It was pretty close to a year when we found out that Zeta Toys was going to make a Unicron to compete with the Haslab one. The original pics were amazing enough that no one though it could be real. We didn't know if he came with a head, or even if they were just making a head to replace with the Haslab Unicron. Lots, and lots of questions along with excitement! Haslab at the time needed to be backed by close to 8k backers. The price tag along with that was $650!! Yikes! There was no way that I could afford that, and it was extremely disappointing at the time. I wanted a huge Unicron for my collection! While Haslab was trying to get backers to fund it's project, all of a sudden Zeta scratched their "Core Star"?!! Lots of rumors that Haslab shut them down, threatened them, or something happened. So much disappointment from the TF world. We were excited to know there was a cheaper, and possibly a better Unicron coming our way. I believe there were pre -orders up for the Zeta version. I was not one of them...

As we all know, Haslab got all of its backer, and are in full production right now. It's due to start shipping in early 2021. In the meantime, we find out that Zeta "Core Star" is now Studio Cell ZV-01??? What happened?! They debut it at TF Con in Orlando, FL....with no head! Now wait a minute, you show off this amazing figure that we now can afford into our collection with no head? How can that be...Let's jump to today!
You can purchase him on a few sites right now for Pre Orders only. TFsource, Robotoybase, and ShowZstore. I ordered mine from Robotoybase, but he was in stock for some reason. Not sure, but I feel like I got super lucky. I'm seeing that a lot of people won't see him until December now.

I am extremely happy to say that this is the best figure in my collection. He can not be any more accurate of the Unicron we all know. The price is completely affordable. The great part of all this is that the quality is amazing! Zeta toys have THE best combiner toys on the market, it only makes sense that Unicron follows suit. 

​What I can not figure out is who made the head? He comes separately with his rings. I have to assume that there was some sort of collaboration to make all this happen. Whatever the case is, I have The Star Lord of Chaos (Unicron) in my possession!!! 

Adding to the list of my hobbies...3D printing Transformers

It's a lot of work! I have to give credit to Tim Yeung on Cults3d. He did an amazing job on the STL files. 

Hook is completed, and now onto Bonecrusher.
The purple I used was metallic, because the SDCC Devastator gave me an inspiration that I needed. I couldn't afford him a that the time, so this will fill my void for the time being. 

Completing the Siege line has been extremely fun chasing down every single figure possible, but there are a few that I thought I had no chance of obtaining. Takara Tomy Mall Exclusive Siege Nemesis Prime was one of them. As it is the Mall Exclusives are very difficult to get your hands on alone. When I first heard about him September of 2019, I immediately pre-ordered him through RobotKingdom. I didn't see him up on any other site. Quite frankly, they have been very good to me as far as shipping on time. They are the only site that I purchase from that comes directly from Japan. Some things you just can't get a hold of through the "middle man".
So I've eagerly awaited his shipment in March 2020 (6 months later!) As we all know Covid began a month prior to that, and everything, I mean EVERYTHING just went bad. The good news is that some places were still shipping on minimal staff, and RobotKingdom was one of them.
Nemesis prime was the last of the Siege line. He wasn't supposed to be. It was supposed to be the Seacons, of which I completed in April. They are not considered part of the Siege line, but to me they will be as they have come out during the Siege releases.
March comes around, and I got an email saying that my Nemesis shipped!! Yay!! Right....Not so much.
A month later I get an email stating:

Thank you for your purchase on Robotkingdom.
As the recent corona virus situation continue, there are insufficient air freight for most air and EMS mail by post office.
 
We suggest revising to Surface mail as an alternative.
Please reply to confirm your decision.***
Any extra shipping cost will be refunded within 7 days after order shipped, based on official post office ship out date
The expected transition time needed is as follows:
 
South Korea
Small Packet & Parcel : 21 to 45days

Whatttttttttttttttt!!??? I couldn't believe it. I had to sit on it for a day. I decided I had no choice but to go through with it. I emailed them back sadly saying that I accept changing my delivery to take 3 months to get to me. This was just to get from South Korea to USPS. That is a whole story of it's own of that place is operating. 

2 days later:
RK crew wrongly send to you.
Your order has already shipped by AIR on MAR 27.

Please neglect the email below.

Sorry for any inconvenient.

I just laughed. I told myself from there I am not getting the last piece to my Siege collection. I went on Ebay to see how much is he really going for. I almost lost my mind...he is going for 3x, sometimes 4x the cost!! Scalpers are unreal. I couldn't do that. That is way above what I would pay for a figure like that. I knew he was going to be impossible to ever get if mine got lost.

In the meantime, I'm tracking it just about on a daily basis to see if I have chance of ever seeing him. At one point I saw he was "handed over to the final destination" in the US. I was so happy! At least he made it on the soil I live on haha. 
Stuck here for weeks. I put in a case with USPS. They can't find it. Told me to get info from the shipping company (RK). They email me back immediately! Telling me that this is normal due to the pandemic, and give it time. I stopped. I told myself you'll see this in July, maybe by year end. Of course things get exaggerated, and your mind just goes places you don't want to go.
There is a happy ending to this story. I'm proud to announce after 3 months in transit, 9 months from pre-order date that I just got him this weekend! Here he is: The unicorn of the Siege line

Optimus Prime instructions?!! 

