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Series: Fans Project
Allegiance: Autobot
Categories: Upgrade Set
Year: 2009

With lasers blazing as you dash across the battle field. Avoiding to trip over deactivated allies while dodging those who wish to see you among them. You soon realize your standard tech is not enough. But out of nowhere your comrades bring you a new weapon, forged from the fires of the Great War. It comes to mind, you now hold the key to change the tide of this battle, if you dare to enter... TF-Crossfire!


Prelude: To get the legal stuff out of the way, the TF-Crossfire kit is not an official Hasbro or Takara-Tomy product and is not in any way affiliated with the Transformers brand expect for the fact that the creators are great Transformers fans. The TF-Crossfire kit is an add-on to the Energon Combiner Superion Maximus or its G1-themed reissue, which was released in both Universe and ROTF packaging.

Robot Mode: The add-on parts are designed so the Aerialbots can use them in all three of their configurations. In robot mode the various parts serve as weapons and additional armor. Windrazor and Treadshot (the red and black robots) each get two handguns, which they can use two-handed or combined into a single weapon for one-handed use. Additionally they get shin guards, so bad little Decepticons can't kick them in the shins. The enhancements are nice and subtle and the weapons look a lot better than the original weapons those two got.

Terradive and Skyshadow (the white-blue and maroon-grey robots) both gain a two-barreled gun, again looking better than their original weapons. Additionally one of the two (Skyshadow in my case) carries the two halves of the radar dish (used in jet mode) on his wings. This is one enhancement that definitely looks better in jet mode, as its just kibble in robot mode. It doesn't look too bad, but not particularly good, either.

Finally Stormjet (the big leader robot) carries a big rifle that strongly resembles that of his G1 counterpart and looks pretty good, too, esepcially since Stormjet didn't originally have any weapon to begin with. What doesn't look so good is the two big rectangles Stormjet carries on his back (really Superion's feet). They just hang there, giant kibble, and don't do much for the robot mode. Stormjet can still move and isn't much hindered by them, but personally I'd rather leave them off and pretend they're banished into subspace. So all in all the various enhancements look pretty good in robot mode with only one or two exceptions.

Alternate Mode: The TF-Crossfire enhancements can be applied in jet mode as well, of course. Treadshot and Windrazor don't need to change much, as their shin guards from robot mode can remain in place for the transformation. The jet mode doesn't look quite as sleek with them on, but more powerful. The guns can be fastened either to the wing tips or the armor enhancements. Both looks good.

Either Skyshadow or Terradive can carry the big radar dish on top, effectively becoming an AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) plane. The other of the two gets 'just' the double-barreled gun on top. While I've never seen a Thunderbolt-type jet with an AWACS dish on top, it looks pretty good and the TF-Crossfire guns look a lot more natural here than the giant Energon guns the robots originally came with. So no complaints here.

Stormjet carries the same parts here as in robot mode. The big gun goes on top, smoothly integrating with the jet's aerodynamic shape. No problem here at all. But once again Stormjet has to carry around the two big robot feet. They take the form of pods hanging under his wings. They look better here than they do in robot mode, but once again Stormjet looks better without them. Still, it's nice to see that all the parts are actually accounted for in all configurations, so thumbs up for that.

Combination Mode: The main purpose of the TF-Crossfire kit is, of course, to fix the one big flaw of the Energon style combiners: The lack of proper hand and feet. Superion had it worse than the others, so it's nice to see him get the fix-up first. First off, he gets proper feet. The only disadvantage here is the fact you are forced to use both Terradive and Skyshadow as legs. Which isn't a problem in itself, but because of their design Superion has very wide 'knees', forcing him to either stand with his legs spread or in a stepping motion, one leg behind the other. Not a big thing, but a bit bothersome.

Superion also gains proper hands and forearms, as he had neither before. Windrazor and Treadshot serve as arms in a much different configuration than they'd normally do. One robot leg of each basically becomes the forearm, encased in a gauntlet with two guns each and a fist with moving fingers plugging into their feet. As a result Superion now has full arm posability and can hold the big rifle in either hand. Very nice. There are some minor restrictions, as the ball joints of the smaller robot legs aren't quite strong enough to hold up the heavy rifle in every pose, but you can easily work around that.

Finally, Superion also gains a visor which can clip onto his eyes to strengthen the resemblance to G1 Superion. Whether you put it on or not is a matter of taste. Overall the enhancements for the Superion combiner work very well. The leg thing does need a bit of getting used to, but otherwise: Very good.

Remarks: The Energon combiner robots were very good, except for their lack of proper hands and feet. For Superion at least that problem is now solved. Once again Fansproject delivers an excellent upgrade set to an existing Transformers toy (or a group of toys, rather) and except for some minor issues, such as the feet not looking too good as kibble on Stormjet, everything works out just fine. Recommended to all fans of combiners.

Rating: A-
 
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