Tag Archives: DTF

Toyguide Update: Royal Starship Droids (Walmart Exc.)

The Yakface Toyguide updates resume today with the next addition for the 2012 “Darth Maul” product line. We continue with the Royal Starship Droids Battle Pack (2 of 2) from Walmart’s exclusive “Discover the Force in 3-D” collection.

PROS: Walmart picks up a great exclusive here. Anything astromech related has a huge following in the collecting community as demonstrated by their steady sell through at retail. The deco on all of the droids is great making these the most accurate versions to date. As a bonus, these figures use the B.A.D. sculpt which promotes a ton of customizing options and additional play value. R2-N3 (the green one) gets a debut here and each droid includes their power harness/docking stations – all of which act as a huge accessory set to the Naboo Royal Starship/Playset from 1999.

CONS: Some may not like the Build-A-Droid/Droid Factory play system. Initially difficult to find but the set is now shipping in greater quantity. Since there is only one new figure (by name) in this set collectors might feel obligated to pick this up by that reason alone.

Head to the toyguide for the full image gallery and to judge for yourself whether this figure is worth adding to your collection.

You can also weigh in with your impressions on the figures we add to our toyguide on facebook and in our forums.

Walmart Exclusive R2-B1 Variant Discovered

Our friends at Jedi Temple Archives are reporting the discovery of a new astromech variant/running change for the R2-B1 from the Walmart Exclusive Royal Starship Droids multipack. As you can see, the internal “guts” of the body are now cast in silver/gray plastic whereas the initial releases were cast in solid blue. It also appears there may be a slight color shift in the yellow accents on the variant as well. Which one(s) do you have? Post your findings in our comment section, on facebook or in our forums.

Discover the Force G8-R3 Harness Variant

While photographing and reviewing the Walmart Exclusive G8-R3 a couple weeks ago, I noted that the power harness for the figure did not match the other harnesses included with the Royal Astromech Droids in terms of paint details/color.

After looking on ebay and reviewing similar image galleries at both Jedi Temple Archives and Rebelscum, I thought I might have inadvertently photographed the wrong harness for the toyguide since I gathered all of the related Naboo astromechs for a group shot.

I solicited my friend Paul at JTA for assistance as he happened to have a few G8’s on card to see if he spotted a variant amongst them and sure enough there was!

As you can see in the side-by-side image, the details on the harness “arms” have different details on the hub section and there is also a different red/green light configuration on the front of the harness arms (not visible in the carded photograph).

You can count on us adding this variant to our G8-R3 entry as soon as I can track one down for myself as all of the versions in my area have had the missing paint details (shown on the left).

Which one do you have? Leave a comment or a post in our forums. We welcome responses on facebook as well.

Toyguide Update: Ric Olié & Naboo Pilot (Walmart Exc.)

The Yakface Toyguide updates resume today with a “two-for-one” special since they are both so closely related. We continue on with the addition of Ric Olie (9 of 12) and the Naboo Pilot (10 of 12) from Walmart’s exclusive “Discover the Force in 3-D” collection.

PROS: Hasbro makes the most of its tooling budget here with two “all new” figures. While Ric “Captain Obvious” Olié was a great figure in 1999, this new version is simply great, especially the likeness of actor Ralph Brown. The generic Naboo Pilot is no slouch either. He features a completely nondescript portrait making him the perfect army builder for any Naboo display or hangar diorama so you’ll want a few to pilot those new N-1 starfighters due in a couple weeks, but they’ll work with the original 1999 vehicle just fine. Finally, the inclusion of the soft goods overcoat completes both of these figures nicely as does the removable helmet, both of which are unique sculpts to each figure.

CONS: Having two virtually identical figures as separate, concurrent exclusives seems like a odd move, but the line has to pay for all those other repaints and repacks some how, right? The color of the plastic coat seems a bit too brown when compared to the on-screen costume. In another strange move, the Naboo Pilot, not Ric Olié, will be making his way to the Vintage Collection – everybody say it with me – pegwarmer!

Head to the toyguide for the full image gallery and to judge for yourself whether these figures are worth adding to your collection.

You can also weigh in with your impressions on the figures we add to our toyguide on facebook and in our forums.