For fans and collectors G1 Transformers Devastator, you might be interested to know that Takara Tomy has released the box set consisting of the 7 little green Legends Constructicons toys in Japan and some Asian countries! 

I have not seen this version in Singapore departmental stores yet, but the independent collector’s toy shops here might have them for sale already or for pre-order.  You can check it out with the toy shops that you usually frequent, or just drop by the Sunday Toy Market at China Square Central.

As I am mainly a Movie Transformers fan and collector, I have little attachment to this green version of Devastator.  Furthermore this isn’t how he looks like (I mean his shape) in the G1 cartoons.  I still prefer the more colorful *ROTF movie version of him.  You can view the full comprehensive list of his preview toy photos at this link. 

*ROTF - Revenge of the Fallen, the 2009 Transformers movie sequel. 

Seibertron.com has posted links to the preview photos of Transformers Movie Battle Ops Bumblebee toy from Hasbro.  This figure is slightly taller than a Leader Class Transformers movie toy.

Battle Ops Bumblebee has quite a few interesting electronic and lights features!  He still has a right hand despite having an arm cannon there.  His feet look rather small, especially from the back view. 

Overall he looks like a beefed up version of the 2009 Transformers Revenge of the Fallen (ROTF) Human Alliance (HA) Bumblebee toy that fans were so looking forward to last year.  You can view the full comprehensive list of his preview toy photos at this link. 

Top: Maisto 1:24 scale Audi R8.

Middle: ROTF Human Alliance Mudflap and Chromia w/Agt Simmons.

Bottom: ROTF Robot Powered Machines Optimus Prime & Bumblebee.

Amidst the sheer madness of the super crowded OG private sale today, I secured these toys!  For this OG private sale, the security guards at the entrance didn’t check if the shoppers had an OG card.  Everyone was let in.  It made the place looked more crowded than the private sales of past years.  In previous years, I went in the evening after work.  This time round, I went after lunch and the store was already super crowded, as if everything there was going for free today!

My shopping experience at OG today: Overall not very pleasant.

All the snaking queues to the cashiers were so slow moving that I spent nearly an hour waiting in line for my turn to pay for my purchases.  I contemplated leaving the the queue and give up buying a few times.  Luckily I brought along something to read while waiting.  My feet ached from standing still for too long and I was thirsty because of all days, I forgot to bring along some drinking water with me.  Apparently if you decided to pay in cash, there is another faster queue, but the stubborn me wanted to score some precious points in my credit card.

Overheard in the queue: Some interesting stuff

While queuing, some aunties behind me were overhead saying that one of them arrived at 8.30am today (the sale started at 9am) and the queue to enter was already all the way to the back of the building!  Another said that her friend came even earlier at 7.30am.  And yet another auntie takes the cake.  Apparently this was her second shopping trip to OG today.  She had came in the morning and went home first to put down her earlier purchases so that she can come again and shop a second round!  Wow!

What’s up at OG? - Sale and storewide discounts

For your information, it’s a 20% + 10% discount sale today.  From tomorrow till 21 Mar 2010, it will be storewide 20% sale for the public.  If you do not have anything crucial to buy at cheaper prices, I suggest that you forget about going for future OG private sales and just go for the 20% storewide sale in the few days that follow.  The crowded aisles and long waiting times to queue for purchases just aren’t worth it! 

Were you there too?

I’m sure several other local toy collectors and bloggers were there as well today.  If you are one of them, what are your toy hauls and how did you feel about the whole shopping experience?  Feel free to share them here! 

In conjunction with the 1 week long March school holidays (this week) in Singapore, Toys “R” Us (TRU) has listed many of its popular toy brands for special discount sale!  Among them are the LEGO King’s Battle Chariot box set.  It’s usually going for around SGD 40.90 each.  Since last week and till stocks last, there is a 30% discount on it and I picked up one over the weekend from TRU Suntec City!

Actually I find the chariot design recommended on the box and instruction sheet too tall and bulky for a single horse to pull.  In battle, the speed and agility of chariots are critical.  It seems odd that chains are used as reins to drive the horse.  If the driver flicks the chains on the horse’s back like what is usually seen in movies, it’s gonna hurt the horse real bad.  Which warriors in the right mind would injure their own war horses?  The wheels of the chariot are also too large.  Do you notice that the wheels are even bigger than the horse itself?

Hence I decided to redesign the battle chariot using only the available LEGO pieces given in the box set and here is my custom built chariot!  I have included a driver’s seat for the soldier, though this is not how chariots are usually driven.  The rear part of the chariot can still hold the golden treasure chest.  The extra pieces are used to build a road block set up by the menacing troll soldiers.

If I’m not mistaken, the king character of this box set is known in the LEGO Knight’s Kingdom series as King Leo.  I have been collecting many LEGO Knights box sets (mostly the smaller ones) since the early 90’s.  I mixed and matched the various LEGO pieces and LEGO mini figures to create custom characters for my own LEGO Knights adventures series.  Some of the characters in my stories, especially the villain ones are provided by LEGO itself over the years in their catalogs. 

To date, 9 stories of magical medieval adventures have been summarized by me and each of them is long enough to be expanded into a novel on its own.  The stories are all inter-linked and involve the same set of main characters.  Another couple of stories have already been conceptualized.  Someday, I’ll introduce them all to the world in literature form.  Till then, they stay with me as part of my many fictions that are inspired by my toys!

“Halt! Who goes there?”

The Transformers Revenge of the Fallen (ROTF) toys are on clearance sale now!  First up are the box sets that used to be exclusives to Toys “R” Us.  Their original retail price (ORP) had originally been on the high side.  Now the following can be found at much reduced prices at many departmental stores, most notably at OG Orchard!

