Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures Review

NOTE: These figures were provided to us by the manufacturers for review purposes. Our opinions are our own, and we speak only for ourselves, and not for the manufacturer.

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These Aliens Colonial Marines action figures have incredible articulation for 3.75-inch figures, and a solid sculpt, but suffer from spotty paint.

(ED: This is a co-review, and will be shifting between Carly and Christopher’s opinions. Also, as a quick note, Quintero is not a character from the Aliens film. Instead, he comes from the “Aliens: Colonial Marines” video game that came out in 2013. The plot for the game involves a team of marines going to find out what happened to Ripley, Hicks, Hudson and the rest after they never return, so there’s your connection.)

Packaging – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

Hiya Toys did an amazing job packaging and protecting the whole Aliens Colonial Marines set, which arrived in perfect condition. And for a little box-ception, if you will, the window on the actual package (the box inside the box… get it?) generously displays the Marine and his accessories in all of their plastic glory, also providing a peek at the United States Colonial Marine Corps logo from Aliens. However, after opening the package I noticed the USCMC logo on the removable card in the box was upside down, in contrast to the tiny logo on the box and in the movies.

Thinking it might be a one-time packaging mistake, I checked the two other Marines, the three aliens, and the power loader, and found they were all packaged the same. Looks like Hiya made an oopsie during the design process that no one caught. Because it’s removable, it’s not really a big deal (to me) but to collectors who don’t intend on cutting the tape on the package, it might be a bit of a sore spot.

Not a single part of this package is lacking in detail, but my favorite part is definitely the top panel. Behind the Aliens Colonial Marines logo is a snarling Xenomorph, emerging from the shadows with claws at the ready. Highlighted with light blue and turquoise, the alien really pops against the matte black background. You can even see the secondary jaws inside the Xenomorphs mouth, super freaky.

The background of the packaging (front, sides, and bottom) is this really cool circular design that looks like the metal grating on the floor of the USCSS Nostromo, blue against black, that fades to matte white halfway up the box. Around the edges of the window are Xenomorph faces and tails, hinting at the intricate design on the sides of the box. Beneath the window on the front is a larger version of the Aliens Colonial Marines logo, with the Marine’s name centered beneath it. Other than that, there’s only one small Hiya logo that matches the color scheme of the packaging and isn’t distracting at all.

The sides of the box again say “Aliens Colonial Marines” printed vertically in white (glowing blueish) over a horde of writhing Xenomorphs, colored in black with turquoise-blue highlighting and details. Behind the disturbingly sinuous swarm is the same black and blue grate pattern fading to white.

The back features the nice blue and black grate pattern at the bottom, but instead of fading to white at the top, it fades to black, which complements the matte black top panel. A cool bit of design continuity I didn’t notice the first time around! The back of the box is topped with the same Aliens logo as the front, and has two white-outlined images reminiscent of the on-board computer displays from the films, which show the Marine (in this case, Hicks) in two different poses with his pulse rifle, one pictured with his helmet, (an included accessory) and one without.

The bottom of the back panel displays manufacturer information, and various warnings and copyright information again with the sci-fi computery white outline. The bottom has more of that slick grate design, but is otherwise blank. Continuing the design on the bottom is a nice touch a lot of designers may not bother themselves with.

Packaging Score – 5 out of 5

Christopher

I agree with Carley on most every point. I was really blown away when we received this set how carefully packaged they were. Not a scratch or crease on them. I do, however, disagree about the best part of the package. I think the sides were the best.

I absolutely love the swarm of Xenomorphs they have going on. One thing I wish they would have done, and this is not a big deal, but I wish they would have shown the other half of the Xenomorph that is shown on the top on the bottom of the package. it would have been the cherry on top but the packaging is still amazing on these and I am going to give it full marks.

Packaging Score – 5 out of 5

Sculpt – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

The sculpt on the figures is overall pretty excellent. The attention to detail is impressive, from the age lines on their faces to the tread on the soles of their boots. My personal favorite touch was the amount of detail they sculpted into their fatigues. It’s difficult to see on camera, but there are wrinkles and pockets all over the pants, and you can feel the wrinkles on their shirt sleeves where they’re rolled up, as well as the USCMC patch and the flag patch on either shoulder.

The armor and straps over it are made with a soft, pliable plastic that very slightly improves the range of motion, but mostly looks and feels more realistic. You can see the laces in the boots, the folds in their ears (which stick out a bit, very cool!) as well as the button and strap holding their rolled up sleeves in place! For such a small figure, I would say the sculpt is exceptional. The paint however…

Sculpt Score – 4.5 out of 5

Christopher

I think the sculpt on these figures was very good. The armor is awesome and the camp deserves the highest praise for the patches Carly mentioned. I think my favorite part of the sculpt is a tie between the trending on their boots (Their BOOTS!!) and how they sculpted the hands so their trigger fingers actually sit on the trigger! That is some serious attention to detail. There are some problems like Quintero’s club foot. It even makes it hard to use the peg in his grate. I love posing my figures in awesome ways so this was a big hit for me. However, that was really the only serious problem and it was only on one of the marines that it made things difficult.

Sculpt Score – 4 out of 5

Paint – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

As we began moving the figures, it became obvious that Hiya painted over all of the joints, making it difficult to move at first and damaging the paint on the inner elbows particularly bad. The skin colored paint on the elbows and wrists/hands chipped off as the joints bended and twisted, revealing a whitish color plastic beneath with blotches of skin stuck to it.

Not awesome, but easy enough to hide. There was some weird paint defects on all of the Colonial Marines, but the most distracting were the darker tan smudges on their hands, the “freckle” on Quintero’s cheek (unintentional, we checked the packaging and the film), and the “mole” on Hicks’ arm.

