We are still celebrating Armada's 20th anniversary, and the birth of the Unicron Trilogy.
What better way than to review something "new"?
In 2003, Armada's outstanding success led to Hasbro's product team rushing to expand the toyline.
Repaints abounded. And you can't spell Armada without "minicon", and you can't spell "minicon" without "repaint". 600-ish different minicons created since 2002, and most of them came as teams of three.
To learn mode about [url='https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/top-10-best-transformers-minicon-molds-ranking-for-all-100-minicon-molds/47445/']each of the 100 minicon molds[/url], you will find a full ranking here, with dedicated articles on [url='https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/top-5-best-transformers-minicon-teams/47191/']minicon teams[/url] and [url='https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/top-5-best-transformers-minicon-partners/47336/']partner minicons[/url].
Alt modeTransformations are pretty unique for at least a couple of the member: however, they only work at this scale, where the cuteness factor kicks in. Anything bigger, even at scout size, would reveal the limitations of these designs.
In alt mode, all three minicons transform into sport cars, looking great. So, for children, the Street Speed Team should be great fun: who doesn't love toy cars? And, compared to the Race Team, these molds are much better looking, and better rolling.
Robot ModeOne of the first minicon teams, the Street Speed Team, had a basic gimmick: articulation. In reality, articulation for these three little robots is minimal. Elbows are meant to make a difference, but in reality their functionality is minimal, and it's very easy to disconnect the forearms.
Overall, these are not great toys - not now, and not 20 years ago. Actually, in 2002 some shelfwarming RID Spychangers would have made for a better gift.
So, what's the story?All minicon teams got repainted at least once. Notably, the Street Speed team includes some of the very few Armada minicons which never got repaints in the West, only in Japan.
The Powerlinx minicon team was meant to join the coda of Unicron Battles repaints, filling the gap before the start of the Energon toyline. While the Sea Team and the Emergency Team made it on the shelves, other minicon team repaints got eventually cancelled, including this very team.
In this case, many fans didn't mind: the three color schemes, in black, red and grey, were already delivered in Japan as part of the Overdrive Micron Team, just with "swapped around" colors.
According to Aaron Archer (thanks!), the plan was to eventually repaint this team three times, to get three teams of the same color: all red, all black, all grey.
As you can see, something went wrong: only the Red Street Speed Team got completed.
What happened?
Well, the Overdrive team did its job: the combo breaker comes from the Armada versions. This is not random.
If you look at the "Armada Transmetal Minicon Team", you might remeber it was not released together, but split between two releases:
Supercon class Airazor
Maxcon class Predacon
To keep this going, Airazor's minicon should have been a dull grey, which effectively would have been much worse that the sexy black palette we got.
And Predacon... well, one of its partners replaced black with maroon, a great match for this TM Megatron repaint.
And what about the only minicon which nailed the combo? Well, with one minicon "sacrificed" to match Predacon's palette, the other one was effectively free, allowing the red color to stay.
And this is how we ended up with Red, Maroon and Black instead of Red, Black and Grey. Mistery solved.
This is a bit of a funny review, because the set is one of very few unreleased copies. However...
Even ignoring its unavailability, the Powerlinx Street Speed Team would have been hard to recommend even at retail price: these are not great toys. If you absolutely lust for this palette, you should eventually find a copy of the Overdrive Micron Team online: a few thousands of those were made.
Overall, I give the Unreleased Powerlinx Street Speed Team a 6/10.
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