Megantik

Please Scroll down directly to see the Checklist of Megantik figures or for the Link to the Megantik Review by BEASTFORMERS.

Introduction


Sono arrivati! (They arrived)
Italy, March 2017, a new line of anthropomorphic animals was launched by Diramix Srl, within the Diramix Terra series (year 4 nr. 3), under the name: MEGANTIK. Distribution of the line started on March 6th within Italy though it didn´t become available until March the 14th the moment the TV commercial was launched for the first time. In itself the name Megantik holds no deeper meaning or explanation; ¨it sounded well from an Italian point of view¨ according to Diramix. The line consists out of 15 ¨Animali Humanoid¨ (humanoid animals) of around 1.8 – 2.1″ (4,5/5,5 cm) tall. All figures have their own unique character (based on a storyline), look and a specific type(s) of weapon(s) which is all captured within a static pose which means there are no points of articulation.

Megantik Commercial
In Italy this line of colorful figures kicked of with a ¨Grande Campagna TV! (big tv campaign).
Here is the original Megantik Commercial from Italy;

Official Megantik Website
Apart from the promotion on TV via the Megantik commercial Diramix also composed a unique website for this line  where all information about the figures, the story, the promotion and the game can be found. Even though the page is in Italian it might be worth to visit it because there´s also some interesting artwork of the characters within this line that can be found there;

MEGANTIK.IT


Edicole
Even though the line is well received by collectors from outside Italy for now the Megantik line is only available in Italy and it is exclusively offered via the Edicola (newsstand) shops. These small shops, stores and even kiosks are found all over the country and they are mainly known for selling newspapers and magazines but luckily they also hold a small toy section in which the Megantik are found. Since the boxes, in which the Megantik are distributed, are displays on their own and don´t take up a whole lot of space they are ideal for these Edicola shops.

Packaging


Blind Bags
The Megantik are sold in blind bags. Each store display box holds 15 of these blind bags and Diramix confirmed that each box contains 1 full set of all 15 characters. Which means that the odds of picking the ¨lucky draw¨ Golden Leonidas are equal to any other figure 1/15. Even though the size. shape and weight of the blind bags might vary a bit, depending on the figure that is inside, it is pretty hard to tell which one is inside solely based on touch. This is caused by the fact that they´re wrapped in such a way that the inserts that are included within the blind bag are often surrounding the figure meaning you can´t really find the specific details you´d need to distinguish a specific figure from inside the package. The blind bags have a retail price within the shops in Italy of €2.99/each.


In each bag
Apart from the Megantik figure that you will find inside the blind bag there´s also 1 Magazine and 3 ¨Tessere¨ which translates best into Tiles. The magazine (in Italian) holds various kinds of information about the NERF promotion that´s connected to this line (more about this on the Review page), space and galaxy related subjects, a character guide with info, ¨La Storia Dei Megantik¨ (The History of Megantik) and an explanation about the game. The 3 Tiles you´ll find inside the blind bags are needed to play the Megantik game.

Here is an example of an opened Megantik blind bag;

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Content Megantik
Blind Bag:

1 Figure
1 Magazine
3 Tiles

 

 

 

 

 

 

Megantik Figures (Checklist)


INCLUDED: 15 Figures
RELEASED: March 2017
AVAILABILITY: Italy

There´s a total of 15 Megantik figures to collect! All figures are static so they don´t have any articulation points and weapons cannot be removed.

 

Markings
The Megantik figures don´t hold a specific number or order and the only marking you can find on the figures itself is found on the bottom of the feet or tail showing the word MEGANTIK® but there´s no year added.

 


REVIEW
Before continuing with the explanation about the Megantik Game and a brief insight into the Megantik Story you can check the Review of the Megantik line by Beastformers by clicking on the image on the right. In the review you can see why the team behind the Beastformers Blog decided to publish an article about this line and what score this new, Battle Beasts inspired (?) line, receives when looked at it from a Battle Beasts perspective. This and more can be found in the Megantik Review!

(Click on the image to visit the Megantik Review page)

Megantik Game

 

Within the Megantik Game your Megantik figures actually become pawns who will fight their Battle against each other, multiple opponents or by itself in ¨survival mode¨ within the Megantik Arena.

Megantik Arena
The Battle of the Megantik is fought within the Megantik Arena which is a playing area that´s composed out of the Tiles that are included in each blind bag (3 in each bag). Each of these tiles has two sides; the tile part, with the tile look and the star in the middle, and the card part, which is the side that´s holding the crucial details to play the game. With the tiles having a hexagonal shape there´s directly a solid base for the Arena you can start with placing one tile in the center working your way around it, expanding the Arena, by adding more tiles to it. The more tiles you have the larger your Megantik Arena can become and the tougher and more unpredictable the Battle between the Megantik will be! Of course you´re also free to create your own style type of Arena trying other connections and compositions of the tiles since the game works regardless the shape of the Arena. You could for instance also create a path for each figure to follow.

Card Explanation
As mentioned above the other side of the tile is actually a card and within the Megantik Game there is three groups (colors) of cards, knowing:

Attack Cards (GREEN)
These are the cards that do direct damage (in points) to your opponent, and in some cases to yourself too!

Unexpected Cards (RED)
These cards are the cards that do damage (in points) or make you lose a turn.

Benefit Cards (BLUE)
These are the card which gain you a benefit (in points) or by exploring a new area within the Megantik Arena.

Since the Game is in Italian as well it might be helpful to have the cards translated in order to be able to play the game the way it´s intended so here is a translation of all the cards found within the Megantik Game.