Despite all that, the lines between the two types of cammo on the pants and boots are super clean, and Hiya even went so far as to add slightly darker paint to Quintero’s head (to imitate shaved hair around his Mohawk) and gave Hudson a little bit of five ‘o’ clock shadow. They also added slight details unique to each Marine: for starters, they all have a small personal logo on the front of their body armor (a homage to the Chilean flag for Quintero, a skull and crossbones for Hudson, and a heart with a padlock on it for Hicks, all taken from the movies). There are some interesting white designs on the back of Quintero’s armor, squiggly white lines that look like the sun. Overall, because of the attention to detail, I’ll bump the paint score up a bit despite the shortcomings.

Paint Score – 3 out of 5

Christopher

So as far as paint is concerned I was let down. The fact that there are clean lines makes the splotches on the figures arms even more mind boggling. I would have expected better. One cool thing they did was painting the little custom paint that each Marine had on their armor as Carly mentioned. The bus line on Quintero was also kind of awesome so even though the spots on their hands was really bad I am going to agree with Carly here. (I heard generosity is good karma)

Paint Score – 3 out of 5

Articulation – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

And here’s the part of review where everything falls apart. Literally. We struggled to film the review because the figures kept falling to pieces! They have amazing articulation, but once you crack the paint on those joints it’s downhill from there. The left leg specifically will not stay in place on any of the figures! The sockets are too loose or the ball joints are too small. Either way, if you plan on playing with them, keep a bottle of chill pills ready, because it gets frustrating after a while. It was hysterically bad.

Other than that though, the amount of articulation points and flexibility on this 1/18 size figure are impressive to say the least. Every articulation point except the knees turn 360 degrees, the head/neck and right wrist pivot, and the left wrist and every other joint also bends. Did I mention that WE HAVE AB CRUNCH AND DOUBLE JOINTED KNEES?! Ahem… sorry. Uh, we have ab crunch and double jointed knees. Exciting stuff here people.

The figures can do everything under the sun except for successfully be posed more than once without falling apart. Because of the hip joints being an endless well of cursing and fumbling and having to crawl around on the floor looking for the tiny boot that fell off AGAIN, I’m regretfully giving the articulation a bit of a knock in the score. Pull yourselves together, soldiers!

Articulation Score – 3 out of 5

Christopher

This is where I have some heavy mixed feelings. Where the legs hard to keep attached? Yes, yes they were. Did their club feet come off at the ankle? Well, yeah they did. BUT THE AB CRUNCH!!! Oh geez, guys, I love it so much! I had no idea when I saw them in the package that they had ab crunch so I was soon happy when I saw it. Also the double jointed knees and the ankle articulation. If only the limbs we were positioning would stay on! I am going to be generous here despite the problems Carly pointed out. Yes, I love the extra articulation that much.

Articulation Score – 4 out of 5

Accessories – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

Each figure has a minimum of 4 separate accessories and 2 that come attached to the figure: each Marine has a camouflaged helmet with a light on the side, a scanner, an pulse rifle, and an itty bitty knife and motion detector (?) that both come attached, to the belt and the back, respectively. The sculpt on the pulse rifles and the scanners were particularly impressive, and the paint on the scanner was my favorite out of all of the accessories. Lots of tiny clean bits of color that really make the accessories pop. Just like the body armor paint, each figure has a touch of individuality in their accessories. Hudson comes with the basics, but also has a black pistol with a shiny hilt and a shotgun with an excellent sculpt.Hicks comes with the same pistol as Hudson, and Quintero came with M56 Smart Gun, a long and delicate gun that somebody-who-wasn’t-me totally snapped in half when trying to put it into Quintero’s hands.

The other accessory to break was the handle of Hudsons knife. The little knifes come plugged in to the Marine’s soft plastic utility belts, and are really hard to put back in. The knives really don’t add enough to the pose-ability of the figure to risk breaking them, or at least committing yourself to screwing around with them for hours trying to put the tiny plug back in the tiny loop. So, I would definitely recommend pretending they don’t come out.

The accessories were really cool, despite being fragile. They had a lot of almost unnoticeable details that brought the score way up, such as being able to put the figures finger into the trigger hole on each of the guns. We even made the broken Smart Gun look badass when posing the figures!

Accessories Score – 3.5 out of 5

Christopher

I think Carly cover this pretty well but I am going to disagree with her score. Between having a really hard time getting the knife on and off the belt and the knife and the gun breaking I was a little disappointed. I also would have liked to have seen a screen painted onto the scanners so they were a little more, you know, scanner like.

Accessories Score – 3 out of 5

Overall – Hiya Toys 3.75 Inch Aliens Colonial Marines Action Figures

Carly

The Aliens Colonial Marines series was a complete blast to review, and we had a ton of fun posing and photographing them. The amount of detail in the sculpt really brought the whole set to life, enough so that the paint ended up not being that big of a problem. The legs and feet falling off and the accessories breaking though… that was annoying. The experience was overwhelmingly good on the whole though, so I would recommend picking them up if you are an Aliens fan.

Overall Score – 3.5 out of 5

Christopher

I am super happy we got these in. The figures have some problems. Standing can be hard for them since they have club feet and legs that hate being attached. They also have some really cool points. The articulation points were great and both the sculpt and the packaging are great. While the problems they have can be bad. I personally think the positive out ways the negative. Or maybe I am just high on double jointed knees and ankle articulation. . . Either way, I am sticking to my guns!

Overall Score – 4 out of 5