Ready 2 Robot

Leeeeeet's get reeeeaaady to rooooobot!

Ready 2 Robot is the latest blind toy series from MGA featuring over 25 different robots all with interchangeable parts. MGA also makes the Awesome Little Green Men I looked at back in January.

 Let me tell you, I haven't had so much fun just getting and opening a toy! I wish I had the patience to make a video because words and pics just don't do the experience justice. There are a few YouTube videos if you'd rather watch instead of read. I happened across these at Target recently and had to Google them to find out what they were. The store display is fantastic and caught my attention.

It's sort of like a gashapon, or capsule toy, dispenser. The whole thing is gravity fed. You pull one of the yellow tabs and it pops out a capsule like in the first photo. Since these are all blind packed, you don't know what you're going to get. And of course, being blind packed, there is an ultra-rare chase robot that lights up.

Each capsule contains robot parts (torso, 2 arms, 2 legs, 2 weapons) and a pilot. Once you remove the outer wrapper, this is what you get. LEGO spaceman for scale.

If you look at the front right of the capsule, you'll see each segment is numbered 01-04. That's the order you open them in. Each section has a few bagged pieces that you assemble into your robot. After you've taken everything out, you can flip the 01 section to use it as a display stand. There are little tabs built in so you can interlock multiple bases.

The robot is very easy to put together. The torso has multiple socket holes where you can connect any piece with it's little ball joint. Want to swap the arms and legs? I'm not going to stop you, it's your robot.

Here is the pilot that comes in its own little slime pod.

The slime is great! It's all gooey like slime should be but it's not very wet. I was able to extract the pilot pretty easily and peel the slime off. It didn't leave any kind of residue on the figure. The slime will also basically disintegrate if dropped in really hot water.

Here's the robot, Kill Switch, all assembled. For the record, the pilot's name is Clubb. The black band over his head is actually headphones, not a helmet.

You can see the pilot is not very big in relation to the LEGO minifig but has a pretty good amount of detail for being so tiny. There are little pegs in the cockpit that go into holes in the pilot's feet to keep them "seated." It's hard to tell in the photo but the bot body is black metalflake meaning it's got shiny bits in it sort of like car paint.

In addition to the holes for the arms, legs, and weapons, the back has four more holes for attaching things. All the robot parts are interchangeable so you can get crazy with it if you get multiple robots, or accessory packs!

Here's the other one I picked up. (You can't just pick up one of a new toy line, they need buddies!) This is Lowlife with pilot Bootlick. At first I thought he was a crazy baby. The nose ring looks like a pacifier from far away! The bot should have another missile launcher but I don't know if I accidentally threw it out or if it wasn't there to begin with.

The Bot Brawler capsules retail for around $10. It's a little pricey for a blind packed toy but I think there are enough in the series that you shouldn't get a duplicate too soon. I haven't found anything other than these capsules but there is more to the line.

Survivor Battle Packs come with 2 bots (one you can see, one hidden) and a weapon accessory that actually shoots something. Bot Blaster Packs have a hidden bot and a visible minibot that shoots something. And there's also a Pilots Pack which has 4 slime capsules, each with a pilot.

You can hit the Ready 2 Robot site and see some animated webisodes, get more info on the bots and pilots, and view the checklist that comes in each package.

I really like these toys! There's quite a variety to the types of robots and the pilots all have their own personality to them. Hopefully they'll be around for awhile.

Dino Drac Funpack - October 2014

I'm just going to presume anyone reading this knows who Matt/Dinosaur Dracula is and not fanboy all over him. I decided to pull the trigger on his October Fun Pack because Halloween!

In case you're an unfortunate soul that didn't snag one, here's what you missed.
I apologize in advance for the busy background. I thought this table cloth would add some good holiday vibes to the photos but I think sometimes, it takes away from the focus.

I haven't even unpacked the box yet and I already feel like I got my money's worth upon taking in that gorgeous Nightmare on Elm Street sticker book. I definitely had one of those as a kid. OK, kid may be stretching it a bit as I was in my late teens when it came out.

Let's dive right in!



Matt includes a list of what's in the box as well as an October checklist of eerie things to do to get you in the holiday spirit. The Budweiser sticker is pretty neat, incorporating the sideways hourglass logo into the bat design. Glow sticks are a staple of Halloween and this one even says Halloween on it! What I really like about it are the package graphics. The glowy eyed ghoul emerging from its coffin with red-tipped claws is awesome.

Tucked in the upper right of the box is a pumpkin shaped goodie bag with a ghostly doodle attached. In the bag were some candy skeleton parts which did not last long. Hopefully they were from a more recent date than everything else! There's a vintage Stripe sticker card from Gremlins. On top of that is a teeny tiny Pepsi can necklace, which I remember getting a few of as vending machine prizes. And last is a pocket book about "Real" Monsters. None of those fictional creatures in here! I loved books like this as a kid. I was big into spy stuff so anything like this that was of a smaller size was instantly interesting. Add in monsters, and it's home run, out of the park cool.



