Ninja Turtles T-Machines Mutations One-Touch Figures Review
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Playmates has been working hard in the last two years to find ways to expand the Ninja Turtles toy lines. And today I'll be covering yet another such
product, an expansion of the T-Machines line called the One-Touch Mutations. These figures transform between a vehicle and a figure with just a touch
of their head. It's an interesting idea. But creating a well designed, transforming figure in such a small format is quite difficult. And unfortunately
the One-Touch Mutations don't prove to be the exception to this.
Packaging - 4/10The T-Machines One-Touch Mutations are packaged in open tray packages much like the Half-Shell Heroes toys. The toy is mounted on a clear plastic platform so that customers can transform it back and forth from figure to vehicle. There is an arrow inviting people to try it out. The back of the card is small, but they did include photos of all three toys. The has a big short coming in that it doesn't do a very good job of describing how you change them back from a figure to a vehicle. So it's really easy to think that they are either broken or just don't work to begin with. That's a pretty big issue if you are hoping to sell many toys.
Sculpting - 3/10The challenge with transforming figures usually is in trying to get the toy to look good in both forms and making sure that you don't see parts of one form hanging off of the other. The One-Touch Mutations handle this by just not looking good in either form. In vehicle form, they have four wheels at the corners but that is about it. Both Leonardo and Michelangelo have their arms clearly visible as the fenders on the front of each vehicle. In their figure form, there's just a large chunk of plastic in place of their feet and there is no detail on their back. So what you actually get are three toys with a head ontop of a vaguely car or body shaped chunk of plastic.
Paint - 3/10The One-Touch Mutations have the bare minimum amount of paint work to not be a bootleg or $0.99 store toy. It's not even clear if these are suppose to be the characters in mechanical suits, robots or some sort of cyborg hybrids. The lack of paint work certainly doesn't help bring out what detail there is in the sculpting.
Articulation - 1/10The only articulation on these toys are the four joints used for the transformation and the four rolling wheels. But since the articulation is all spring loaded, you have two choices: standing straight up as a figure or locked down in vehicle form.
Accessories - 0/10The One-Touch Mutations have no accessories. They also have no movable limbs to use an accessory or hold one. So it isn't a great loss.
Action Feature - 2/10This should be pretty obvious by now, but the action feature for the One-Touch Mutations is that with a simple touch of the driver's head, the vehicle pops up to become a figure. That's not a new idea. Transformers has characters that sprang up to transform. But they looked like a humanoid shape when they transformed. The One-Touch Mutations go from a clunky block of a vehicle to a chunk of plastic standing up in what is suppose to be a humanoid form. It works mechanically. But that is about all it has going for it.
Value - 2/10These figures sell for $6 to $7 each. Sadly, there is really no reason to spend that for these figures. There's really no reason to spend any amount of money for them. They just aren't very good as a figure or a vehicle. If you really want a TMNT figure that can transform, there are better options out there.
Happy Hunting:If you still have to have these in your collection, then you are probably me and I already own them. If there is someone other than myself that wants them, they aren't hard to find. I bought mine at Toys R Us. But they are also available from Target and ToysRUs.com.
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