And, so, here we are. The infamous Boss Fight Studio Skeletons.
Aside from Medusa, the Skeletons felt like one of the main focuses of the Kickstarter, a fully functional, fully articulated, fully in 1:18 scale Skeleton figure that looked as if it crawled from the corpse of a 4” figure, yet still managed to pose like one.
Honestly, many folks had their doubts that it could be done. Even with the decades of toy design experience Boss Fight has, they were attempting something that not even global toy brand powerhouses have been able to pull off.
Would it work?
Does it work?
Oh hell yeah it does.
Every time I’m sure I’m prepared to extol the virtues of these great action figures, I remember something else. First it was the fact that even just the human skull itself makes for an awesome prop (and actually has a movable jaw!). Second it was remembering that the Skeletons themselves could also be disassembled like the blanks and reassembled in different ways. Third it was the realization that the Skeletons were skinny enough to look realistic, but just bulky enough for armor to fit in key places. Fourth it was DOUBLE JOINTED KNEES ON A FRIGGEN SKELETON. Then I started to lose count. From the different colors to the amazing sculpting on the bones, these figures are really amazing to look at.
Now, the pieces are thin. Like pretty thin. But throughout my review, I wasn’t exactly gentle, and considering I had almost 20 of the things sitting in front of me, I certainly posed them, removed parts, and swapped things around quite a bit, and I’m happy to say, all of my Skeletons remain completely in one piece.
Incredibly, even as skinny as they are, they retain ball joints in the shoulders and hips, very poseable elbow joints, moveable wrists, ball joint neck, base of the spine, double-jointed knees, and at the ankles. These things can move like freaking crazy. They are light as a feather, yet seem to hold up to reasonable punishment.
Now obviously you need to be reasonable. The plastic is thinner than the normal standard figures, and the joints are a bit smaller as well, so take the proper care and attention, and don’t be afraid to use a hair dryer when swapping limbs around.
Obviously if you’re going to be swapping hands around and removing limbs, take some care and apply some heat! That will ensure that the material has enough “flex” to allow for things to be removed and replaced without fear of breakage.
The Skeletons come in white, black, yellow and translucent purple, with a surprise bonus hot pink one as a free gift to supporters who had to wait a little while for the product to be done. Each color is gorgeously chosen, and if you want to go “full bone” a light dark wash will truly bring out some amazing detail on the white and yellow versions.
Personally, I find myself in love with the purple ones. Ever since the release of the Eternal Struggle 2-Pack I’ve become infatuated with Hades and his crew, and these purple skeletons are the perfect compliment to the Undead Warrior from that 2 Pack. Toss in some Tartarus Guards (and pink Skeletons to go with them) and you’re quickly amassing an awesome pink/purple army for the God of the Underworld to set loose upon the world.
I will say one of my purple Skeletons did come through pretty bow-legged, I’m thinking mostly due to the material of the plastic that’s used to make transparent figures. I applied some heat and reshaped the legs somewhat, and it seems to be a lot better.
Each Skeleton comes with a footpeg and a series of clear plastic devices that seem a little strange if you don’t know what you’re looking for. The two curved pieces have holes on the bottom and plug into the battle stand so that the Skeleton can use the stand more effectively. Obviously his bony little foot is too narrow to get a peg hole in there, so these clasps make for an excellent work around.
Along with those two items are four different “spacers”. These spacers can hook into various places on the Skeleton’s narrow frame to allow for larger armor pieces to fit snugly without moving around. Most of the female armor slides right on with no issues, but if you want larger male armor (especially leg armor) to work, you need to clip on a spacer to fill in some of the gaps.
Boss Fight truly thought of everything. These skeletons are a hell of a lot of fun, and add yet another intriguing dimension to a toyline which is already completely full of intriguing dimensions. There are so many things to love about Vitruvian HACKS and it seems like as I push through these reviews I continue to be amazed and surprised by what I find.
A final note about this review… I’m not sure I’m giving this figure appropriate credit and he doesn’t really jive with my format for reviews. He ended up with 4 Stars, but when you look at what had to be overcome with the overall structure and durability of a human skeleton, what Boss Fight did with this figure is completely and truly remarkable, and deserves far more credit than my review score can accurately depict.
