G.I. Joe Quickstrike w/ Sgt. Bazooka
Toy
name: Quickstrike
Assortment: G.I. Joe Valor
Vs. Venom Bravo vehicle
Price: MSRP $14.99
Availability: September, 2004
Key Features
- Includes Sgt.
Bazooka
- Figure fits inside cockpit
- Lift-up launcher fires missiles
- Figure can sit in lift-up launcher
If I have one big complaint with Hasbro's presentation of their G.I. Joe product over the last four years, it would be "consistency"...or more appropriately, the complete lack of it. Within a single wave of figures you might find two or three fantastic ones, a few mediocre ones, and then a couple that just make you scratch your head and wonder who thought up this figure and why aren't they on the unemployment line? It's very hard to line up two figures next to each other and tell that they went with the same wave. Take the Wave 7 Destro and Wave 7 Red Spot. One of the best new sculpt figures and then a long-legged monstrosity who makes no sense as a toy, or even as a soldier on the battlefield.
I am seeing
this occur within some vehicles as well, although not necessarily to the same
extent.
Take the reviews I did a couple weeks ago for the Jungle Strike. This is an
ultra-realistic to scale accurate representation of a military vehicle...and
then you look on the same shelf next to it, and you see the Quickstrike. Not
a bad vehicle, per se, but one with no basis in reality and whose only concern
is how big a gun can you cram in a Bravo-sized vehicle? The answer, apparently,
is a pretty darn big one.
Now again, I'm not really comparing quality here, since I think the Quickstrike has some of it's own merits...I just find it funny that customers may very well run into this vehicle and the Jungle Strike on the shelves at the same time and seriously wonder if they actually do belong to the same toyline.
Design and Playability
Design is definitely one of the Quickstrike's strong suits. It does not even pretend to be a type of vehicle based in reality (although I suppose it could be VERY loosely based on the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, although the Warthog works much better for that). The vehicle design team merely tried to think up some really neat concepts and come up with an ultra-modern vehicle for them. In some ways it works, and in others, it doesn't quite.
The overall shape of the vehicle is pretty neat, I think. I really like the sloped front canopy and the shape of the front of the Quickstrike. It looks lean and mean, and capable of travelling at some decent speeds, plus it just looks stylish, which is really what the design team is going for, I'd say. The twin seats in front work nicely, too, giving a pair of Joes somewhere to sit to operate this vehicle of destruction, although from a functional standpoint I'm not sure why it takes two people to run this thing. The weapons on it are a machine gun above the canopy and the honkin' missile launcher that pops up out of the back, both of which have their own operators. So I can't really tell what the second driver is there to do, but hey, whatever works, I guess.
Now, unfortunately the flow of the vehicle seems inconsistent, too...what starts off as a sloped, sleek, speed demon quickly turns to a blocky, clunky, heavily armored battle wagon, and I have a hard time telling how the two different types of battlecraft successfully merge here. It almost looks like the front is the "Quick" and the back is the "Strike" but they don't necessarily compliment each other that well. However, even with the tall rear end of the vehicle, it still looks moderately effective as a medium-sized COBRA-killer...it does suffer from some weaponry issues, though.
A vehicle called the "Quickstrike" would seem to indicate a fast moving, fast attack vehicle, but the main weapon of this battle wagon looks anything but "quick". The monster missile launcher on back looks fearsome and fires a rather large missile, but I'm just not wild about the design element of it. It just looks like a big old cumbersome missile launcher rather than some of the cooler, more modern weapons that Hasbro has been incorporating into their vehicles recently. Now besides this larger than life launcher, the only real offensive weapon here is a machine gun manned by a single person above the cockpit. It's an open firing mechanism (as is the missile launcher, for that matter) and doesn't really add a whole lot of fire power to this thing. It's a neat looking gun and an effective last line defense against foot troops, but just doesn't have much punch against armored craft when they come knocking.
