Set Price: $15 U.S.
Overall Rating: 5.2

(NOTE: Because this set is composed mostly of repaints, this is not a full-blown review. This mainly covers any changes made to the relevant molds and their color schemes, and merely compares them to the original versions of these molds. For a review on the normal version of Backtrack, go here. For a review on the normal version of Beastbox, go here. For a review on the normal version of Swelter go here.)
 

Backtrack (Blizzard Strike)

Allegiance: Decepticon
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Milky semi-metallic aquamarine, transparent moderately dark orange, and some dark glossy blue, silver, and red
Individual Rating: 4.0

    The "Blizzard Strike" version of Backtrack largely fits the bill, with his main color of the "base toy" being a semi-metallic shade of aquamarine-- it's got a bit of glitter in it, and even just by itself is a really nice shade and looks rather "aqua-arctic-y" as well. The main contrast color is a dark glossy shade of blue-- again, a nice shade by itself, but it both complements and contrasts against the aquamarine nicely. There's some dark blue plastic on some of the interior "robot parts" for the upper legs and connector bits, as well as some nice decorative angular paint apps on the front of the ball/robot mode. There's also some blue lines along the bottom half of the ball mode, but sadly those paint apps don't follow those circular mold details all the way around. For some accent colors, just like his "regular" version Backtrack has a silver face and red eyes, and the circular bit in the middle of his body is painted red as well. For his armor pieces, Backtrack has some orange transparent bits-- not a fiery orange, but a bit darker and duller than that (putting them up to the light still looks pretty cool, though). Obviously this contrasts very well against a toy that is otherwise almost entirely blue, and Blizzard Strike Backtrack just has a great color scheme overall. Shame about the mold, though.
    No mold changes have been made to Blizzard Strike Backtrack.
 

Beastbox (Scorch Strike)

Allegiance: Autobot
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Moderately dark brown, moderately light muddy brown, and some moderately light sky blue and metallic gunmetal gray
Individual Rating: 4.7

    The "Scorch Strike" version of Beastbox is basically meant to fit in a desert, and here Beastbox does the job pretty well. Largely speaking, his arms are a fairly light muddy brown, and his main body is a much darker brown. They both contrast and complement each other pretty well, though having so much of him being a color such as brown-- regardless of the shades-- isn't the most eye-catching choice, though it's far from bad, either. I do like the attempt to "vary things up" a bit, with some dark brown paint on his fromt lower arms and on his headcrest. His face has a GREAT shade of gunmetal gray on it, and his eyes and the little dots on his "shoulder guns" are a nice light blue. This last color looks quite good and I wish it was used just a bit more on the toy for some more color variety. Still, overall he looks pretty decent and has slightly more color variation in robot mode when compared with the original.
    No mold changes have been made to Scorch Strike Beastbox, but unfortunately his armor bits have been taken away, which is why his score is a bit lower than the original's. Unfortunately that's part of the price you pay for the discount price of these Mini-Con 4-packs, which cost the same as 3 individually-packaged Minicons; 2 of them don't come with armor, and Beastbox here is one of them.
 

Swelter (Blizzard Strike)

Allegiance: Decepticon
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Moderately light grayish blue, dark rich blue, and some dark metallic rich blue, silver, moderately light sky blue, and red
Individual Rating: 5.4

    Blizzard... Strike... Swelter. Ooookay. Did they even know they were repainting this mold into Glacius at this point, who is kinda the same thing? Well, regardless of the nonsensical name, Blizzard Strike Swelter has some pretty nice main colors. By far the most prevalent is a fairly light grayish blue, which looks kind of like "dirty" arctic ice and of course fits the theme of the redeco. What I REALLY like about the color scheme is the rich shade of dark blue plastic used for his toes and much of his back. It's just SUCH an attractive color and very eye-catching, and of course it both complements and contasts against the light gray-blue. Even better, there's a metallic version of this color used for paint on the headcrest and on angular details on his arms. On a lesser note, his face is painted silver with some red eyes. Finally, there's some sky blue paint used for the "cockpit window" of his torpedo mode, adding in another shade of blue to the mix. Even though-- like pretty much any Mini-Con-- Swelter could've still used a few more paint apps, he definitely looks more visually interesting than the original.
    No mold changes have been made to Blizzard Strike Swelter, though like Scorch Strike Beastbox his armor pieces are gone to fit into the 4-pack pricepoint.
 

