Things you never realised about Transformers (toys etc)

[Sky Shadow]

Good list. I remember being confused fifteen years ago when I first found out that Scoop, Quickmix and Landfill weren't released in Japan, because there was cartoon footage of them in Episode 1 of G2 that I'd always assumed had been from the Japanese cartoon. (It was from their advertisement.)

I've also not included Waverider, although his Pretender shell is blonde, whereas Diver's shell is a brunette.

I always find that so weird, since Diver's hair and eyebrows in the cartoon look more like Waverider's than his own toy's. Would Takara have done that to the toy because they thought Japanese kids would be more likely to buy/play with/imagine themselves as the darker-haired toy?

[GoktimusPrime]

And similarly, here is a list of toys that were only released by Takara, using the same standards as above. I'm not including Fortress Maximus who came with extra swords, but the toy is otherwise the same.

Astrotrain (black & white ver.)
Shouki
Getsuei
Yukikaze
Suiken
Seizan
Kaen
Graphi
Noise
Dial
Zaur
Rodney
Kirk
Leoné
Trizer
Loafer
Shuffler
Twincast
Soundblaster
Stepper
Artfire
Ginrai
Godbomber
Ranger
Zetoca
Bollet
Aquastar
Doubleclouder
Metalhawk
Go Shooter
Minerva
Hardspark
Hotspark
Wildspark
Sixknight
Grand Maximus
Hydra
Buster
Browning
Guzzle (Sparkdash)
Sizzle (Sparkdash)
Javil
Black Zarak
Star Sabre
Victory Leo
Galaxy Shuttle
Blacker
Braver
Lustre
Wing
Waver
Mach
Tackle
Dash
Tacker
Greatshot
Deathzaras
Leozak
Guyhawk
Hellbat
Jallguar
Drillhorn
Killbison
Yokuryuu
Gairyuu
Doryuu
Kakuryuu
Yokuryuu
Rairyuu
Black Shadow
Blue Bacchus
Grimlock, Hero (no Pretender shell, silver face)
Starscream, Hero (no Pretender shell, grey face)
Dai Atlas
Sonic Bomber
Roadfire
Speeder
Sonic
Drillbuster
Black Heat
Dead Hour
Roadhugger
Gingam
Gunlift (variant colour of Long Shot)
Powerbomb (variant colour of Flak)
Sidetrack (variant colour of Hasbro Sidetrack)
Sunrunner (variant colour of Hasbro Sunrunner)
Landshaker
Metro Titan
Metrobomb
Star Convoy
Hot Rod, Micromaster
Sky Garry
Shot Bomber
Grandus
Spinner
Leaf
Diego
Knight
Alan
Spark
Joe
Gran Arm
Crushbull
Ironlift
Digger
Mixing
Treader
Missile Run
Chaingun
Supersonic
Raiser
Falcon (Micromaster)
Flanker
Road Police
Glide
Circuit
Neo Wheel
Sireen
Discharge
Desire
Atlan
Raise
San Diego
Windy
Converter
Fire Chief
Streetstar
Fly Up
Sparkride
Safety
Great Cannon
Leyland
Sandstorm (Battle Gaia)
Shuttle Gunner
Target Hawk

I always find that so weird, since Diver's hair and eyebrows in the cartoon look more like Waverider's than his own toy's. Would Takara have done that to the toy because they thought Japanese kids would be more likely to buy/play with/imagine themselves as the darker-haired toy?

I doubt it. Kaneda Masuimi/Toei seemed willing to introduce a fairly multicultural mix into the human cast of Masterforce, including a blonde-haired Minerva, dark-skinned Carb, Chinese Cancer, redheaded Bullhorn, and whatever-the-hell blue-haired Wilder's ethnicity is. My guess is more likely just a running change in the toy line, but the animation model was already based off Waverider's blonde hair. The Masterforce toys were originally designed by Takara for Hasbro (as per their specifications), but later some of them were modified for Masterforce. Ginrai being the most significantly modified from his Hasbro counterpart.

[griffin]

The Japanese version of the Flip & Change Grimlock LA-02 has the Flip & Change gimmick removed, giving it a 3-steppish manual conversion.
I got it today and I was trying to spin it around, but wasn't getting anywhere... so looked on the packaging and it has a 3-step instruction panel.

Speaking of 3-step changers... the RID Grimlock toy may be simple, but very creative with its transformation. The two Robot legs fold over and under the main body, to have the feet meet up and join together on the other end, covering up the robot head to create the dinosaur head. So one leg is the top/back of the dinosaur, and the other leg is the underside part. If it wasn't so simple, like a gimmick toy, I'd recommend this for others.

[GoktimusPrime]

Although the RiD2015 Legion Class toys don't come with any weapons of their own, they are backward-compatible with 3mm post weapons from other toys such as TF Prime Cyberverse figures.

[Bidoofdude]

No weapons?! I didn't like the look of the cyberverse translucent pieces, but they're better than nothing at all.

[Paulbot]

All this time I've been saying "Die-a-clone" when I should have been saying "Die-a-cron"?

That's the lesson I took from these Japanese toy ads for Diaclone toys (including pre-TF Autobot Cars, Prime, Magnus, Dinobots, Constructicons, Trainbots and Triple changers) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_BOj1Qqx0Q

[CoRDS]

All this time I've been saying "Die-a-clone" when I should have been saying "Die-a-cron"?

