Haslab Victory Saber

I originally meant to publish a post on Haslab Victory Saber about a month ago, but...you know. Busyness, time slipping away, etc. 

     Honestly, at the time I wasn't too seriously considering backing the project, as the initial grey renders did not wow me (though the actual photos of physical prototypes started to get my attention). Me being the mark that I am, the first serious temptation was a couple of weeks ago when Tier 3 was unveiled, which included a wonderful photo gallery of the fully painted sample, including finally showing the blast effects to be a clear green - honestly, those blast effects are what did me in!

     Anyhow, if you've been paying attention, you know that the backing window for Victory Saber closed on the night of Sunday, 10/10/21. The initial unveiling and Tier 1 (V-Lock Cannon & blast effects) were both shown back in August, with Tier 2 (flight stand) shown in mid-September and Tier 3 (shield and micromasters Fire & Holi) shown on 10/1/21 (with that awesome gallery). The set reached its funding goal of 11,000 backers on my birthday (9/29!), with Tiers 1, 2 and 3 unlocking on 10/6, 10/8 and 10/10 respectively. I have just read that more of the international orders have finally been added, with the current number of backer reading 27,372!

     I managed to figure out funding last week and finally backed last Friday, 10/8/21, the same day I picked up the new Metroid: Dread game that I'd been looking forward to, so it was a fun day.

Now for the set itself:

Here's the Brain of Courage; that is to say, Saber in his Brainmaster form. He is tinier than even the Titanmasters/Primemasters of the Prime Wars Trilogy, which I think makes him the smallest functional -master type toy yet! The face flips up from the back when inserting him into the larger Saber body, and he sports shoulder and hip articulation so that he can be seated in Saber's alt mode. Visually, he resembles a tiny version of unhelmeted Star Saber.

Here's Saber's jet mode, which has a bit of a resemblance to a Gundam core fighter. Again, the Brain of Courage can pilot the jet (you can see this in the image).

This is Saber in his robot mode - the brainmaster is installed while still allowing for neck rotation. The nosecone is an unfortunate kibble "shield," but whatever. Overall I like the chunky look. He reminds me quite a bit of the Titans Return Jumpstarters.

Saber's "trailer" is the V-Star, an aerospace weapons platform that Saber can dock with in jet mode. As such, this can also be considered to be Star Saber's altmode. I have always loved how this looks, and they have certainly done a good job with this Haslab version. Mine will probably be in this mode quite a bit!

I love this image even more; the flight stand looks terrific and I've already expressed what a sucker I am for these green blast effects. This is one of the images that honestly helped sell me on the set!

Behold: Star Saber. This is Saber transformed into the torso unit (again; core fighter) of the V-Star; this is akin to Powermaster Optimus Prime. This design has always resonated with me because I have wanted a true jet mode Optimus that had a super mode as well; I think Star Saber is the closest we will get to this, especially due to his very Optimus-looking helmet and faceplate. 

Star Saber wields the Tier 3 shield in this image. The shield was an invention of the Victory television show and only appeared once (to my knowledge). It was included with the masterpiece Star Saber toy, but also had to double as the base of that toy's flight stand; thankfully the Haslab mold has a dedicated stand. 

I actually really like this base mode; I attribute this fondness to the base mode of Powermaster Optimus Prime (easily the biggest transformer I had as a child). This base mode isn't too different from PMOP's; however the shield really helps sell it as a defensive emplacement. I didn't include the shieldless base mode image as it is kind of pointless now that the shield has been unlocked. I do really like the articulated shoulder guns; apparently that is a feature that the original toy lacked. Saber looks great operating the base mode!

Victory Leo! His lion mode is interesting with its ridiculous armament and wings; he definitely looks like he means business, even down to the fantastical tusks. This mode is fun and has strong Voltron vibes.

This is Victory Leo's nominal attack configuration; I like hip-mounted cannons (see Armada Megatron or the smart rifles from Aliens), so I'm quite glad the V-Lock Cannon was unlocked in Tier 1. The cannon plus the arm-mounted rifles looks awesome. I have recently learned about Leo's characterization in the more recent IDW continuity, and I think it fits the design.

Leo's "3rd mode," which is really just an independent version of how he combines with the V-Star. Still, it's fun in a dumb way. I would love a bonus item to be thrown in - an add-on cockpit/nosecone as it was depicted in the Victory Show. If Star Saber can get his anime-exclusive shield (twice!), then surely Leo can get a somewhat more believable altmode, right? 

Again, the blast effects and flight stand are employed to make Leo's flight mode look pretty awesome!

As you can see, Saber is quite a bit smaller than Leo. Saber is about the size of a deluxe, while Leo is close to a modern Leader class transformer. I like this image, especially with how it contrasts with the next one: 

Woah! Saber's a big boy now! As you can see, Star Saber is quite a bit taller than Leo, being closer in size to older Leader class toys, such as from the Prime Wars Trilogy (I hesitate to say that he is as tall as something like Cybertron Galvatron, who for some reason still serves as a Leader class benchmark for me). Awesome shot.