Card Translation

RAFFICA LETALE: (Lethal Burst) Deals 1 Point of damage to your opponent.
TIRATORE SCELTO: (Sniper Shot) Deals 2 Points of damage to your opponent.
GRANATA AL PLASMA: (Plasma Grenade) Deals 3 Points of damage to your opponent.
ATTACCO NUCLEARE: (Nuclear Attack) Deals 5 Points of damage to your opponent and 2 to yourself (It is a very powerful attack but handling nuclear weapons also has its disadvantages)

ARMA INCEPPATA: (Weapon Jamming/Failure) Take 1 point of damage.
CAMPO MINATO: (Minefield) Take 2 points of damage.
CAMPO DI FORZA: (Force field) You lose a turn (this is not necessarily meaning damage, your opponent can move and end up in a minefield!)

RICARICA RAPIDA: (Quick Charge) Gain 2 life Points.
KIT MEDICO: (Medical kit) Gain 1 life Point.
KIT RIPARAZIONE: (Repair Kit) Gain 1 life Point.
JET PACK: (Jet Pack) Move 3 steps (in the same round, the tile you decide to land on is the card you´ll discover its effect from and that´s directly applied)

Game Instructions
In general the Megantik Game is relatively easy to understand once you have the translation of the cards. First you compose the Megantik Arena with the various tiles you have. Secondly you choose your favorite Megantik figure, which becomes your pawn. Thirdly you write down the names of the figures in a small table, all starting with 10 Points. The moment you take a hit, negative points, or gain points during your turn or the turn of your opponent you add or subtract these to your point total, first player who´s down to 0 (zero) or the player with least points left after having all tiles turned loses the game. You are only allowed to move onto adjacent tiles unless you find the Jet Pack which allows you to cross over 2 tiles (landing on the 3rd one). In case all your adjacent tiles are already turned you can move up to the nearest unturned tile to continue your path. It is always the youngest player that begins the game!

 

 

A Quick look at the Game
In this case Revolveragno, chosen by the youngest player, is Battling against Trigger. Each player positions their pawn (figure) somewhere within the Megantik Arena and the turn (youngest player) starts by turning the card it is standing on.
(Image Right: Possible starting position)

 

 

(Image Left: 2 turns played)
Each player has had 1 turn so far. Revolveragno directly gained 1 Point by finding a Medical Kit card during its first turn resulting in the fact it´s total number of points increased to 11 (10 Points from the start + 1 Point gained). But during the following turn the player playing with Trigger stepped onto a Sniper Shot card, which deals 2 Points of damage to the opponent, resulting in the fact Revolveragno takes a 2 Point hit decreasing its total from 11-2 to 9 Points after this round. (Score after these rounds: Revolveragno (9) vs Trigger (10))

 

 

(Image Right: 2nd Turn Revolveragno)
An unlucky start of the 2nd turn for the player that´s chosen Revolveragno since it has landed on a Unexpected card stepping into a Minefield resulting in a damage of 2 Points… With the total of the previous turns Revolveragno is already down to (9-2) 7 Points while Trigger is still standing strong with the 10 Points from the start. But you cannot predict what´s underneath the next tile so the momentum of the Battle can change in almost every turn!

Megantik Story

 

The Story of the Megantik, found within the Magazine included in the Blind bag or on the Megantik Website, starts with Polpop being kept inside an aquarium at a Biopark from which it plans to escape. During its escape it gets confronted with some weird kinds of spaceships and while exploring these Polpop gets blinded by a light that filled him with all kinds of information until it fell asleep from complete exhaustion. When Polpop woke up it was changed and it had grown legs and it acquired a lot of knowledge. And it now knew about a Planet called Meganthia which was swept away by an alien race called: the Destroyers! First Polpop had to learn and live with its new transition that´s turned him into a humanoid animal. Polpop was so exited about what had happened that it decided to return to its old aquarium to tell the others but none of the other octopuses wanted to listen. The only one who wanted to listen was the old janitors dog, an old bulldog, called Burk. Burk seemed to know another passage to get to the spaceship Polpop discovered earlier and also Burk was confronted with a transition after touching the spaceship. They´re both so impressed about the story of Meganthia and the Destroyers that they wanted to share this with someone else. Burk thought the Grand Council, who´s a council within the Biopark, was the right council to talk to. Within this council were Leonidas, Trigger and Guerrilla. Also they were shown the spaceship they had found and they also gained advantage from this visit. Later they found the room of arms within the Biopark and Leonidas decided to open this but the biggest discovery they found was the Battlefield simulation room which was an area paved with hexagonal tiles. You could not get hurt within the simulation area because it was a completely virtual experience. After some training the Megantik hoped they´d never really have to face the Destroyers. A spacial laboratory, showing a sort of galaxy map, kept showing worrying signs and Leonidas knew something was about to happen. He recognized the danger similar to the feeling it had once it was captured as a little whelp from the wild by men from the Biopark years ago. Now the Biopark was its home and the Megantik were his family. For Leonidas the choice was now simple since they had to start training within the Biopark day and night to be prepared for the unexpected!

A brief translated part of the story that´s in Italian but it should be enough to address the vibe and history Diramix wanted to created surrounding this new Megantik line.

This was the information about the new Megantik line which the Beastformers Team managed to gather so far. During our research about this line we did have contact with the company responsible for the Megantik line, Diramix, but in no way has this communication influenced the outcome of this page apart from the fact we´re able to add some interesting details and information that´s not been publicly shared before. They couldn´t answer all of our questions since that´d reveal part of their business strategy they had with this line but for all the international fans of this line outside Italy they´d like to say that they are looking into a way to sell the Megantik line to other countries in the future.

In general when these kind of toy lines turn out to be a success within the Italian Edicola shops it is not uncommon that there´s a second series of a certain line so depending on the success the Megantik might have within, and outside, Italy during the next period we might be able to welcome a second series. But until than…..

Godetevi il Megantik!
(Enjoy the Megantik)

The Beastformers Team