Rodimus & Cyclonus

Review by chachipower

Battle in Space set is only just starting to pop up in certain stores. Wont be long until all the big retailers have them. I, however took the online route to get mine since it was meant to be a Christmas present for myself. I can't tell you how psyched I was to receive it. Now that its in my hands, I can show you guys whats going on with this playset so you can decide if it's a worthwhile buy-it-now or wait-'til -later purchase.

The Battle in Space set comes in the new Reveal the Shield colored box that carries over the Generations design. The figures are neatly laid out in all their splendor. In the middle you will notice a mini robot. This here is Mini-Con Nightstick who becomes Cyclonus' gun. If you look even closer still, you'll notice that this set comes with the Matrix! Nice...even nicer when I talk about it later on in the review.

RODIMUS

First up is Rodimus in his cool Classics sculpt. First thing I noticed is how horrid some of the paint was. Very quickly applied and sloppy. Even his rubsign is crooked. I'm a little put off with the bright red color and the low contrast in the yellows used for his flame job.Otherwise the figure is great as far as design.

The back is very simple but its refreshing to not see a bunch of parts hanging off the back.

When we take an up-close look, we can see the sloppiness I was talking about. It looks like those little fins on his head were painted with watercolor paint. Thankfully, the sloppy paint does not carry on to the rest of the figure. This figure has no light piping.

His tailpipe becomes his gun in robot mode. Check out the unawesome projectile he shoots. It looks like a water gun when using this missile. Notice they round off the tip so you can't impale any eyeballs. Not that you could even if it was sharp as the force the spring provides is minimal.

His chest sports the new-style rubsign. Give a little rub and you can see he is indeed an Autobot.

His transformation is rather cool but simple. His car mode is clean and sleek. However, the baby blue windows are cheesy looking... or slightly cartoon accurate depending on how you look at it.

From the back, things are still relatively clean. If it wasn't for the exhaust tip, there would be an awful gap back there. Again, here we see the water-looking flame gimmick/missile.

CYCLONUS

Next we have Cyclonus. He seems to be of higher quality than Rodimus. His molding is sharper, paint apps are better, windows are translucent plastic instead of painted and he has much more detail. It is instantly obvious that he is the highlight of this set.

From the rear, he looks really clean with none of the nonsense other transforming figures have.

Unlike Rodimus, Cyclonus has some really cool light piping. Those red eyes you see are glowing by way of the lamps I used to take these pictures. Glorious.

My Cyclonus had his rubsign applied straight and with a little rubbing he reveals himself as an evil Decepticon.

His transformation into his alternate mode was much more interesting than that of Rodimus' transformation. There is a lot more engineering and movements to achieve his ship mode.

If we take a look at his underside, we can see that he has landing gear which is actually retractable. Very nice.

MATRIX

Remember the Matrix I mentioned? I never in my wildest dreams expected it to be made out of my favorite stuff...METAL. Yeehaw! I thought it was cheap chromed plastic but when I held it in my grubby hands, I knew I held something special. Bad news is that Rodimus cannot hold it. However you can use it as a necklace if you wanna show it off.

Another bonus that's included in this set is a full color glossy comic book by IDW. It's got Animated style illustrations which I dont care for too much but the artwork is really good overall.

Now, we can't forget about little old Mini-Con Nightstick can we? Don't get too excited though if you noticed his Decepticon insginia, It doesn't come with one, I made that myself. I suggest you do the same so he looks cooler. He's got nice atriculated elbows for some extra play value.

By simple folding his feet in and folding him in half, he transforms into a gun for Cyclonus.

I noticed that the inner box makes a pretty cool backdrop for these figures. I've taken the liberty of taking some photos using the inner box.

While working on this review, I happened to place it next to my Animated Rodimus Minor. It wasn't until I did this that I realized how much better the Animated colors look on Rodimus. I wish the Rodimus in this set was more along the lines of the Animated figure's color and quite frankly, quality. One interesting thing to note is that in robot form, the Animated version towers over the Reveal the Shield version. However, in vehicle mode, the Animated version is dwarfed by the Reveal the Shield version.

Overall this is a nice set and will appeal mostly to G1 fans but there is enough good things about this set that it will appeal to just about anybody including casual fans. It's not perfect, but the price is right, the figures are nice and there are a couple of welcome bonuses. An updated Rodimus would have made this a homerun. Look for this set to hit wider distribution in the near future.