Broke down and ordered one from Chimungmung. BTW, Uncle Billy @ aliexpress sells it cheaper, but I don't see options to pay with Paypal just in case something goes wrong.
www.aliexpress.com/store/product/KFC-Eavl-Metal-Citizen-Stack-Pre-order-available-April-2014/613353_1775573522.htmlThe initial pre-reviews from Peaugh and Sidecutter of Captured Prey Toys are quite encouraging.
From Peaugh:
Okay, some quick thoughts on Citizen Stack here. First off, HUGE. That may turn some people off, but it is what it is. Alt mode fits super nicely with MP-10 which is a plus. The design/engineering on this guy is excellent. EXCELLENT. Everything folds and tabs securely in alt mode, and there are a lot of little bits and details that flip up and fill in a lot of little areas to give a cleaner/more cohesive bot mode. They could have left all of them out and still had a solid figure, but the little touches really shine.
Regarding overall quality, I will say that while he's certainly got some heft, he does feel light for a figure of this size. The plastic here feels like the same stuff as previous KFC releases, HOWEVER, this really is an instance of "bigger is better," because due to the size everything is thicker and sturdier. Even in the couple of places where it took some decent force to get parts to slide up or down for transformation, I never felt like anything was in danger of snapping or breaking. He's pretty solid overall.
If I had any nitpicks so far, and they're all very minor ones, is that when viewed from the side, his head seems a little smished from front to back. Not detail-mushed, just the head from the side looks a little flatter than you'd expect. The face could have been a little more expressive, but it does definitely jibe with the stone cold killer bio on the package. And I second sidecutter's comment on the white paint, it's just a WEE bit thinner in a couple spots than I'd prefer, but it's not bad by any means.
Overall though I'm pretty impressed, and I'm a big fan of the all-in-one design versus white prime in armor. If you were already digging the look of it, I can't find any reason not to recommend picking this guy up.
From Sidecutter:
Uppers:
The plastic feels very nice - A lot like the plastic on Krank and Stax, I think. A slightly matte finish to it. It doesn't feel like it's going to snap or anything. Good color, too. The blue and red have a great saturation. They look just about perfect for Ultra Magnus' colors.
There's a LOT of very snug connections that work together in concert to create a very solid trailer. Once you get it all locked in, it's not going anywhere easily.
Paint looks good. The white might be a *little* thin, but not horribly so. Everything is painted where it should be, without any noticeable bleeding or oversprays. Good and crisp. I wish the edges of the vertical bars on the sides of the cab were painted instead of just the outer sides, but that's the kind of thing HasTak does a lot and we generally accept it, so I wouldn't personally hold that against the toy.
The missiles are a separate piece of red plastic but are permanently fixed in the launchers, so no worries about loss there.
Head looks to be easy to pop open for those who want to paint the eyes.
Bumper bars look removeable, but you'll want to be careful. They're thin plastic and pegged in snugly, so you'd want to nudge them out from the back with a tool.
Solid joints and connections again in robot mode. Some parts take a pretty good amount of pressure to move into place, and everything snaps together pretty dang tight. The only fault I can find here is that the side to side hip motion is just a smidge looser than I would like. Every other joint seems perfectly snug. Ratchet joints for elbows, knees, and in/out hip motion!
Index finger is individually jointed with two knuckles, and the remaining three fingers share a base joint, with individual second knuckle movement. All the finger joints feel very firm, and very solid, I don't expect to have these popping off or breaking on me at all.
Yes, you can rotate the forearms so the gauntlets are either on the side or the bottom.
Two-part feet, with a spaced out heel and toe, both articulated on big, solid ball joints with good resistance. Should accommodate dynamic poses very well!
Ball joint head, swivel & hinge shoulders, swivels above AND below the elbow, swivel wrists, jointed fingers, waist swivel, universal joint hips, thigh swivel, swivel below the knee, and dual-ball joint two-part feet. Articulation is definitely NOT an issue here.
Silver and blue paint details on the backs of the hands, despite that they are usually obscured by the gauntlets. Also, the trailer has a couple extra bends and folts to it, and some panels that are there purely to fill in gaps. Not just "stand up, flip feet, flip shoulders back" like G1. Nice touches.
Neutrals:
Cab is pretty simple and basically hollow, just kind of folds over itself. Sorry folks who wanted something more, but this design just didn't call for that. It accomplished what it needs to from the angles at which you're ever "supposed" to see it, so I'm not really knocking points for that.
Downers:
Well bummer. One of the stacks was broken off at the base of where it gets thinner, just above the cab. However, this doesn't really seem to be a design or inherent packaging flaw or a problem with the plastics used, just a result of the usual rough handling overseas postal service packages seem to get
for the record, one missile launcher had been knocked loose from the shoulder, too, and the rifle had been whacked out of storage as well. The good news is, if this happens to you, the stacks are held in by small screws inside the cab. You'll need to do some disassembly to get to them for the fix once you get a replacement stack, but it can be done by anyone with a set of cheap precision screwdrivers and a few minutes to spare, so no biggie.
I've got one mis-molded peg on the base of a missile launcher. It still works, it's just set at an angle. Doesn't look like a "normal" problem, just like the mold didn't quite fill in fully at the back of the peg. The other launcher is fine.