These figures are a ton of fun.
Vitruvian HACKS Skeleton
Character
Sculpt
Articulation
Paint Deco
Accessories
4
Summary
If I wasn’t holding it in my hand I wouldn’t have believed it, but I can vouch for the fact that these skeletons manage to be functional, aesthetically pleasing, fun, well articulated, and customizable! It’s a trifecta of coolness from the Boss Fight Studios Vitruvian HACKS line. It’s tough to portray how much I love these with my review scores, since I do focus on character and accessories, but trust me when I say these things are SWEET.
Pre-Order the Blanks at BossFightShop – Either Female or Male!
Realistically, what can be said about the blanks that hasn’t already been said countless other times in all the other reviews? After all, the blanks simply are the foundation that every single figure is built on. Any Spartan that you love is just paint and a new head with armor combinations layered on top of the male blank. Any Amazon you love (or Tartarus Guard as the case may be) is just a head, paint, and armor layered on top of the female blank. Without these two building blocks, the rest of the figures simply would not exist.
Boss Fight Studio knows this and knows how to develop their product as the Highly Articulated Character Kit System meaning they want people to tear these things down and build their own. Rather than tearing down carded figures, why not offer up some blank templates for collectors to mess with all their own. The flexibility this offers also allows them to branch out into a rainbow of different amazing colors, go transparent, and completely expand the character base.
Do you want to see how Poseidon would fit into the Gorgon War? Grab yourself a Bio Blue blank, an accessory kit, and knock yourself out. Want to go full demon? Grab a red blank (either gender) and build you own demonic creature.
The blanks are fantastically sculpted, retaining an amazing amount of mobility and sculpting which somehow dovetail perfectly together. Each blank is muscular enough to look imposing, yet narrow and flexible enough to retain some incredible poses with or without armor. This claim goes to either male or female blanks.
Adding the accessory packs to Boss Fight’s library of colorful blanks only increases collector and customizer options, letting them pick, choose and swap to their heart’s content. I literally spent hours swapping parts as I worked through these reviews and I barely scratched the surface of what’s possible with a lot more creativity than I have.
Simply add some heat (preferably via hair dryer, boiling water can sometimes warp plastic) and these blanks can also be fully disassembled into a ton of smaller pieces to allow even more color swaps and mixing and matching. The pegs remove and clip back in very easily and manage to retain their tightness even after swapping. I’m in awe of the engineering required to make this happen, and the overall design of these figures is really and truly impressive.
Even with all of the actual characters and painted figures I have on my shelf, I can’t help but continue pulling out blanks, posing them, making them fight, gearing them up and just having fun. Boss Fight has perfected the art of color in toy design, and each of these blanks feels like the almost perfect shade of their given colors, rich and vibrant, and contrasting with complimentary accessory kits to a nearly flawless degree.
Each blank also comes with three heads, three sets of feet (boots, bare, and sandals), two sets of hands (one jointed forward/back, one jointed side-to-side) and the footpeg to help them stand. I could actually see someone producing a full line of just blanks, the fact that Vitruvian HACKS offers them as compliments to a full blown universe and toyline is absolutely amazing.
These blanks are FUN. I don’t consider myself a hardcore customizer, but the time that could be whittled away mixing and matching parts is almost frightening to consider. There are so many options and they are so simple to part swap, that this could easily become a time consuming venture, but a venture that has its own set of awesome rewards.
Like the accessory packs, I’m not even sure how to frame a numerical review for these. The colors are vibrant and striking, the articulation is unmatched among 1:18 scale peers, and the sculpting is meticulous and downright artistic. That being said, these figures are built for customizing and designed around a foundation of being the building blocks with which to create other characters. As such it’s incredibly difficult to assign a score to these blanks as a whole, I can only reiterate what a terrific idea this is conceptually, and how impressive the execution has ended up.
I struggled mightily to figure out precisely how to handle reviewing these, because while I didn’t think each set necessitated it’s own review, trying to review the concept as a whole felt unwieldy and like a battle I would not win.
