2nd Worldwide Release

Dear Black Rhimos: thank you for being so hard to photograph. Dear Hasbro: thank you for making this NJR limited more widely available. Pic #7 shows the gears what make the horn spin.

The first “Holotech” version of a Zoid, from Hasbro. Awesome, but for some reason it was nearly impossible to find. I’m planning to use this one in a custom, so I wanted to get some pictures of it all pristine. Unfortunately I already started masking before I got out the camera, so one piece of leg armor doesn’t match. Think of it as a compare/contrast with the standard NAR Zaber Fang!

I’m putting this up mostly for historical completeness. Anyway, the Hasbro one’s big difference was that spacers were added to make its body wider, I guess because of US safety standards or something. Eventually this bugged me enough that I sold it. I think I was going to put the money toward a proper NJR, but I was probably broke at the time. I did make a couple “joiner” style pics, though. That was about all my crappy camera could do with this guy.

I had to have this one sent to me from Australia, which was the holotech capital of the world, for some reason.

The clear plastic on this one was even more brittle than usual, and the pegs that hold the feets did not survive my last move without a dab of super glue. Still, Holo-fishy wins points for being the most “holotech’d” of the line (but it would have been nice to have smoky grey boosters too). As with all my holos, I had to get this from a contact in Australia.

For the longest time I’d been sitting on a MIB one of these, but recently I stole its wonderful clear saws, for a custom weapon for Hammer Rock. Then, someone on Pheno’s forum was selling a built one for dirt cheap. Hooray!

Also: Orange! Transparent! Chainsaws!

This wasn’t an official Hasbro release in the US (though a few people have ultra-rare prototypes), but did make its way to the New Pacific Release. I ordered mine from the Philippines. I stole one of the gunner seats for my Helcat custom, but it’s otherwise complete. The tail mechanism is quite clever, with a string/pulley system. I have no idea how to take good pics of this one. For not having much bulk, it still manages to be the longest zoid ever at well over 30″. This is probably a job for joiner stylee (see #16)!

In all my years of scanning and photo-ing, I’ve never been able to get accurate purples without hella color correcting. Even still, I can’t get these to look good. Anyway, the Gravity Zoids (named for the “gravity wheel” powered walking mechanism) were a Hasbro exclusive, until early 2005, when they resurfaced in Japan’s Fuzors release. I think this guy’s pretty cute.

For the NAR, Hasbro released Metalrhimos, which was only available in Japan as a limited edition. They assigned an arbitrary number, so as not to interfere with future NJR kits’ numbers. The Japanese version was a lot shinier, as opposed to pearly, but you can’t have everything. When the head is angled down (pic #4), a gear causes the horn to spin!

Bear Fighter was previously a “white box” limited (the crappier the box, the rarer the prize), until this surprise Hasbro release. They assigned an arbitrary number, so as not to interfere with future NJR kits’ numbers. Apart from the orange canopy, the colors are identical to the (hella rare) OJR version. After noticing all the detail on the parts, I decided to panel-line and detail this one into next week. Gold marker + humidity = PAIN.

Other fun facts! Bear Fighter has two modes, and can walk in both: lumbering, four legged mode, and upright, amorous camper-mauling mode! Also, thanks to Hasbro’s font choice, this guy often shows up in auctions listed as “Gear Fighter”.

Dear Hasbro: Worst Name Ever. The Fuzors line got a limited version called Ray Kong, which is a bit better, yes? I think he looks like a football player, which has made him grow on me. Consider these pics the “BEFORE” set, because I want to mod the shoulder gun things to look like the spikes shown on the box. I think some wider shoulders would help too, but I haven’t figured out what to do about that yet.

The NJR version of this (called Dimetro Ptera, note the O), had a more subdued color scheme. This poor guy gets no love, yet somehow he has survived my great sell-off of #&8217;07. It’s a weird one—it has two modes (hence the compound name), and it’s a blox zoid with a motor. Instead of a row of blox held together, there’s a clear red motor unit (see pic #2). Now, on the two modes thing, it’s not like a Transformer—you basically have to take the whole thing apart and rebuild it in the new mode. Not too handy on the battlefield, eh? Anyway, I got this for fifty cents, plus three bucks shipping.