Titanium Transformers is the newest line of Transformers toy to be released in the market. The toy line features Die-Casts builts with a good number of articulation. One their first figures to be released is the long awaited War Within Optimus Prime. You see, ever since Don Figueroa (He’s a Filipino) drew the art for Dreamwave comic’s Transformers War Within there was never an action figure to represent prime… Sure there was a Statue and recently a small 3 inch die cast figure (From Titanuim series also) but there were no transforming toy yet and what is a transformer that can’t transform… well… not a transformer that’s for sure.

For the remainder of the review this toy will be refered to as WWOP (War Within Optimus Prime)/span>

Review

I will review WWOP in three categories:

- Sculpt (Form and Color)
- Articulation (Movable Parts and how can it be moved)
- Fun Factor (How did I enjoy it)

Sculpt

[Robot Mode]

This action figure stands at around 4.5 inches, slightly smaller than Armada Bendy prime and slightly taller than Robot Master Convoy.

One thing I will say is WWOP is pretty hard to remove from the box with twisties being connected to almost inaccessible places, forcing you to cut the twisties with a tool. There are also plastic stubs connected to the cardboard backing to hold the bubble in place and it requires you to cut all the tape from the stubs so you can easily separate the bubble from the cardboard backing. Makes you wonder why its so hard to remove the toy from box… Well, there’s a reason for that, I will explain later.

First thing you might notice on your WWOP, is the non-reflective red surface of this chest. The paint applied on the chest is not smooth at all making you guess if that is the die cast part or not. Yes, folks, that is a Die cast part! The die cast parts are the chest, legs, shoulders and the parts of the truck. The paint on this part features some dark washes especially on the legs which would have been great except for the fact that the toy easily gets paint chips. One paint chip arised from simply having the twistie rub the shoulder part while I was trying to remove the toy from the packaging. For some reason I think the paint doesn’t stick on the metal part well. The abs of WWOP looks hastely painted and a lot of silver paint bleeds are seen.

The sculpt of the toy’s head is pretty nice, but like his chest, it suffers from the same paint bleeds, mostly the blue parts bleeds into the silver face-mask.

The arms are made of plastic which was nice since making it die-cast would weaken its joints a lot when posing. The hand could be retracted using plastic square knobs, this is required when turning him into a truck. Along the arms are three exhaust pipes, molded into the plastic and painted silver. The paint is a little grainy making it look less metallic. The hands are fixed into holding to position to hold his G1-like gun. However the handle of the gun fits quite loose when placed in the toys hand.

With all that its no wonder Hasbro made it hard for us to remove WWOP from the box.

[Vehicle Mode]

Vehicle Mode

Vehicle mode is ok, a bit forced, but still ok. The simplistic transformation makes it easier for you to transform him to and fro. Be careful tho, since rubbing something against his die-cast parts may chip some of the paint off, fortunately I haven’t experienced extremely easy chipping.

While in this mode, the gray parts are less seen.

Articulation

WWOP is articulated at the head, shoulders, arms and hips. The articulation was designed to make use of the current advancements in TF toys, with ball joints in the hips and parts that retract and expand. However, from the toy I got I could see that the figure’s legs could easily popped off from the hips making it irritating to transform him back to a robot from his truck mode (You have to pull his legs and most of the time I pop the hips as well.) But one good thing I could say is the legs has an additional joint. The hip and the thigh are actually two different pieces, adding more possible poses for the toy.

Fun Factor

WWOP comes with a plastic polygon base with a removable Autobot insigna. The base looks great. However there is nothing on the base to keep WWOP on it, but its excusable since WWOP is a pretty sturdy toy when it comes to standing.

This toy doesn’t have any gimmicks, its die-cast so its more in tuned to collector rather than kids. But the fun part of this toy would be the novelty value of being the first ever War Within Transforming Optimus Prime toy. And on that I guess, it did its job.

Overall

It’s a great sculpt but the paint is pretty lousy, the articulation is forgivable, but with the lousy paint and the unsteady parts, it would say its a B level toy.

Regardless of the flaw, this would be the first War Within Optimus Prime toy giving it a lot of collectible value but the execution of the toy makes me ask for something more. The news that it was die-cast was something synonymous to saying its of high-quality, but what went wrong, I ask?

If you’re a fan of TFs and of Optimus Prime this item is worth getting (at $16.50 or 900 php), but if you do… I suggest you don’t open it.

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