That being said, I’m going to attempt to cover each of the seven initial Accessory Packs in this review and try to do as much credit as I can, because it’s evident that each one was developed with quite a bit of care and attention to detail, and the existence of these sets has added a whole new awesome level of the play and collecting experience.
Bone White
Designed as a kit of white accessories, the shade of white that Boss Fight uses is remarkably cool and actually resembles some form of bone. It’s a fantastic color that contrasts wonderfully with most of the other colors of the figures and the blanks.
The set itself comes with two shields, a standard Spartan helmet, Athenian torso and leg armor, the Amazon helmet with Eurayle’s top and bottoms, plus the various snake bands. There’s two axes, two swords, the curved knife from Stheno, a sheath, a spear, and the twisted snake knives from Eurayle and her disciple. As all the other sets do as well, there is also a foot stand in the corresponding color of the set.
The first thing I notice with these accessories is that each one comes with a TON of gear. Loads and loads of elaborate weaponry in all sorts of shapes and sizes. I like the bone set quite a bit, but feel like it does need some paint. Adding deco to the handles of some of the weapons, so that just the bone itself is revealed as the blade would be pretty bad ass and add some interesting twists to these existing weapons. Looking at the collection of weapons here, I like this set, though without some paint additions, I’m not sure how much I’d use plain white accessories. Once some paint is there, though, this is a set that could find a LOT of use in various collections.
Black
One of the most popular accessory sets on BossFightShop (already sold out!) the black weapons add some really nice variety to what we’ve seen, and considering so many figure weapons are pure black these days, it doesn’t look too out of place there. Admittedly, though, the Boss Fight weapons are generally more impressive shades.
The black accessory kit contains a wealth of great gear, in my mind, a nice balance of color and accessory choices for both male and female figures. At this point you should see that each set comes with the two shields and foot stand. This particular set also comes with two helmets, one just plain, the other with the wide fin at the top. The standard smooth Spartan chest and leg armor as well as the terrific curved sword and two straight swords of varying lengths. Pretty much the entire Medusa accessory kit is here, too, with the spiked shoulder pad, dual arm bracers, hip armor and the bone knife and whip. Lastly, we have the black spear.
I find myself really loving this accessory compliment. Medusa’s armor looks great on a standard figure as well as the skeletons, and makes for some pretty nasty accoutrements for Gorgons or for your human compliments. Along with this, I’m a big fan of the smooth Spartan armor, too, so all in all, this set is a big winner.
Unearthly Green
How can you not love the look of this accessory set? Trust me when I say any images you see don’t truly do it justice. This green is super bright and truly marvelous. It’s a vibrant and exciting color scheme that doesn’t look at all realistic, but considering the esoteric backstories for some of the HACKS characters, could conceivably fit right into the mythology.
Along with the two shields, spear, and foot peg that comes with every set, we also have the decorative Spartan helmet (that came with Talos) and the Athenian Warrior chest and leg armor. Two swords and a sheath are also included, as well as the armor from the Amazon (torso, leather shirt, arms and legs). The bone knife, snake skull helmet and bone whip finish off this crazy assortment of colorful accessories.
It’s interesting to see where Boss Fight pulled from with the creation of these sets. They try to offer male and female parts in each one, and full sets of armor for each gender, though it can be more fun to color swap. The Unearthly green is pretty great, and right now is resting on my pink skeleton, giving me a medievil ‘93 Toxo-Zombie to love and cherish.
Glow in the Dark
Boss Fight Studio’s experiment with glow in the dark continues with this accessory set, a cool jump into a more supernatural realm. I haven’t quite decided who needs to glow in the dark, though I’m tempted to lather these on top of the Ghosts of the Battlefield 2 pack and watch the world burn.
Two shields, spear, and foot peg? Check. This set also has the more ceremonial helmet that came with the Athenian Warrior and the layered armor we saw with Talos, the Myrmidon Warrior and the Disciple of Eurayle. Two swords and a curved knife add to the arsenal, along with the four familiar bladed weapons from Eurayle herself (as well as the disciple). There’s a sheath for one of the swords and the snake staff from Stheno to finish things off on the right foot.
