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Just getting back to some reviews, and this week I'm taking a look at the figure above there, Mace Windu!  The new Mace is a marked improvement over, well, every other Mace Windu figure to-date...  The articulation and sculpt details are superior, the figure sports a spiffy saber, and a nice electric accessory...

Unfortunately, Hasbro has a ways to go with Sam Jackson's likeness, and I'd be lying if I said the way the skirt-piece inhibits the leg articulation/poseability isn't just a tad annoying...  It's actually very annoying.  Either way Hasbro seems to have improved Mace, they just need to take that leap of sculpting an accurate likeness of the actor, and maybe a cloth skirt-piece. 

Still...  I place this happily as the best Mace figure out there, upon my display shelves...  Till they give us another one with, hopefully, that new head and cloth bits.  You know what you need to do Hasbro.

Thanks for reading guys...

Just thinking out loud some...  I was playing around with one of my new IG-88 figures, and started removing all his greeblies that make him extra cool and "layered" looking.  If you remove him down to the bare figure basically, I was thinking what a nice base for a super articulated IG-Lancer Droid this figure could be.

Whip up a swoop for him, a lance, case him in black with some paint highlights (very few really), throw him on the bike...

I dunno, that seems pretty easy and I'd be perfectly content with this figure as the base I think.  It's so modular as well, that if you were to want to modify a specific part of the sculpt to be possibly more accurate, I don't think it would be difficult at all either.  I don't have an IG Lancer Droid pic to compare well with the figure at the moment, but I don't see why this would be a problem.

That's one of the main Clone Wars figures I'd love to see, so I hope Hasbro's considering this as a possibility for the future.  Love those lancer droids.

Welp, Celebration IV is wrapped (wrapping actually, for some) up, and what better way to unwind than to read my reviews, right?  Right...  So, up for examination this week is the...  The Galactic Marine!

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A figure with much talk buzzing around him even before his release, any Clone of this caliber is gonna be hot.  Needless to say, your army building may have been difficult thus far, as he's one of the first of this assortment to disappear.  The new sculpt, the articulation, the paint aps, the removable helmet, the gear...  Hasbro has a doozey of a figure on their hands.  One of the finer incarnations of the Republic's forces.

Not without his flaws though, as the Republic Marine's got a weird design flaw at the knees that make his poseability a little difficult (just slightly) for standing straight up and down, and his weapon is beyond rubbery.  Hasbro most definitely cheaped out on the plastic this time, and that sucks considering how good a job they did with this rifle's sculpt originally in the Evolutions packs.

Is it a deal breaker?  Well I'll save the drum roll and simply say no, but there are some flaws there... Read the full review to check out what worked and what Hasbro could improve.  I'd buy this figure again with a new (older) headsculpt on it, better accessory, maybe different battle damage, and a cloth Kama...  Wouldn't you?

Celebration IV is here and someone on the inside got us some information on the latest Hasbro wares we'll be catching out there in LA...  On Friday.

But for now, we've got details, details, details...  There's a lot going to be shown, and some of it is wildly surprising, some was already rumored, and some may even irritate you (SDCC exclusives anyone?).  Eitehr way, you'll want to check out our list of the NEW product Hasbro's going to be unveiling at Celebration IV on Friday!


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So a shadow biker scout?  Ewok army building 2-packs (finally)? 

How badly does it hurt waiting to see all this stuff?  And from what I hear, the quality of 2007 is going to roll right along as it has been...  Articulation, softgoods...  Some re-used parts here and there, but where it seemingly makes sense.

Good times...  Good times.

It gets even better though...  Check out the fairly blurry images we received!

Wednesday Hasbro Sneak Peak!

So when Hasbro was kicking around 30AC figure photos, I don't know many that didn't excite me in some way...  R2 perhaps, but even Obi-Wan was pretty cool looking.  The early photos of this week's reviews, despite the character's background nature, were still exciting...  I'm not so sure the figure lived up to my hopes though.


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The Mustafar Lava Miner gets the scrutiny this week in my reviews...  He's neat, he fills a hole, but he's far from "ideal" action figure.  I'd say he ranks as the 3rd most likely pegwarmer of the Wave 1 30AC figures unfortunately, despite being all new, and an alien.  The Miner's articulation and pre-posed leg sculpting are his major flaws...  His articulation isn't horrid mind you, it just doesn't give the figure any benefits as it should.  In comes the leg sculpting, and well you have some problems with poseability.  Essentially he's forever locked in a "mining" hunched over pose...  That sucks.

Still, he's new, he fills a hole, he fills a purpose on display...  Hasbro just didn't deliver greatness with this one.  Check out the review to see the flaws, but also the highlights.  There's some cool stuff to him like the accessories and such.  He's one of those guys that you just buy and never really care much about after you get him *cough*Lushros Dofine*cough*.

I really do...

-X-Wing
-TIE Fighter
-XW: Alliance

and more...

The old strategy guides used to almost be a novel, or they at least outlined and detailed story/plot points throughout them, and gave incentive to the gamer to buy them just because they were cool reads, had cool images in them (not necessarilly from the game, but rather art and things), and other stuff like that...  Anyone else a little annoyed that strategy guides these days are much "less" than that?  They're usually just gaming bits, nothing more.

I mean, X-Wing and TIE Fighter's strategy guides BOTH were stories...  They extended the mini-novels you got with the games (Steele Chronicles & Farlander Papers), they took you through the character's story along with the game...  Even if you beat the game without the book, it gave you the incentive to own the book for the bigger story around the story you just experienced...

This isn't always practical of course...  Battlefront has no real story, as their single-player game is fairly lame, and any attempted story mode for the game is "meh" at best.  So how do you put a "story" into a guide for the game, ya know?  But I was just thinking how cool a strategy guide could be for, say, EAW: Forces of Corruption.  Great characters, potentially great story you could mix INTO the guide...  Same with EAW really if you wanted, or what about the upcoming Force Unleashed?  Unfortunately I think the guide to FU is gonna eat it pretty hard...  At best you'll get some art in it, which is nice, but not like the old days of guides to games that really opened up the game's experience with a little reading.

As per our front page DPCI # from Target...  There's something called an R2-D2 Laptop coming.  Just one of those toys geared at young children for learning?  Something different?

Looking at the image jedijaybird took comparing the new Death Star Trooper to an average height Imp. Figure in a similar get-up, what methods will folks be using to shorten the guy to a more proportional height?



I'm thinking a slight hacking at the ankles with a new hole drilled up into the shin (and reinsert the foot) might be sufficient...  His calves look "long" to me for some reason, plus I guess the boot isn't accurate to the character's boot style in the film as well, so that's food for thought.

Anyone going to run with this or just leave the DST as-is?  Some "taller", and some shortened perhaps?  Might be a good mix to get variety in height that isn't awkward looking too.