That's very much how it felt to me in hand. I've had an Optimus Prime toy for nearly 40 years, and this one is similar to look at in cab mode but does these new things that feel a bit unnatural; as they conflict with my muscle memory of how to transform Optimus Prime.
Nothing in this toy couldn't have been done in the 80s, but would have made the toy more expensive (as it has today) due to part counts and there were things that just weren't done back then - like the ankle pivots and extra posability.