Undertone (Scorch Strike)

Allegiance: Autobot
Size: Mini-Con
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Moderately light muddy brown, transparent dull orange, and some moderately dark brown, moderately light sky blue, silver, and yellow
Individual Rating: 6.6

    Undertone is the only new mold in the pack (at least in terms of it being the first "appearance" of the toy), and oddly enough they released the "Scorch Strike" variant of him before the regular version! I guess it's to fit in with his fellow Autobot Mini-Con Beastbox... Anyways, Undertone is the only Autobot Mini-Con ball, which is kinda weird as he has no one to deploy him. Regardless, in ball mode he's largely pretty solid, being quite round with two ridges of spikes on the sides of the "center stripe", in a manner similar to Hammer. There's some pretty intricate mold detailing, like circuitry and armor lines all over his armored hull, and some patterned lines near the flattest area in between the spike rows. There's some visible robot mode extras in this mode, the most obvious one being two definite "gaps" in the middle formed by the piece that becomes the robot legs-- there's a noticeable hole where the bottom of the feet has folded up against the main section of this mode and about a quarter of the way further down the middle of the ball, there's several smaller holes made by the leg piece folding away from there. It's definitely noticeable, but it's difficult to see how to make a ball that becomes a decent robot in one step WITHOUT a few oddities in the ball mode, so although these are definitely issues, I don't consider them huge ones. On a lesser note, the top of the head is a little obvious, as there's two stripes of yellow paint there but nowhere else on the toy, which is almost entirely a fairly light muddy brown. By far this shade of brown is the most prevalent color on the toy-- especially in this mode-- and I wish there was a bit more coloration. The yellow sticks out juust enough to make the head obvious, but isn't enough to really make much difference in regards to the color scheme. I DO love the blue jagged circuitry lines on each side, but I wish they were used more thoroughly throughout the whole mode-- being used just a little on one quarter of this mode is kinda odd-looking. There's also a bit of fairly dark brown used on the lower arms as well as on the clip pieces that help launch him from a Deployer. While I like that they complement and contrast against the lighter brown a bit, on the lower arms they make those pieces obvious in this mode when otherwise they would not be. (The arms don't really stick out at all in terms of their shape if you don't pay attention to the color.)
    To transform Undertone to robot mode, you just slide the sides of the ball mode out at the shoulders, and the rest auto-transforms. Then you simply rotate the arms forward at the elbows, and you're done. (These points are the only points of articulation on the toy-- back-and-forth at the elbows. But hey, it's more than some other Mini-Cons.) In robot mode Undertone is remarkably solid. I LOVE the large sections of the ball that give him beefy shoulders-- that's definitely the most unique aspect of this mode. The legs are merely molded onto the underside of the ball section that folds down, but they're molded in quite well, with little angular details all over the place-- no "2-D legs" here. The chest is also molded pretty nicely, and almost looks like it's an animal chest folded up, what with the blue paint apps on the chest that look like eyes. (Are we sure Undertone wasn't a Beast Wars toy in a former life?) The head is a nice sturdy-looking headsculpt, with narrow blue eyes, a silver faceplate, and a fairly roundish head that's molded into the body, making him a bit of a hunchback. The color of Undertone's armor bits is a transparent dull orange, which unfortunately doesn't really add much to the color scheme-- they're too similar to the shades of brown. Still, the parts themselves are pretty cool. He's got two knife-like armor bits that peg into his lower arms; two curved pieces that cover his ankles and part of the back of his lower legs; two pieces that go on the front of each of his massive shoulders; and a pretty cool detailed armored chestplate/face mask that makes him look more knight-ish. The leg pieces' peg holes are a bit shallow, so they can fall out a little easier than I'd like, but otherwise everything pegs in pretty well, and they all can stay on in ball mode, to boot.

    The "Scorch Strike vs. Blizzard Strike" Mini-Con pack, while not an outright BAD buy, is probably the easiest skip out of the three different Mini-Con 4-packs. The Blizzard Strike toys have great color schemes, but the Scorch Strike toys have more boring/dull color schemes. Additionally, most of the molds are not the best the RID2015 Mini-Cons have to offer, regardless of whether the colors are better and worse. The only mold whose first appearance is in this pack, Undertone, gets a better color scheme in the 2nd Mini-Con multipack. Recommended if you're a big Mini-Con completist or want a version of Undertone with armor; otherwise, skip.
 

Reviews by Beastbot

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