We opened our 30th Anniversary "IDW Bumblebee" today to discover a quality control issue which we do not believe has been reported thus far.  The figure has been assembled with his right shoulder joint on backwards which means that the figure becomes impossible to transform.

The fix is really simple, just take off the back, remove the piece and turn it around, then put him back together again.  We are currently uploading a very short raw YouTube video to help highlight the issue which will be online soon.

Our recent Tranformers buying habit has not been great for QC, our MP Frenzy has two right hands, Jinbu had the normal QC issue, Bumblebee has this QC issue though none have been as bad as the state our Lazerback was in when we picked him up earlier in the year.

Thanks to Seibertron for reporting that that Harmony Gold, the producers of the Robotech brand, have filed a lawsuit against Hasbro Inc over the recent SDCC 2013 Jetfire / Hound boxset stating that the Skystriker infringes on their Robotech IP. The original document can be found here.  It is unlikely that the suit will succeed, but other than stopping the sale of the figures and the usual compensation, the suit also requests a recall from any persons or entity who purchased or received the figure.

iGear have released some images of their first upcoming Con Air Raptor Squadron called IG-C01 StarBurst which is based on Starscream.  The toy, reported to be in scale with the Masterpieces, sees the seeker leader transforming into a Raptor fighter though his head sculpt is proving to be diversive.  What do you think?

 Simon Plumbe, head of the Auto Assembly Committee, has posted a personal apology over the confusion caused by a recent press release. You can find a copy below

Dear friends,

Over the weekend, I posted a press release offering a 20% discount to any person who opted to buy an entrance ticket to Auto Assembly 2013 between now and the convention.  It has since come to my attention that quite a few of our loyal attendees are understandably less than pleased with this, feeling they have missed out through no fault of their own.

Please accept this post as my full and unreserved apology.

The discount was purely intended to be a bonus incentive for those people who were on the fence about coming to the convention or not for the first time; but with hindsight, I now realise that this sadly may have left some of our attendees feeling alienated.  This was absolutely not my intention and, having now spoken to the AA committee and numerous attendees, I realise that I jumped the gun a little this time.

As we have said all along, late bookings hurt the convention. They really do, because so many of our costs need to be paid in advance – more than ever this year.  But I now realise that my attempts to try and avoid this situation by encouraging bookings now, rather than in the last week, were counterproductive.  Sadly, I unintentionally added to the very problem I tried to address!  I hold my hands up completely for that. In the words of Optimus; “Sorry, my bad” :(

So, how do we move forwards? Having now spoken to the AA committee (who I wish to thank for their help and honesty at this time), I have decided that the following action is the most appropriate;

    I am hereby formally retracting the discounted ticket offer. It was, I now realise, unhelpful and has caused some upset. So I firmly believe that removing the offer is the right thing to do.
    For anyone who has booked a ticket whilst that offer was live, I will honour the price you paid. It is not your fault that this has happened.
    I will make everyone a personal assurance right now that there will not be any repeat of this situation in 2014. All year, my committee work hard to encourage people to book early for the good of the convention – I do not want to undermine their exceptional work and I do not want to appear ungrateful to those who support us so fantastically well with their early bookings.
    In lieu of rising costs, we were reluctantly in the position of having to raise ticket prices by £10 for 2014. However,by way of an apology to each and every one of our attendees, I have decided to FREEZE ticket prices at their current levels until 31st December 2013 and beyond that point, a continued reduced level of £55. Once you have all seen the reveals we will be making at this year’s Saturday night show you will truly understand why Auto Assembly 2014 is going to be our most expensive event ever. I guarantee that these reduced prices will not have any adverse impact on the convention although this will mean that the team and I will have to shoulder some extra work, and indeed, work harder than ever, but I think it is the right thing to do to show everybody just how sincere I am with this post.

At the end of the day, Auto Assembly is YOUR convention. Its continued growth and success is down to YOU and YOUR feedback. Bar discount… Swerve’s diner… the fantastic new hotel… my team and I have worked hard to make all of these things a reality because of YOUR excellent feedback over the years. Sometimes, very rarely, we do get things wrong. Because we are human and because we try as many different things as possible to improve the show for you. But we will never try to hide behind a mistake. The special offer, whilst made with the very best of intentions, was misguided and I hope you will accept my full apology and then, join me to help make Auto Assembly 2013 the best darn Transformers convention on that planet. The convention which each and every one of your DESERVE for your tremendous support over the years.

