Continuing on with my series of reviews, here is a look at the Clones and Droids set:
Star Wars Battle Pack Review:
Clones and Droids
Description: (Lifted from HasbroToyshop.com, because I’m too lazy to retype what’s on the box)
Clones and droids battle each other during the Clone Wars. Each army — human and mechanical — builds its arsenal of skills and weapons throughout the conflict as new challenges arise. The clone troopers of the elite 327th Star Corps, under Commander Bly, clash with their robotic enemies throughout the entire span of the war. The troopers devise new combat strategies as the Separatists develop more powerful droids.
Clone Troopers: Clone troopers apply all their military training, warrior skills and weaponry to battle the endless army of “clankers” during the Clone Wars.
Retail Droid: The technical name for retail droids is LF-57 combat droids. Used by the Separatists, they check for enemy activity — sounds, movement or anything that seems suspicious.
Super Battle Droid: These heavy infantry droids are powerfully built, heavily armed and very strong. Some versions are specially equipped with flight packs for aerial combat.
Bring the battles “to life” with this awesome action figure four-pack! Start the showdown between your articulated Clone Trooper figures and the Retail Droid as your heroes try to destroy the droid figure with their blaster accessories. Then, send your Super Battle Droid figure in to tip the scales and give the good guys an even tougher fight. These four make for exciting characters even when they’re just standing at attention in your collection.
Clone Troopers figures with blaster accessories, Retail Droid figure and Super Battle Droid figure come with 4 Galactic Battle Game cards, 4 battle bases and 1 game die.
This set includes four cartoony action figures: two Clone Troopers and two Battle Droids. Each clone comes with accessories, while each droid comes with nothing. According to the box, the clones belong to the 327th Star Corps. One of the droids is an LF-57 “retail” droid (he’ll be called Soda Can for the rest of this review.) The other droid is a Super Battle Droid (SBD).
Each clone trooper is white with yellow trim on the arms and helmet. The Soda Can is light brown, with some gold stripes. The SBD has light blue markings on his charcoal colored body. Also present on the SBD’s back are multiple yellow stripes, along with some writing. The paint applications on all four figures are very neat, with no bleeding or excess paint.
The Clone Troopers have top-notch articulation. They are repaints of the 2008 cartoony kids Clone, which is still one of the best figures available. The SBD is a repaint of the 2008 figure of the same name. There is articulation at the elbows, shoulders, waists, and hips. The lower legs have NO articulation. The Soda Can is an all-new figure. Though the articulation is pretty minimal, it isn’t bad. The walking keg has ball jointed elbows, a swivel waist, swivel hips, and ball jointed knees. Lastly, the Soda Can’s body can also tilt from side to side.
For the clones and SBD, the best sculpts available have been repainted for this set. The SBD closely matches its appearance in the Clone Wars cartoon series. I’m not sure if yellow clones have appeared in the show, but the figures look like the other clones that are seen on screen. The Soda Can is an all-new figure, and it looks just like the design from the Clone Wars movie. Granted, a cylinder on legs is a pretty simple design that only the dumbest of toy makers could fail to recreate.
When it comes to accessories, I have definitely been spoiled by past figures and battle packs. That said, this set lets me down. Only the Clone Troopers come with accessories. Each figure has a blaster. In addition to the guns, one trooper also has a jetpack with a firing missile, and the other has a rope accessory that was originally included with the 2008 Clone Wars Anakin Skywalker figure. The battle droids include nothing. I’ll give the Soda Can a pass, since it’s a new and larger than normal figure. However, Hasbro should have included some missile firing accessories or extra blasters for the SBD.
Overall, I give this set 3 out of 5 bits of string. While it’s very cool to get a brand new figure (Soda Can), the set is otherwise very boring. We have seen similar looking Clone Troopers many times before, and the Super Battle Droid is an absolutely crappy figure. I feel like this set might be a hit with kids, but it has some stiff competition from the Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad.
