Imperial AT-AT (All Terrain Armored Transport)

Having been born in 1972 and with the first Star Wars film released in 1977 I was pretty much a card-carrying member of the “Star Wars Generation.” I grew up with these characters as the films came out every 3 years and so the toys dominated my childhood. My favorite of these was hands down the Imperial At-At released in 1981.

The At-At became a focal point of many an adventure. Often the rebels would overtake it and use it as a base of operations in their fight against the Empire. Sometimes the Empire would devastate the Rebel forces under the weight of the Walkers feet. Whatever the scenario the At-At was a prize jewel in my pile of toys way back in the day.

As awesome as the 1981 At-At was I thought it could have been better. I knew then that as big as it was it was not in scale to my figures and the inside of it should have done more than hold 10 figures. I dreamed and fantasized with friends that one day Kenner would remake it better. They never did…

Fast forward to Toyfair 2010 and Hasbro (who had bought Kenner and now has had the Star Wars license for many years) is showing off a brand new completely redesigned At-At and it was over 2 feet tall. Released during the summer of 2010, I broke down in November and scooped it up. Bottom line…. it’s EPIC!

The box is big and utilitarian. Included with the At-At was an At-At Driver and a Hoth themed Speeder bike.

The At-At itself comes disassembled. The head and front part of the main body (that includes the head movement mechanism) are one piece that slides down and clicks onto the main body. Attach the legs and the feet and you are good to go.

The first thing I noticed was how much more movie-accurate this new version was. The shape and size of the head, main body, legs and feet are all much more in proportion to each other.

It’s impressive and HUGE but because it’s size comes from its height and not it’s width or length it is much easier to find somewhere to stick it without it being in the way. Not something that can be said for Hasbro’s remake for the Millennium Falcon (which I would LOVE to add to my collection but it is just too big to easily store anywhere… just ask Josh.)

I remembered the original being huge to me as a 9-year-old kid but when I got the new mold and old mold next to each other I realized just how tiny the original was.

Let me be clear, the 1981 At-At was a FANTASTIC toy that pushed the envelope for quality and size in 1981. In 5 years of knocking it around I never had any parts break. It was an awesome toy.

But you get the old and new version together and the differences are night and day. 29 years of toy manufacturing and engineering have been crammed into this new 2010 model making it the At-At I was dreaming of when I was 9.

There is so much going on with this thing I am not even sure where to begin. So I will start at the head and work my way back.

The cockpit can accommodate 2 pilots (which can be seen through the red window on the front) and hold another 4 figures standing comfortably.

Detail in the cockpit is fantastic. There is a command console there in the back that has a view screen that lights up when you activate certain sound phrases. The button here will activate sounds for General Veers, Darth Vader and a generic Imperial Commander. The Imperial Commander sound clips are new for this toy but sound appropriate. The Veers sound clips are from the actual film, The Empire Strikes Back but the Darth Vader sound clips are done by a sound alike and are not the James Earl Jones delivered lines… which makes ZERO sense since they are all lines from the film. Couldn’t Hasbro get the rights to use James Earl Jones’s voice? The way I understand it, every actor signed away their likeness (which would include dialogue) to Lucasfilm for merchandising. Very strange but not a deal-breaker.

Imperial Officer Phrases

• “Forward deflectors at full power.”
• “Launch speeder bike recon patrol.”
• “Rebel snowspeeder squadron approaching on your flank.”
• “Red light.”
• “Target the Rebel scum.”
• “Troops standing by for deployment”

Darth Vader Phrases

• “Don’t fail me.”
• “Don’t let Skywalker escape.”
• “That’s it, the Rebels are there. And Skywalker is with them.”
• “The Rebels are alerted to our presence.”

General Veers Phrases

• “All troops will debark for ground assault.”
• “Distance to power generators.”
• “I’ve reached the main power generators.”
• “Prepare to target the main power generator.”
• “Target, maximum firepower.”
• “The shield will be down in moments.”
• “You may start your landing.”

On the outside of the head the side lasers fire missiles and rotate 360 degrees.

Underneath the head the spring loaded chin guns can be fired by pushing the lever forward. Blaster sound goes off when it slides forward. Releasing it activates a second blaster fire and light-up red. Because the gun barrels are painted a dark grey the red lighting shows up a bit more even under bright lights.

The neck of the At-At hides the movement mechanism and is covered by a soft, flexible rubber.

Yep, that’s right you can move the head just like the original but in a much different way.

