First, we start in truck mode, the mode where its pretty blatant that its reusing Magnus parts and engineering, although not 100% of it. The truck cab is almost entirely the same, though this truck has a new, more generation 1 esque trailer akin to that of both the original Optimus Toy and the original Powermaster toy. The paintwork is nice, though basic, but one thing I find odd about it is some of the sculptings, particularly that there are tiny doors on both the truck and trailer. Doors on Transformers isn't new, they're assumed to be human scale, though by going with that logic, this truck is gigantic due to how small the doors are. Imagine a truck the size of the S.H.I.E.L.D Helicarier. On some figures like Broadside, that scale works, but on a truck? Not at all. The truck cab's kind of hit and miss for me. While I like the futuristic look it has, the front of it is 70% grill, which does make it look kind of stupid. Unlike the original Powermaster toy, the cab only exists to fill out the body and store the helmet, it can't transform into a smaller robot. If that's a problem for you, don't worry, this and the Takara version have had tons of upgrade kits made to make the toy more into the G1 toy. The truck mode overall is fun, and there's enough room in the trailer to fit a Deluxe class car (provided it has the right shape. It's certainly better than Prime's next mode.
The Base mode then and... it's a Transformers Base mode alright, in that it's a robot awkwardly contorted a way that makes it into something loosely described as a base of operations. I'll be short with this, I hate this mode. I am not a fan of most base modes that Transformers have had, the best have been those in the Micromasters line (from what I can see from commercials), but their big advantage is that they don't need to have a robot mode. I have a soft spot for the Titans Return Blaster/ Soundwave base mode, but that's because I don't see that one as a base, but more of a stage at a concert. This? This just looks bad in every sense of the word. The Titans get a pass on their Base modes, as I will admit that G1 Fortress Maximus's looks good, but this is bad in every sense of the word, and not worth the time. Before going onto Robot Mode, I should bring up the Titan Master, Hi-Q. While very similar to Revolver, just with some different moulding, different colours and a new upside-down face, it's the face that I want to bring up because you don't see a lot of it in Robot Mode. Because the helmet has all the Optimus Prime parts (with the exception of the eyes), the designers decided to make Hi-Q's upside down face be Orion Pax's face, the character Optimus was before he became Optimus Prime. It's a nice bit of attention to detail, and give's an option for display if you get both this figure and the Voyager Class Prime that was a mould reuse of the later release of Octone. Unfortunately, you can't hide the helmet in robot mode, and it's hard to remove as they used a pin connection to connect the armature the helmet's on to the body.
To the robot mode, and while it is a bit smoke and mirrors, this guy looks very imposing. The bulky arms and legs give the figure a feel of power, definitely not someone you'd want to mess with if you had to fight him. It definitely owns the space you give him on a shelf. However, like I said, there's some smoke and mirrors used for this. For one, he's very hollow, there's a lot of visible dead air in the arms and legs, and combined with a non-existent waist swivel and no hope of ankle tilts thanks to how the shin and foot assemblies work, he really only works in that stock, imposing pose. I love the sculpting on the helmet though, while I'm sure it came from the Powermaster look, it reminds me of the helmet Energon Optimus Prime had for his combined modes. I can't help but make that comparison, I don't have a G1 Powermaster Prime, but I did have an Energon Prime growing up. Alongside the shoulder cannons, Prime comes with two guns that came with the original owner of this mould, Combiner Wars Ultra Magnus, and as such can still pull off the hammer handle mode. Unfortunately, thanks to the new panels on Prime's arms, he can never hold onto the hammer handle. What I don't like though is that, at least on my copy of the toy, he doesn't really hold the guns well, it does not take much to knock them out of his hands.
Does this work as a Powermaster Prime? Yes. Is it a good toy overall though? Kinda? If you want something to display, he's fine, and there's nothing stopping him from being a fun toy to mess around with. He does his job, but I can't help but feel that he's only barely doing his job, that this could be really good if there was more effort put into it. This review doesn't work for the Takara version of the toy, as they did do a lot to retool the engineering in order to incorporate a combination gimmick with a new Godbomber. Will I review that version of the toy? Not for a long time if I'm lucky. I don't own the Takara version, and like I said at the start of the review, Magnus Prime never came out here in Australia. I can, however, review something similar, and I will be next week when I review the Power of the Primes version of Optimus Prime. In the meantime, I'll see you on Wednesday for the review of Sailor Moon R over on the main site.
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