Customer Reviews

The Unofficial Guide to Transformers: 1980s Through 1990s (A Schiffer Book for Collectors)

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

On of the most over looked and yet most active fields in thevaried world of action figure collecting today isTransformers. Eventually it had to happen that someone would produce a Transformers guide. While not a definitive bible, J E Alvarez's book "The Unofficial Guide to Transformers" is a good introduction to the Transformers' Universe.

For the novice collector just beginning to collect or for someone wanting to stroll down the memory lane of their childhood toys, this is a good guide. Visually, this is a good book. There are over 150 pages of full color pictures of all the great figures to Transformers. The pictures are well photographed and are a fair size so you can have a good look at each toy. The information on Transformers' history is ok but isn't very in depth. For instance, other than the mention of Diaclones and Diacrones in a few brief lines at the book's beginning, there is little information about the toys origins in Japan. Most of the information before each section is set up so the reader can skim through it easily.

For the seasoned Transformer collector already familiar with the figures you will notice some problems that holds this book back from being a great guide. The biggest problem is with the loose figures sections and how the accessories are shown. Some figures are shown with all their accessories while others which came with accessories are either shown incomplete or completely without what they came with them. It would have been nice if Mr Alvarez took a page from any of the three Lee's Guide To: Collecting Loose Figures, of which volumes 2 and 3 have loose Transformers pictured. In Lee's guides, each loose figure is shown with their given accessories, making them good identification guides for Transformers. In this area, Mr Alvarez's guide has room for improvement.

Another glaring over sight is the sections on Pretenders and Action Masters. Rather the lack there of. While it is true many purist view Pretenders and Action Masters as less desirable to other series in the line, never the less, they are still Transformers. Very few Pretenders are included in the book. The most obvious omission are the Action Masters, especially on pages 101 and 102. While the Action Master vehicles are shown, the figures which came with these vehicle sets, strangely, are not shown. Also there are no pictures of any of the individually released Action Masters. By excluding them from this book, it not only disappoints those of us who do like Action Masters [yes, we are out there] but it leaves a hole that needs to be filled in. Let's hope future updates to this guide correct the over sight.

Last, there is the price guide. Within the various action figure / toy communities, price guides have become a bane. In the wrong hands, price guides are often misused by sellers not familiar on how to correctly use them and by a few dealers who ill use them to try and justify the sometimes outrageous prices they charge. [That and on-line auction sites, but I digress.] While the prices in this guide are fairly reasonable, there is one area that should be better explained. That area is "How a price guide should be used." The brief explanation contained in the Introduction is to general and falls very short. It fails to mention things like various conditions a loose figure can be found in and how those differences affect value or tackling the debate of what is a "Mint in Package" figure verses a "Mint figure with its package"? [Which is a bone of contention between many Transfans some of whom believe it means the same thing.] On of the great things about any of the price guides published by Tomart is that they explain these differences and how to use a price guide in its correct context. Mr Alvarez's guide would be greatly improved if a fuller, more fleshed out explanation of conditions and how the affect value were used.

Over all, The Unofficial Guide to Transformers has a nice, friendly feel. With the photos of pristine pieces and pieces less than c10 condition shown together, you get the impression the author just invited you into his home to show you his collection. It likely will make many collectors feel good about the Transformers in their own collections. That a collection can have less than perfect pieces in it and still be cool. However, if your a seasoned Transfan you may find this guide falls short of your expectations. Though this guide on Transformers has room for improvement, it is a good beginning and worth having in your library.

Transformers expert? What a joke, this guy doesn' even know how to correctly transform Bruticus. Overall the pictures were semi informative, the dialog was cheesy, and what's the point of a price guide. I expected from a "guide" pictures of all the toys, correctly transformed with all accessories. Instead many items are incomplete and some nobody took enough time to transform correctly or even pose. Also, there are many items missing including pretty much the entire action master line, most powermasters, and most pretenders. Unfortunately it is the best book currently avaliable.

As a long time collector of these toys, I was excited that finally, a book about Transformers was being released. What a disappointment. This book is abound with lots of pictures of toys that aren't even that well kept, let alone fun to look at (blue backgrounds? Is that the best you could do?). I guess I was expecting too much. I personally have toys that are related to the Transformers that I consider key to the history of the toy line, yet were somehow not mentioned in this book. Unfortunately, there is little mention of the television show, and this cuts severely into the importance of these toys. All this being said, the book simply isn't well written. Typos and poor grammar aside, this book could have been much more entertaining with a more seasoned writer. If you're looking for anything more than a photo record of most of Transformers available in the U.S., pass on this one.

This book is flooded with amatuerish writing, corny jokes and lots of pointless prices. I'm not looking forward to story reviews, etc. but at this price, the writer should at least include pictures of all weapons, accessories, instructions and tech specs. I'm very disappointed with the effort. I won't call it a waste of money, but I do feel shortchangedby the poor quality. Seriously, if I've his collection, I could have done something similar, if not better.

If you don't mind not reading the words, I suggest you get Transformations: Generations. The pics are superb and they showed all weapons, too. No box, tech specs or instructions, but the presentation is much more professional, and the pictures are definitely of a higher standard.

