It’s Perceptor! In black! Much like Megatron and Soundwave, Perceptor was part of Takara’s Micro Change toy line, which had everyday objects that were secretly miniature robots!
When Hasbro licensed and imported both the vehicle-based Diaclone toys along with Micro Change in 1984, they combined both series into The Transformers, and paid no attention to the scale of said toys.
MC-20 Microscope, here, is an homage to Perceptor’s Micro Change toy. Takara has also released a black Perceptor toy under the name Magnificus, and THAT character is an evil Decepticon. Unlike Perceptor, who is usually depicted as a heroic Autobot.
MC-20 Microscope was released as part of Super7’s 2020 Black Friday sale, along with the black repaints we’ve already looked at of Soundwave into Soundblaster, Megatron into MC Gun Robo P-38, and Jazz as Stepper.
Truly, MC-20 Microscope is a toy that’s more than meets the eye.
Perceptor, Transformers, Micro Change, Diaclone, and all related characters and concepts are co-owned by Hasbro and Takara.