As Armada gave way to Energon, Universe quickly incorporated redecos of the new molds as well. North American customers were treated to Japan's Operation: Combination Micromaster combiners for the first time, through a long string of KB Toys exclusive single-packs. Like most contemporary Transformers series, Universe featured a liberal amount of retailer exclusives, covering most of Hasbro's major retailers at the time. The toys were fit (and occasionally shoehorned via creatively multi-packing) into the standard size classes. Universe, much like the later portion of Robots in Disguise before it, drew upon every previous generation of Transformers before it. Loosely tied in with fiction about a battle extending across multiple universes and many eras, Universe filled the gap in toy sales without the major investments associated with new toylines.
Despite the increased number of redecoes in other lines, Universe was the first to issue no new-mold toys (although several of its molds were borrowed from Japanese toylines, and new to US customers). To ride the wave of increased popularity, they quickly developed Transformers: Universe, a series of redecoed toys from previous franchises. With the explosive sales of Armada in 2003, the demand for new Transformers toys was higher than what could be met by Hasbro's new inclusions in Armada.
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