The long awaited King of the sea is finally complete! The last two remaining bots; Overbite, and Tentikil arrived yesterday! I hope to post some pics of them real soon. While you wait you can have a nice hi-res peek at a face that will give you nightmares!

As we adjust to these "normal" times of life; it has not stopped me from buying my most favorite passionate hobby. Yeah, it may be a little slower to get what I want (shipping industry is a mess), but I'm still getting it. Before the chaos broke out I was able to get all of wave 1 of Earthrise minus Optimus Prime. Of all of them I wanted him the most! He finally came with a trailer! In the packaging he looked amazing, and I desperately looked for him. I had him pre-ordered on 3 different sites...All of them were pushed back to June!! I was not waiting that long. In my TF chat guys from the west were finding him left, and right. Couldn't believe it. I had them snag me up one, and 3 days later I had a beautiful Prime. He is amazing!!! The best G1 accurate Optimus to date. The transformation is genius. He is a MUST HAVE!
In my free time I've been building Gundam kits. Toyhax labels can only be fun for a short period of time. I'm extremely anal, so my eyes get crossed after applying a dozen stickers lol

​

I This weekend was Toyfair 2020, and it was absolute overload! The first day was Friday they didn't really do anything for transformers, so I was totally out of it.  Saturday night I was out having fun pay way less to my phone, and having a great time. I decided while we were in a little lull waiting at the bar for our drinks to take a peak into the TF Universe. That was a huge mistake! They had released pics of wave 2, and wave 3 of the earthrise line. WOW!!! I immediately had to ditch my friends (15 mins tops) to take a close peek, and figure out the pre-orders. Not all on the same website, just like the Siege line...They make you work! Walmart, Target, Hasbro Pulse, and BBTS so far got my wallet. It's going to be another great TF year! I attached some of the great ones that we have been waiting for about 30+ years to get!

It's a bit late, I know! HAPPY NEW YEAR!! Takara/Hasbro gave us a stellar year of bots. Ones that will never be forgotten. Others that were super hard to get a hold of (Siege Astrotrain). Some were just OK...like another prowl. But I guess without prowl we wouldn't have gotten Barricade, Bluestreak, and Smokescreen. All of which have the same mold. 

I am thrilled to say that I did end up completing the entire Siege line!! Every single bot in stores, and exclusives from every site. All of the generations select bots, also! Lancer, and Red Wing were probably the most difficult to your hands on if you didn't buy them immediately online!
In the wild, I'd say that Astrotrain was by far the hardest. Honestly, don't think the east coast got a single one put on the shelf. Extremely disappointing on the distribution of wave 5 of every line Hasbro put out in the last 8 years! I would rank Thundercracker, and the Rainmakers the second hardest to find. For some reason, I didn't get a hold of Thundercracker until way into wave 3, probably closer to wave 4,  when we was released part of wave 2. If you were collecting the Siege line you would know that the rainmakers were maybe, if you were lucky, one per store. I believe they were Target exclusives too. That made it much harder, cuz my Target is awful at stocking Transformers to begin with.
Overall, I am stoked with the line! Great job!! What makes this difficult now is that I wanted to only collect the Siege line...Earthrise is looking more promising than Siege!! We have a Quintesson coming!!! I am most excited that we will get a first ever since his G1 release, a titan, SCORPONOK!!!!!! How can I pass them up? The quality has been unbelievably better since Hasbro/Takara teamed up. I feel like the figures have been produced in ways we have always wanted them. We are being given weapons that rightfully belong with each of the figures. We got screwed hard on a lot of the combiner wars/titans return/power of the primes. I am still upset that the Dinobots didn't get their swords! 

Welcome 2020 to the Earthrise line. Stayed tuned...

I guess if you bought every single Siege figure it unlocks this map of Cybertron! I'm a die hard fan of the line, but not enough that I wanted the battlemasters. So I was never getting to this map. There are codes issued with every figure that you are supposed to go online to unlock. I never did lol I'm in for the bots! Seibertronian ScottyP seems to be the first. Spinster is the last of the final wave, and he got his hands on him to unveil this. I gotta say it's pretty cool to see all the places on Cybertron. Some I've heard throughout the TF universe, others didn't know they existed. Enjoy!

A wonderful surprise happened on Saturday...Siege Apeface was available to purchase through Amazon!! I haven't had the chance to open him up. Really I haven't had much time to open up the 20 others that are comfortably piled up in The Vault. Honestly, I was content I wasn't getting any new transformers until the beginning of the year. There are always new surprises in this TF world. If everything stays the way it is, I shouldn't see anything new this year. Hasbro, you listening to me?! Christmas is coming I need to save up for my daughter lol