Every year, Hasbro shows off some of its best new products from top entertainment brands at a pre-New York Comic Con party focused solely on them. This year’s ‘Twas the Night Before… party was once again full of games, themed cocktails, and photo ops. For Star Wars fans, the Rebels and classic series allow for plenty of action figures, Black Series figures, and new Star Wars Command Battle and Versus packs. Hasbro’s KRE-O line had a whole slew of new building sets to power up the new Transformers: Robots in Disguise TV series (check out our coverage of the series’ panel at Comic-Con the following day!) featuring the new characters, as well as new sets based on the classic and movie brands. And, naturally, I got ponyfied like Rainbow Dash at the Ponyfication Station—celebrating the iconic look of the My Little Pony brand. Here’s a look at our favorite highlights from the Hasbro party—of course, featuring more Tranformers and some of our favorite Marvel heroes.
With the upcoming Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, there were new action figures galore on display, but the coolest part of this line had to be the role-play toys. The Iron Man Arc FX Armor are articulated Arc FX gloves that kids ages 5 and up can wear, featuring a light-up repulsor in the palm. Kids can raise their hands to activate lights and blasting sound effects, just like the real Iron Man. There’s also the Captain America Star Launch Shield, putting kids in Cap’s boots with a disk-launching shield. Kids ages 6 and up pull the rip cord to deploy the center disk to surprise their enemies with a counter attack. And, of course, no Avenger’s battle would be complete without the Hulk destroying half of Marvel Manhattan with his smashing fists. Now, kids ages 4 and up can wear the Hulk Gamma Grip Fists, which flex to let kids grip, grab, and stop any villain from escaping their grasp. But don’t worry, parents—these Hulk fists are foam hands, so they won’t actually smash through any obstacles your little Hulk finds around the house. All Age of Ultron products will be available next February.
Of course, no Hasbro pre-Comic Con party would be complete without a little Angry Birds Telepods talk. This year, Hasbro unveiled a Telepods line featuring Angry Birds Transformers. The digital and physical crossover play experience features iconic Transformers favorites in Angry Birds form. The Angry Birds Transformers lineup and Telepods gaming platform gives fans three different ways to play. Players can launch Telepods figures in vehicle mode for awesome races, convert them into robot mode to reenact classic Transformers battles, or teleport figures straight into the Angry Birds Transformers app, from Rovio Entertainment, to unlock additional characters and special powers. The Telepods figures also look awesome, featuring more details and a much different shape than previous Telepods characters and perfectly reflecting the robotic appearance of the Transformers brand.
The highlight of the party was really the reveal of Super Awesome Me, a collaboration between Hasbro and 3DPlusMe to provide an in-store, personalized 3-D printing experience that allows kids and super fans to become a superhero action figure. It’s no secret that 3-D printing is becoming quite a trend in the toy industry, and now each fan can choose to either be Captain America or Iron Man, take a photo of him or herself, and get a 3-D printed action figure featuring his or her own face on the superhero’s body. The unique figures feature traditional 12-inch articulated plastic action figure bodies, manufactured by Hasbro, with the full-color 3-D printed head created by 3DPlusMe. Recommended for kids (and kids at heart!) ages 4 and up, Super Awesome Me is available at Toys “R” Us Times Square beginning October 9 and at FAO Schwarz Fifth Avenue, with plans to expand to more locations. Hasbro invited guests to create their own Super Awesome Me figures at the event, and the line was wrapped around the room, so I would expect no less at retail.
#SuperAwesomeMe at #HasbroParty! Make yourself a superhero through the magic of 3-D printing! pic.twitter.com/PyJZqJotrL
— The Big Toy Book (@TheBigToyBook) October 8, 2014
You can check out more photos and fun from the Hasbro ‘Twas the Night party by searching for #HasbroParty on social media. Be sure to keep an eye out for the rest of our New York Comic Con coverage!
