I just recently returned to collecting G.I.*Joe, so I'm not quite up-to-date on a few things.

Are the 25th figures the figures that have the pivot in the middle of their chests instead of their waists?
Is this the new mold that Hasbro is going to use from here on out?

I do have a couple of these guys: Mutt, Beach Head, Wild Bill (pilots three pack from TRU), Scarlett and Lady Jaye (Weather Dominator Pack).

For the female figures, this body style is fine, they are closer in size to the old figures, plus, to me, it gives them a bit more femenine shape, but for the male figures, I gotta say, I'm not a fan.
For the three figures I have, they are wearing vests, so you can't see the body sections, but for the figures not wearing vests, they look a bit odd, I believe I read one forum member describe them as "man boobs."
When looking to get a Beach Head, I was looking for a Mainframe at the same time. I found their comic pack at TRU, but the Mainframe (I ain't using that "Dataframe" nonsence) just turned me off from wanting to buy the pack. He was too lankey looking. Just...not right looking.
I held out and found Mainframe on eBay and later found Beach Head. I could accept that he was a bit taller than the other Joes, but I darn near broke down and cried like a little girl with a skinned knee when I ripped his lower leg off trying to get him out of my Night Ops HMMWV. (Needless to say, he now mans the 50 cal in the turret and my ARAH Falcon takes over the shotgun seat).

Wild Bill won't fit in my Dragonfly or Night Attack Chopper. That seems to be more because of his holsters and not so much his height, though he is tall and lankey as well, he's taller than Mutt. Too bad, coz he's the coolest looking Wild Bill. I may have to mod the Dragonfly's cockpit and cut some notches out of the sides of the seats to fit the holsters.

I prefer the [what I assume is] the O-ring style where the bodies pivot at the waist.

_________________

Welcome. To answer your question. Yes this is the body style they will be sticking with. Personally I think the figure designs have gotten better at giving us the mid torso articulation but also making it look better as the line has progressed. Some of the movie figures look really well done. However, as you've noticed, not every figure is as well done. Wild Bill is probably one of the worst in my opinion. First, he's saddled with the Ace body which is already lanky in the arms and torso. Then they went and gave WB a teeny tiny head.

Also, as you've noticed, these figures were never created to fit in the older vehicles. Most of the newly released vehicles that have been sold as part of the 25th line were either revamped to accommodate the taller figures or they were already compatible for larger figures. I don't know why. That wasn't my decision. I can only assume it was to make people buy new vehicles.

_________________

The torso joint is an acquired taste. Sometime I love it, sometimes I hate it. I wish they moved at the waist, that would give me more options when doing a custom.
I've learned to like them for what they are though.

The good thing about ARAH is you can always, always find it to satisfy any urges you may get for it.

_________________

The human body rotates at the shoulders/chest, not the waist.

I like the chest pivot.

Good point.
I can also bend at the waist though, not just the thighs.

_________________

Amen! Oh, and welcome aboard.

The O-ring added one big advantage to GI Joe that no other figure line could match--ease of deconstruction. Remove one screw (well, three if you count the legs) and you had all your parts in a neat pile. As a customizer I work more with Star Wars and non-Joe lines now and I find myself at times envying that ease again. A friendly warning, there are some in the community who are die-hard about the 25th Anniversary (often simply called 25A) bodies being "the best eva!!!111!" but you can safely disregard them. I certainly do. What you like is what matters.

E-bay is your best source for the O-ring style Joes, as is the Marketplace forum here. They come in what we call RAH (1982-1994) and newsculpt or JvC (2002-2005). Some of the 2002 era figures didn't have O-rings; I didn't get back into the hobby myself until 2003, by which time they'd been introduced with the Spy Troops and Venom Vs. Valor lines, as having the O-rings again. Spy Troops and Venom Vs. Valor will fit all the older Joe vehicles (some Venom vs. Valor figures are even a bit short, particularly the females). Newsculpts are my favorites, as a customizer; they're more detailed, the plastic is a bit softer to work with, though they do suffer from proportion issues (tiny heads and hands, short arms, short toros) throughout the line, so it's mix and match. But the construction is largely the same as the old Joes your familiar with, and the variety between those two lines of new characters, is much larger than 25A.

Myself, I'm pretty much done with GI Joe as GI Joe, and am planning at some point on dumping my old RAH Joes entirely; so keep an eye on the Marketplace, you might be able to replace a few old favorites not to far down the road.

_________________

Yet not all of the humans who do that have man-boobs

Personally, the "chest-hump" has been my biggest complaint about the 25th figs thus far. Its a very un-natural looking peice. What has aways killed me about it is that the chest pivot can be done without the "hump." Hasbro themselves did it with Evolutions Darth Maul just before 25th appeared. The joint doesn't disrupt anything in his form in the slightest.

