Quote Originally Posted by MV75
How to improve combiners?

Just reissue superion, menasor, defensor, computron, devastor, etc and be done with it as they'll never improve upon those even with 24 years more toy technology. Want proof? Just look at what is in the stores right now.....
I disagree. There have been several improvements in gestalt toy technology since 1985/86. Devastator's actually quite fragile as a gestalt and tends to fall apart easily. Some of the "Scramble" gestalts' limb members suffer from "blockhead" syndrome. And all of the "GeeWun" gestalts lack self-contained gestalt parts which was something that was only introduced in 1989 with Liokaiser.

We've had some great gestalts with superior sculpts, engineering, posability and fully self-contained gestalt parts, such as:
+ Tripredacus
+ Magnaboss
+ Build King/Landfill
+ JRX/Rail Racer
+ Legends Class ROTF Devastator

With the exception of Legends Class ROTF Devastator, I think this standard has declined since Car Robot/RiD. The Superlink/Energon gestalts went back to the bad old days of non-self-contained gestalt parts (though arguably it was part of the whole "energon weapon" theme of the line) and Combiner Class Devastator was 5 flavours of fail.

Quote Originally Posted by KaRNiV8L PRiME
Hasbro should purchase fansproject and let them officially redesign all the G1 combiners..period. They would then get the funds and backing to mass release these at retail under the name masterpiece combiners. I love what they did with bruticus but if fansproject had designed all the individual components it would have been truly a work of art.
Is Fansproject even a legitimate corporation for Hasbro to take over? Cos I don't think Hasbro's allowed to takeover companies of dubious legal status. Although I suppose HasTak could attempt to snipe talent from Fansproject... <shrug>

My knowledge of Fansproject items is extremely limited... but keep in mind that when HasTak design toys they're limited to very strictly controlled budgets. A lot of features are often changed or dropped due because they exceeded budget (e.g. Prototype Godbomber); even simple things like a minor paint app (e.g. red tips on Animated Deluxe Bumblebee's rockets). The key to being a successful Transformers designer for HasTak is not only to design decent toys, but to do so while keeping within a strictly predetermined budget.