Tiger Hunter

The Tiger Hunter is a Beastformer Head Hunter vehicle from the Generation 1 continuity family.

The tiger
He destroyed his cage
Yes
YES
The tiger is out

The most powerful of the three legendary Head Hunter vehicles, the Tiger Hunter (タイガーハンター Taigā Hantā) may be the ultimate weapon in the Beastformers' arsenal. Fueled by a fusion engine and the "Psycho Brain", which draws out, amplifies and focuses the power of its pilot, it can achieve speeds of 3,000 kilometers an hour with a burst of Psycho Energy, more than twice the speed of sound. Its Psycho Waver weapon, focused in the tiger's ears, is capable of destroying matter at an atomic level.

Though it has a considerably higher Psycho Energy use safety threshold than its follow Hunters, the dangers of over-use are feared to be even greater. Legends say it can even turn those who try to pilot it into demons. Thus its creators sealed it away in a secret place, the only mention of the machine being a note in the ancient Beast Bible that it is hidden in the "Cave of Fearfulness".

Driven to desperation by the advancing Laser Beast army, the wise and powerful Platinum Tiger has recovered the Tiger Hunter and rides it into battle. But can even this noble and pure warrior resist its tremendous might?

Fiction

Beastformers comic

The three Head Hunters were created long ago by the Three Wise Ones who, deeming their power too dangerous, hid them away. Legend of the Three Wise Ones

Toys

Beastformers

• Tiger Hunter (Beastformer Head Hunter Vehicle, 1987)

Released in the Takara Transformers-less Beastformers sequel series, the Tiger Hunter is a large orange robotic tiger-head "chariot" with a pull-back motor: pulling back and releasing the vehicle sends it rolling forward, slowly at first then dashing forward with a burst of speed, with the lower jaw rapidly moving up and down. The back end pulls out to allow a Beastformer or Laser Beast figure into the control section, pushing back to "lock" them in. Each side of the control station features a pair of swing-up gray bars, used to secure other Beastformer figures by slipping under their arms.

This Head Hunter vehicle came with Platinum Tiger as a pack-in pilot, unchanged from his prior releases. While late-series runs of the individually-sold Beastformers could have full-color Fire/Water/Wood rubsigns, it is unknown if the box set toys could have them.

What was not packed in with the Head Hunters was a collector's card for the vehicle, slightly unusual since the larger Battle Bases got cards.

• Beast Planet's Greatest Confrontation Set (Box set, 1988)

The Tiger Hunter was also available in the "Beast Planet's Greatest Confrontation Set" (ビースト星最大の対決セット bīsuto boshi saidai no taiketsu setto), unchanged from the prior release, once again with Platinum Tiger as the pack-in pilot.

This set also came with Golder and Yellow Giraffe (same as their prior releases), and the set-exclusive Skullgrotes, Kingbuster, Salmomancer, and a chromed-gold Battle Drill.

This set is particularly expensive on the secondary market, given the entire Laser Beast half of the set is not available anywhere else.

Notes

• The Tiger Hunter is the only one of the three Head Hunters without visible secondary weapons. The Stag Hunter has (non-spinning) drills, and the Sheep Hunter has (non-firing) cannons, but the Tiger Hunter has nothing like that.
• The Head Hunters' packaging has virtually no information about the vehicles' fictional powers outside of the generic "sealed away for being too powerful" backstory, plus they lack "bio" cards. The Hero Special 12: Laser Beasts mook, which simply calls them the "Hunters", goes into far more detail on their powers and weapons.
• In the Hasbro Battle Beasts line, the "Battle Chariots" came with a semi-random selection of Beasts. Supposedly, this is the source of many of the rarer variants in the Hasbro line, like the pink War Weasel and Crusty Crab, whose decos match up with their Takara releases, but more carded samples of these toys would help confirm that.
• Speaking of Battle Beasts, the Takara-release Hunters' customer-applied decal sheets are the same as the ones packed in with the Hasbro versions of the toys, using the Battle Beasts logo and having "©1987 Hasbro, Inc. All Rights Reserved" on them.

Foreign names

• English: Battling Tearin' Tiger