The Ultimate Guide to Vintage Transformers Action Figures Paperback – 29 July 2016

There have been a couple of guides to the Transformers toy line released over the years, but this one is by far the most complete, detailed and definitive one yet!Published in UK magazine-style format, and almost 300 pages in total, 'The Ultimate Guide to Vintage Transformers Action Figures' by Mark Bellomo offers a season by season guide to what would later be referred to as the 'Generation One' toy line.Featuring every Transformer ever to grace the toy store shelve or a young childs bedroom floor (or imagination!) during the Generation 1 period, starting with the original 1984 series that included classic mainstays such as Optimus Prime, the Autobot cars, Megatron and the Decepticon Seekers; all the way through to the final 1990 series that included the likes of the Micromasters and Action Masters - and every Transformer in between. Special teams, Jumpstarters, Headmasters, Triggercons, Pretenders - you name 'em - theyre all here.The entry for each Transformer comes complete with the characters biography (including motto and function), their 'tech specs' (listing their level of strength, speed, firepower etc), and also their current market value in Dollars. Each entry also comes with full colour photographs of the Transformers robot and alternate forms, as well as accsessories, and useful commentry and trivia from the author about the toy covering topics from legal issues, the origins of the toy, or the characters role in the animated series.Also included are entries for the various mail order exclusives that fans could obtain if they obtained enough 'robot points' (which were tokens printed on the packaging of every Transformers box), such as a transforming digital watch, the Powerdashers, the Omnibots, Reflector, and the S.T.A.R.S Autobots Command Centre.Its a brilliant read that should be considered an essential purchase for any dedicated Transformers fan, was clearly written by one of our own in what must have been a real labour of love, and comes with my highest recommendation!

A***

Great to find/see these vintage pieces. He best part imo, is the fact that the production and release years bring you back down memory lane.

Perfect book!

Very impressed with this

I liked this book well enough but really wish it contained more european releases and oddities. I'm sure there are other reference books that do so but Mark has nicely done photos of good examples. Would be fun if he did a book in the layout of a wish catalog from the 80s :)

The Back of the book gives a fair bit about how great 'Mark Bellomo' is in his field as a top toy expert in the USA. and the amazon info notes particular knowledge with the transformers toys. Going through the book with this in mind, might make you think they confused with author with another person. There is also the issue with the book being the Ultimate guide to vintage transformers.. If we take Vintage is only refer to the 'classic' Generation One era (so called due to the launch of G2 1993, This book only talks about toys and variations released in North America, So Official released ones in Brazil, Europe and Asian are completely missed out, this also means the book ends in 1990 with the first wave of action masters. None of the Second wave action masters (so the 6 regular figures, 2 exo-suits, 2 motorized exo-suits or the 4 transforming Elites), the Japanese exclusive headmasters era, Masterforce, Victory, or Zone releases, or some others.When talking about various figures, it's more likely to make off hand comments to variations more then show pictures but while these comments aren't too bad, they are again limited to only North American variations, so rare ones like Red Foot Optimus prime aren't even commented on. There are kinda the odd changes.. Megatrons information, while making a minor mistake about the diaclone release name (forgetting the American version was based on the p-38 U.N.C.L.E. version) it comments about the Japanese one could figurebullets' but lacks the information on the colour change (red plastic swapped with Blue for the most part) and the Sword that was exclusive to the Japanese release. Some write ups have been fleshed out with information from the error prone and problematic Dreamwave source book series (More then meets the eye) while later toys have no write up at all. There are also some issues with incorrect photos being used (there is no photo of Gunrunner's robot mode, it's just a photo of Roadgrabber being used by mistake, and Snarler and Carnivac's robot modes are swapped) , and the odd part not being classed as 'easily lost' despite being parts you would often find missing on the second hand market.This might seam like I have nothing good to say about this book.. well, that's not correct. the author does seam lacking in some of his knowledge and information on G1 transformer toys, variations and some of the target prices for secondhand but most of the book isn't too bad. While you can find the information online (with some more stuff there), I got this for a quick reference guide as it can be much easier flipping through a book to double check the odd part or accessory then trying to search through the internet archives for it. Some of the book has problems with layout, and other problems said about, but as a basic guide to North American releases and quick reference, it's pretty good. As an ultimate guide for the G1 toys? it lacks too much to have anywhere near that title, not even featuring information on included sticker sheets. I can't say this effort makes me want to see any thing else the guy has to say on other toy lines, but as a quick visual reference, its worth the price I paid. if you see it for around up to £15, it's good if you are that interested. If you see it for higher? it's not worth it.

It's clear that a lot of time and effort has gone into the making and the book is fun to flick through, assembling decent photos and coverage for the range it tries to address and filling almost 300 pages in doing so. The trouble is that it's a big subject, and ends up missing out Japanese releases, the G2 line and even well known Western stuff such as the Actionmaster versions of Bombshell, Sideswipe, etc. If a photo for each vintage Transformer before Beast Wars is what you're mainly after -- although Beast Wars itself goes back to 1996 -- there are plenty of websites (or the old Generations / Generations Deluxe books and reprints if you can find them).As a guide to collecting you're also probably better off with websites, both because prices don't stay current and because there are only nods to the existence of official re-releases and knock-offs -- even a note against figures that are known to have been reproduced would help a potential collector. Despite the author mentioning TFWiki as a source there are errors which have crept in such as the guns for AM Soundwave and Treadshot being switched, which is based on an instruction booklet rather than what was actually released.Don't expect too much and it'll be an enjoyable book to dip into.