Walmart Exclusive "Mega Exosaur" Review:
On a recent trip to Walmart for groceries, I happened upon this great cyborg T-Rex in their "Adventure Force" line.
The Mega Exosaur is HUGE and features not only lights and sounds but a motorized walking feature. The lights are extremely bright and the sounds are very loud. The features are controlled by a motion/light sensor that is overly sensitive, activating at the slightest movement in the air or change in light intensity. I actually had to open it up as soon as I got into the house to remove the batteries as the constant roaring was driving me insane. After removing the batteries, I noticed the on/off switch located between the dinosaur's legs.
The lights are located in the clear yellow crest on the back of the dinosaur's head, the mechanical left eye, the cannon in the mouth and the exposed cybernetics on the left flank. The bulbs are clear but the light up features' colors come from the various transparent plastics that make up the builds (red for everything but the yellow crest). There is little to no light bleed through on the non-transparent parts due to a combination of opaque plastics and dense paint apps.
There is only one bit of assembly needed, the tail needs to be plugged into the torso (this is a one time assembly). Other than this, the Mega Exosaur is ready right out of the box.
There is not much in the way of articulation as the head and tail are static and the limbs' motion is tied to the motorized walking feature, but you can get some free movement from the arms thanks to a pair of ratcheting joints, one in each shoulder. The jaw is hinged and spring loaded (also tied to the walking feature) but can be manipulated manually.
The overall design of the Mega Exosaur is quite good despite being a bit of a "retrosaur" (the upright posture with a tail that drags on the ground in the style that old dinosaur toys from before the discovery that most dinosaurs held their tails out straight behind their bodies for balance). The cybernetics are well designed and there are areas where it looks like the skin was torn away revealing the mechanical elements underneath in addition to the enhancements and replacements above the skin (my wife thinks the mechanical feet look like the dinosaur is wearing roller skates
).
The deco is fairly basic, but still looks pretty good. The dinosaur is cast in a vibrant green plastic. There are some brown markings on the dinosaur's back. The cybernetics are painted up in various shades of gunmetal and black metallic paints. The teeth and organic eye are painted the same bone color. The paint apps are very neat with no overspray or bleed through on my sample.
I plan on repainting the skin in a more lifelike fashion with highlights and lowlights and will be weathering the cybernetics (as well as painting the unpainted hydraulics in the corners of the jaw).
The Mega Exosaur retails for $14.88 and is worth every penny!