Like the Unearthly Green set, I’m not entirely sure who will be running around the HACKS universe carrying these crazy glowing weapons around, but I do know the weapons are amazing and glow like crazy. They’ll make for some awesome magical totems and will accentuate the more spiritual characters nicely.
Blood Red
I’ve found there’s a certain balance to which of these accessory sets I love. They have to have cool colors, but also have a good selection of gear, and the Blood Red set has both in spades. As I took pictures for these various reviews (as well as the blanks and skeletons) I found myself drawn more and more often to the Blood Red accessories. The fact that this set is also sold out at BossFightShop seems to lend credence to the idea that it’s a pretty hot ticket.
Along with the now standard shields, spear, and foot peg, this set has my favorite leg/chest armor as well as the excellent standard Spartan helmet without any flair. Two straight swords and a curved sword come with the set along with twin battle axes. There’s a sheath for one of the swords as well as the snake skull helmet and Medusa’s whole kit, including the shoulder pad, arm bracers, and hip armor. Along with that, the Amazon’s leather skirt is included, too, and I think people will be shocked at just how bad ass figures look with all of the female accessories in this set equipped at once.
This Blood Red accessory set is high on my list of favorites, and I can see myself equipping quite a few blanks and skeletons with the gear found inside.
Fire Red
The only thing cooler than translucent figures are translucent accessories, and if you stack translucent accessories on top of translucent figures, the effect is even better! The moment I layered these fire red accessories on my translucent orange blank to make a fire spirit, my entire world had new meaning.
You can guess the standard stuff now… yes this set comes with two shields, a spear, and a foot peg, all in the translucent red plastic. It also has a Spartan helmet as well as the chest and leg armor and three separate swords. One of the swords is actually the sword normally found in stone with the Gorgons, and I love having that awesome weapon available elsewhere. There’s a sheath for one of the swords as well as two solid knives (the Eurayle weapons). I have to say the snake skull helmet looks fantastic in this clear red, as does the snake themed forearm guards and curved knife. I’m not especially crazy about the Stheno armor and snake skin skirt. That skirt reduces articulation a bit more than I’d like, and the spike armor looks great on Stheno, but a little weird here. The crazy spiked shin guards that came with Stheno are here as well, and looking pretty crazy.
I really love the clear red accessories. They are extremely colorful and look fantastic on pretty much every figure I’ve tried them on. Not only that, but the clear red works for some kind of magical weapon or energy based weapon, which I can see fitting into the HACKS mythology nicely. Definitely one of my favorite sets.
Silver
I’ve mentioned a few sets so far that were “one of my favorite” but haven’t really designated an absolute favorite. Well time to make that declaration. One of my favorite parts about the Amazon Elite Warrior figure was the fact that the color of her silver armor was so crisp and almost chrome like. Bright, shiny and super vibrant, just the shade of that silver was enough to make me fall in love with the figure.
Every single accessory in this pack is that same bright silver, and it’s magnificent.
Two shields, the spear, foot peg and the sword sheath are included here, as they are everywhere. For weapons we have twin battle axes and a whipping four swords, including the Gorgon sword and the excellent curved sword that I love so much, and there’s also Stheno’s snake staff.
The armor in here is fantastic as well. While I’m not wild about the frilly ceremonial helmet the layered armor and leg guards are great (I’d almost kill to have the standard Spartan armor in this color, though), and what really excels here is the Amazon gear. Like the Elite Warrior exclusive, all of the Amazon armor is here and in this great shade of silver. The helmet is the icing on the cake.
There is a lot to love in this silver set, and it remains at the top of my list.
Sitting back and looking at all of these, you realize just how many accessories are here and how much opportunity there is to put together some really fun customs. Adding some minor paint tweaks to these things opens up even more doors for possibilities, and I am blown away at how much selection is here. Just about any combination you can think of is possible.
That being said, I think it would greatly benefit Boss Fight Studio to consider other color options, especially considering so many of these are already sold out. They are evidently very popular with collectors!
