Graham

The new August 2008 issue of Hobby Japan magazine (out today), has the first published lineart for the VF-25 and also the first CG art of the Cheyenne II Destroid. See the pics below. I really hope somebody can translate all the text on the VF-25 lineart page. Graham

Couple of interesting titbits. Scale will be true 1/60. However, Kawamori-san may have retconned the VF-11's size to make the dimensions larger than previously given (TBC). Apparently, he now thinks he made the dimensions too small originally. Graham

Nice to see that popularity is on the up. Graham

Yes, basically they can. The arms attach to the torso by a simple peg and hole design. The shoulders just plug onto pegs sticking out from the torso. So yes, you can rotate the arms up and down. However, on all of mine, I have glued all the parts together. Not really beacuse they are loose, although a few parts like the VA-3M Fighter's tail definitely need gluing, but as a preventive measure, because if my 4 year old gets hold of them, he will definitely scatter parts all over the house and no doubt lose some bits. He's already claimed the VF-1J for himself, which is OK, as it's the one I'm the least interested in. Graham

The 1/60 DX is definitely looking better and better in the latest pics. I hope Bandai is working on the Armored pack for the Ozma VF-25S. I hope they don't just intend to supply the Super Pack for both the Alto VF-25F and Ozma VF-25S. Still no news about the 1/100? Graham

Sorry, real life intruded at the weekend, so wasn't able to get any more scans done. Plus I wanted to get started early on the 1/60 VF-1 review. Graham

I certainly hope not. Die cast metal is a major no no in my book for transforming toys, except where absolutely necessary for strength, for example swing bars. Graham

I really hope Bandai makes the 4 sensors on the nose (located ahead of the cockpit) out of transluscent plastic, rather than just having them painted on. Yamato have done this with the nose sensors on all their recent releases (VF-0, YF-19, SV-51, YF-21), so there is no reason why Bandai can't. Graham

Where are you getting that info from? I haven't seen anything new from Bandai on the 1/100 for ages. Graham

We don't know for sure. Likely towards the end of the year. Graham

The side view Gerwalk pic worries me. On the underside of the nose, below the cockpit, there is a noticable gap and an ugly looking IMO curved (radiused) section See attached pic. I really hope Bandai improves this before production. This is obviously done to allow that part of the nose to hinge, but IMO if properly designed, such a large obvious gap should not be necessary. Yamato had a similar ugly gap on the nose hinge of the 1/72 scale YF-19, but that was back in 1999! Since then Yamato have proved with the 1/48 and all subsequent 1/60 VFs (especially the YF-19, SV-51 and YF-21), that with proper design, you can completely eliminate this type of visually unappealing gap. If Yamato can do it, I'm sure that Bandai can. Graham

We have a thread for the 1/200 VFC figures already. Please keep pics and discussion on the VF-9 VFC in the correct place please. Graham

SHE products are resin garage kits. perfect transformation, but extremely difficult to build and quite fragile. They also loosen up very quickly after a few transformations as well. The VF-5000 has been out of production for quite a number of years, but you can still occasionally track it down online on in specialist hobby shops. Graham

Shoud be a flawless, problem free first release. Everything's nice and tight. It locks ogether amazingly well in all three modes. Tons of Tampo printing as well. Graham

Chapter 6, page 28. Last page for tonight. I want to go and watch ep # 11 of Frontier now. I still haven't seen it yet. I will get the last 15 pages finished tomorrow. Graham

Chapter 6, page 27. Graham

Chapter 6, page 26. Graham

Chapter 6, page 25. Graham

Chapter 6, page 24. Graham

6 more pages scanned in. Chapter 6, page 23. Graham

Plus, the mecha action episodes such as 7 and 9 have gotten the lowest ratings, so I expect more and more character-centric episodes and less and less mecha action. Graham

Now for the dreaded question. How is the character art in this episode? Is it handled by Nara, or have they subcontracted out to a Philippine/Korean/Chinese studio again? Also, I take it there is little or no mecha action this week? Graham

Please keep this to Frontier news only. Graham

Looking much better. I imagine the 12,600 Yen price quoted will be for the bare Valk only, sans Armoured Pack or Super Pack. Graham

I'm with Renato on this. I found the PS2 game pretty quick to complete, with little replay value. After completing it, it's just sat on the shelf gathering dust. By comparison I constantly replay VF-X2 and MPGE. Graham