Challenge of the GoBots - A Robo Machine Product (catalogue)
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| Challenge of the GoBots A Robo Machine Product | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | Bandai | ||||||||||||
| First published | 1985 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Uncredited | ||||||||||||
| Illustrated by | Uncredited | ||||||||||||
| Page count | 16 | ||||||||||||
| Price | Free | ||||||||||||
The 1986 Challenge of the GoBots - A Robo Machine Product catalogue featured a comic strip across its' pages, which would no doubt clear up the line's convoluted and confusing mythos once and for all.
Synopsis[edit | edit source]
Eons ago on GoBotron an evil scientist decides to conquer Earth as a base for an invasion of his own planet. Disguising them as Earthern motorcycles, he sends an army of Cy-Kills to do his bidding. This is detected by the Security Force, who send Leader-1 and Friendly Robo Machines like Dive-Dive and an army of Path Finders to battle the Enemy. However, the Super Size Vamp ran amok in a city until Throttle came up with a plan - getting a human bystander to jump on him and drive straight at Vamp, which allowed Spy-Eye to blast the Renegade. The battle raged for years, with the Security Force developing the Combinators - with Helicopter and Transporter taking out Vamp once again. The Enemy responded by creating the Puzzler Fiends - their mission to confuse and destroy. It got so confusing that humans were unable to realise that a giant robotic wasp called Traitor wasn't on their side; thankfully Mammouth appeared and charged the Ultrabot. The watching human remarked he thought mammoths were extinct, with the huge robotic mammoth showing he could change shape into a tank. Mammouth then summoned the rest of his team to form Dancougar - with excellent timing as the enemy Bismarck was right in front of him in space cruiser mode. He converted to robot mode, proclaimed himself not to be a pussycat and engaged Dancougar in battle. Meanwhile on Quartex, Boulder remarked to Pulver-Eyes that Magmar had been quiet for too long; he shouldn't have tempted fate as the Evil Rock Lord was standing a few yards away with Slimestone, who trapped Boulder with his slime gun. Marbles and Nuggit then arrived, covering everyone with sand. This soaked up the slime and jammed up the joints of Magmar and Slimestone, which makes perfect sense when all of them are standing around in a desert. Just then Marbles spots something alarming - Rockasaurs and Narlies!
Featured characters[edit | edit source]
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Friendly Robo Machines | Enemy Robo Machines | Good Rock Lords | Evil Rock Lords |
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Pages[edit | edit source]
Front cover
GoBots
GoBots
Notes[edit | edit source]
- Despite the catalogue prominently featuring Challenge of the GoBots branding the strange, exciting, strange comic uses basically everything but Challenge of the GoBots. The opening especially seems modelled on Fleetway's The Robo Machines comic, unless both are based on some long-lost Bandai bible for the European line. The first frame of Vamp smashing a building on the Super Size GoBots page isn't actually traced from one of the comic's panels of Casmodon attacking London but certainly used it as reference.
- In this exciting but somewhat hectic micro-continuity motorcycles existed on Earth eons ago.
- This was the only contemporary media to feature Helicopter and Transporter, Monsterous and the Robo Machine versions of Mammouth, Dancougar and Bismarck.
- In a tight field this might be the most confusing and unhelpful piece of GoBots-related fiction ever. Even counting Lightning Trap: Leina and Laika.
- By way of recompense there are some nuggets among the toy pictures. Most use the airbrushed prototypes featured on the Robo Machine cardbacks of the time (including the white Major Mo and the GoBots versions of Hornet and Throttle, who is even blue in the art), but there are some points of interest:
- Alternate names, albeit maybe mis-spellings: Good Night, Sliks, Bladze, Night Rider, Stacks Transport, Super Size GoBots, Wierd Wing, South Claws, Bolder. Narlienurtle, meanwhile, is the actual European name of Narlizard.
- The extant Devil Invaders Vamp, Scorp and Pincher are referred to by their GoBots names rather than Casmodon, Zarios and Falgos; the cards on the toys would remain unchanged, however.
- Prototypes shown: Spy-Eye in all-grey; Bugsie with black shoulders; Chaos; Re-Volt; Traitor and basically all of the Rock Lords (released in Europe under the Robo Machine banner) - including the non-ugly Marbles, 'Rockmite' Pulver-Eyes having changed faction but not yet appearance, dark purple Brimstone, meteor-style Crackpot and Slimestone with his early head.
- It also advertises Destroyer, who was never reissued in Europe after his DX Robo Machine initial release as Leopard A4; the images are in fact taken from the similarly-inaccurate cross-sell pictures on the back of the European Super GoBots box.
