Got the rhino in yesterday, and opened the penguin to get access to the packs. Was surprised to see patagona and toxotes came with some as well, though, but I'm not complaining, more packs to open, more odds of new cards for the collection. But yeah, just have icarus, maybe an ice cube, the og penguin, and I may get dummy? I don't like that the 4cm cubes don't come with chargers, so that's why I'm not sure about the koala. And if I do end up grabbing it, I'll probably get tempted by the axolotls and the fish as well

Finally got a signed copy of BJCC Dio!! Also went with a MISB Metal War Tale Ghost Dog along with it. Unfortunately this copy is already opened... I am afraid that I may damage the packaging if I tried taking Dio out so no poses :(

Can't believe I was able to hunt down a BJCC Dio. Came with a signature also! So excited.

Received this lovely gentleman (BB-15DP Smoke) today, and I’m really happy with him. Open box, but otherwise it seems to be immaculate, and I love the gold, red, and silver accents on the translucent purple. I only recently saw some videos reviewing various figures with this BB-15 mold, and while the gator is kind of chunky and stiff in beast mode, I actually quite liked the look of the transformation, which led me to check out listings for Teardrop, Schlegel, and this guy (not ready yet to consider Albitron from the Botcon 2022 set, but it does have a great look, too). I got a bit lucky and saw a listing for an open box figure from a US seller, and the cost was much less than it would've been to get it from any of the small number of Chinese sellers. Also lucky with the condition, as it didn't feel like it's ever been handled except for photos, and all the paint and plastic appears to be immaculate.

I have to be a little careful opening the mouth in beast form, lest it come a bit unhinged, but otherwise I really like how the head/neck and tail unhinge into panels and collapse. The box form feels solid and looks great, though the head/tail side is a mostly just held in place with joint friction rather than tabbing together (edit: transforming it a second time, now I see where tabs from the neck and tail base go into the belly to secure it a little more - nice touch). I can already tell I will be reaching for it a lot to go through the transformation. When I can have a properly dark room I might add a pic showing the UV reactivity of the plastic and red paint.

Getting close to having all of the current AMTS Combiners. I also have the red Cheetah + Gazella, but I got lazy after transforming all of these 😅. Just missing Icarus (non-Elite), Deep One (non-Elite), and Landbreaker (non-Elite). Pictured:

- Hercules: Toxotes (torso) + Patagona (legs)

- Hermes Evo: Cheetah Evo (torso) + Gazelle Evo (legs)

- Landbreaker Elite: Mole (torso) + Groundhog (legs)

- Deep One Elite: Monkfish (torso) + Lobster (legs)

- Icarus Elite: Eagle (torso) + Raven (legs)

- Moonwalker-ish: Endymion (torso) + Actaeon (legs)

For the Endymion + Actaeon combo, I deviated from the instructions and made up something that I think works. Kinda tempted to get another set of these two to be able to do the twin combos (Actaeon + Actaeon).

I might spend a weekend in the future taking shots of every suggested/hinted at combo in the instructions for these. I love how flexible the newer AMTS figures are and how you can get really creative with combining them.

Wondering if we'll see elite versions of Toxotes/Patagonia and Actaeon/Endymion in the future.

And I've got Beastdrives on the way, too.

H e l p

But really, getting them all out and just seeing how they're able to get so many organic shapes to work as nearly perfect cubes is just insane to me, and how the sizes vary in beast mode.

Love this figure.

Last night late at night creativity struck me.

I made a non-Newtonian liquid with food dye to make some acid blood. I used a milk frother to fling some of the blood on the scene. I added some shots showing the editing process. I usually do composite shots because I like to get all the main details in focus and I've stopped using magic eraser to remove flight stands.

I realized I never showed off the newest wall I've built with these, added a few new figures to it. If anyone wants a list of exactly what's in the wall, I can definitely post that in the comments

Getting the hang of how Godspeed transforms and felt I had to try do something like this haha

I've picked up some more boxes since my last post, and I have some thoughts on them to share.

BB-13FYX/26FYX/39FYX Firefighter Heroes

Firefighter Heroes' hangars, ready to deploy!

When fires are burning, these guys are turning... into beasts!

BB-13FYX Water Cannon: Mixed feelings about this guy. He's a kind of cute panda character, but of the boxes I have, it's the one which is most representative of the early days of chunky, less elegant Beastbox figures. I'd love to see a newer bear design; the only really new one they've done since BB-13 is the SwinGo bear IronPaw, which hardly counts. That said, Water Cannon makes a decent box, and while I don't really care for Beastbox partsformers, I do at least appreciate that the box mode comfortably accommodates the extra pieces of the the cannons and baby panda. This won't be my least picked-up Beastbox, but it's a little too simple to be as pleasant to handle and transform as the boxes that came after it.

