Cliffbee.com Super Mach Alert Toy Review

Individual Review




Name: Super Mach Alert
Series: Car Robots (Robots in Disguise)
Allegiance: Cybertron
Function: Sonic Speed Patrol (not sure what that's supposed to mean)
Alternate Mode: Lamborghini Diablo Police Car

Thanks to Goktimus Prime for loaning me Clear Super Mach Alert for this review.



DIABLO MODE
Height: 3.5cm Length: 12cm Width: 7cm

   A colourless Diablo police car with black bumpers, grey engine cover and gold chrome hubcaps. This version is a repaint of the regular Super Mach Alert, with colourless plastic and no blue paint. The word "POLICE" is splashed across the front in white and on the doors in black with the words "MACH ALERT" along the sides in white (inside a black block). He has a strobe rack on his roof, one blue and one red. There's a lot of visible robot stuff underneath the colourless shell, which has some plusses - the robot feet inside the cabin are designed to look like seats, and they're really easy to discern here. He almost looks like a "ghost" police car, which makes this an interesting variant.

   This is a pretty realistic car mode - the proportions are good, the wheels are chromed and the tyres rubber. Mach Alert has front indicators painted on the front _and_ sides, transparent red taillights, two sets of twin exhausts at the back and rear vision mirrors.

   His spoiler has tips that fold up to reveal attachment points for his weapons. If you point them forward they become flamethrowers or missile launcher, if you attach them backwards he's got rockets. He also rolls quite well on his wheels, but you've got to make sure the chestplate is folded up properly for this to work.

   Overall, this is an excellent car mode, and while the clear shell detracts from the wonderful detailing here, the painted details are great. The visible robot parts make this a fairly inaccurate Diablo considering how well sculpted he is, but the idea makes for a good exclusive version.

TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE

   Pull out the sides, lift up the roof. Fold up the front section, exposing the legs. Unfold the legs, slide the section to which they attach in, fold the front section up and the roof down again. Fold the chest down and push in, position the mufflers upwards or out to form chestguns (whichever you prefer). Spilt the rear section, fold the sides out to form the shoulderpads. Position the arms, as well as the shield on the left arm. Rotate the shins 180°, swing down the feet and rotate forward. You can put his guns on his right forearm or attach them to the tips of his spoiler (ie on the shield) on his right arm.

   I've heard people call this mould a "shellformer", but it's more than just unfolding panels. Aside from that, this isn't a mould with panels hanging off it everywhere.

ROBOT MODE
Height: 12cm Width: 14cm

   Super Mach Alert's robot mode is largely colourless with some hints of the blue seen on the original this time. The chest guns, groin and boots are paint blue while the thighs and forearms are white. The upper arms and feet along with parts of the torso are grey, while most of the rest of the toy is colourless. His face is white and grey with orange eyes. He sports gold on his shoulderpads, one with a red and one with a blue circle and wears a gold chromed Autobot symbol on his chest, along with silver engine like bits. The colours here aren't as striking as those of the regular version's robot mode, the transparent backdrop to the golds and blues doesn't work all that well - but it's still a good colour scheme for a limited toy.

   Lanky and poseable, Super Mach Alert does have some car kibble, but it all serves to enhance the aesthetic. The doors are hanging off his hips, but give his legs plenty of clearance. The shield attached to his right forearm is the engine cover & spoiler, and the shoulderpads are the rear fenders. The shoulderpads look cool, the hip pads the sides form look decent, the shield is nice, too. It'd be nicer if you had the option of detaching it, but it's attached with a metal post through it's joint. Still, the joint gives it meaning since he can do stuff with it, rather than just have it as kibble.

   This toy is really poseable. His head turns, he has ball joints at his shoulders, and swivels below his shoulderpads on his upper arms. He has two joints on each elbow giving full poseability, as well as the joint on the shield's attachment point as mentioned. His hips and knees are ball joints and his ankles have _two_ ball joints each! So yeah, this guy's pretty much a contortionist. He's reasonably top-heavy, since the car bits are almost entirely above his waist, so while you have to balance him, he has a wide range of poses available, and the twin ball joints in each ankle mean you can find a way to make him stand up in the vast majority of poses.

   The wide array of poses, the missile launchers, shield and chest guns give Super Mach Alert a _lot_ of play value in this mode. The colour scheme is a little muddled between the striking highlights and the colourless base plastic, but it's still a nice colour scheme for an exclusive toy. He's a little back heavy with some kibble here and there, but this is still a good robot mode.

VARIATIONS

   A repaint of the standard Super Super Mach Alert, as mentioned. The clear plastic is now colourless and unpainted, but the paint mask and colours are otherwise the same. This particular version was sold in a three pack with clear versions of Super Speedbreaker and Super Wild Ride, available exclusively at Botcon Japan 2000.

OVERALL

   An interesting repaint of a great toy, and while I'm not quite sold on the clear base and striking details in robot mould, the mould is good enough to carry this variant. I _do_ prefer the original Mach Alert and regular Super Mach Alert, but this is by no means a poor variant. The mould is well designed with a great sculpt and good poseability, so he's quite capable of displaying well. I'm not sure that I can recommend the three pack he comes in, simply because it's limited and likely to be pricey, and I feel that the clear Speedbreaker works better, but this variant is well done for what it is - 8/10

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