KRE-O Optimus Prime

Prelude: In 2011, when the Transformers brand was at its height, Hasbro figured they could do their own click bricks to compete with LEGO and produced the KRE-O line, which naturally included many an Optimus Prime, too. Well, the Kre-O line is long gone and there is a LEGO Optimus Prime now, but that’s no reason not to gaze back in time at this assembly of colored bricks here. KRE-O Optimus Prime (the large one) is here, so let’s say go!

Robot Mode: Okay, as a click brick set, this guy comes in pieces, naturally. So the first thing you do is assemble him. I started in robot mode and ended up with a huge, huge Optimus Prime figure. He’s not quite as huge as LEGO Optimus Prime would turn out to be many years later, but still: pretty huge! His look is largely patterned after Live-Action Optimus Prime, except for the head, which is taken almost unchanged from Classics Optimus Prime. If you follow the instructions to the letter, you have parts left over by the time you’ve assembled him, but hey, it’s click bricks, I’m sure you can find a place to click them.

One advantage this brick Optimus Prime definitely has over the LEGO one is the articulation. He is quite the contortionist and includes knee joints, too (take that, LEGO!). He’s a good deal slimmer than the average Movie-style Optimus Prime, which certainly helps his balance. He can stand on one leg, kick, run, no problem. He’s also as stable as a figure assembled from click bricks is ever going to be (unless you glue him together), so no problems here, either.

The only thing really complaint-worthy about this robot is the weapon, if you can even call it that. It’s really just a plain grey brick which can fire off one of two missiles, said missiles being Optimus’ smoke stacks. That’s a little sad, really. Enterprising brick-heads can no doubt assemble a much better weapon for this guy from whatever spare parts they have lying around, but it shouldn’t have been that difficult to include a better weapon.

So bottom line: a very nice robot with a terrible weapon.

Alternate Mode: Now we come to the part where the KRE-O sets disappoint: you cannot transform the robot into a truck. Instead you have to completely disassemble him into his component bricks and then reassemble those into a truck. Once again there are parts left over, too. So while some Transformers such as Omega Supreme have been called puzzle-formers, the KRE-O figures truly deserve the title. Maybe this is the origin of those pixel-transforming characters from Age of Extinction? Is Transformium just microscopic click bricks?

Once assembled, the truck looks pretty cool. It’s the familiar long-nosed Peterbuilt truck from the movies and includes a trailer as well. The truck is pretty well done, looking very much like it should, and includes a driver cabin where you can seat any of the accompanying Kreon figures (see below).

Now while the tractor is pretty cool, the trailer might well be the most boring Optimus Prime trailer ever. When closed and attached to the tractor it looks good enough, but opening it up reveals… well, nothing, really. Just an empty space for the two accompanying bikes to park in (see below). The trailer can, of course, be rebuilt as well, becoming a sort of command station… which is really just a shortened pit lane for the motorcycles. I’m sure there are other options to rebuild this thing, but the stock options are really, really boring.

Bottom line for the truck mode: great tractor, really boring trailer.

Partners / Add-Ons: Like most KRE-O sets, Optimus Prime comes with several smaller figures, called Kreons. These are the equivalent of the familiar LEGO mini figures that have been around for decades. Two of them are rather generic humans, intended to be the stunt drivers of the two included motorcycles. The other three are Transformers character, namely G1-based incarnations of Optimus Prime (looking a lot bulkier than the big one), Skywarp (sporting a wonderful frown), and Bluestreak (the really blue one). All five figures can interact with Optimus in his two modes and populate his trailer base if you want. 

At some point Hasbro stopped making bigger figures and just released lots and lots of Kreons based on popular TF characters, but in this set here they are just add-ons. Fun ones, but still.

Remarks: As mentioned above, 2011 was around the time that Hasbro figured – thanks to the success of the live-action Transformers movies – that the sky was the limit and branched out in many different directions, including their own TV channel and their own attempt at competing with LEGO, whose monopoly on click bricks had expired the year before. This was Hasbro’s second attempt, actually, but few want to remember the “Built to Rule” line from 2003. The KRE-O line kind of fizzled out in 2015, even though a few more Kreons were released afterwards, mostly repacks. With LEGO now releasing Transformers figures, the odds of KRE-O ever resurfacing are probably near zero.

The big KRE-O Optimus Prime (there were smaller ones, too, plus many, many Kreons) shows both the strengths and the weaknesses of the KRE-O Transformers very nicely. The individual modes are pretty well-made (except the trailer). Both the robot and the truck are very good, the robot is pretty stable and playable, the truck looks like a truck and can hold drivers, the works. The fact that the robot does not transform, however, is kind of a let-down, as it means you have to completely disassemble him in order to change modes and there are parts left over in both modes. Plus, again, the trailer appears a mere afterthought.

So bottom line for KRE-O Optimus Prime: a very nice set, fun to assemble, far more playable than LEGO Optimus Prime, but with several avoidable flaws and the lack of an actual transformation kind of drags him down, too. So at the end of the day it’s a nice piece of Transformers history. Recommended to click brick enthusiasts and Optimus Prime fanatics.

Rating: C+