2017 - NEW YEAR BEGINNINGS & FINDS - PART 2 - MUTANT INSECTS
Hello & welcome to the 2017 Robo-Synergy New Year Beginnings & Finds, Part 2.
I have finally found 2 french gifts sets that can be very uncommon to find and see around.
They are the Mutant, Les Mutants Transformables (Mutant, The Mutants Transformables)
Insecte De Combat (lnsect Of Combat) and the Insecte Envahisseur (Insect Invader) or can be translated from the toy instructions as FIGHTING INSECT and INVADING INSECT.
French version
by
and
Japanese version
by
The toys were originally made in Japan and Taiwan in 1986-87 by toy companies HERO, MARK, and SELECT for the Sacred Beast Legend Bioroid (Bioroid) toy line series. The Bioroid series had 2 sides the TRIANFORCE and DELTAFORCE with both having 4 insect members each side.
However it is said that the toy company/s was going bankrupt, leaving them to import the toy molds to a french toy company name Lansay. This led the 8 insects to be only European releases either on individual card backs or gift sets.
TOY PACKAGING
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| Front of packaging. |
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| Top of packaging. |
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| Bottom of packaging. |
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| Left side of packaging. |
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| Right side of packaging. |
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| Toys on styrofoam insert. |
TOY INSTRUCTIONS
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| Insecte De Combat & Insecte Envahisseur - Toy instructions. |
TOYS
INSECTE DE COMBAT
I'm going to use the Mutant names and then Japanese Trianforce names as one.
From left to right:
ABEILLE/QUEEN-BEE, SAUTERELLE/KRATOS, LIBELLULE/DOOLA, and PAPILLON/BAT
TLE-QUEEN.
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| Insect modes. |
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| Mutant modes. |
INSECTE ENVAHISSEUR
I'm going to use the Mutant names and then Japanese Trianforce names as one.
From left to right:
MOUCE/DEATH-FLY, GROUNDIN/WASPRAN, MOUSTIQUE/MOSQULANO, and MITE/ZONUS.
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| Insect modes. |
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| Mutant modes. |
INSECTE DE COMBAT & INSECTE ENVAHISSEUR
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| Insect modes. |
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| Mutant modes. |
ARTWORK
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| Mutant - Insect modes artwork. |
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| Bioroid - Robot modes Artwork Note: DOOLA's toy photo shows he has red insect eyes when the official release and green eyes. It probably was intended that he could of had red eyes or does on some other release I don't know about and have not seen yet but it is very interesting. It is similar for WASPRAN's toy photo that his insect mode has green eyes instead of red eyes to match up with the other DELTAFORCE insects. And the artwork of DEATH-FLY and WASPRAN, I think are mistakenly misplaced since the Mutant modes should be the other way to around to represent their toy. |
MY THOUGHTS & REVIEW
Having the complete 8 Mutant insects with everything is surreal! I didn't expect to find them because I think they're very uncommon oddities of this toy line. The quality of the toys are perhaps even more sensitive and fragile than the ZERO-SEEDER versions and international releases. On some of the parts on the toys the plastic can break easily if you don't take extra care when transforming them from both modes. The stickers are good but some of the parts aren't as good quality, they tend to peel off very easily if you knock them around so that's another part to be wary of. The design and colours of them are just fascinating, the choices they made really work in contrast between each team. I like how they chose cohesive colours to distinguish the teams apart. With the Insects of Combat, they added green eyes for the Mutant modes and green eyes for the insect mode eyes, although however Sauterelle/Kratos is the unique exception with his insect mode eyes are red, I think they did this to not make it blend in his green insect mode and I like it as it gives him a unique characteristic. I just love the route that Lansay went with designing their toy packaging for the Mutant insects, they went with see through plastic windows to show what the Mutant toys look like in Mutant modes instead of vice versa with the insect modes. I love the beautiful toy artwork of the insect modes, they look like they could exist in a cartoon/anime or comic/manga, the amount of detailing is really impressive enough if it were to be so. I noticed one thing when I searched to find these toys that I think they resemble a little like another toy line called SECTAURS. The head designs/sculpts have a resemblance to that toy line just with the combination of half humanoid and half insect features, I think they could fit in side by side with a Sectaurs collection.
I also like the background designs of the box, it feels like scenes where they toys would inhabit in. The text of the titles, insect names or insect mode names are stand out like it was written in a more olden day aesthetics. Another cool feature is the toys come on styrofoam insert, which is very 80s for toys, especially for transforming robot toys and great to secure the toys safely with their accessories and instructions.
If had HERO released these toys in their own packaging and marketing it would of been so good to imagine and foresee how they could of been like their other Bioroid toys that were done amazingly too but I'm glad they found a alternate way to release them in another profitable capacity and I fore one am grateful they did it still.
I'm also proud to own these wonderful and innovative toys, the overall thought and creation behind them really shows in so many ways and I love them a lot!!!
A special thank you out to redstarrobot.com for helping me discover and obtain these beautiful gift sets!
I hope you enjoyed viewing and if you have any questions or feedback, feel welcome to comment or PM me!
Kind regards,
Robo-Synergy