Design-wise, this thing looks pretty similar to how Hasbro is releasing their Joe stuff...inconsistent. It tries to be everything at once, and as such, doesn't really come together over all. It's got a large assault missile launcher, but tries to be a fast attack/transport as well, and doesn't really end up being any of them effectively. It's got a really cool paint scheme and awesome camouflage pattern, and some neat qualities about it, but it just doesn't hit a home run on any one level.
Play Features/Gimmicks
This is something Hasbro is always working hard to integrate into their vehicles, and here it works moderately, but far from perfectly. It's pretty obvious that Hasbro came up with the action attack concept first here and kind of built the vehicle around it, which is probably why it's not as successful as it could be. Great vehicles can be great vehicles with special gimmicks, as long as the design isn't sacrificed to make the gimmick work...in order to get this huge missile launcher to effectively work, Hasbro had to beef up the rear section of the Quickstrike, which is part of why the vehicle as some problems with me. Not only this, but the launcher isn't even activated by a button press or other mechanized gimmick...it's just a "lift-up launcher" meaning you just pull it up into firing position. Meh...
Color Scheme/Paint Applications
This is one aspect of the Quickstrike that I do like. The dark black base color with splotches of green/bown camouflage is a pretty effective coloring scheme for a vehicle of this type. It's dark, it could easily serve as a night ops insert vehicle or combat assault craft.
The rims, guns, radar, and other trimming are all done up in a cool metallic silver/gray, which looks realistic and adds some nice flair to the overall appearence of the vehicle. If the shape were a little more appealing, the colors might make more of an impact. As it stands, they're acceptible, but don't really make an iffy vehicle any better.
Figures
and Accessories
Ah, this could have been a fantastic figure! Well...it IS a fantastic figure, but it could have been one of the best new sculpt updates as of yet had they made this figure Sgt. Zap as was previously believed. I can only think that somehow Hasbro couldn't isolate the copyright in time, because one look at the facial sculpt of this figure and you know it's Zap and not Bazooka. The thin moustache (as opposed to the big bushy one) and the slim, angled face match Zap's look much better than it does Bazooka...but I guess that's what imagination is for. I have a very hard time overlooking the names that Hasbro gives their figures, but in this case, I think I will have to, as this Quickstrike driver makes a fantastic Zap update and only a moderate Bazooka one.
The headsculpt looks very nice and detailed, and I really love the helmet he comes with. He retains a nice military look to him, but has some very cool quilted armor that looks awesome. Unlike Rollbar, who was sculpted so realistically he almost looked boring, Sgt. Bazooka has some nice modern aspects to him and comes to life as a military guy, but one still involved with an ultra-modern, almost fantasy-like super hero team. This military appearence matches Zap a lot better than it would ole 'Zooka, too, but I'm just happy the figure is a nice one. His proportions are realistic, his uniform is interesting, but not too "out there" and looks like he'd fit in with pretty much any other Joe on the team.
His colors are very cool, too, maintaining the military look with some different shades of green. Some other colors besides green would have been nice to kind of liven the figure up a little bit, but as it is, he looks neat. My only real complaint with the colors is also that he doesn't mesh with the vehicle at all. His bright green uniform doesn't mix with the black/brown of the Quickstrike, and just doesn't quite look right with the vehicle. On his own, though, he works well, which is fine with me, since that's probably mostly how he'll be used.
Final Comments
My feelings on this vehicle are pretty mixed, actually. It's definitely an improvement over vehicles we've gotten in the past, but still appears hampered by the rounded tonka-truck type design element of the past couple of years. It tries to do a number of things, but can't quite get them all done successfully, and I'm not sure how much use it will end up getting in my Joeverse. There are things I like, like the six-wheeled form factor and the sloped canopy...I love the paint deco and the included figure, but it just doesn't quite all come together. There are enough good points to warrant a purchase, probably, but I cannot recommend it whole heartedly. It's not a bad vehicle by any means, but next to items like the Thunderwing, Jungle Strike, Night Grizzly, and Ice Sabre, it just doesn't really measure up.
Ratings (out of 10)
Presentation:
6
Design: 5.5
Playability: 6
Value: 6
Overall score (not an average): 5.5