Thanks for your understanding. I really appreciate it and truly value your continued support of the show.

Til all are one

Simon Plumbe
Auto Assembly Committee Head

Our thanks go out to Neurie for tweeting us some images of the Predacon Rising figures he spotted in Tesco within the London area.  The toys have been sighted in other areas of the country for the last few weeks but it seems that their distribution is now starting to spread.

Neurie has also just confirmed that he has spotted the FoC Soundwave and Grimlock in Toys R Us as well within the London area.  In a related sighting, Pete Brown has also let us know that the same FoC figures have turned up within in the Poole Toys R Us, though we have also received report that they are yet to turn up within the Bristol area. If your area does not yet have them, do not worry, they are likely to start turning up soon.

It has been bought to our attention that there is, and has been, auctions appearing on ebay for toys claiming to be, or hinting that they could be, lucky draw items including a black Astrotrain.  There is no such prize figure and what's more the figure appears to be a fake using the "lunchtime special" mold.

TakaraTomy are not releasing, or considering to release, G1 based prize figures at this time. The only prize figures recently have been based on Transformers Prime and will be based on the Transformers Go line and are well documented now on TakaraTomy's websites as well as staffs Twitter accounts.

TFYuki has shared a new image of ゲキソウマル (Gekisoumaru) with the prize campaign samurai team head.

金兜は、ケンザンを持っていなくても、武器としてゲキソウマルに装備してもカッコイイぞ!! http://t.co/DdtxxtbJkW

— TF YUKI (@TFYUKI) July 23, 2013

On Sunday TF Upgrader posted an album to their Facebook page which showed new images of the upcoming Fans Project Retro Futures GlaciaLord team.  The images include the first look at Tusker, the Mammoth and body of the gestalt team.

The Retro Futures concept is to produce new figures designed to look as if they are from the 1980s complete with vintage instruction manuals, boxes printed with wear and half used sticker sheets.  The figures themselves consist of a small robot and an outer "mech" suit with the inner robot becoming the head and chest plate.  This look keeps the limbs styled like the 1980s combiner teams where their counterparts had undersized heads compared to their bodies.

The figures are compatible with G1 combiners and are also "scramble" compatible.  You can view the new images after the jump.

Thanks to new images from SDCC 2013 we now know that the Linkin Park Soundwave tou will now be made of a yellow plastic rather than gold chrome.

This new Soundwave, nicknamed by some as Chedderwave, would make Wallace and Grommet proud.

Image thanks to Toyark . TFW2005.com

Auto Assembly have sent out the following press release:

Auto Assembly 2013 Pre-Registrations Close In Two Weeks
 
It's hard to believe that Auto Assembly 2013 is only three weeks away! We're still working hard to bring everyone our best convention ever and we STILL have a lot more surprises in store... we have a fantastic free gift giveaway to announce in conjunction with one of this year's sponsors and we may even have one last surprise guest up our sleeves.
 
2013 is set to be the biggest year yet for Europe's Largest Transformers Convention. We have more dealers attending the convention than ever and not only is our dealers area a total sell-out but we have a large waiting list of dealers wanting table space. Tables are in such high demand now at the convention that spaces for AUTO ASSEMBLY 2014 are now over 50% sold!
 
We have a stunning guest line up - we have three voice actors joining us - Steve Blum (TF: Prime Starscream), Dan Gilvezan (G1 Bumblebee) and Neil Kaplan (RiD Optimus Prime) supported by a plethora of comic talent headlined by Simon Furman, Andrew Wildman, Nick Roche, James Roberts, Alex Milne, Andrew Griffith, Jim Sorenson and many more...
 
Over the three days we have guest Q&A Panels, a special themed Bumblebee night with an exclusive reading from Bumblebee And Me by Dan Gilvezan, special panels with IDW creative talent and a panel dedicated to Regeneration One, two charity auctions, free workshops, a script reading featuring all our voice actors on stage together in a brand new original story, a cosplay competition, and much more. And if you get hungry or thirsty during the day, why not pop into our themed bar / restaurant... SWERVE'S DINER!
 
