Beast Wars Transmetals Rampage

One of my favorite characters in Beast Wars was that kickass crab, Rampage. He was ruthless, powerful, pure evil, insane, and a lot of fun to watch. So, of course, I had to get his toy counterpart. I got one on eBay, mint in box, for $21 (plus six for shipping), which is actually not much higher than it originally was when it first came out.

Of course, the first thing you'll say when you see Rampage is 'damn, his claws are huge', and indeed they are. The size of them is as big, possibly bigger, than his whole crab body. Speaking of his crab body, it's pretty cool. It's a mix of purple, brown and orange with some red and yellow in there, very cool. It also matches the show very well, as is the case with all the transmetals.

The only real problem I have with this mode is the usual arachnid (or crustacean in this case) belly crawling thing which plagued Scorponok, Tarantulas and to an extent Quickstrike. So, he can't hold his enormous bulk up by his crab legs, but if you stick his cannons out, he can somewhat life his claws off the ground, though he still tilts forward a good deal. However, I like to overlook this fact due to the coolness of his crab mode. Kind of a shame he didn't use it more in the show.

Conversion to tank mode isn't overly tough, though you need to get his claws to mesh right with his sides for it to line up right. Also, just a side note, but make sure his arms are pegged into the sides of his robot shoulder pads otherwise the wheels won't line up right.

Tank mode is very cool looking. His claws become the highest part of his treads (which are folded up in his claws) and the thumb part of them become shields in the front for running over Maximals. However, despite the cool look, there are a few problems. First off the treads don't roll very well. They tend to either not hit the ground (due to the wheel on his cannon) or when they do they catch on his crab legs. Sadly this can't be fixed because there is no way to move the legs, short of removing them completly (which is possible, since they're ball joints). The second problem is the wheel itself. His cannon can be positioned two ways when he holds it, one to just spin, and one to fire while it spins. The first position is impossible due to the shape of the peg and hole on the gun. However, despite the flaws, tank mode is really cool looking.

Transformation to robot mode isn't too tough, it's essentially just unfold him from under the crab body and stick his claws over his shoulders. In robot mode Rampage is very well proportioned. Unlike most Transformers who have too small a head for their body, Rampage's is the right size (it actually looks too big when you first see it because of this). He's also full of kibble.

First off, he has a massive backpack. Remember those claws that were the size of his entire body? Yeah, they're now part of his backpack. On top of that his crab shell is back there, and the sides of it fold up (they conceal his arms in beast mode) to form his shoulder pads which massivly widen him. The final annoyance is that he has two crab legs attached to each arm (unlike in the show, which had them attached to his back), which really get in the way at times and even limit his poseability a bit. His crab antenna also stick out below his chest, making it look kinda like he's wearing suspenders at times. However, with the exception of a few colors, Rampage is very show accurate, except his head, which has the same shape, but doesn't look quite as cool as it does on the show.

So, in conclusion, despite his flaws (which aren't really that bad), Rampage is one cool toy, both in looks and transformation wise (he's a lot of fun to transform, as in, he's complicated, but not annoying). This one is definetly worth the cash, and that may not even be that bad, you can probably get one for around $25 with no problems. Very cool.