BB-26FYX Firethrash: This guy is the reason I wanted this set at all, if I'm honest. Ankylosaurus is my favorite dinosaur, and not only is this set considerably easier to get ahold of than the older Thrashard, I actually like the red and black color scheme here a little bit more than the yellow/orange/grey of the original toy. You can really see how Beastbox was rapidly evolving, comparing the original BB-13 Bigpower to BB-26 Thrashard, and while this toy's appearance is still pretty cartoony, and the articulation of later toys isn't here, it shows a lot of improvement. Honestly, I was surprised how much I like Firethrash. He's got good desk presence in either mode, and the transformation really is in a nice spot for me where it's intuitive and pretty easy, but has enough going on to occupy my brain and hands for a minute. It also forms an extremely neat and tidy cube, which is a big plus for me. This, of all the Beastbox I currently have, is probably the box I've been reaching for the most, lately, and I don't see that changing any time soon.

BB-39FYX Firepower: Of the three boxes in this set, this is definitely one of them. It's got more going on than Water Cannon, and arguably more than Firethrash, especially considering the wing-flapping action mechanism, but that's only really entertaining for a few moments, and after that one must reckon with a too-chunky body, legs that seem to move in every way but that which will let them hold up the figure, and a box mode that is weirdly fussy to form, for how comparatively simple the transformation is. I'm glad to have it, but it's not going to be a favorite.

Overall, I am quite happy to have the set. The box chargers are fun, with the vehicle hangar theming, and I really, really like Firethrash. Someone with less ankylosaurus affection might find the figures in this set a underwhelming compared to more recently-designed releases.

Komodo dragons have venomous saliva!

BB-66 Kommando: I have strong feelings about this figure, in multiple ways. The beast form is one of the best I've seen - it's very convincing as a komodo dragon. It has great articulation, I love the purple and grey aesthetic, and it's really pleasant to just have it in that form on my desk. The transformation to box form is a real pain, though, especially at the end. It's still not intuitive for me, so I either have to bring up a video, or fuss with it for a while, and the best thing that can be said about the end result is that it's nearly, almost a pretty good cube. The reverse (box to beast) feels to me like a much easier and more pleasant process. When converting to box mode, the grey quarter panel flaps never want to stay in the right spot at the end, the side corners don't come together as neatly as they feel like they should, and I almost always end up with a box that's a little too warped to smoothly slide into the box charger. No regrets on getting it, because I really do love the look of this thing as a beast, but the box mode on this one feels just a little underbaked, to me, despite its complexity. That said, it's hard for me to fault them for being ambitious with this design.

A reasonably well-armed dragonfly

An unreasonably equipped helicopter (with bonus item cannons)

BB-62 Onitopte: I love the look of this figure both as a dragonfly and as a cube, and yet this is among the boxes I'm least going to reach for, because of how hard it is to reposition the legs without breaking the joints. I cracked one of them the first time I transformed it, although at least that joint moves more easily now. It's just so uncomfortable to transform that I can't enjoy it even though I really like it in almost every other way. This is another one where I don't really like taking apart the built in weapons to reconfigure it for box mode, and this one is worse because getting all the pieces to line up is weirdly challenging for me. It really does look great, though - probably the single best-looking box mode of any that I have. That's honestly the main reason I got it, even with the warnings about the leg joints. I've read some tips about lubricating the joints, and maybe I will give that a shot sometime, because I really don't want to neglect this figure indefinitely.

Black Wind's box charger casts an eerie glow under UV, as it gets ready to leave for an BBAB mission

BB-38BW Black Wind: My buying this piece broke up another Redditor's Air Force set, which feels sort of weird. I really wanted one of the BB-38 mold figures, though, and when it was offered for sale, I decided I actually like this one the best of them, whereas the seller favored Tech Ninja. Regarding the rest of the Air Force set, I already have White Noise, and don't feel the need to get one of the horned owl retools. With the archaeopteryx mold being largely a retool of the pterosaur, I do not want another box that feels like Firepower. Again, getting a custom box charger is a bonus, though the Air Force didn't get anywhere near as cool looking chargers as the Firefighters, UV reactive plastic aside. Anyway, this figure pretty much immediately became one of my favorites. IT has a very nice looking box mode, a fairly straightforward transformation that still has interesting steps, and a pretty much a perfect wasp shape and articulation, down to the ready-to-strike, stinger-forward pose. I sometimes find it tough to line up the wings just right for everything to lock into place, but when I do get it, it's a really solid cube, and all the sides look good to me. This is a figure which has convincingly well thought out engineering in almost every aspect, and it's a shame the BB-38 mold is tough to acquire outside the Air Force set for a US buyer, without importing from China or Japan. A part of me has been wondering if this might be my first mold to double dip on, as the original Gunpowder deco is looking better and better to me when I see it in pics or vids. I will admit, I remain curious about the 5mm pegs on the wings that don't seem to have any use. Are they meant to be able to be attached to Unus, maybe? My only other quibble is that it lacks a 5mm or 3mm peg hole in its underside that would allow it to be more easily raised up on a stand for a flying pose. I gotta get some action figure stands with grabber arms to go around a figure's waist; I've seen those used to good effect with this figure.

Without UV, this Meltdown could belong to any faction - you'd never know!

