the Siege Spies do fit inside G1 and MP Soundwave, but they are far too small.

RESCUE PATROL

Comparison w/ G1 in vehicle mode


Comparison w/ G1 in robot mode


As mentioned before, the Siege Rescue Bots (heh) are fine - just as good as the Wave 1 Micromasters, so if you like those then grab 'em. Expensive for what they are considering that the G1 Micromaster Patrols, adjusted for inflation, cost about the same as the Siege Micromasters. Only that they gave us twice as many figures per patrol. So in terms of value for money the Siege Micromasters are only half as good as G1.

But out of this wave the Autobot Rescue Patrol are MUCH better than the Decepticon Spy Patrol. Their robot modes are fine (even if Red Hot has inherited Big Shot's drawbacks) and they have fully functional alt modes. Yeah, they have weapon modes but they're completely no needed to enjoy these toys in their own right. The white decos do make Stakeout look less G1 accurate, which is odd, but objectively it does help to break up all the black (which would otherwise look kinda bland), and they are realistic police car colours - so aside from G1 fanboy bias there's nothing really wrong with it.