Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The Ark Addendum - Shouki's Transform

Oops, sorry, I glance up and the next thing I know, two weeks have gone by.  I realize that last week I skipped The Ark Addendum, but this week I'm back in force.

Time to break out the Trainbots!  I'll warn you in advance, I don't have all of their transform sequences.  I'm missing one of the train-to-robot sequences, and I don't think I have Raiden's combination either.  Still, I figured that it was better to post what I had than not.

What boy doesn't love to play with trains?  I know I loved them when I was a kid.  There's something so majestic about a mighty engine pulling a dozen or two cars along.  Thee have certainly been no shortage of Transformers train toys, most of which come from Japan.  The trainbots were the first dedicated train team from Transformers.  (Well, there was the Astroforce... oh, I'd love the models for the Astroforce!)  They'd be far from the last. 

As for the specifics of Shouki's Transform, I don't have too much to say.  It's not spectacular, but it gets the job done.  I do remember that I had a lot of fun researching the Trainbots for  Transformers: The Complete Ark  (order it today!) .  Getting the best translations for their names and a bit about their personality was very satisfying.  Hope you enjoyed those efforts, and this transformation.

3 comments:

Hans said...

I certainly do! :)

I remember first reading about (and seeing) the Trainbots on a site, a looong time ago, in 1998 I think. Maybe it was megatronsdominion.com, I don't know, but the site doesn't exist anymore. In any case, I was intrigued with the idea of an entire team of train-formers that I had never seen before. Managed to get a mint set of the Trainbots years ago (man, those were expensive!), and Raiden is great. Very much in line with Devastator, Reflector and many other Micro-Man designs.

A shout-out should also go to Rail Racer, from Robots in Disguise. Also a fantastic looking toy, and keeping the spirit of Raiden alive in RiD! :)

Carlos said...

Hey Jim, it's been a while since we talked!

I still love these addendum pages. You could have easily put together a 3rd Ark volume with them. They don't seem to come to an end! :D

Hope you're doing great.
Best,

Carlos

Jimtron said...

Hey, Carlos, it's been a while! Glad to see you're still around and enjoying the Ark Addendums. I'll admit, I'm running a bit low, at least as far as G1 is concerned. I'd still love to revisit the Ark concept in print form for RID, Beast Wars, or maybe even G1.

Hans, Rail Racer was pretty cool. I also like the various train Micromaster six-combiners. What I'd really love is a nice HO scale transforming train with a working engine. Maybe the engine doesn't transform; maybe it just has guns that pop out or something. But all the cars turning into robots would be terrific.