This is a "gimmic line" plain and simple. These figures have nothing at all to do with the real plot of ANY Sonic video game or the Sonic X TV show. How did this line get approved? What is its inspiration? Who knows...but Toy Island made it, and it was released nearly simultaneously with their Figures & Chaos Emeralds and the Mega Bot lines. The lines started around April of 2006.
Why?
More articulation
They light up
Better faces
Better paint jobs
Articulation:
On all the Space Fighters, one arm is jointed at the elbow, and all have jointed knees and hips. The space suits do limit the shoulder/hip movement to just 1 direction...but then the Mega Bots wierdly ended limbs did the same thing, so there's not a whole lot to lose on the SF hip/shoulder problem. This actually makes them semi-poseable as well, rather than being stuck on 1 pose like the other guys. Of course, they'll mostly tip over except Tails, who has his tails to support him even if he only stands on 1 leg. The 2nd arm has to be un-jointed because the wire for the LED light in the fist is inside it. The batteries are replaceable! Don't worry about wearing them out, because if you remove their back pannel it's easy to change them.
The sculpt:
The heads seem to be a different but -really- similar sculpt on the MegaBot heads. If you look closely, you'll catch different nose sizes and some eye details that are mostly improved on the SFs. Tails is a GREAT example, as he comes across cute without those horrible key-hole-eyes that the MB line gave him. Sonic is still stuck 'looking up' but with his mouth shut, it seems more 'concentrating'. Also, by wearing the space suits and boots, this has re-proportioned the bodies to a small degree...that makes a difference! The feet are a little smaller and don't look as 'clownish' and the bodies are bigger but it does NOT cross over into "Big Body Syndrome" that Tails especially seems to get and look goofy with.
The Shadow is from the Mega Bot line. You can see that all the Space Fighters guys are a little bit bigger than their other line counter-parts. Missile Wrist is much smaller than the 'mega bot' (and also its Sonic X size is out of scale, or else it would be huge!)
Space Sonic has a minorly different head than the other lines, but he's still a bit off. His hands don't have the same attention to detail as the Mega Bot Sonics, but naturally 1 must accomodate the LED. His 'weapon' or whatever is more a rod than a staff. Note that it has tiny versions of his spikes near the 'chaos emerald'-like top. The shoes are a bit odd with blunt fronts, but he's pretty poseable and the figure actually makes a good presentation if you can get past the odd space theme.
The rods needed to be better implemented. They ALWAYS fall out of the figures' hand, due to mis-sizing. They could have had a snap in, or a twist/screw in rod and it would be fine...but they're supposed to pop in and don't. The only way to keep Tails holding his, is to glue it permenently to his hand, which no one wants. Their joints can also be a tad loose, but they tend to keep the poses most of the time. The helmets are non-removable. Tails' isnt attached but his hair keeps it on. They could have had some kind of 'snap on' helmet or something, but I guess they thought everyone would lose it.
Their hands aren't as well crafted as some on the MegaBot line. They're simplistic, but still fairly nice, nothing outrageous either way. Of course, one hand is always a 'pre-made' simple fist of some kind to hold the light. Although it is similarly sized, it tends to be blocky, but with good reason.
You can imagine Tails inventing something like this suit, if he had to. (but who knows why) The suit makes him look proportionate, and not suffer from 'big body' at all. This is one of the most poseable figures on the line, with his tails for support. You can see that they also bothered to color the insides of his ears this time, however they added a bit much 'white space' to his tail tips (they are actually about half+ white) which is inaccurate, but somewhat nit-picky.
Tails' magic space wand or whatever is more of a staff. It is a good deal longer than Sonics'. There is a bump on the emerald top for some reason. If you look closely, the bottom is divided into 2 tail shapes, with zig-zag ridges to denote tip color although the staff is all one color. WHY do they think it is necisary for the accessory to have body-part features of it's carrier?
Mini-Note:
Tails' tails do not articulate, although there does not seem to be a reason for it not to.
Whimsical wielder of tethered projectiles. It is good to see that Toy Island is giving some of the badguys (obscure or not) some decent figures.
This robot was one of the first robots that Eggman sent after our heroes in the Sonic X tv show. It was rather un-charismatic, and non-important in the grand scheme of things, however...here it is. This figure makes it look almost whimsical and fun. (although it was really a destructive badguy) It's quite pose-able, and will even sit down, adding to its odd charm.
It is obviously different than all the other figures. It's not as big as it was in the show (if it was, it'd be the size of the mega bot!) but it is still fairly large. The 'dome light/eye' is what lights up for it. You can extend both parts of the arms, and rotate the bottom of the arm 360 degrees to simulate missile firing, which is a nice touch. It has huge feet, so it's pretty stable too. The arms twist at the shoulders, and the legs at the hips. The 'knees' will also go 360. It is all hard plastic, with some paint details. This one has a really bright light! You can use him for a flashlight.
Coulda:
Made him turn at the head (to a limited degree of course, due to the wiring, but put some stops on him)
Made him turn at the waist, it would be simple and the joint wouldn't look dumb. Just have him able to rotate there
The LEDs are colored according to the rods, to better help it match when it lights up. This is a nice touch. Missile Wrist's light is blue.
The Space Fighters Shadow the Hedgehog was a *little* dissapointing because he has the EXACT same head as his MegaBot counter part, which was not that great. Only this time, they neglected to paint inside his ears. It seems like they did not try to improve him at all, unlike the other figures.
Added articulation, better body/head ratio sizing, and proof that they can do detailing makes this line nice. The colors, if you notice, are all taken directly from ONLY the colors already present on the figures. Only Sonic's suit introduces light blue, which was technically his color already anyway. This gives the characters' suits a familiar feel and insures that they aren't jarring. This was a very smooth move.
They could have copped out and done different repaints of the same helmets for everyone, but they chose the high-road and made each one different. If you look closely, each one has a detail which looks like a comm-unit. For something so out of left-field, these are surprisingly thoughty.
It's this nice attention to detail that causes the flaws to be downplayed, but baffeling. Why skip some paint portions? Why use a clone-head on Shadow that they KNEW was an inferior sculpt? Why the wide varience in paint quality? Joint mobility & weapon-grasping? The other stuff proves they knew better, or seem to, and then just didn't act to get it that final 100%.
The good points, attention to detail, extra mobility, and smart theming, make this set one to look for, especially with the oddity value. As a gimmic line, it may be overlooked now or shunned, but in the future these figures may prove quite the addition to your collection...or not.