That's the lesson I took from these Japanese toy ads for Diaclone toys (including pre-TF Autobot Cars, Prime, Magnus, Dinobots, Constructicons, Trainbots and Triple changers) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_BOj1Qqx0Q

die-a-.........clooooneee

[GoktimusPrime]

Yeah, it's pronounced "Dye-ah-kron" (or "Dye-ah-klon"), but spelt "Diaclone."

Other weird Japanese spelling & pronunciations...
* Ginrai is pronounced "Jinrai" but officially spelt with a G (so it's a soft 'g' as in 'giraffe')
* Carb is pronounced "Cab." So the 'r' is silent I suppose.
* Minerva's name is officially spelt as "Minelba." This is due to the fact that "Minerva" and "Minelba" are pronounced the same and are phonetically indistinguishable to most Japanese speakers. Although the original Classical Latin pronunciation of "Minerva" was more like "mee-nerrr-wah", as the Romans did slightly roll their Rs, and Vs were pronounced like Ws.
* Goshooter is considered to be the name of the Autobot Transtector, however, his human component's name is Gō Shūta (剛秀太), which sounds almost the same in Japanese; the key difference is that "Goshooter" is pronounced as Gōshūtā (longer "a" vowel).
* The "u" in 'Jaguar' (JP name for Ravage) and 'Jallguar' is silent, so their names are pronounced more like "Jagar" and "Jall-gar" or even "Jarugar".
* Many English speakers may pronounce Jean's name as "Jeen," but it's actually meant to be the French pronunciation, as in the name "Jean Luc Picard." In Japanese, this is approximated as "Jun" (ジャン).

Also, the "Micro" in "Microman" is based on the Greek pronunciation of "Micro" (from 'micross' [μικρός]), so it's more like "mee-cro-man." However, the "Micro" from "Micro Change" is the same as in English, so it's "my-cro change." Weird, huh? And two of the gestalts from Transformers Victory use the two variant pronunciations of Caesar. You have the Decepticon Breast Force who combine to form "Lio Caesar," where the 'caesar' is pronounced more similarly to the Classical Latin pronunciation of "kaiser" (and indeed the name is commonly spelt as "Liokaiser" by Western fans); the Autobot Brainmaster gestalt "Road Caesar" uses the Vulgar Latin pronunciation of "see-zar," and thus many Western fans simply spell it as "Caesar." But it's kinda cool how the two rival gestalts from Victory are both named 'Caesar,' only that the Decepticon one is pronounced Classically, whereas the Autobot is pronounced Vulgarly.

[GoktimusPrime]

Heh, whaddaya know... MP Red Alert's strobe is detachable.

[griffin]

Finally the mystery is solved, I think...

The Rescue Bots Beam Box computer game (for the TV - you plug in figurines to play their characters), comes pre-installed with six characters. In other words, the game is not like Skylanders or Disney Infinity which has the characters downloaded into the game from the figurines. As such, it is possible to trick the Beam Box console into thinking you have bought and plugged in the characters.

The six characters in the game (on the main menu screen to activate)...
Optimus Prime - comes with console
Bumblebee - sold separately in wave 1
Boulder - sold separately in wave 1
Heatwave - sold separately in wave 1
Chase - SUPPOSED to be sold separately in wave 1
Blades - sold separately in wave 2

The thing that bugged me (because I was trying to complete the set, and make the most of the game), was that I couldn't find Chase anywhere.
The figure was displayed at places like the US Toyfair, while original online listings said it was supposed to be in Wave 1, but then never showed up... and never appeared on places like ebay or online stores.

Today while doing a search for the official images, I found it listed on the Amazon Canada site (noted as not available), and scrolled down to the feedback section to see if anyone actually bought it (so that I'd know for sure that it was released somewhere).
But the feedback comment has not only reassured me that I wasn't just being unlucky with tracking it down, but has now shed some light on WHY it wasn't released.

I got a beam box for our 3 year old and we've managed to collect all the other figures for it, but Chase is probably his favorite character and he's been disappointed he can't play that game. So, I managed to "trick" the little buttons inside the unit by wedging a cut off piece of a credit card under the right side of the Optimus Prime figure. The beam box recognizes it as Chase and allows you to play as Chase. The unique game for Chase is completely broken; its controls do not work, so if you pick that game you're stuck in it until you turn off the beam box. I believe that this flawed program is why you cannot find a chase figure anywhere, and likely never will (if you can't access that game, you can't complain your beam box is broken. )

What that means, is that Hasbro must have decided to not release the Chase figure, to prevent people from returning the more expensive Beam Box to stores for refunds (because the Chase portion of the game apparently has a glitch, so people would return it thinking that it was faulty/defective).
I wonder if Hasbro actually manufactured the Chase figurine. If they did, it would mean that they trashed them all, as the cheaper of two options (not release one of the six figurines, verses, refunding the value of the Console to those who bought Chase figurines).
Yes, there is a third option (fix the game glitch), but the Beam Box may have already been in production or was too late to fix by the time they knew about the glitch... which would suggest that they don't properly test their out-sourced products, as this game wouldn't have been done in-house by Hasbro.

This will probably be another one of those unanswered questions, as I could ask at the next BotCon, but they never have Reps of the peripheral lines like Rescue Bots, Kreo, Crossovers, etc, so are never able to answer anything about them.