Today I would like to do a review of Schleich’s Agustinia. I would like to begin this review with my conclusion: Overall, it is a decent sauropod figure, if it wasn’t for the goofy head and the blunt color scheme.
Schleich definitely saves on colors and efforts in supporting a decent sculpt with decent coloring. This makes me lose my temper. Schleich behaves like a big shot on the market, blatantly suppressing other brands in retail, but does not constantly substantiate these manners with continuously appropiate dinosaur figures. Many releases still remain average. While CollectA and Safari succeed with constant quality, Schleich does not care for supreme dinosaur figures, snubbing loyal collectors with their fickleness.
But now to the object of this review: Agustinia is a genus of sauropod dinosaurs from the Early Cretaceous Period of South America. It contains the single species Agustinia ligabuei, a single specimen of which was recovered from the Lohan Cura Formation of Neuquen Province in Argentina, thought to date from the late Aptian to Albian stages of the Early Cretaceous Period, between 116 and 100.5 million years ago.
The figure is 34 centimeters long and stands up to 9.5 centimeters tall. It shows a sauropod in the traditional pose, slowly strolling through the Mesozoic landscape, left foreleg first, holding the head in the air, watching out or looking for a partner or the rest of its herd. The sculptors took the approach of making a box-shaped sauropod, not a barrel-shaped one. This is a welcome diversion from the normal way of representing sauropods.
The detail of the skin is impressive. The knobs, wrinkles, scales, and osteoderms that the animal’s skin probably sported, are perfectly rendered. The underside of the long, skinny neck reveals a skin flap. The most obvious attribute of this sauropd, the spikes protruding from the back, are well scuplted, albeit sloppily colored, as is the whole figure. Just three colours have been fixed to the figure by hopefully not underpaid Chinese workers: A dull beige, a bilious green and grey for the spikes and the claws.
The feet of this digitigrade are surprisingly detailed and seem to be correctly sculpted, and so are its muscles and the tail it held up high upon the ground.
Another big downer is the head. It seems every Agustinia toy figure suffers from a goofy head, just take a look at CollectA’s attempts from a time they were as unsettled as Schleich still is today. The figure peacefully seems to smile at us. This anthropomorphised mien and the implied color scheme addle my overall positive verdict for this figure, again leaving me with the question: Why is Schleich not able to decide for constantly convincing dinosaur figures? This Agustinia is a solid, yet not completely convincing double beam with spikes. But in both their release waves and the figures themselves they always seem to build in annoying lapses.
This figure gets 3.5 – rounded up = 4 out of 5 stars.
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I really think that Schleich is worse every next year. From poor and ridiculous designs to incompetent paint jobs. And for me this is a clear example.
Yes,Schleich figures are indeed made and painted in China.
Hmmmm, definitely not an improvement over the first Procon/CollectA one and considering this is a 2020 figure not a 2008!
And yes, the feet is very wrong for a sauropod.
And then there is the question whether or not those signature spikes were really body armor or just broken ribs, given the sad state of the fossil.
Ignoring egos altogether, paleontologists, like many academics, are under constant pressure to publish, make new discoveries, in order to generate funding. While this can lead to great things, it can also lead to flights of fancy–fish stories, if you will.
So this thing might be more poetry than reality, under the circumstances.
Sincerely, the figures of prehistoric dinosaurs and animals (postosuchus) of this year 2020 are quite decent, the best by far are the baryonyx, and then the postosuchus and ankylosaurus. The agustinia is in the average of genius on the part of Schleich, which perhaps is its weakest figure is by far the Schleich cryolophosaurus of this year. Magnificent review of the agustinia of Schleich the best of toy figures. My congratulations.
I like this more than I thought that I would, even the green on the beast’s dorsal aspect. There were some adverse comments on the DTF in the late fall about the accuracy of the front feet, but were these wrong, then? As for the smile, well, I’m thinking that this is something that the target audience , kids, will appreciate. I agree with your overall assessment – a solid 3.5. Always appreciate your reviews, Libraraptor.
No, I believe the feet are incorrect. Whereas I don’t think phalanges are preserved in Agustinia, all other advanced sauropods whose footprints or forefeet are known have crescent-shaped feet with at most a single claw, on the thumb.
I am confused. In case you’re wondering, my collection consists of fauna from all of the eras of the Phanerozoic eon. I try to collect as many figures as you Halichoeres, but I am not as scale-sensitive as you, as I will collect the best version of every prehistoric animal regardless on scale or time period. But my restrictions come to anything viable to the Unique Species Reference List, so nothing from Shapeways or any resin kits done by lone hobbyists.
So here’s what I am wondering; is this the best Agustinia figure or is the CollectA Deluxe one better? Both are depicted with the spikes that have been now found out to be broken ribs, but is CollectA’s still better than this? And I wonder, what scale is Schleich’s Agustinia in?
When I get answers, I will hunt down the better figure in term of accuracy. So, which figure should I agree with, this one by Schleich, or the CollectA Deluxe Agustinia?
Hard to say. They both have ugly heads, but the CollectA is a bit derpier. They both have the spikes, which are incorrect. They both have incorrect feet, although Schleich’s are worse. CollectA has these weird bars across the top of the neck (maybe supposed to be osteoderms?) as well as ridiculous ridges along the side of the neck. I don’t think there are any winners here, only losers.