From a review perspective, I’m somewhat conflicted on how to score these, so I’m just going to leave it at what I wrote above. Suffice it to say these accessory sets were a brilliant idea and have already gone a long way towards prolonging the viability of this HACKS project. There’s a ton of different gear in a ton of different colors, and the combinations from each option are nearly limitless. I guarantee you will thoroughly enjoy mixing and matching this stuff with blanks or with the regular character figures you already have.
I’m not even sure where to begin with this figure, other than to profess my love for it in pretty much every way humanly possible. Yet another figure with a link to Hades and the underworld, the Tartarus Guard represents the secret elite, supernatural soldiers who guard not just the Underworld, but Tartar, the lowest level of the underworld. It’s somewhat dubious as to whether or not they actually serve Hades or some other entity apart from him, but considering how much I love the Undead Warrior (and the purple skeletons, but more on that later) I’m finding it really appealing to try and work this figure into the more standardized Hades crew. Her pink trim is a lot more pink than purple, but I think I can make it work.
The Tartarus Guard features the familiar female figure build with a new head, and a striking new head at that. Her excellent braided pony tail is removable so the helmet will fit on, but the figure looks terrific with or without it. She’s wearing the familiar Amazon armor, but really, it’s the sinister paint scheme that completely sells it.
Black is her base color, a complete jet black, with only pink trim in the right places to illuminate her. Using the skeleton has a template, her bones appear to be painted over in a vibrant pink color, which stands out incredibly well among the black body backdrop.
The face paint is especially compelling, with the blacked out sections of where the skull teeth would be looking very sinister and evil. Bones decoed into her dark skin are obviously stylized, but an exceptionally cool design aesthetic, even with the armor over the top of them. She is one hell of an evil looking netherworld defender, and the pinnacle of design excellence. I’m not sure where Boss Fight got the idea of painting this figure up like this, but it’s a daring concept and executed remarkably well.
Accessories
The Tartarus Guard comes with an arsenal of weaponry, including three separate swords, a spear, a shield (with a fantastic rendition of Hades Bident), two battle axes and her helmet. She also has the Amazon breastplate, arm, and leg armor as well, so she is well equipped to defend her station.
The fact that the Hades Bident is decoed on her shield leads me to believe she does exist to fight alongside the Undead Warrior, which is awesome. I really love that figure, and I love this figure as well, and as the days go on I feel more and more compelled to find a way to involve Hades in my HACKS mythology.
The Tartarus Guard is phenomenal. Excellent design, terrific articulation, and an exciting new head sculpt all come together to give us a great new character in the HACKS line. Black skin with the pink embellishments works far better than I suspected it might, and I actually find myself wondering how I can get a few more pink skeletons or even maybe leverage some of the pink blanks to bolster my Tartar forces. Fantastic job on this one.
Tartarus Guard
Character
Sculpt
Articulation
Paint Deco
Accessories
4.7
Summary
From the depths of the underworld, the Tartarus Guard strikes fear into the hearts of all. A spectacular insidious paint scheme, terrific figure design and an arsenal of nasty weapons gives the Tartarus Guard a huge upper hand against all foes. The new head sculpt is terrific, and she wears the Amazon armor to perfection in a really appealing gold and purple paint scheme. With each passing day I’m becoming more interested in the Hades side of this whole conflict, and the Tartarus Guard fits right in that sweet spot.
Like the Celestial Battle two pack, the Ghosts of the Battlefield two pack veers off into the metaphysical a little bit, talking about the eternal battle between the Gorgons and Spartans being so intense that it actually spills over into the afterlife. It brings up the question of whether ghosts exist and if the battle between Gorgons and Man is in fact immortal.
It’s an interesting way to try a Glow in the Dark experiment, and ultimately that’s the draw to these figures, finding a way to bring some glow in the dark fun to the toys. Largely, the experiment is successful, making a Gorgon figure that is aesthetically pleasing even when it’s not glowing.
The figure is actually a human figure with the Gorgon head, the only one of those in the line so far that leverages Stheno’s secondaries to maintain a serpentine look. It’s a very cool aesthetic and between the faint milky white material of the figure itself and the really cool nearly clear blue highlights, the figure looks completely supernatural. I really like the idea of an upright walking Gorgon with a human body as well, it’s a cool idea.
