Transformers Go!: Hishoumaru G10

While Western audiences were treated with the continuation of the Transformers Prime toyline in Beast Hunters (and eventually on the television show as well), Japan decided to go a different route with Transformers Go!. Set in the same universe as Prime, Go! essentially continues the story after season 2 of Prime ended. This isn't the first time where Takara has taken Transformers down a different path than what other parts of the world received.

Combiners made their return to Transformers with the inclusion of the Swordbots, martial artist transformers that have the ability to combine and form powerful three robot combiners. There were two teams, Samurai and Shinobi. The Samurai team was the first to receive toys in the Go! series. I own this group and had every intention on doing a post for each 'bot, but if I'm being honest I wasn't all that impressed with them as individual robots so I may never get around to that post. However I'm glad to say the Shinobi team is pretty cool and Hishoumaru is the first member of the Shinobi team we'll look at.

     

Takara always does a great job with the packaging for their Transformers series and Go! is no different. Packaged in large window boxes, you can see Hishoumaru displayed in his robot mode. Flip the box over and you've got a larger product shot of the toy in robot and beast mode as well as his combined mode where he forms the top of the combiner.

One side of the box gives you a larger view of the combined mode where Hishoumari forms the top of the combiner robot. We'll talk more about that later. The other side of the box has his tech spec ratings.

When you have a robot that combines with others there is bound to be some drawbacks to the toy. In the case of this one (and others in the Shinobi group) these robots tend to have very long legs and not much of a defined waist area. Hishoumaru has probably the best robot mode of the group as the torso plastic covers the center portion fairly well. Flip the figure around and it's a whole different story. The robot's legs do suffer from a bit of beast kibble as the bird feet fold up and just hang off the side of his calves.

Articulation for the robot is hampered by the combining element, but between the hinge joints and ball joints you can pull off some decent poses.

The only part of the robot that I really don't care for is the head/face sculpt. I guess I'm just not fond of the rounded, almost humanoid head. Looking at his long enough and I can start to see Rodimus Prime a little bit.

Each Swordbot comes with their own unique kabuto along with a few weapons. The kabuto serves as the upper torso and combiner head for when that robot forms the upper half of the trio combiner. While not combined, each robot can wield the kabuto as a shield or a weapon. This piece can also be attached in beast and robot modes.

In this shot you can see the kabuto has been attached to the back of Hishoumaru. He is also wielding his main weapon, a kunai knife sword. This piece also doubles as the tail section while in beast mode.

I'm not sure what animal his beast mode is supposed to be. Is it a phoenix, eagle or some sort of chicken? I actually like the bird mode more than I thought I would. It's a little thick and wide in places, but it works. It's not as nice as say Energon's Divebomb was, but it gets the job done.

From a top view you can get a better idea how the kunai sword attaches to the rear of the bird to form it's tail feathers of sorts. You can also attach the kabuto to the bird's back as well and flip up the head antennae to form little guns. I apologize that I forgot to take a picture of this, but you'll see what I've referenced in the Shinobi team group shot below.

While I didn't care for the robot's head sculpt, I love the beast mode's bird head sculpt. The red eyes help complete that evil Decepticon look.

Overall Hishoumaru surprised me. I honestly didn't know what to expect going in after the mild disappointment that was the Samurai team. He has decent looking forms in both robot and beast modes, a fair amount of articulation and he makes for a good upper torso potion of the combiner, GoHishou. I do see however how some fans just don't care for this figure. It's made to combine with the other Shinobi team members...period and while it has it's shortfalls, he turns out to be a decent figure who just happens to have a very loud color scheme going on.

I don't believe this figure (or the other combiners) sold very well and now can be had in a set of 3 with the other Shinobi team members ($30-$50) for what I paid for the figure alone when it was first released. One online store I used to shop frequently has him in stock as of today's date for a mere $16.03 if you're interested.

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