The V-Star, as noted, combines with Leo's flight mode to gain a booster, more wings, and much heavier armament. The aircraft/physics enthusiast in me is a bit bothered by the huge V-Lock Cannon being off-center, but at least Saber's gun on the opposite kind of balances it out. Kind of.

While the flight stand and blast effects are back, you can also see that the shield can be incorporated into the combined vehicle mode, which I think looks great. it greatly improves the visual continuity of this giant vehicle. 

VICTORY SABER! Yep, Leo becomes a backpack and platform shoes. Not the most dignified combination, but i actually like it. The boots hit a good balance between big but not too big, and the wings and rifles from the backpack sell a war machine look. Also, one of the few things I dislike about the Star Saber mode is the lack of back-mounted wings, which this combination resolves. The V-Lock Cannon looks great once again. 

Victory Saber is posed with the shield swapped for the sword. I hope the shield and sword both can be attached somehow in this mode, but it's not a huge loss if it's not possible. 

This is another image that helped sell me on this set. It really is beautiful. 

Here are Fire and Holi. These two are too similar to their pre-existing Siege releases for me to be very interested, but at least we get one more (not great) weapon mode from them, though it's not shown in the gallery. 

Fire and Holi in alt mode. Again they are part of Tier 3 with the shield.

Finally, the base mode with Fire and Holi. This is fun and probably the best reason for their inclusion.

There has been some discussion about whether or not the Victory Saber set is worth the asking price of $180+tax. It's a totally fair question, and people who don't think the set is worth the cost don't bother me as I can understand some of the arguments used to support that stance. However, one word stands out to me that describes this set: uncompromised. When was the last time you saw a retro set this big that included all of its legacy features and components? I bought Titans Return Fortress Maximus for half price at Ross and was still disappointed due to his lack of a normal weapon and inaccurate base mode. Even Earthrise Scorponok, who is much better than his counterpart, is lacking a primary weapon and has non-elevating turret guns. Some other releases, like Combiner Wars Liokaiser and Titans Return Overlord, also come to mind specifically as JG1 designs hampered by being forced into the existing play pattern of the toylines they were released through (mind, I actually like CW Liokaiser quite a bit, but a proper update is always on peoples' minds. Overlord I find more boring and almost wish the original had been reissued instead).  What, exactly, is Victory Saber missing? Nothing that I can think of, at least as it compares to the original toy and the Masterpiece (which neglected Victory Leo, leaving an opening for an illegal "third party" version). If anything, I was a bit disappointed that Haslab didn't go whole hog and produce Deathsaurus, but at the same time that is a relief, as the price would have been somewhere around $250 minimum (the rumor mill suggests a Deathsaurus at retail in 2023 pending the success of Victory Saber; I think it's been a success, so hopefully they are right). Additionally, this thing is priced way more competitively than any large Masterpiece or third party release and still manages to scale with normal Generations releases. 

On top of the uncompromised aspect of the toy, while I have no real attachment to the character (I've never watched Victory and I don't care too much for the IDW version of Star Saber), I've always loved his look and the playability/functionality of the design. It really is "Optimus, but in space" in a way that Star Convoy isn't (or really any other futuristic type Optimus toy). It's nice to see that design get the appreciation it deserves outside of the Masterpiece realm.

One final point about the price: collectors having been paying very high prices for less for a while now. I've always been more of a Hasbro guy rather than Takara, willing to suffer deficits in accuracy, paint coverage, etc., in order to not pay an arm and a leg to acquire mainline toys (for the most part). However, once Pulse started offering Takara products in an easily accessible fashion with free shipping, I started to get tempted by such remolds as Star Convoy, Super Megatron and the Seacons. All of these have cost near double the price of their original molds, and not one of them is a new mold! The older FunPub releases similarly fall under this umbrella. Even the Crossovers Jurassic Park set - which includes one leader class retool and a new mold deluxe* is very high priced at $104. To be fair, I have seen a decent number of complaints about that price. And of course, I haven't even mentioned the illegal "third party" figures, most of which cost incredible sums for the amount of product you receive. Finally, I was priced out of the Masterpiece market years ago; those figures also have a tremendous price for their size. 

I think the issue here is that Haslab Victory Saber doesn't really fit into any of these other categories - he's not MP, not 3P, not a Takara import, not a licensed Crossovers release, etc. This set is definitely meant to fit in with the War for Cybertron line and upcoming Legacy line, both of which are retail lines . They are collector-oriented, but still ostensibly mainlines, of which our previously most expensive figures (aside from Unicron, of whom few question the value) have been the Titan class releases. And until the new Legacy line, all other Titans have been cheaper than Victory Saber. 

Oh well. I'm committed now, anyway, and the people who don't see the value will either be just fine without a Victory Saber or they will wish they didn't have to pay aftermarket prices come next winter.

*JP-93 - the Ford Explorer new mold from the Jurassic Park set - seems like a deluxe, though a larger one. He could have enough mass/engineering to be a voyager, maybe. Alternatively, it's been suggested that JP-93 is not the new mold as we've been led to believe, but rather a pretool for an up coming Legacy release. Not sure if I buy this, but it might be true.