Stealth mode, showing the clean black and red appearance without UV

BB-16MD Meltdown: This one felt pretty self-indulgent to seek out, but XMattingly's review of various crabs got me thinking about it, and it's not that much more pricy to get this one compared to Kanibal or Overkill (or so I'll keep telling myself). Getting the other goodies in this set is a nice bonus: a custom, UV-reactive box charger, a UV penlight, and a nifty little Beastbox-themed puzzle cube on a lanyard. This figure, randomly, comes either with white, glow-in-the-dark paint markings, or nearly invisible, UV-reactive ones. I got the UV-reactive figure, and while I don't think that would've been my first choice, I do like how clean the figure looks in normal light. The transformation is extremely simple, as reflects the early days of the Beastbox line, but its robot crab shape is quite fun, and the box mode is also quite clean. Having it made me want to also get a BB-18 male crab, which is actually a bit tougher than coming up with a BB-16. I've got a Blue Crab coming soon, and I'm looking forward to getting it and being able to do the full crab assembly mode with the two of them. Taking out the integral weapons and plugging them back in to complete the box mode doesn't bug me with Meltdown the way it does with Onitopte and Firepower. Partly, that's because it's such a trivial thing: just fold them up and put them back in the same 3mm holes, but with the opposite orientation. The other reason is, they really do complete the look of the box nicely. Regardless, this is likely to be a box I reach for on the regular, since it combines an easy transformation with a fun crab figure. It seems to me that after this one, 52TOYS moved away from making mainline Beastboxes (which is to say, not counting AMTS) that were designed for interaction with 1" figures, up until some of the 7cm cubes had bays and cockpits for them. I don't have any of those figures, but it doesn't bug me that this one feels like it's meant to go with them. The minimal lore suggests that it's autonomous, anyway.

The duality of bun

BB-54 Ironblood & Loyalheart: These were recommended to me in a comment after my first collection post, and I was immediately taken with them when I looked at some pictures and videos. What a delightful pair of cute little guys. They can easily hold a variety of interesting and realistic poses, as well as standing up like the White Rabbit, and I quite enjoy the way they form a bit of a taijitu symbol from the side when they combine into their box mode. Compared to the foursomes (penguins and meerkats) they have pretty interesting transformations. I do sometimes find it challenging to leave enough room for their heads in combined form (the key is to make sure to push the tail assembly far enough in to click), so sometimes it's a bit of a tight squeeze to get them back into their fantastic, zodiac rabbit themed box charger. I like Godspeed's a little more, but this is definitely one of my favorite custom box chargers, and really helps this set feel like a complete package. I really hope Beastbox continues for many years, in part so that we can see more lunar year zodiac animal releases.

I really do have the Beastbox fever. With these additions, I currently have fifteen boxes, if I count an increasingly shabby Wandering Star (in addition to the rear foot I lost previously, my last attempt to transform it resulted in one of the forelimbs flying away, and I still haven't found that, either). Meanwhile, I'm waiting for five boxes that I've ordered from various sellers in the last couple of weeks, including an almost indefensible choice to pay eBay prices for a BB-44DP Deep Purple set. That one came from my wanting that mold, but really not liking the Vanitas or Oldone colors at all, and while I almost settled for a Chimelong Octopus (it really has a pleasing color scheme), I really am a sucker for DP's dark purple theming, additional components (I still don't have one of the transforming stands), and beautiful box charger... plus, now I have this UV penlight I can use to appreciate the UV reactive elements. Besides Deep Purple, the next batch will include Blossom, Blue Crab, Icyboy, and Floyd, so I'll soon have quite a variety of birds and aquatics.

...and, as I was writing this, I impulse bought a BB-15DP Smoke, after seeing a pre-owned one with domestic shipping at what felt like a pretty reasonable price (considering its rarity).

My remaining wish list after those currently looks like this, in numerical order: Year of the Horse Dio, Jetsam/Sea Turtle, Chromeribs or Dark Klawd, Ricochet or Realsteel, Vaporwaveor Lotus, Kharon, Pyromancer/Cryomancer, Phantomaster, Mortal Coil, Giraffe, Neo Gio or Mojo, Tukuru Neon Blue, Baihu, Golden Dragon, Xuanwu, and then the upcoming Cubeauty Diana, Capybara, and Vermillion Bird / Zhuque. Most likely, I won't get all of my wish list items, and almost certainly not as quickly as I've built up my current collection, but I think I'm in it deep, regardless.

This guy is fantastic! The toad/frog flip mechanism works great. It's a fun, involved transformation without being ridiculous.

I did not see anyone talking about this here so wanted to share it with everyone. Pretty sure it is a limited edition/co-op from 2018 with a video game.

I always loved my original Delta (his name is Ceres) and recently I have set out to collect all the variants. Today this snow white Delta finally arrived :D

Absolutely love the color scheme; makes it appear more 'techy' Only complaint is that its left hind leg sometimes appears a tiny bit loose from the body. But I can just push it back in fortunately.

Any name suggestions?

Love these big fellas