Buy this book only if you're a hardcore TF fan, flipped through it once and then forget about it.

I was very disappointed with this book. When you read "A Guide", you expect this to mean a "historical review" and possibly some summaries. Unfortunately, this is not what happened. This is a TOY TRANSFORMER COFFEE TABLE BOOK. If you expect details regarding the cartoon, the characters involved, the comic book storylines, the cartoon storylines, any cartoon images, movie images, etc..., you will be sorely disappointed.

This books covers the toy imagery, and that's it. It discusses, at various points (the book is focused on displaying pictures of a transformer collection rather than text) the production of the transformer toy line at various instances.

The detailed information regarding the history of the Transformers toy production, including at least a 1-2 page summary of each product line, is very nicely done.

The book contains many, *MANY* pictures, both excellent and poor, of the various Transformer toys, from Japan and America and England, across the entire world. In this scope, it is a winner. Almost every toy, including many rares, are displayed and named.

But there is a lot of whitespace that could otherwise have been filled with text information. I would have liked to have seen comic and TV story summaries, pictures from the cartoons (Japanese and US), possible interviews with TF story-writers, character and personailty summaries, details on Bot-CON, etc.

The prices are useless, since pricing guides do this, and auctions as well as the internet have enabled easy availability of product utterly changing the prices of any product both up and down.

All in all, if you would like to see almost all of the past products involving the transformers, purchase this book. Do not expect cartoon and comic story summaries or information in that manner. This books is strictly about the toy line, and it should have been advertised as such.

This book has it's ups and downs, the ups include,it identifys a wide range of the toys, I didn't know some of the toys existed(I'm was new to collecting when I bought the book), there's little bits of background info dotted here and there, it runs through most of G1, G2, Beast Wars and Machine Wars, The main down is it doesn't show all the toys. E.G Runabout, Runamuck,the Throttlebots and a few others are missing but not that many. If your starting a collection this is the book to get!

Although the book is not the greatest book when it comes to design and photography, "The Unofficial Guide to Transformers : 1980s Through 1990s," is a modest start to the possibility of future books that will discuss and price to one of the most popular toy lines of the 1980's. The author, who obviously has done good research on the Takara/Hasbro toy line regarding the appearance of new characters and/or physical changes to certain toys, however the photography could have been better. It looks like Mr. Alvarez was in a rush to get these photographs taken (he mentions the photography costs). My advice for future editions of this book is to first get a better publisher (Schiffer collectible books have always looked shoddy in design).

In simple words, this book makes a modest try in to disuss the Transformers , however with better planning, photography and design, it could be a whole lot better.

I was very disappointed with this book. When you read "A Guide", you expect this to mean a "historical review" and possibly some summaries. Unfortunately, this is not what the book contains. This is a TOY TRANSFORMER COFFEE TABLE BOOK. If you expect details regarding the cartoon, the characters involved, the comic book storylines, the cartoon storylines, any cartoon images, movie images, etc... you will be sorely disappointed.

This books covers toy imagery and that's it. It discusses, or rather SHOWS, since the book is focused on displaying pictures of a transformer collection rather than text, the production of the transformer toy line at various instances.

The detailed information regarding the history of the Transformers toy production, including at least a 1-2 page summary of each product line, is very nicely done. But considering that this is the only informative text in the book, it isn't very helpful.

The book contains many, *MANY* pictures, both excellent and poor of the various Transformer toys from Japan, USA and England. In this scope the book is a winner. Almost every toy, including many rares, are displayed and named.

But the book contains a ton of whitespace that should otherwise have been filled with text information. I would have liked to see Transformer comic book and TV story summaries, pictures from the cartoons (Japanese and US), interviews with TF story-writers, character and personality summaries, details on Bot-CON, obscure trivia, etc.

The book supplies useless prices, since that is what a pricing guide is for, and this book is not advertised as one. Auctions as well as the internet have enabled easy availability of product utterly changing the prices of any product both up and down.

All in all if you would like to see many of the obscure and older product for the Transformers, purchase this book. Do not expect cartoon, comic book, or much in the way of historical information. This book is strictly for the toy line and it should have been advertised as such.

I was certainly disappointed with the contect of this book. Although there were a few choice peices presented by Dan Hodgkinson(sp?), overall most of the toys were satisfactory at best. An authority on Transformers? Hardly! This guy gave only brief overveiws of toys with a rich history. The information in this book could be learned on the net in about 10 seconds. Just a reference for weaponless robots. All one would need as a substitute would be any transformers wishlist. Kept my attention for about 15 minutes-ponzip

Growing up in the 80's, it seemed everyone knew what transformers were. Boys had them and their sisters played with them. However, how much do people really know about this supposedly, universally-known line of toys? This book really intrigued me and captured my interest with every fresh turn to a crisp new page of transformer enlightenment. As Edgar Allan Poe once explained, only great authors can communicate to their reader a new wealth of knowledge, all in one-sitting. I acknowledge J.E. Alvarez's compliance to this definition and I commend his successful ability in conveying the reason transformers are now a collectors item. I highly recommend this unique and informative book to any intellectual whose personal library is a collection of classics of all time.