Sunday, June 12, 2005

SFX's Toy Shop - Jabba the Hutt Concept Mega Figure

Hey gang, welcome to the Toy Shop!

As you can tell by the great threads about game play variations and future figures, Attacktix lends itself to creativity. I've had a few ideas rattling around for awhile and I thought I'd share them with you. Think of them as figure mods, but instead of paint & clay I'll use ones & zeros.

Today I'm going to tackle Jabba the Hutt. Since the early days of Attacktix, oh so long ago, one of the characters people wanted to see immortalized in 'tix form was the Hutt. I, on the other hand, was of a different opinion. Jabba is one of my favorite characters but lets be honest, he's a fat slug that basically did jack-squat. He wasn't what I'd call a fighter so I didn't think he'd translate well into the Attacktix world.

But even more pressing in my mind was "How do you make him fall?" He's a short, squat, chubby dude. Not exactly the type that is easy to knock over. But it was this problem that got my mind a-racin'. Design comes in many forms. Sometimes you develop a cool idea and sometimes you have to come up with a creative solution to a problem. And the problem of knocking the Hutt on his ass was a problem I wanted to solve. I give you...

JABBA THE HUTT
(original photos via Rebelscum.com)


Jabba is a MEGA and can be broken down to 3 major sections

1. TAIL/STRIKER (works just like Boga)
2. HEAD
3. TARGETS/TORSO


His HEAD is solid plastic and very heavy. It features two large TABS with holes in them (as seen in the side view).


His barrell shaped TORSO contains the TARGETS (a) and a ROD (b) that runs the length of the TORSO. This ROD goes through the HOLES (c) in the TABS and creates a kind of hinge.

How does he work?

A. When both of the TARGETS are hit
B. the HEAD is released and falls backwards...
C. rotating around the ROD
D. The weight of the head falling backwards causes the base to tip and lift off of the playing surface

Jabba's special power is:
ATTACKBACK: Free move and attack for up to two of your BOUNTY HUNTERS

What does this mean?

Well it's pretty self explanatory... you can knock Jabba out.. Momma said knock him out!!

And there you have Jabba the Hutt: MEGA. But, he's pretty similar to the Boga and in a game that looks like it will get more innovative with each release, kinda simple. He's just missing that special something. What could it be?...


Ahh yes, he needs a little Crumb. That's right folks, the nastiest muppet around, SALACIOUS CRUMB, is just the guy to spice up our game play.

How does he work?

SALACIOUS will sit on a small track in front of JABBA. He will be connected to JABBA's tix wheel. As JABBA moves SALACIOUS will slide back and forth blocking a TARGET. He will have to have some kind of special gearing that allows him to move back and forth in a somewhat random fashion. If he moved back and forth evenly people could cheat by timing his movements to block a certain TARGET.

I think that Mr. Crumb will add just a bit more of that 'fun factor' that makes Attacktix the game we all love.

Here is the completed Jabba


Well, that's it for today's Toy Shop! Join us next time for...

FORCE JUMP FIGURES

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

with jar jar and now jabba!! the kinda of thinking thats going into these concepts are freakin phenomenal!!!!! hasbro needs this kind of thinking in a BIG way, keep the awesome ideas coming!!!!

Anonymous said...

I like the Jar-jar and Hutt figures. I have had a few ideas of my own, including jabba, but yours is better. Keep up the good work and I hope to see more!

Anonymous said...

I had a thought on how to move crum around randomly, why dont you just make the teeth on the gear different sizes. it may sound crazy or like it wont work but as long as you change it on both gears it should work fine with just a bit of tinkering.

Anonymous said...

My squad would be Jabba and Boba Fett.

Anonymous said...

to go with the "boga" tail you should add the spit balls of the series 3 jabba. and since hes fat and slow he definitely should move 4 tix, or maybe two.

joshua said...

wow that is so much better than the "ball shooting one"