Some have managed to pull off the chest pivot without the hump (destro, Storm Shadow, Quick Kick). And honestly I love those figures the most. But I am very far from being won over by the design. Mostly I prefer ARAH (the classic 1982-1994 figures) more than anything else. Some will shout that 25th is "Superior" but really its not, mostly due to the chest hump (and in some cases an elongated torso that results from the chest pivot that I am clueless on why it was included).

So don't worry you are not alone in your views

Personally I'm still in love with the 25th design. Nostalgia aside, NOTHING that came before can come close to the detailing and articulation of the new figures.

I love all my old figs, but those stumpy, big headed, anatomist's nightmares look horrible standing next to the hyperdetailed 25th.

Still, the good part about this hobby is that there is something for everyone. If ARAH is your passion, there are hundreds of figures to catch up on and endless variety for custom fodder. Plus they're compatible with many newsculpt parts increasing selection even further.

_________________

Man, I disagree... a lot. Other than the wrist and ankle joints, all of the articulation changes are just fluff. That mid tosro joint doesn't bring any additional mobility and in fact, I often find it LESS poseable than with classic figures. That double jointed knee, with a few exceptions, doesn't allow for much more than the 90 degrees we''ve always had because of the poofiness of the lower pant legs. And the ball jointed head is LESS mobile than the classic ball jointed head.

And without the web gear, the figures are pretty plain and detail-less, IMO.

Don't misunderstand, I like the 25A figures quite a bit, and have many and have struggled through lots of 25A customs. But they really aren't superior to anything else, again, IMO.

_________________

Echoing Lance's points and adding some others:

1. Oddball hands that can't properly grip weapons due to shape (Roadblock), others that are too soft to hold weapons. The only 25A figure I ever used wholly for a custom, I had to GLUE his weapons (two swords) into his hands to keep them there. It's only been in the later releases that the hands actually measured up. I could see if this was a brand new line, but c'mon, they had 25 years to get it right, they DID get it right (mostly) with newsculpt; they even had a model to copy from (Microman), and they still couldn't get it right.

2. Scrawny legs on figures that should have massive ones (Roadblock). Only plus side is these work rather well with VvV Bombstrike and SpyTroops Lady Jaye waists. In short, you gotta go retro to really make them work. Bow legs on Baroness utterly ruined that figure.

3. Elbows that can't reach a 90 degree bend.

4. Some truly bad head sculpts--Scarlett, Tunnel Rat, Falcon, Baroness all come to mind.

5. The early Duke/Flint mid-cut wrists.

_________________

I guess out of all the styles, I prefer the new sculpt versions. They have the easy to deal with O-ring configuration and all in all, they seem to be the best proprotioned. Some of the ARAH guys tended to have big heads. The new sculpts have the softer plastic, so the hands don't run the risk of breaking when you put a weapon in it. I have found, tho, that if you have to put a weapon in their hand sideways, it'll stretch it out too much.

Being new to customizing, I've found the biggest bummer is that the heads of the new sculpts don't work with the ARAH bodies. I head a great custom in mind, but had to change his head out. No big deal, I just found the head of a one time use figure and made that his head.

The 25th guys just don't do it for me. The heads remind me of bobble-head dolls. I think Beach Head is pretty cool looking, but he does have the long, spindley, too small legs and arms, like Road Block.

I discovered this forum through the site's wiki while trying to find out information on how to disassemble figures. There's a very brief description on how to take apart the 25th guys, but no video or pictures. I have no reason as of yet to take one of my 25ths apart, but if I do, I'd rather not do it wrong and break it until I see how it's done.

The only figure I've come across that I like less than the 25th figures was a Duke I found. When I started looking for a Duke, I went to halfbattle.com and looked him up, found the body style I liked, and hit the auction (or it could have been JoeArmory). I found the one I wanted and when I got it in the mail, I was a little less than pleased. Duke seemed to be in a permanate pose of doing The Twist. The Star Wars waist should have been some kind of clue.
There was a button on his back that, when pressed, made Duke twist to his left. Release the button and he pops back to the right. What the heck is this crap? If I was 25 years younger, I'd have found no fun in this feature. You have to hold him in place to make him move, and while at rest, he's twisted to the right. He can't sit in a vehicle or stand up right. Yeah, he ended up in my "To Sell" list with Croc Master, Swamp Rat and Oxy Clean Pitchman, codename: Low Light.

_________________

Yet these aren't dinky look-alike space troopers with Australian accents (or New Zealand accents..) carrying lasers that can hit robots but not people These are soldiers that exercise and, according to Hasbro's designers, apparently have friggin huge pecs and/or pec implants a la Duckman.

So far while a few hands haven't fit weapons well like the first Roadblock's...I haven't broken a single thumb.

The same can be said for waistpieces. It's nice being able to pose Zartan and Airborne and not worry about busting their crotch. Same for the Cobra troopers.

