Vifam7

If you're talking about the animated theatrical movie "Uchuu Senkan Yamato: Fukkatsu-hen", the Blu-ray release has been pushed back to July 23. Link to CDJapan Yes, the Blu-ray release will be watchable here in the US. However, it will not have English subtitles.

Evangelion I can understand. But Patlabor? As for Gundam, the whiny emo-ness is really not too bad in most of the UC Gundam anime. I mean, if you can handle Ichijo Hikaru in Macross, then you can handle Amuro (First) and Camille (Zeta). The really whiny protagonists appear in those robot anime that follow Evangelion.

Pondo, At the very least you should watch the First Gundam trilogy movies before you watch Gundam 0080. While not essential, it'll give you a better appreciation and some background to the UC era world. If anything, the trilogy movies is where the popularity of Gundam truly began. It's the foundation and inspiration for all the other Gundam anime.

It comes with 2 different sets of hands. One DYRL style, one TV atyle.

This is what I'd recommend. Maybe suggest the Zeta Gundam TV series instead of the movies. But these 3 titles are the core of UC Gundam and great place to start with. you could branch to the other UC era stories from here. I'd recommend staying away from the AU series until/unless you become a Gundam fan.

It's going to be painted.

I like the widely spaced canted twin-tailfins and the stabilators jutting out past the fins and exhaust pipe. The air-intakes could be cooler-looking IMO.

What most fans (particularly young ones) don't understand is what constitutes "good animation". Too many take thin lines and defined or sharp edges as quality animation. That's just paintwork on a computer. There's more to animation than just how "pretty it looks". Camera angles, action sequence, choreography, animation fluidity, attention to detail, etc. - many other factors should be factored in before one opines about "dated animation" as if to signify 'low quality'. Most of the quality animation titles from the 1980's generally come from theatrical versions and direct-to-video OAVs. The reason why they had such fantastic quality was not only budget but also time. Production of TV anime series were/are particularly very rushed. Those with bigger staff could do more with the alotted time but those with smaller staff had to do more work at a faster pace. I remember hearing stories about how some episodes of Macross TV were being worked on to the last minute and staffers literally running to make the scheduled broadcast.

The dry transfer decals hold up fine if you clear coat it. If you do not spray any kind of coating, the markings will easily rub off with the slightest handling. Testors Dullcote works well. I use the spray can version and it's my preferred clear coat. However, Testors Dullcote is lacquer based so it's not recommended if you've painted your kit with acrylic paint.

What swapping parts? The only thing that seems to require swapping are the landing gears and the hands (though I recall seeing integrated hands in a prior photo). Everything else appears to be an optional. Swapping the wings seems to be an option, not a requirement. Btw, to repeat, the Figure Oh page that I see above says nothing about swappable wings for battroid mode. It only mentions about a clean wing and a wing with missiles. That said, I see the difference in wing length. Anyone have a bigger scan of that page? With regards to the 2 different battroids seen on the Figure Oh page, it's barely legible but it seems to say the one on the left is the final production version and the one the right is the prototype we've been seeing up til now.

Probably not much because it's a Takara Tomy web exclusive.

I don't think shorter wings are included for battroid mode. From what I can read I think it's just the option of having a clean wing (no missiles) vs. wing with missiles. What this suggests to me is that Bandai has opted to make the whole wing swappable instead of us having to deal with teeny tiny pegs for the missiles.

That won't be the case with the upcoming Hi-Metal VF-1 though.

These toys don't exactly "transform". To switch from one mode to another, one needs to disassemble the toy down to dozens of components and then build it back up. It's a partsformer in the worst possible way. I have 3 of these VF100s. They do look nice in each mode once put together and the battroid mode is quite articulated. But, they feel rather flimsy. The only reason I'd get these is if you absolutely must have a VF-25 in 1/100 scale now. Otherwise, I'd recommend waiting for the eventual VF Hi-Metal version (the VF100s line failed and it has been replaced by the VF Hi-Metal line which is superior).

I just want to remind everyone -> Yamato never said they won't release a completed Regult toy. Nor did they say if they do release it, it'll be web exclusive. Earlier in this thread I posted that Yamato believes they need to study the issue further. When they do figure out what they believe is a profitable strategy to release a Regult, they will no doubt do so. In the meantime, this is just a limited edition garage kit for hardcore modelers. This is kinda like Bandai's B-Club releasing a resin kit of the 1/100 scale Nobel Gundam while many Gunpla builders still wait.

I kinda agree. The front looks nice but the back is rather plain. I almost chose the Lancer Sprtbck because I really liked how the interior looked. It felt very Mitsubishi. For my new car, I wanted a 4-door Japanese hatchback so my choices came down to the Subaru Impreza, Mitsubishi Lancer Sportback, and the Mazda3. The current Impreza gets lots of flak, but I picked as my choice.

A 2001 Mirage DE coupe was also my first brand new car. It was a very reliable car with great gas mileage. Sold it last year and purchased a 2010 Subaru Impreza Outback Sport. I could've gone for the Lancer Sportback.

Perhaps it is not the quantity or popularity of robot anime that is the issue. But rather, the quality of recent robot anime. I also think that there has been a decline in the interest by the younger fanbase to simply buy merchandise - ie. toys and model kits. Heck, some won't even buy the anime itself.

How about using a doll stand? Something like this: http://www.hlj.com/product/CUT20056

Actually these old kits are good skill improvement kits. Once once one is adept at Gunpla, the next step in the learning process is to build a traditional glue and paint kit. For beginners, I wouldn't recommend jumping straight into a rather expensive Hasegawa. A cheap Arii or Imai kit will do.

The reporter of this blog asked Yamato about a completed toy version of the 1/60 Regult. The answer was that they think at 1/60 scale the price will become too prohibitive to buy multiple copies and thus they think it's necessary to study further the matter of size and cost. I suppose what one could infer from this is - for the completed toy version, Yamato might scale it down, do away with certain gimmicks, or something else to bring the cost down.

Photos of this Regult was supposedly forbbiden by Yamato at Shizuoka. Btw, this is a resin kit. The same "HDP" stuff they used in the 1/2000 SDF-1 prototype kit. Price is approximately US$400... yikes

A must have for me. The Monster does not seem like a reissue. It says "test shot"... Is it a new tooling? Anyone know if the sprue looks like the old 80's kit?

But I doubt they'd do a stealth or low-viz scheme though... They'll definitely do a clear version though. Almost guaranteed. Kawamori seems to have a thing for clear versions and lately Bandai has been doing the clear parts thing with their kits.

But this is a handier smaller scale which won't take up much space anyways. Also, I believe there are still quite a few folks out there that simply did not/could not collect the Yamato 1/60 series due to their size and/or price. None of us know why Bandai didn't do so years ago. It could be any reason. Gundam fans didn't get a decent toy figure (kits don't count) of the RX-78 until just a few years ago with a 1/100 GFF Metal Composite. From my experience in business, licensing and agreement issues can often lead to long delays. In Macross's case, I'm sure the whole legal battle between Big West and Tatsunoko created a lot of problems. Even though Bandai had rights to Macross, it doesn't always mean they get to do whatever they want whenever they want.