Next is a McDonald's promotional ad for Halloween gift certificates featuring Roger Rabbit (now on VHS!). As with a lot of things in here, I am amazed that he not only has these relics but that he has enough of them to pack one for everyone that got this Fun Pack!



Here's mini-poster celebrating the Dino Drac 2014 Halloween Countdown, a Mordle creature, and an official Dino Drac specimen. I'm actually pretty stoked about the specimen. I have an affinity for capsule toys and vintage vending things. Let's take a closer look.



The Monster Pop-A-Bead is hard to photograph because it's so small but you can see some of the detail here. I would have loved to have a few handfuls of these as a kid to make into horrific bracelets or necklaces.

Pop some Hypnocil, kids! We're going to Dreamland...



In addition to the Nightmare sticker book and a pack of stickers (where does he get this stuff?!?), he also included a pair of 3D glasses from Freddy's Dead. I still have my original pair and used them the last time I watched the DVD. The sticker book covers the first three movies. I guess maybe there was too much gore for each movie to have its own book.



Here's the full cover art in all its disturbing glory. As I held this childhood (again, go with me on the child part) relic in my hands and flipped through it, I started thinking about just how messed up the 80s were with marketing R rated properties to a young audience: Aliens, Predator, Robocop, Nightmare. Most of them had action figure lines. Some had trading cards or sticker books. All things generally targeted at kids! Weird.

Kristen hanging out with her friends

And that concludes your tour through the Dino Drac October 2014 Fun Pack. He still offers monthly Fun Packs as a monthly subscription service if you want to get in on the goodness.

Before you head off to your next house, swing by Halloween Mixes.
They're posting a themed mix album every day of the month!

And of course, check out all the other folks participating in the Countdown to Halloween!

Mailbox Invaders - Trading Post Success

Thanks to the recent League of Extraordinary Bloggers post where we all put up stuff for trade, I got more than I bargained for. Literally!

I set up a trade with Jboy from Revenge of the Cosmic Ark to get a couple of LEGO minifigs and one of the new Battle Beasts figures. What did I get?
A box full of frickin awesome is what!

Just look at all that goodness! To start, he sent the two Atari Hot Wheels that I've been hunting all over for to finish the set. My wife recently went out to CO and I had her looking out there too. The Secret Saturdays was a favorite cartoon of mine since it debuted so it was cool to get this little set. The figures are neat considering they're only a couple inches.

I don't know if this Corps figure is a pilot, astronaut or some kind of android but he can pop and lock like nobody's business!

I might open this and see if the battery still works.
As a first gen Atari kid, it's cool to have for the Activision artwork alone.

These guys are from the latest incarnation of one my childhood favorite toy lines, Battle Beasts. I was very against the idea of these from the start because they were so different from the toys I collected. Also, I just don't like Mini-Mates as much as LEGO and Playmobil. Both of these guys have holes in their back so they can wear their weapons, which is a genius idea.

The snake is by far the better of the pair, he succeeds in all areas where the walrus fails. The walrus is an odd shape and that means using a Mini-Mates base body and putting custom pieces on them. I seriously cannot pick this figure up without at least one part coming off. I don't understand why they think he needs all that articulation if it means body parts falling off constantly.

Anyway, a huge thanks to Jboy for hooking me up with all this!
You can see what I sent him on his blog.

Zombie Planet!

My semi-regular trips to Toys R Us over the past few months haven't been yielding much. Mainly because I was looking for SLUG Zombies and not finding them. They finally showed up with Series 3 12-pack ($11.50) and 3-packs ($4.49). While not much over the Target prices, I passed for now. But those aren't the zombies I'm posting about today.

During those fruitless months of searching I got addicted to Buggyboos capsule toys on the way out the door. They're cute little aliens/bugs and each one comes in a multitude of colors so even if you get your third Cionus, it's not exactly the same.

At the start of the summer, I had seen another vending toy called Zombie Planet at WalMart. I didn't have any change and the next time I was there, it was already gone.
(I try not to go to WalMart very often, it can be scary.)
But lo and behold!
What have they gotten in at Toy R Us...

Zombie Planet!

I'm not sure if each figure has multiple "wash" variations (see below) but I really prefer the full color ones so it's not a big deal. They sell for $60 online for a case of 250, which is about 0.24 each! If these weren't quite so gruesome, I'd buy a case and hand some out in Trick or Treat bags. And if I had the cash, probably buy a vending machine to hold them.

While browsing the vending machine site, I also found Freaky Geeks.

Now, if you'll excuse my, my inner child is going to go freak out some more at the idea that you can buy capsule toys in bulk online.
If you want to join me, head over to CandyMachines.com

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