ROTF Gathering at the Nemesis box set @ SGD 49.90 (ORP: SGD 119.90).

ROTF Back Road Brawl box set @ SGD 29.90 (ORP: SGD 79.90).

ROTF Voyager The Fallen - Burning version @ SGD 19.90 (ORP: SGD 51.90).

On top of the above ROTF toys discounts, a free ROTF Deluxe toy (Dead End) will be given for free for purchases of more than SGD 80.00 worth of ROTF toys at OG Orchard.  I hear that this ROTF toys offer is also available at other departmental stores, though the free ROTF Deluxe toy varies from store to store.

There is also a private sale at OG Orchard on this Wednesday (17 Mar 2010) for OG card members and their guests, and most items will be on 20% + 10% discount!  From 18 - 21 Mar 2010, there will be 20% storewide discount for everyone!  Happy toys shopping!

Marvel Universe action figures - wave 8

Top row: Spider-Man (House of M), Iron Man & Original Captain America.

Middle row: Havok, Colossus & Juggernaut.

Bottom row: Kitty Pryde w/Lockheed, Archangel & A.I.M. Soldier.

The Marvel Universe toyline is getting more interesting as new Marvel characters are made and released.  But then it’s also a 2-edged sword.  The better looking some figures are, the more popular they are and it becomes harder to get hold of them.  Hence I’ll probably not have much chance of seeing many of the above wave 8 figures in person before they get picked up by fans and collectors here.  I really like Archangel from this wave.  I hope that I’ll have a chance to get him some day!  Meanwhile, happy waiting for these Marvel Universe toys to arrive in Singapore!

Wow, take a look at the Iron Man 2 movie toys preview filmed during the recent Toy Fair 2010! 

I like the Iron Man race car and mobile headquarters (reminds me of the Pit Mobile HQ playset of the 2009 G.I.Joe movie toyline but smaller).  The Iron Man helmet and remote controlled Iron Man toy look great for kids!

We should expect to see the Iron Man 2 movie vehicles toys and role playing items in local departmental stores in the coming months leading to the movie sequel in May 2010.

Happy viewing the video and happy waiting for the toys to hit local mass retail! 

Marvel Universe Comic Packs action figures - wave 4

Top row (from left): Bulldozer & The Thing; Dr Doom & Absorbing Man.

Bottom row (from left): Storm & Nightcrawler; Re-released from Wave 1 - Klaw & Captain America.

Here we have wave 4 of the Marvel universe Comic Packs to be available in some local toy stores soon.  The departmental stores here have stopped bringing in these toys since wave 1. 

Wave 4 contains 3 new pairs of figures and characters.  They are Bulldozer & The Thing; Dr Doom & Absorbing Man; and Storm & Nightcrawler.  My guess is that the Comic Packs containing The Thing and Nightcrawler will be more popular with fans and collectors.  The former is to complete the Fantastic Four team, while the latter as a popular X-Men mutant in his classic costume.

Since wave 3, the earlier waves of Comic Packs figures have been gradually re-released.  Hence if you had missed out on some of them, you have a good chance of getting them in the subsequent waves.  For e.g., Klaw and Captain America of wave 4 above are re-released from wave 1.

Similarly if you should miss out on any new Comic Packs from the new waves (because many anxious collectors are also rushing for them), you can consider waiting out to get them as re-releases in the later waves of Comic Packs.  For regular collectors and observers of the Marvel Universe toyline, as well as most other similar scale toylines by Hasbro, this is quite a fixed distribution pattern already.

With this, happy toys shopping and collecting!

Upon further observation of the Iron Man 2 movie toys that have just been released at mass retail here, I realise that there are more variety of figures than what I covered in my earlier blog post on them 2 days ago.

Iron Man 2 movie action figures - movie series wave 2 - SGD 16.90 each 

Top row (from left): Iron Man Mark II, Hypervelocity Armor Iron Man & Iron Man Mark VI (w/Power Up Glow).

Bottom row (from left): Deep Dive Armor Iron Man, Iron Man Mark IV & Iron Man Mark VI.

Note: For Iron Man Mark VI (w/Power Up Glow), the bubble packaging has an opening that allows you to press the figure’s head, and the body will light up in red color, very nice! 

Iron Man 2 Movie Armor Tech Deluxe action figures - wave 1 - price to be confirmed

Juggernaut Mission Iron Man (left) & Negative Zone Mission Iron Man (right).

Iron Man 2 Movie Mark VI 8-inch action figure - SGD 19.90 each.

Iron Man 2 movie toys buying tips coming up tomorrow!  Come back again to read them!

While window shopping at Orchard Road this week, I came across the Iron Man 2 movie toys in a departmental store.  There were mostly in the popular and in trend scale of 3.75-inch action figures. 

This time the retail price per figure is SGD 16.90, which is slightly cheaper than the other Hasbro action figures in the same scale.  I do hope that the retail price of subsequent Hasbro 3.75-inch action figures will at most be this price, or lower!

Iron Man 2 movie action figures - movie series wave 1

Top row (from left): Iron Man Mark I, Iron Man Mark II & Hypervelocity Armor Iron Man.

Bottom row (from left): Deep Dive Armor Iron Man, Iron Monger, Power Assault Armor Iron Man & Iron Man Mark III.

Iron Man 2 movie action figures - comics series wave 1

Top row (from left): Classic Armor Iron Man & Stealth Iron Man.

Bottom row (from left): War Machine, Original Iron Man & Crimson Dynamo.

I forgot to take a photo of the Iron Man 2 movie toys hanging on the pegs.  Perhaps if I see them again, I’ll take a photo.

Updated on 5 March 2010: Incidentally, Little Plastic Man blogged about seeing these toys as well and he took a photo of them too.  Both of us spotted them at the same departmental store, but not at the same time, LOL!