If you haven't already got a copy of Bumblebee And Me, Dan will be bringing copies with him for sale but these will be limited so if you want to get this before the convention to get signed, you can get your copy before the convention here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1467929565/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1467929565&linkCode=as2&tag=vitpla-21
 
If you've never been to Auto Assembly before everything taking place at the convention is included in the ticket price! Once you have paid for your tickets, all you will need to pay for after that is your travel, accommodation, food and drink and for anything that you buy from our dealers. We don’t charge for workshops, autographs (our artists will sell original artwork, prints and sketches and some of our voice actors may bring items with them for sale, but none of them will charge to sign any items that you bring with you to the event), Q&A panels or for our "Premium" Friday and Saturday night events - all you need for these is a full weekend pass!
 
The full Schedule for the convention, including a map of all our function rooms, is available to download from the Auto Assembly website so you can see for yourself what a packed weekend we have on offer. If you've already booked for one of the days but now want to upgrade for the full weekend so you don't miss out on anything, email us at contact@autoassembly.org.uk to take advantage of our great upgrade offer!
 
Tickets for Auto Assembly 2013 are selling quickly and once again we are on target to set a new European attendance record. If you want to be a part of the convention this year, pre-registrations close in TWO WEEKS on 1st AUGUST 2013. We may have on-the-door places available, but if you want a personalised pass for the convention and to guarantee early admission for the weekend then you will need to book in advance.
 
Auto Assembly 2013 is Europe's largest Transformers convention and is taking place over the weekend of 9th - 11th August 2013 at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel. To book your tickets or find out more including details of all the dealers attending, all of our guests and a full schedule for the weekend, visit the website at www.autoassembly.org.uk
 
Hope to see you all in August!
 
The Auto Assembly Team
 
Web: www.autoassembly.org.uk / www.ct-alpha.com
Auto Assembly Europe: www.autoassemblyeurope.eu
Youtube: www.youtube.com/autoassembly
Twitter: www.twitter.com/auto_assembly
Forum: http://www.autoassembly.org.uk/forum
Email: contact@autoassembly.org.uk
Tel: +44 (0)7860 948296
 
Auto Assembly is sponsored by
 
TF Source - www.tfsource.com
Robot Kingdom - www.robotkingdom.com
Transformers @ The Moon - www.transformertoys.co.uk
Big Bad Toy Store - www.bbts.com
Benscollectables - www.youtube.com/Transformermegazord
Geek-station - www.geek-station.co.uk
Comic Toys - www.comictoys.nl

Million Publishing have annoucnced that the exclusive toy for Transformrs Generations 2013 will be Decepticon Rebel Infiltrator Starscream a translucent (Ghost) version of the War for Cybertron Starscream toy.

The figure comes with three weapons, the Neutron Assault Rifle accessories, Sideswipe's Path Blaster and Shockwave's Photon Burst Rifle

A new 3rd Party group called The Time Machine have announced they will be releasing a Seeker called Starshout later in the year (so late Q3 or Q4)

Hasbro have sent out a series of official stock images of the toys which were shown at SDCC including the previously unannounced Minicon combiner team.  You can view all of the images by clicking on the headline of this news stroy

Since we are in the UK and are simply two brothers maintaining this site whilst working, we have no means to be able to be out at SDCC in person, sadly, so instead here are some links to Seibertron.com, TFW2005.com and TheAllspark.com's coverage of the event.

Seibertron.com - Preview Night (Masterpieces, Platinum Edition, Linkin Park Soundwave)

TFW2005.com - Generations and 30th Anniversary figures including Whirl and Rhinox.

The Allspark - Preview Night

The folks at Kotaku have got their hands on the San Diego Comic Con exclusive Transformers / GI-Joe Crossover set.

The set contains the Jetfire Skystriker, Hound Vamp, Baroness with Ravage, Blugeon (recolour of Budo), Snake-eyes (with Autobot Symbol) and Blaster (geto-blaster mode) with his cassettes

You can read their review by clicking the link Kotaku