Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye Volume 1 [Paperback]

This is a reprint of the Dreamwave version that was released in 2004. It does offer a wonderfully detailed listing of each Generation 1 bot, as well as gestalts, micromasters, targetmasters, headmasters and pretenders. Each listing covers Personality/Bio, Weapons and Abilities, Weaknesses as well as pictures of robotic and alternate mode/modes.

However:

When compared to my original Dreamwave copy, many of the pages in this one are not very clear or bright. It's almost as if the original artwork was not available for some of the pages and they used a photocopy for the page in this book, thus making the color less vibrant, less clear, quite dark in fact and the text part on these pages is effected as well. On other pages the color is just dull. The effected pages are all scattered sporadically throughout the book. Still this is perfectly usable for reference as well as to save your original copy (if you have one) wear and tear.

Nitpicking:

While this does have a one page character index in the back for all characters included in this volume, it is lacking the two page -covers both volumes- index that is in the back of the Dreamwave version. The lack of the two page index is disappointing as it is an extremely nice feature that covers both volume 1 and volume 2, so no matter which volume you pick up, you have the complete index for every character detailed in the books and don't have to switch books when trying to remember if a certain bot really exhists or not.

Ultimately:

Especially for the price being in the mid-teens, it's worth the money, especially if you don't have the original release. And recently the original Dreamwave release is selling for 30, 40, 50 or more dollars, thus making this version an even more reasonable bargain.

I had no idea what to expect from this book, in fact the item was brought because it was cheap! imagine my surprise when i opened the pages and it was like a step back in time to my childhood.

each page feature a transformer with his bio, his quote, abilities and weaknesses. the illustration is well drawn and the details are quite indepth - note they are drawn by different artists so you'd get a taste of different graphic styles.

the transformers are purely G1. starting from the orginals optimus, megatron etc (and alpha trion!) - all the way to the action masters if you remember them! including pretenders, gestalt/combiners, micromasters, targetmasters, headmasters etc. if you're into beastwars or G2, don't get this - this is a book for pure G1 fans. within minutes of opening the pages i was already online pre-ordering volume 2!

highly recommended, excellent collection, good value.

So when I saw this book, and the amount of pages it was, I decided it would be a pretty good buy.

And it is. You get around 240 pages with very few transformers taking up more then one page (Megatron for example takes up two pages, but I'm a fan of him so I was all too happy to see this!). This means you are getting a lot of transformers represented. Each guy has a nice full color picture and a smaller picture of what they transform into. The artwork is great for the most part, and I'm sure fans from all ages will spend a lot of time just flipping through the book and looking at the artwork.

I really liked how it goes into detail on a lot of the transformers presented, for example on some of the triple changers it points out that due to the amount of parts that have to fold out to create one of their bigger vehicle modes, the robot is very strong due to the condensed parts.

Also each gattai, or combiner, is presented as its own entry after a list of the robots that combine to make it, a nice touch.

I only had two problems with the book, and they are production issues.

The first is that some of the pages are darker then others, it doesn't happen a lot but it is a little vexing to have some nice artwork all darkened.

The other one, which is just me, being nit picky... On the left page in the background there are a series of 0's and 1's, but on the right page, these are backwards. Clearly just a flipped image but come on, someone should have caught that. (You may note the few "problems" I have with it aren't really big, and most likely will be fixed with other printings.)

I would love to see a hard-bound version of this, for as durable as it seems I really can't stop flipping through it.

This really is a great product, and for the price you are getting a lot of artwork with a decent amount of information. As has already been said, if you're a fan, or just getting into it, I highly suggest you pick it up.