Eventually I would like to get the armada range and my old unicron. Not too sure on all the names and the like. What are official? What are unofficial? Studio? Masterpiece? Series? All so confusing.
Currently Hasbro lists by class which is Core, Deluxe, Voyager, Leader, Commander, Titan and Masterpiece.
hasbropulse.com
In years past before the Siege toyline (2019) the classes were mostly by size and how gimmick intense it was and that the same character could show up in it (in different sizes with different gimmicks). Nowadays starting with the Siege line that is now changed to match bot heights with each other (so now say G1 Bumblebee is going to be either core or Deluxe class while Starscream is in Voyager) or how many components/parts/plastic is used by that character. An example would be G1 Hot Rod. If by size alone he would be deluxe however his type of transformation scheme necessitated a higher price point to do correctly, bumping his part count up but to also compensate for the higher cost of bumping him to Voyager class he was saddled with a bunch of accessories.
Hasbro usually releases these classes in waves per year and the higher the class you go the less the characters per wave. Commander's for example only get one release
per line a year while Titan class is just once a year. Among the fandom these are colloquially known as CHUG or the CHUG Lines (Masterpiece is not included in this).
As for lines that's where your question about Studio Series comes in.
"Mainline" is the stuff you will find in every Target, Walmart in the most quantities. They are generally cheap and small or large and gimmicky and are usually related to what cartoon is airing at the time or if there are movie tie-ins.
Then there are the more collector aimed releases and these are where the different names and themes come. As I mentioned above "Siege" was the name of the first part of the
War For Cybertron line which for the first time brought back near all the G1 cast in their Cybertron alt modes or their original 80s alt modes (or as close to it to avoid car licensing). The three parts of the WfC line were Siege, Earthrise and Kingdom. After that (and currently) is the Legacy line which continued the size and overall design scheme, bringing in more G1 characters as well as characters from other Universes in the G1 style, such as Animated, Prime and the Unicron Trilogy (Armada, Energon and Cybertron). This years Commander Class toy is Magmatron from the Japanese Beast Wars anime.
Last year's Legacy Commander was Transformers Armada Optimus Prime.
The
Studio Series line was created in response to the fans who wanted more of the live action movie stuff to actually look more like what was scene in the movies. This has now expanded into the PS2 War for Cybertron Game and the 1986 Transformers Movie (and this one compliments the Legacy lines). So there is a mix of Bayverse toys, Bumblebee movie toys, G1 and Game. This years Commander Class toy is Optimus Prime to celebrate the 40th Anniversary.
The Titan Class toy this year is Legacy Transformers Armada Tidal Wave.
The
Masterpiece line is one that tries to go for the most screen accurate toys in both bot mode and alt mode at the higher prices. Usually for the G1 toys there have also been Beast Wars releases however the releases on these have slowed down a bit.
And now for where it's weird, confusing and awesome.
Third Party.
There's this grey area where you can't quite copyright how a robot transforms. Not to mention that Transformers is a beloved
worldwide phenomenom. And most factories in the world are in China. And China really doesn't give two shits about copyright (unless it's Disney - no, I'm not shitting you).
Add in the above and then add that Transformers has a large Chinese fandom. Then add that Asian black magic in figuring how to contort shapes and you actually get some varying high quality Transformers toys.
As there were times Hasbro/Takara moved too slow it literally became the eptime of "Fine. I'll do it myself".
It started mainly as add-ons to compliment released toys but then some companies went ahead to produce their own toys. The big stuff from Chinese companies are in the Masterpiece class or what is now know as Legends class. Legends class are some of the smallest Transformers toys ever (some even smaller than Hasbro's core class) but are at Masterpiece level of transformation and complexity.
From TFW2005:
The above figures are incredibly small.
Also from TFW2005:
From the above the Bumblebee with the Autobot faction logo is the only official toy there outside the mask. The smallest BB in this picture is from NewAge s
tands slightly above 2 inches!
Please also know that youtube has plenty of reviewers going over all of these figures. So if you are unsure of something or want to see what some think of these toys go ahead and look them up before you decide to buy.