Radically Engineered Vehicles Become Awsome Fighting Machines

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Combining vehicle and action figure play into one unique play pattern, Playmates Toys today announced the creation of the REVs line, which will hit store shelves in the fall of 2006. REVs (Radically Engineered Vehicles) are tricked out, free-rolling cars and SUVs, each having a separate, fully articulated robot making up its chassis. The car body and wheels are built around and snap into the robot allowing it to become a free rolling vehicle.

The transformation from vehicle to robot is simple – each part on the car un-snaps leaving a fully articulated standing robot. With a snap, the parts then become battle gear, creating a fully armored fighting robot with spring loaded, firing projectiles. The individual parts of each REV can be mixed with any other REV for virtually unlimited combinations, or to create giant battling robots of huge scale.

“REVs are a brand new concept that combines transformation and customization into one play pattern,” said Pat Linden, Director of boys marketing at Playmates. “The REVs’ interchangeability gives kids tremendous options for creativity and the rich storyline from which they were created provides a context for imaginative play.”

Designed for boys ages five and up, REVs will come packaged with a limited-edition CD-ROM that includes background biographies on each REV character as well as an animated comic that explains how the REVs came to exist and why they must fight each other:

The REVs project was created as a way to replace human soldiers on the battlefield. Dr. Preston Tucker felt a machine with this much power should have the ability to distinguish right from wrong, so he started installing a conscience in REV soldiers. But Lucien Malik, the REVs Project Director, wanted to create simple killing machines to wipe out all human life on the battle field. When Malik caught wind of what Tucker was doing, he fired him immediately, but not before five self-aware REVs — the MavWrecks — were completed and set loose by Tucker to find the other REV facilities around the world and warn them about the potential danger. But Malik wants his property back and sends five of his own REVs — the Syndicate — to hunt down the MavWrecks.

With ten REVs in all — five MavWrecks and five Syndicates — the line includes:

Scrappers — Four individual robots – Wildcard, Crux, Infernix and Tengu – each with their own theme, stand five inches tall and include 10-12 different interchangeable parts. Each Scrapper transforms from a free wheeling vehicle to a fully armored standing robot, with spring-loaded firing power. Each can also be uniquely customized using parts from other REVs.

Street Strikers — From a free wheeling vehicle to a fully-armored robot standing seven inches tall, these four individual robots – Gunner, Grimm, Axl and Dreadlock – can be customized using parts from any other REV.

Auto Assault — The daddy of the REVs, when transformed from vehicle to robot, Sarge and Anarkist stand over 10 inches tall. Featuring 20-25 different interchangeable parts, all the parts from the Scrappers, Street Strikers and Auto Assault REVs can also be combined to create a gigantic, unstoppable, fully armored, car crushin’ bot!

Playmates will support the launch of the REVs line with national television advertising, a comprehensive public relations campaign and a dedicated website showcasing all of the REVs with biographies and the background story of their creation.

For images of Playmates's R.E.V.s toys shown at the 2006 International Toy Fair, Click here.