General Information:
Roulette and Shadow Striker were two of the exclusive toys released at OTFCC (Official Transformers Collector's Convention) 2003. Both are redecos and retools of Side Burn, who in turn was a slight redeco of Speedbreaker from Car Robots. You can read a review of Speedbreaker here. This review will go over Roulette first, and since Shadow Striker is just a redeco of Roulette, her review will just cover the changes made to the toy for that character.
Packaging: The toys themselves are held to a tray inside by twist ties. The tray is black with a red grid pattern on it. The box also has the tech specs for each character printed on it in traditional Generation One style including the red background on the number stats. There are two sets of art for each character, one smaller and one main "tech spec" art, which was a nice touch. The only complaint I have on the packaging is the clear plastic window, which was quite frail and easily damaged. The design of the packaging is great however. It's visually stunning and brings some old and some new together.
Vehicle Mode:
Sculpt wise, this is a very well done Viper. It has all the right lines and curves including the large front section and the curve near the front of the doors. Since this mold was created in Car Robots as an attempt to recapture some of the original Transformers "realism" when it came to alternate modes, the toy holds up well, not looking out dated even after three years from its original release. The fact that Dodge would even want their logo on the toy is a testament to how well done the sculpt is. Nice details fill out the engine mode such as vents on the hood, the design of the engine and the patterned Like her Generation One predecessors, Roulette has rubber tires. Each tire has the words "TF Cybertron" on them. The doors can open and look good (although all you'll see inside are a bunch of robot parts). Roulette's primary color is silver. Two purple stripes run down from the back of the car all the way to the front, making Roulette slightly reminscent of Generation One Jazz. A large Autobot symbol is heat stamped on the top of the vehicle (which all the Robots in Disguise cars had). The headlights are made of translucent clear plastic, and the smaller headlights in the front are painted white. The rear brake lights are painted gold.
Overall, Roulette has a nice, understated color scheme in this form. She's not over the top and seeing this mold without the blazing flame pattern is Transformation to Robot Mode:
Robot Mode: Roulette's color scheme is primary black, orange and purple. The helmet, shoulders, chest, feet and knees are orange. Her lower body, upper legs and arms are black. The purple is actually metallic purple painted on the legs and abdominal area. The face is silver with blue eyes (following the convention of the G1 show where all Autobots had blue eyes) and pink lips (which follows the portrayal of female Transformers in the original show as well). The Autobot symbol on her left arm has been painted with vacuum metallized purple, which looks really nice against the black of the arm. Roulette has fourteen points of articulation. She has two weapons: a "crossbow" type weapon formed from the rear of the car and the tailpipe and a gun that doubles as a blade (it can be held both ways). It's really nice to see the amount of tech detail worked into the smaller weapon. The smaller weapon is no longer vacuum metallized, rather it is just plain silver now. Roulette is a really nice piece of work. The redeco was cool enough, but the whole new head sculpt totally rules. It's not ambiguous at all (like say, Strika was), this is definitely a female Transformer, no doubt about it.
Shadow Striker is a redeco of Roulette (who in turn is a redeco of Side Burn who is a redeco of Speedbreaker. Whew!). This review will cover the changes made to the toy (see above for a more detailed review of the toy itself).
Vehicle Mode: Like Roulette, Shadow Striker is technically closest to the Robots in Disguise redeco Side-Burn in color scheme. Her engine is vacuum metallized gold and silver and she has a Dodge Viper symbol on the front of the car. The brake lights are painted gold while the small headlights on the front are painted silver. A large Decepticon symbol is heat stamped onto the top of the vehicle. This color scheme looks great on the car. The stripes running from the back to the front is a great piece of visual continuity between the two sisters who are supposed to be twins. Interestingly enough, although she is a Decepticon, Shadow Striker has an Autobot symbol. Look at the window in the back and you'll see the Autobot symbol which is molded into the left robot arm. It is colored in vacuum metallized blue. Of course, it would have required a much more extensive retool to change this arm, and since Shadow Striker is hanging out with her sister in the Universe continuity, perhaps this shows something of a dual nature? A stretch, maybe, but it's neat to speculate about.
Robot Mode: The robot face is pretty much the "opposite" of Roulette. Her face is gold (as opposed to Roulette's silver) and her eyes are red (the "traditional" G1 Decepticon eye color). The lips are still pink (pushing the whole "female robot" thing home). It would have been cool to see a dark red or something used for the lips to differentiate the face more from Roulette, but it is hardly a fatal detail. The gun and missile for Shadow Striker are the same color as Roulette's, which works out well since that allows their parts to be interchangeable between the two. While Shadow Striker looks good in robot mode, Roulette's more metallic looking details stand out a lot more than the more flat colors used on Shadow Striker. Make no mistake, if you purchase this two pack, you will be spending a good chunk of change. It sold for $65 at OTFCC 2003, so expect to pay more than that. This is definitely an item meant for a more hard core collector and in that vein, it is recommended.
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