Cliffbee.com Generations Select Turtler Toy Review

Individual Review




Name: Turtler (AKA Snaptrap)
Series: Generations Select
Allegiance: Destron
Alternate Mode: Turtle Monster



TURTLE MODE
Height: 9cm Length: 16cm Width: 10cm

   A turquoise, magenta and pink robotic turtle, Turtler's shell, head and lower legs are turquoise while his lower body is magenta and his upper legs and lower jaw are pink. These colours match those of G1 Snaptrap well - in fact the yellow eyes and black cannons on his back also match. There's a Destron logo on his head and another, backwards facing, Destron logo on top of the shell, and backwards-pointing silver wings tucked into his shell (but still visible) - the wings are also a good match to G1. It's a love-or-hate type of colour scheme - I do like it, but I'm happier that it nicely matches G1.

   Unusually for a Generations figure, this mode is a clear regression compared to G1. He's a very heavy retool of POTP Hun-Gurrr, and it shows here, particularly in the legs. He should have "lizard" hips - reptilian hips push out to the sides - but his legs are underneath him - I guess Hun-gurrr's a mammalian dragon. The rear legs actually push out to the back, which looks worse than it would have if they were just directly underneath the body. The rest of the turtle mode is fine, though - he has a detailed head including silver point teeth on both jaws, painted claws on his feet and some magenta on the back of his rear legs.

   The top of this beast is more a collection of turquoise elements than a half shell. The rear is convex but the front isn't so much. There are magenta protrusions above the forelegs (robot knees / King Poseidon shoulders) - they do detach from the whole half shell thing. He sports twin black cannons on top at the front, which is true to G1 & looks good here, but they're not enough to mask the awkward protrusions.

   There's some play value here but not really enough for a voyager if we're being honest. The limbs do have joints but they're all for transformation and offer no useful posing. His neck features two hinges but they're both for transformation so don't help much - in fact they're a hindrance here as his head will easily flop down, leaving an awkward gap behind it, as it doesn't clip into his body, relying only on the tension of these joints. His lower jaw opens and shuts - which IS some useful poseability here. The black cannons can extend forward with some effort, but it's not the alternating action we saw in G1. His sword can stow underneath or clip on top - as can his black gun.

   A rather disappointing turtle mode. Between starting out with the dragon mode of Hun-Gurrr and the need to form a coherent torso for King Poseidon, there's not a lot of room here for Turtler to shine. the The rather clumsy addition of the turtle head with nowhere to clip in, and the fairly piecemeal shell and the mammalian hips all hold back this beast mode, which is the weakest of the Generations Selects Seacons.

TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE

   Detach and set aside the rear of the shell, along with the black cannons at the front of the shell; set them aside. Swing the turtle head underneath, swing back the forelegs, rotate in the lower legs and then pivot these legs inwards, clipping in on either side of the head. Rotate this assembly around to the back end, clipping into place as his chest plate. Split the remainder of the back (front centre section), pivot the "protrusions" out to the sides, straighten out to form his legs, fold the shell pieces in to form his calves; pivot the boots so the outside edges are the front of the boots. Unclip and straighten his feet, pivot the rear legs down to form his arms, unclip and fold back the beast feet to reveal the robot hands. The head just lifts up from within his torso, but to do so you've got to open and then close two panels on his back (one of which exposes the gestalt head) - it's all rather unelegant. Plug the cannons onto his back, give him his sword and gun as desired, attach the ear of the shell on either forearm and you're done.

ROBOT MODE
Height: 21cm Width: 12cm

   A magenta robot with pink upper arms and thighs, black head and fists, turquoise forearms and much of his chest. His face is silver with yellow eyes and there's a purple Destron logo on his chest. The colour scheme is pretty close to the G1 toy's, with the turquoise forelegs being the main difference (black patches on his knees are another). The body shape is much better in this mode, although the chestplate is a little awkward. It reminds me of the protruding chests of the G2 Gobots / Spychangers. His sword is painted a rather unusual metallic pink, which looks good and resembles the flat pink of the G1 version.

   Again, this is a heavy retool of Hun-Gurrr, but there's few pieces that aren't retouched. The chest, head and boots are all very different, so it's not obvious at a glance. This is a good thing tough - Turtler is very much _not_ Hun-Gurrr with some fiddling around the edges. He looks good and really does look like Snaptrap - this mode is far more successful than the beast mode, visually.

   Poseability is what you'd expect, for the most part. His head is ball jointed while the shoulders rotate lift out to the sides - both sets of joints are very strong ratchets, since they double as the hips of Piranacon and so bear a lot of weight. His elbows and knees are both hinged with rotators while the hips swing and lift out to the sides. His waist is fixed while his ankles are hinged with ankle rockers. The heelspurs are not as long as I'd like, and the hinges aren't all that firm either, so he can easily fall over backwards - it's not so much that he's back heavy - it's just that the feet are more substantial than the heelspurs (that said, his ankles can give way if you tilt him too fast forward!). The poseability is actually quite hampered by the instability of his ankles - you've got to be careful how you pose Turtler lest he fall in a heap.

   Stability issues aside, Turtler's play value is good. He has the gun, sword and shield which all work well enough; and the feet of Piranacon are designed to be able to clip onto the outsides off his forearms as weapons - and can also fold up and plug into his fists as guns - and this works better than you'd expect, thanks to the sides folding over to form the barrels. You've also got the option of detaching the cannons on his back and plugging then into his hands. The sockets that hold the cannons in beast mode are on the insides of his boots but can pivot to the outsides - allowing the cannons to sit on the outsides of his boots, if you wish.

   White the turtle mode is a bit of a mess, the robot mode is actually pretty good. The shape works, the G1 tribute is strong and the play value is quite impressive thanks to a wide array of weaponry options. The only significant downside is the ankle joints which have a tendency to topple - usually backwards as his heelspurs are fairly short.

VARIATIONS

   None that I'm aware of.

OVERALL

   Very much a mixed bag, this one. The turtle mode is... pretty bad, in truth. The transformation is ungainly, but the robot mode is actually pretty good. He comes with a raft of accessories and they bring lots of play value to the robot mode; and while it has stability issues, it's still a good robot mode. I couldn't recommend Turtler as a standalone voyager (especially given his relative scarcity / price you're likely to pay), but most of his teammates are pretty good and well, you can't make Piranacon without him - 6/10

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