One heads up, because of the glow in the dark methodology, the plastic here is a little softer than the plastic in other figures, and I’ve actually had some issues keeping the figure together. I don’t think that’s a wide spread problem, and typically I won’t be fooling around with the figure as much as I am during the review, so I don’t think that’s a deal breaker by any means. Just something I wanted to mention.
As for the glow in the dark functionality, it is very impressive. Obviously the longer you keep the figure under the light the more vibrant it will be once the lights are off, so I experimented somewhat using the lights in my review station, and the figure glowed pretty heavily after about an hour charge. I’ve heard if you leave the figures in sunlight for an extended period of time, the effect is even greater.
This excellent effect is made even cooler by the deep black of the open mouth and the eyes, which looks great normally, and just as cool when the lights are off.
Accessories
The Afterlife Gorgon comes with a sword, shield, and spear, and the sword is one of the cool curved swords that I really love, all coming together to form a really nice weapons compliment for the snake woman spirit.
The first snake Gorgon we’ve seen without the snake tail, this Afterlife Gorgon is a pretty cool glow in the dark rendition of a snake warrior that manages to add some really neat play features with a great, and different, figure build.
Your mileage may very a little bit with the actual material of the plastic, but out on display it’s a cool looking figure that will bring some real variety to your shelves.
Afterlife Gorgon
Character
Sculpt
Articulation
Paint Deco
Accessories
3.2
Summary
I enjoy the concept of this character and love that we have some kind of Gorgon “foot soldier” (if you will). The Glow in the Dark concept is very cool, though some issues with the plastic material and the accessories drop this particular figure a little below expected high standards. While the snakeskin skirt and armored top look great on Stheno, they don’t work quite so well here and restrict articulation a little too much. I love how potent the Glow in the Dark function is, but as a whole, the figure itself doesn’t blow me away.
Like the Gorgon, the Spartan is produced in a somewhat milky color to represent the glow in the dark look and feel of these supernatural characters. The build for the spectral Spartan is much like the others, only with a bald head.
The pale color of his skin is offset by a somewhat orange look to his armor and leg guards (as well as the helmet) which breaks up the base color quite nicely and adds a nice spark of interesting detail, even without actually glowing in the dark. In fact, I think as a whole, the Spartan is a lot more aesthetically pleasing than the Gorgon, the combination of light yellow and red complimenting each other much better than the other half of the two pack.
The plastic here feels quite a bit more solid, too, not quite as soft as the Gorgon, so I feel more comfortable posing and displaying this figure. There’s a certain feel to the translucent figures that is actually really fun. The joints feel like they move a lot more freely and they feel far more playable, and even though these figures aren’t translucent, I notice some similarities here, too.
I did run some scientific field tests on the glow in the dark functionality with these figures, and I was pretty pleased with the results. All told, the Spartan looks cool standing on the shelf in regular light, and he glows really nicely in the dark as well, once those lights go off. It’s a very cool effect.
Accessories
The Spartan comes pretty well loaded with nice gear, all in the same great semi-see through red color. A shield, two swords, and two battle axes make for a great arsenal, plus the normal helmet and armor all combines together to give us a really nicely equipped glow in the dark Spartan Warrior who is a lot of fun in the light and in the dark.
Yes, glow in the dark is a gimmick, but Boss Fight did their best to try and walk the line between gimmick and a great figure. With the Gorgon I felt like they tipped a little close to the “gimmick” side, but with the Spartan they seem to have struck a near perfect balance between the two. I like this figure a lot.
Afterlife Spartan
Character
Sculpt
Articulation
Paint Deco
Accessories
3.6
Summary
A very cool looking spectral version of the Spartan Warrior complete with astral looking milky skin complimented by a really cool pale orange armor compliment. The translucent red weapons also look great, and he comes with some really nice gear. I’m always a fan of the axe, and seeing the axe in a cool supernatural red is even better. He holds up more solidly than the Gorgon in this 2 pack and is a lot more fun to play with as well.