If anything I wish they'd gotten the Roadblock & Gung Ho arms right the first time, those were some of the worst when it came to arm posing in the line. Fortunately I've got Resolute Roadblock on the way. The web gear is ok at times and I can see it as a cost-saving measure (probably cheaper to make than new molds), but wish they'd done it for Bazooka instead of someone else or left his torso joint out. It ruins the #14 when it twists lol.

Which figures can't one get a knee bend in greater than 90 degrees in the 25th style?

Don't mention bad head sculpts when those were nowhere near as bad as Duke's or Armadillo's in the RAH line

_________________

This is a feature Hasbro called "Craption Attack"--no, wait, the community called it that, Hasbro called it "Action Attack". Duke, Kamakura, Storm Shadow, Slice and Gung-Ho are four figures that I know of who wound up with these "action features". They were poor sellers and universally reviled in the customizing community. Still a few of us were able to use them for customs but those were pretty limited cases. Most of the craption attack figures turned up in the Venom vs. Valor line as part of figure 2 packs.

Interestingly enough, normal versions of each of those figures was released as well; except for Kamakura (the craption version had a bright yellow head) the normal versions looked almost identical to the craption versions. In hand it's obvious, in pics, not so much. The Gung-Ho even shares the same vest as the craption version--it has a slot in the back where the "quick draw" switch would sit.

Another thing to be aware of is the BTR or Built-To-Rule GI Joe figures. These were sold with Lego-style sets and have no O-ring construction; they also tend to have spots on the ankles/wrists to attach the Lego blocks. There weren't many released, I recall.

_________________

I know guys with huge pecs and they aren't even close the obsenity of the human body that is the "chest hump." In fact it looks like a layer of flab slapped on the top of the figure rather than pectorial muscles.



Actually destro falls just short of that goal, and he is one of my favorite 25th figures.



So it is excuseable in the 25th line?

One of my first Joe purchases as of late was a lot that had a Desert Strike HMMWV and a Piranah Boat as well as five or six figures (oddly enough I was only looking for a newer Ace). One of the figures was the Frostbite that came with a BTR vehicle.
He too, got thrown in my "To Sell" pile. He's brown. Not the best camo colouring for an arctic trooper. The BTR toys look sorta cool and I can remember having built quite a few Joe vehicles out of Lego. (Mom wouldn't buy me war toys. I had plenty of figures that I could afford with my allowance, but not vehicles.) I wouldn't own any of them, but the idea is pretty cool for the younger collecters.

The "huge pecs" idea did occur to me, apparently the Joe gym only features machines and free weights that only work the upper body.

I seem to recall when Kenner/Hasbro started with the new line of SW figures when the SE movies were released, all the male figures seemed to have buffed up in the chest/shoulder area. Strangly tho, so did C-3PO.

Through SmallJoes, eBay, Joe Armory, and CTG Shop, I aquired about 20 non-Joe figures. I got 21st, Elite Force, Power Team Elite and CORPS!
I've compared them to the Joe figures as far as height and detail and build.

The CORPS! guys are kinda cool in their sculps becuase they are "proportionally disproportioned." The have huge chests, cartoon hands and feet and big heads, yet they look good, they fit with my Joes. Even their weapons are slightly over sized. I'm not sure if they'll fit in a vehicle or not, but they still look cool (they are the four snipers offered on SmallJoes, I hit the wrong button and got all four instead of just one, my bad.) I bought these guys strictly for the sniper's guillie suit that they come with, but the figures are cool enough to have then hang with my Joes. The suite consits of a full suit that fits in the screw hole that covers then from the neck to their feet, a hood for the head and a smaller piece for each arm.

The PTE guys are good as well, screw in the back, they have SW legs/waist, but full articulation, including at the ankles, so they're a little easier to pose. They don't look like that have a stick up their backside like some of the Joes.

The Elite Force guys are good in detail and seem to be constructed the same as the PTE guys. These two lines don't have O-rings, but the torso, arms head might work with Joes. The EF guys also have a swivel in their thighs akin to the swivel arm of the Joe figures. Not sure if this adds anything to their posing, but it's there if you need it.

The 21st guy came with the SEAL Jeep from SmallJoes. As a character, he's got an awesome sculpt and detail, but as a figure... well his articulation is very funky. First off, his legs and arms are straight. The bend at the elbow and knee are a 45 degree cut in the limb rather than a hinge. His leg will either be straight or at 90 degrees. After you flip his legs around, you have to turn his feet around so they face the right direction. His arms are limited enough that the figure comes with a second set of arms so he can hold his gun properly. He'll have a part as an extra SEAL in the group but he won't be driving anything. (The Jeep is very cool though and well worth the price.)

If it hasn't been done already, I was going to snap a picture of one of each of these figures standing next to one another for comparisons.

_________________