Today Hasbro Pulse held its annual online event known as Pulsecon. With events like Hasbro’s Toy Fair Fan Media day seemingly in the past, these offer a fun way for the various project teams to present upcoming product for the next year. On September 30, 2022 the Transformers team presented a ton of reveals coming in at the end of 2022 and in 2023. If you missed the event, here’s a rundown of the reveals below.
Legacy Evolution
The next stage of Legacy will be Legacy Evolution. “Evolution” refers to the change in play patterns. Gone (for the most part) are the Energon weapons of Legacy year one and instead the “Evolution” of the weaponry largely involves parts of the Transformer themselves forming weapons and then combining with others to form even larger weapons. So, similar to the Energon weapons but these will make a bit more sense (I’m looking at you random fists with Blitzwing) since they’re part of the figure itself (for the most part).
The other aspect of Evolution being introduced continues the play pattern originated by the Weaponizers in Siege. This time out there will be several Deluxe Class Junkions who not only transform from a robot to vehicle, but they can also break apart so you can use them as armor and weapons or create unique vehicles and robots! Hasbro has seen the weird and wild combinations fans have made over the years with Weaponizers and Fossilizers and they’ve decided to lean into it hard with a whole sub-team of Junkions with that kind of play pattern!
The poster for Legacy Evolution (seen above) reveals a lot of characters that were not shown today. These include:
- Armada Optimus Prime at the top of the poster (a possible Leader or Commander Class?)
- G1 Bombshell and Shrapnel (aka Skrapnel) presumably at Deluxe Class.
- Above the original Insecticon trio are the Deluxe Insecticons. We already have Ransack but my guess is that the other three will all be retools of the original G1 Insecticon trio.
- Diaclone(?) Universe Crosscut
- The Nemesis flying in the background. Given it was also on Kingdom packaging I wouldn’t be shocked if this was our next Titan Class figure.
- A Quintesson ship?!
- It looks like we will have at least four (if not more) distinctive Junkion designs: two types of motorcycles, a pickup truck and a car.
But enough speculation. Let’s get into what was shown!
Core Class
The Dinobots (six of them) will be introduced into the Core Class in 2023 starting with Sludge and Slug (aka Slag in G1). On top of having neat pocket sized Dinobots, these figures will also combine to form Volcanicus! Wait, six? Is there another team of six critters they could maybe retool this into? Hmmmm.
Core Class will also give us a redeco of Soundwave as Soundblaster with the Laserbeak (non transforming) accessory repainted as Buzzsaw! Sure this was a really obvious redeco, but it’s a welcome one.
Deluxe Class
- Breakdown: The final Stunticon to complete the new Menasor started in 2022, Breakdown is a partial off of Wildrider. He features a spoiler that becomes part of his weapon. Breakdown is a 2023 figure but will be in 2022 Legacy packaging so it matches up with his fellow teammates in box.
- Scraphook: A new character representing the Junkions mentioned above. This guy transforms into a tow truck. The figure is not a partsformer. It has a true vehicle to robot transformation and can break apart as accessories or to form unique robots and vehicles!
- Hot Shot: Everyone’s favorite Autobot from Armada is back! Based on his animated look, this figure (sadly) does not include Jolt, but he still has a visor that goes over his eyes and his “Axle-cannon” that flips out and goes over his head.
- Needlenose: Continuing to bring new versions of Targetmasters into Legacy there will be a new release of Needlenose with both of his Targetmasters! Even better, the Targetmasters will be able to combine into a super weapon!
Voyager Class
- LeoPrime: LioConvoy is back as “LeoPrime”! Based on the character’s animated look in Beast Wars II, LeoPrime is carton accurate in robot mode and leans towards the Kingdom style of more “realistic” beast forms. Features include his arm mounted claws in robot mode and his lion mane blasters/attack!
- Tarn: That’s right IDW Publishing fans, Tarn is finally an official figure! Based on the leader of the Decepticon Justice Division, this is a figure many fans have been waiting for. Tarn transforms into a tank and his weapons can be configured in different ways using the “Evolution” play pattern.
No new Leader Class figure was revealed. Due to Covid-19 related manufacturing delays, brand new Leader Class figures will be pushed further into 2023. Instead, the upcoming Transmetal 2 Megatron will serve as the Leader Class figure for the first part of 2023.
Magic: The Gathering
For fans of the Collectible Card Game Magic: The Gathering, they will soon have a new type of card to play: Transformers! A total of fifteen cards will be integrated into a future set. Interestingly, each character will be featured in both their G1 cartoon-inspired forms and their Shattered Glass counterparts! Characters include Optimus Prime, Goldbug and Starscream but much to my surprise they are also including Flamewar! I was very happy to see this and I’ll definitely be hunting down those cards.
Shattered Glass
The final Shattered Glass figure for 2022 will be Soundwave with Laserbeak and Ravage! Even better, this version of Soundwave is the tooling previously exclusive to Wal-Mart so fans can finally get their hands on the sculpt if they missed out on that release. Even better? The head features a new sculpt with his signature bandana around his head! This is due out at the end of 2022.
Lite Brite
You read that right, Lite Brite! The classic brand of toys is back and this time they are large 16”x16” frames featuring Transformers artwork (choose from Bumblebee, Optimus Prime and/or the Autobot symbol). To give you an idea of how much work this will be, Optimus Prime is said to have 6000 pegs! These are being positioned as decorative items to mount on your wall. It will be interesting to see how these sell.
Hall of Fame
The Hall of Fame began with a brief tribute to Derrick J. Wyatt. Wyatt was the art director, lead character designer, and a color stylist on Transformers: Animated and a huge Transformers fan and friend of the fan community. Wyatt passed away in December 2021 so it was great to see his work on the brand recognized. Quite appropriately, the fan favorite character this year is Lugnut from Animated!
A different Hall of Fame recognition went out to Harry Orenstein. Orenstein was the former Hasbro employee who made the deal between Takara and Hasbro in the 80’s that would kick off the Transformers toy line as we know it. It can be said that without him the line would not exist today in its current form!
And that’s it for today’s PulseCon 2022 Transformers reveals! Many of these items will be up on Hasbro Pulse for pre-order by Premium members at 5PM ET and then open to all at 6PM ET.
