Blacktron 260

I was looking at a Facebook post by Blacktron War and smacked my head... 260... I always do an Idea Book 260 post after wrapping up each theme and Blacktron's the last one to do... and guess what.

That's right, you got me... I totally forgot about it.  Here's a Space train from the Space Police page... there was some... ahem, arrested development in the doing of things for a while and I got off pattern.
I feel great though, how're y'all.

And Here, we, GO!

Wait, wait, wait... Those aren't really Blacktron!

I mean... but they are, kinda?  Blacktron got weird for 260... unlike the other 3 themes the book didn't make any attempt to keep these designs on pattern with the produced sets and instead added whites, transparent blues... and then drastically reduced the yellow and nearly erased the existence of transparent yellow.

The color decision aside, I really like the big Blacktron Trike, and the 260 idea instruction  model behind it is also small and attractive... it could've paired well with, or instead of, Meteor Monitor as a Blacktron 1.5 multipack release model between the original Blacktron and Blacktron: Next Generation; which did use white as a main color.

But then we have that toothy robot, and the little black robot.  (See that Small Robot on a black bottom Rocket stage... non Blacktron parts... at the time the best source for 3 of those parts would have been Classic Space: Polaris One Spacelab)  The robots look fun, if off color, and maybe the designs are better than what could have been done on theme... it could also be that the yellow and black would have been hard for kids to see and were thusly and rightly set aside in favor of achievable copying.

The only reason I like the tower is because I'm partial to some of the parts used on it, like a lot of them.

As for the spaceships... the triple tri-force ship is mediocre looking and my few attempts at it have been abandoned.  the rear spaceship seems like a halfway decent vehicle, but seems kinda stuck; not sure if it's Futuron or something else... and neither have Blacktron men...

Point is, Blacktron's representation in this book is slapped in there without any concern for the source material... and some of the times it works out.

The Idea Book build reappears here among the color faithful M:Tron vehicles... They seem to be on friendly terms... kinda sorta.

But of course with Blacktron, they'll spy on you even if you are their 'friends'.

The build for The Blacktron Speeder is simple and sweet... of all the Blacktron things they could have had us build this is the coolest looking one among the options.



The Model features 11 obvious white Futuron parts.  I think there was a shape they wanted to go for, and with no available yellow parts to do it, they switched over to white and didn't look back, or try a different design.  Who knows what might've been?
















To Build it from the existing sets I suggest getting
1 Strategic Pursuer... wha! This is not Blacktron?

1 Invader... I made it big because Blacktron rules.

1 Space Patroller, and this is not Blacktron.

1 Interplanetary Rover... How dare... also not Blacktron.

"It's cute and bug eyed... like a tree frog with no legs... Fancy some rockets little treefrog?"  To be serious, this is the one Blacktron model in the book to use trans yellow... these are exclusive to Invader and very nice.  I might be slightly biased about how nice they are because they are a rarity.  What's with the frog?

Our most Serious assessment continues: It's the smallest Model of Blacktron to feature the trident nose, and the arrows seem to indicate a feature is present.

"That feature is rotating froggy eye..." they don't clear enough room for a door, and the ground gets in the way of what could be construed as the 'view'.  On a more serious note.  They look like blaster cannons on doors that don't actually give enough room for ingress/egress.  It's totally a Lamborghini!

Propulsion appears to be via that black console brick... quite an odd choice, I don't think I've seen that method used elsewhere.  "Maybe it hops in short bursts, as legless tree frogs do."

"Great plagues of Bison, that's a lot of frogs! Hey, dudes, we got a frogidemic erupting in our seriously cool Blacktron post about us."

"The froggy eyes can look around independently... more like a chameleon..." but then again... they may actually just be dangerous laser cannons for ripping apart air molecules on unsuspecting moons.  

"Of course this sweet lil treefrog is actually a real treefrog and really, they aren't legless at all... Did you know, that Frog legs are leg-"

"Oi, that Futuron dweeb's ruining the awesomeness-iss-nes... we're a serious dangerous organization... and he's comparing us to... Base, come in... we got a problem of serious coolness de-Nile!"

All in all, a fine little model from 260. 

In my scholarly Blacktron dood self's personal-est opinion... this is the most wickedly neat instruction option for all of 260 Space.  I do wish they'd made our idea bigger though.  

"It's soo cute and tiny and adorable.  

So cute like a tree frog, oh yes you are."            

"Sic em dudes and dudettes, , we'll not let this fiendish effrontery sully our amazing badassedness-nes-nes... oi, a mouthful... Get them!!!"

"Anyways, it's cool, we got the little bug zappers and put em back in their place.  All's well that ends dastardly-ish."

And then it hits us like a danish brick; We Blacktron didn't get a spread of our own in 260!

Blacktron is the most mature-est and pretentious-est of the 4 awesome-est Space themes.  

*The sets may not have done super amazing because parents don't like cool bad guys, and so as not to disappoint too many kids with a 260 book in their hands the primary elements from Invader were maybe only made prominent since they accidentally made soo many of our wonderful spaceship.  The existence of Renegade (U.S. exclusive), and Message Intercept Base were neglected... pheh!  Battrax got some small parts representation on that trike, oh yeah!  And who knows if Alienator mattered in the overall scheme, it likely didn't, we apparently alienated too many concerned mothers.  But it was for a good... er... badass cause.  

*Futuron of My Youth makes no promises that any of this hearsay has any bearing on reality.

Our cause is coolness!

But in the long term... We kids liked Blacktron soo much...

We still talk about it in vast corners of the netisphere!

That's it from me... I'll be back with Blacktron's brick contributions in a few weeks. 

Sincerely, The Cure-all Pill