Review - Transformers WFC-S11 Optimus Prime
THE SIEGE HAS BEGUN! Brace your wallets for an incoming wave of awesome Cybertonian inspired G1 goodies! With less than 10 days before Christmas the busy elves at Hasbro have delivered the first wave of Transformers War for Cybertron: Siege figures to the Great White North! My first purchase from this highly anticipated line is WFC-S11 Voyager Optimus Prime.
Vehicle Mode
Prime transforms into a very familiar red and blue truck but with a few additional details added in to make the design look a little more alien. The most obvious departures from his classic form are the addition of two huge light bars on the top of the truck as well as 2 pairs of Vulcan machine guns embedded in the front fenders. Primes translucent blue windows are also etched with cool mechanical designs making them more reminiscent of a sensor array instead of visibility or protection for a humanoid passenger. The grill and lighting are all cast in transparent blue as well with painted details underneath. Very little of the “battle damage” paint gimmick can be seen in vehicle mode.
The vehicle mode is solid and pegs together well. I had no issues getting all 6 wheels rolling on the ground and aside from a small gap in the rear of the cab there are no major hollow spots. There is a fun little gimmick built into this figure to allow a hover mode similar to the WFC/FOC video games. Simply unpeg primes front wheels and peg them in underneath the cab, pointing straight down. Next fold the rear wheels halfway as if you were transforming them. Congratulations you’ve got a Cybertronian hover truck!
Prime’s transforming shield/axe accessory can be pegged on where the fifth wheel coupler would normally be located and helps to hid some of the hollow spots on the back of the cab. His gun doesn’t have any set location but can be stored using any of the 5mm ports on the sides or top of Prime. You can also equip Prime with any number of Battle Masters and other 5mm weapons or gimmicks.
Robot Mode
Prime’s bot mode is a vision of beauty for anyone lacking a classics styled prime in their Generations collection. From a visual and tactile standpoint WFC-S11 Optimus Prime is a knock out. Transformation is super fun, simple with a few moments of complexity that are satisfying to figure out.
Plastic quality feels great, articulation is fantastic, leagues ahead of a lot of other mainline figures. His proportions are spot on and he stands taller than most deluxe bots but not so tall that he looks out of scale with his comrades. *Stares intently at MP-10*
While the increased cost may initially be off-putting I feel like it’s immediately evident where the extra budget has gone. Prime is painted in all the spots you’d want him to be, including all the additional silver “battle damage” paintwork. He’s solid with no major hollow spots or waffled plastic. He’s even got wrist swivels and ankle tilts!!! The prophesied day has come! Ankle tilts and wrist swivels have come to save us all!
I also love that his back and forearm kibble are functional. I was a bit bummed to see forearm kibble after living with Classics Prime’s huge obtrusive forearm shields for so long, but once I realized they can function as flip out Vulcan machine guns I stopped caring that they were kibble.
The back kibble is close enough to a jet-pack to make me happy and the effects parts from Firedrive can even be wedged into the bottom as flame effects.
As far as accessories, Prime comes with his trademark Ion Cannon and a new transforming shield/axe. The firearm is a good size and has a compatible hole at the end for blast effects. The axe is a fun accessory with a neat transformation that requires the blades to be folded out in a specific order. My axe handle was a little warped out of the packaging but not to an extent I couldn’t straighten it out. In shield mode there are 3 small pegs for blast effects to be attached.
Not so much a comment on Prime himself, as much as the line-wide gimmick. There’s a ton of fun stuff you can do with the battle effects! I can see myself buying quite a few extra Battle Masters just for the effect parts as I was able to find a number of fun uses for them on Prime, including jet-pack and foot jets as well as bullet impact/reflections using the small pegs on his body. I would have liked to see some of the effects parts included with the Deluxe and Voyager figures as well. Maybe down the road we might see a nice box set with an abundance of effects.
Packaging
I don’t usually talk about the packaging for figures unless it’s particularly exceptional or has something special about it. In this case, aside from the very nice upgrade to “Collector” oriented packaging, Hasbro has also included UV reactive secret designs on the packaging for Siege. Check it out!
Final Thoughts
Clearly Hasbro has been listening to collector’s concerns about the recent Generations lines. Plastic quality is greatly improved and the paint finish on this figure feels like a Takara import release. I honestly feel like I’m messing with a mini improved MP-10 when I’m fiddling with this toy. He’s nearly perfect.
It’s a shame it had to come at such a significant price increase; $30 for deluxe figures up from $20 in Canada, but if we are going to be getting Takara level paint-jobs, then I feel like it can be justified. Takara Deluxe figures used to cost me around $45-60 to import depending on shipping, sales, fees etc. So to see Takara level paint-jobs on domestic figures, even at a $10 jump per figure, I can live with that.
War for Cybertron: Siege is off to an amazing start and I can’t wait to mess with more of these figures. If I gave numbered reviews this guy would easily be a 9/10 with the only nitpick being a lack of forward shoulder movement and ab crunch, and that’s being critical to the point of ridiculousness for a main-line retail figure. Bottom line; I highly recommend picking up this version of Optimus Prime. You won’t be disappointed.
