Cliffbee.com eHobby Kissplay Cassettes Toy Review

Individual Review




Since these are sold only as a set, and are a limited set, I'm not going to write full reviews, instead I'll mainly focus on the differences between these toys and the originals, with links to the original toy reviews for more detailed reviews of the three moulds.



Name: Rosanna
Series: e-Hobby exclusives
Allegiance: Cybertron
Recolour of: Rewind/Eject


   White where the original cassettes where grey, Rosanna has bright pink as her signature colour. And when I say bright pink, we're talking fluorescent to the point that it almost glows. The pictures don't really convey just how bright this plastic is, since my camera couldn't quite pick the whites properly against this white. It fits into the whole girly theme of Kissplay, and I can deal with it on an exclusive toy such as this, even if I don't especially like it. At least it gives Rosanna a very different feel to either Rewind or Eject.

   Instead of a rubsign, Rosanna sports a yellow Cybertron (Autobot) logo. There are small red hearts on her right shoulder and some crimson ones on the tape face, along with her name. The eyes are blue while her her face is a musk pink colour - which is hard to see against the impossibly bright pink plastic of her head. The chrome on her chest and guns is a pale blue, which works fairly well - more pink would have been too much - and the blue is pale enough to be peripheral.

   Rosanna's the second female repaint of this mould in recent years. The last one, Flipsides, was crimson rather than pink, and while the basic idea is similar, Rosanna is a _lot_ brighter.

   TakaraTomy must have got a great deal on pink dye or something, and blown it all on this toy. I can deal with this concept on a limited toy - and I will concede that Rosanna looks about as good as she could with fluorescent pink as her defining feature. The love hearts are a little much, although they're small, not like some of the huge Autobot logos Hasbro have been using on their repaints lately. As bizarre as she is, Rosanna works well enough for an exclusive repaint,



Name: Glit
Series: e-Hobby exclusives
Allegiance: Destron
Recolour of: Ravage


   A white repaint of Ravage with chrome blue die cast on the legs, Glit is far more conservative than Rosanna, whilst still taking an unusual approach with coloured chrome over die cast metal. The side mounted missiles are also chrome blue - although they tend to look brighter than her legs from most angles, since the curves allow them to reflect light in all directions, unlike the flat legs. The eyes are yellow with black borders (to help the yellow stand out against her white plastic, I guess. As with Rosanna, there's a yellow Destron logo in place of the rubsign.

   The cassette features Glit's name, another feature shared with Rosanna. I assume this name was meant to be "Grit" but the transliteration ruins that idea in English. I don't mind actually, since it separates Glit from Grit the Micromaster. No hearts this time, instead there's a logo with is very similar to the English flag (not the Union Jack!). It's an unusual detail and one that I can't really work out, and probably counts as the only feature of this toy I don't like. FortMax (as usual) informs me that this cross is meant to be a medical cross - which makes sense, although it really needed to be square.

   Glit is the most "normal" of this set. By that I mean that this toy would work best as a regular release toy, since the other have fairly adventurous colours. Whilst I don't dislike the colours used on the others, Glit is my favourite purely because the colours work well, and don't need to rely on novelty as justification.



Name: Sundor
Series: e-Hobby exclusives
Allegiance: Cybertron
Recolour of: Buzzsaw/Laserbeak


   An orange condor with yellow stickering, Sundor comes with chrome amber weapons. I really like her name, it's a great play on the sunburst colours, especially when you consider that Laserbeak's name in Japan was Condor. There's no yellow allegiance symbol now - instead there's one integrated into the cassette side stickers, which also feature orange sunbursts, reinforcing the solar theme, which is implemented quite well. Sundor is the only member of this set without her name on the cassette mode, and the only one whose allegiance differs from the original. Her eyes are yellow and the die cast metal is painted red (the same colour as Laserbeak), rounding out a very focussed colour scheme.

   There's a significant mould defect here which wasn't present on the originals. The right leg doesn't fold down properly in cassette mode, instead it sits at an angle with the toe sticking up slightly. This mould defect is apparently also present in reissue Laserbeaks, although my reissue Buzzsaw doesn't have this problem. This defect is a real shame, Sundor is otherwise an excellent repaint with a great theme. I really love how focussed she is - putting most of Hasbro's repaints to shame.

   Sundor has the potential to be a really cool repaint - and while the colours are little too adventurous for a general release toy, they're perfect for a limited release such as this. The solar theme is really well done, but the dicky foot really brings this toy down.

THE SET OVERALL

   A good set overall, despite the blinding pink on Rosanna and Sundor's dodgy foot. Glit is the highlight, but Sundor's colours are quite well done and Rosanna certainly has novelty value. This set wouldn't work as a general release - even in the sexually warped world of Kissplay. It comes with an audio CD, which I can't comment on since I don't understand Japanese. While this set isn't going to appeal to everyone, as a limited set there's a definite appeal here - 6.5/10

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