Cliffbee.com Cyberjet Strafe Toy Review

Individual Review




Name: Strafe
Series: Generation 2
Allegiance: Autobot
Function: Aerial Gunner
Alternate Mode: X-29 Fighter Jet



JET MODE
Height: 3cm Length: 10cm Width: 7cm

   Remember Strafe, the reasonably obscure red and white Technobot? Well he's now an olive green X-29 with brown jagged camouflage patches, a transparent yellow cockpit and some sky blue robot bits visible underneath, which houses retractable black landing gear. Amazingly, this cacophony of colours actually works quite well. Of course, it looks nothing like the Technobot jet, but I give them points for finding a fairly obscure character that would suit the mould. In fact, the tech specs and bio indicate this _is_ indeed Strafe, missing four Technobots.

   Unlike the two other cyberjet moulds, the missile launcher is on Strafe's underside, making it less accessible and poseable than those of his new teammates. I don't mind all that much, since you can unclip the arm it's attached to and target it underneath Strafe. In the rest position, it does get in the way of the front landing gear if it's down, which is a fairly obvious design flaw for the designer to overlook. The rear wheels have no such problems.

   I don't mind the missile being in the way of the landing gear, since you can clip the white missiles under each wing and they look pretty good there. The undercarriage junk is fairly minor, although the blue plastic makes it instantly visible. Blue and green should really look bad, yet it comes off ok, so the blue bits showing isn't an issue for me. Besides, G2 brought us far worse colour combinations. Strafe has a USAF symbol on his portside wing, and rather mysteriously, he has G2 Decepticon logos on the undersides of his tailfins (which are very easy to miss - which is a good thing).

   The missile launcher will fire the missile around a metre, and you can tap the missiles out as(somewhat long) bombs if they're underwing. The missile launcher is a ball-pressure affair. Basically, you push on the back of the missile until the ball slips out of the claw and the missile flies across the room. The upside is that there aren't any moving parts to wear out, but these aren't as powerful as spring launchers.

   The missile and wheel colliding isn't the disaster it could have been - the missile plastic is soft, so it'll happily sit on one side of the moulded wheel. Still, the designer dropped the ball here. In spite of this quirk, it's still a very good jet mode, with unique colours.

TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE

   Pretty involved for a small Transformer. Retract the landing gear, fold the legs up from underneath and forward. Swing out the arms on his underside, swivel the cockpit and lift up between his shoulders to form the chest and reveal his head. Position his limbs and stand him up. This is the easiest cyberjet mould, and is the only one with a symmetrical transformation.

ROBOT MODE
Height: 9.5cm Width: 7cm

   A mixture of green and blue now, although Strafe still has some camouflage on his torso. The torso itself is green, along with the head, forearms and boots, while the upper arms, shoulders, hips and thighs are blue. The yellow cockpit is now on the centre of his torso while his collar and the missile launcher on the underside of his right forearm are black. The wings hang out to the sides behind his waist while the smaller tailfins are behind his shoulders. While this colour scheme doesn't work quite as well as the vehicle mode's does, it's still pretty cool, even if - again - it looks nothing like the Technobot

   Like all cyberjets, Strafe's face is a yellow "T" shape, which is also a lightpipe that works very well. The Decepticon logos on the tailfins are sort of visible behind his shoulders, but are obscure and dull so you can easily ignore them. If they bother you, you can simply remove the stickers to reveal unpainted green plastic. The missile are white, and can either load in his launcher, be held in his fists like clubs or attach to the armour skirt formed by his wings.

   The missile launcher on his right hand works better in this mode that jet mode, and looks _really_ good on his arm. It's actually riveted on, although I wouldn't want to remove it. While the other cyberjet moulds have a claw-hand, Strafe has two hands as well as the launcher, so it supplements rather than replaces an arm.

   The missile launcher is only half the coolness of this robot mode. The neck, shoulders, elbows, hips and knees are all ball jointed and a wide range of poses are possible. He can aim a missile or use them as clubs. Strafe has fairly small footprints, so you have to fiddle sometimes to get him standing upright, but most poses are possible with a little patience.

   The only real flaws of this robot mode are the (removable) Decepticon logos and gaps on his shoulders, on either side of his neck. Since the first is easily solved, the disjointed shoulderblades are really the only worrisome flaw of this mode. Despite this shortcoming, it's still a really good robot mode, even if it's a drastic departure from the Technobot colour theme.

VARIATIONS

   None that I'm aware of, although he is a repaint of Space Case.

OVERALL

   While the colour scheme is about as different from the Technobot colours as you could get, it's a good colour scheme. What's more, it's a very good mould that's worthy of the name. I'm actually glad they matched this toy with a more obscure character - it's a nice change from the endless Optimus Primes and Starscreams. Both modes are good and the play value in this mould is great. Combine this with the colours and choice of character, and Strafe is my favourite cyberjet, even if Hooligan has a stronger mould - 8.5/10

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