Except it's WAY too early to make any kind of comparison between the two.

Well then we'll just compare what we can:

Black Lion: Large, fully posable, fully painted, lights and over 40 sounds. Includes a to-scale pilot figure. $30 USD. Company doesn't have much of a history doing robots that combine but still produces a quality designed figure.

Tyrannozord: Large, hardly painted, barely any posability, (and what's there looks useless because of the feet design) sounds but no lights that we know of, and a pilot figure that- while posable- isn't to scale. $40 USD. Company has a histoy of combining robots and produces a really, really friggin' amateur product.

I for one completely agree with you. It's a stark comparison. Bandai has seemingly failed to produce a toy of real merit when Playmates, often seen as one of their largest competitors, has done so without much experience in that area. Granted we don't have all the information to go on, but it's fairly obvious at this point that not only is the T-Rex pretty bad looking, but it's complexity and features seem very lacking as well. I'm sure we'll get a good comparison of the 2 eventually. But for now I think it's pretty clear the Lion is the winner.

I bet the t-Rex would look half decent if it were custom painted.. But as is, it looks unbelievably cheap. And I thought the AOE leader grimlock was bad.

I don't think they'll be a Japanese Version, this is pure american power ranger. Bandai Japan would probably not get involved in this.