To leave room in the main body to actually “play” they have moved the handle to the top of the unit. A nice touch is that it can be folded in so not to be visible, but when you do pull it out there are laser guns on the side making it looks like additional weaponry and not just a play gimmick. A nice touch indeed!

The one problem here is materials used for the side guns that fold down into the main body are soft PVC and have started bowing out when stored. They should have used a harder plastic here.

On top of the main body are three dedicated sound buttons. One for the side head lasers, one for the chin guns and one for the sound of the At-At walking.

Opening the panels on the side reveals the real changes made to this toy and open up a world of adventure for Star Wars fans young and old…

While the original toy had a very spartan interior designed to hold 10 figures with no special features the new 2010 version comes loaded to the gills with fun play features. Double opening doors are featured on BOTH sides of the At-At giving you complete access to the insides of the unit and giving you troop platforms that allow you to attach even more figures.

The interior is split into 2 decks and has enough pegs to accommodate 15 figures securely. You can also fit more figures into the gully that runs down the middle of the main deck so you can really load it up with troops.

2 targeting scopes are located on the 2nd deck which figures can hold onto and rotate. Located towards the back of the upper deck is another command console that features another sound button that cycles through more sound effects specific to the troop bay.

The Imperial Officer phrases and a whole slew of Clone Trooper phrases can be played with this button. The sounds, like the cockpit, roll thru in a logical order to play out the battle. If you activate the button and play a sound but do nothing a for a few moments after that it will play a random sound effect like an explosion or blasters firing. Occasionally a red alert light will go on inside the main bay

Clone Trooper Phrases

• “All right men load your weapons.”
• “Blizzard squadron objective completed.”
• “Ground troops deployed sir.”
• “Range to target,one seven decimal twenty-eight.”
• “Preparing attack vectors.”
• “Primary guns charged and ready.”
• “Rebel base located.”
• “Rebel forces in range.”
• “Rebel forces spotted.”
• “We’re taking heavy fire sir.”

Imperial Officer Phrases

• “Forward deflectors at full power.”
• “Launch speeder bike recon patrol.”
• “Rebel snowspeeder squadron approaching on your flank.”
• “Red light.”
• “Target the Rebel scum.”
• “Troops standing by for deployment”

So what good are doors that turn into troop platforms unless you can deploy troops from them? Well you can. Hasbro has included 2 working wenches to raise and lower troops from the main deck of the At-At.

A simple button releases the lock on the wench and drops troops to the ground quickly. The wheel pictured allows you to raise them back up to the main deck.

But wait, there’s more! You can recreate Luke Skywalkers heroic toppling of an At-At from the film, The Empire Strikes Back. A hatch on the bottom of the main deck flips out to give you access to a third wench with which to pull Luke up into the belly of the mechanized beast. Just open the door, reach in and pull down on the cable.

At the end of the cable is a clip which appears to be designed to attach to a figure’s arm. Once done just hit the button in the middle of the upper deck and Luke will get pulled up. The mechanism is complete battery operated and incredibly noisy.

Just when you think they couldn’t pack anymore features in they do. The back of the At-At opens to reveal another bay that feature a launching speeder bike platform. That’s right There is a “Return of the Jedi” style speeder bike located there. Press the button to the right of the bike and the platform pops out and the sounds of a speeder bike taking off and flying away play.

The bikes main body has been painted white to go with the Hoth theme and is almost identical to the original speeder bike toy from 1983 minus the “explosion” feature and using a really cheap softer plastic to hold up the front fork.

Which means that over time gravity pull sit down leaving you with a floppy speeder bike fork. Nice they included a bike, lame they cheaped out on it.

Once you get the bike out you realize that there is tons of room back in that bay. Well so did Hasbro, there are 2 targeting scopes for troopers to man as well as a sniper hatch on either side that open.

6 figure pegs are available to stick troopers too. Not to mention 2 figure pegs on the bike platform and 2 on the back door itself.

This is the troop transport I always wanted the At-At to be. My nitpicks would be the softer parts on the side of the head handle and on the speeder bike fork not holding their shapes. I also would have like a “storage compartment” to stick extra weapons and accessories built into the At-At.

But these are nitpicks. Star Wars fans, whether old or young, toy collectors or not, should come up with any excuse to get this into your home.

Big, loaded with play features and reasonably priced at $100 this is a piece you WILL kick yourself not getting after it is out of production so run, don’t walk to your local toy-store and get it. In my opinion this is toy of the year.

The embedded video above is just shy of 15 mins. Not because I like to ramble on like an OCD otaku but because it does 15 mins worth of stuff! And this is the edited down version.