[Paladin]

The thirty-sixth Super Sentai installment has officially begun!

"Tokumei Sentai Go-Busters" began last weekend and the initial response has been highly positive; the premiere episode features some excellent action scenes and effects work unlike anything Sentai has seen in recent years.

And naturally, with a new series comes new merchandise! Today I picked up the first release in Go-Busters' DX Mecha line! Instead of releasing Zords in a single box-set, Go-Busters Machines will apparently be individually released. This may lead for some interesting configurations but it makes the preorder systems even more difficult for collectors.

At the moment only Go-Buster Red's Mecha is available to fight off the evil space aliens. This is CB-01:



A massive super-car that launches off a building ramp to reach fights in time.


The Go-Busters are supported outside of combat by the Buddy-Roids; mechanical animal creatures whose origins have not been fully explained at the time of writing. Go-Buster Red's partner is one "Cheeda Nick" -



A cheetah-inspired robot who can transform into a motorcycle. This is the smallest piece of this first Zord set and looking at its "transformation" (folding the legs upward) I begin to suspect the design team picked up a spare Ranger Key & stuck it on a leftover Goseiger Header.

Nick combines with CB-01 to unlock the vehicles' full potential-



Doesn't do much for the Vehicle form but it does enable further transformations! With Buddy-Roid installed CB-01 can convert to Beast Mode!



A massive cheetah-shaped robot block. Its almost totally immobile but I'm still very impressed at the creativity of this design. We've had vehicles with animalistic qualities before but never animals that turn into Vehicles quite like this.

And Cb-01 has one final transformation!



Red Buster gets his own Megazord, the Go-Buster Ace! Consider this from a Transformers perspective: this single Megazord is a Triple Changer, Breast Animal AND (eventually) a Combiner!

Ace's giant legs prevent any lower body articulation but he does have some startlingly good movement in his upper shoulders (and even some ELBOW Movement, which Megazords almost never have!)

Go-Buster Ace does come with the traditional sword weapon, except the sword is attached to Ace's right hand on a ball-joint instead of a peg. This way the sword is integrated throughout the various transformations without having to be removed. Its another impressive detail but I have already noticed some faint stress marks around the ball-socket so I'll have to keep a close watch on this weapon usage.



The engineering of Go-Buster Ace is simply remarkable; for a long time now Super Sentai has needed something beyond the usual "stick five things together" setup for Megazords and Ace pulls it off with superb detail. Definitely a fun and promising start to this new series! Highly recommended!

[Sentai Tamashii]

Great review!

[ComicGuy89]

Thanks for the review, Paladin!

This is one of those rare toys that actually looks better than the promotional photos let on. All the user images and videos I've seen make me far more interested in this toy than I was initially when only promotional material was available.

Oh by the way, which ball-socket with stress marks were you referring to? Hope it isn't too bad...

[Paladin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ComicGuy89

Oh by the way, which ball-socket with stress marks were you referring to? Hope it isn't too bad...

The ball-socket is located inside the right hand; either the ball is too big or the fingers are too close together for my tastes.

[ZeoRangerV]

Thanks for the review! Really tempted to change my decision of keeping away from the DX line, if only for Ace.

[Shadow Moon]

Great review as always Paladin! Here's a fun vid I found on YT showing off Ace in an interesting way.

[ZeoRangerV]

Wow, I love that the Go-Onger engines can attach. Those neat little features are some of the things I like most about the DX line.

[ComicGuy89]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paladin

The ball-socket is located inside the right hand; either the ball is too big or the fingers are too close together for my tastes.

Hmm I hope this is not too much to ask, but could you take a close-up photo of that area? Thanks.

[Sentai Tamashii]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shadow Moon

Great review as always Paladin! Here's a fun vid I found on YT showing off Ace in an interesting way.

snip

this guy always crack me up with the Gold Lightan in the end, wish I had that much time to do a stop motion, simply because I hate seeing the scars on my hand in the video.

[Banba Soukichi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paladin

Ace's giant legs prevent any lower body articulation but he does have some startlingly good movement in his upper shoulders (and even some ELBOW Movement, which Megazords almost never have!)

So no Knees like the show? Pity. MAN am I looking forward to this guy, but I'm having shipping withheld until all 3 are out so it's gonna be another month or so.

STILL! SEXY!