Renato

I heard that May'n is doing the opening song for some other anime recently, maybe that's what Unleashed is.

Good question. I thought this was only an issue for earlier versions of ePSXe, though. I remember when I played DYRL on ePSXe the boss for one of the later stages never showed up, so you could not proceed any further. I know that bug has been fixed since. OK, firstly, do you have the physical disc? If you're using an image, it might not be complete or may be corrupted somehow. Wish I could help, but I've only completed the game once way back in the day on my ex-gf's PS1, and I only started playing it again last year on my PSP. Unfortunately, I didn't get to the end that time because I got too busy and eventually just gave up (that stupid underwater level, argh). I was meaning to have another go on it eventually, though. Who knows, maybe the ending screws up there, too. My advice would be to first of all get a real copy of the game on CD and try that first if you do not have one. Then if that doesn't work, try the PSP if you have one. Oh, and before you ask, yes you need custom firmware and you need to convert the data on the disc to a file the PSP can read. I remember MW member Valkyrie made a thread on "VF-X2 on the PSP" (don't remember if that was the title though) ages ago, so have a sift through here. Good luck

The feet are posed wrong on the Bandai Koenig. I hope the actual production version can stand in robot mode the way it is supposed to. The Yamato could at least do that. Plus the floppy joints on the Yamato became a non-issue when you use the old patented MW nail polish trick. My Koenig's joints are stiff as ever, five (six?) years on. The only issue I ever had with the Yamato was the two connection prongs for Gerwalk mode snapping off. Even then I have it posed in Gerwalk right now quite menacingly. Other than that, the Yamato looks to me a million times more badass than the neutered Bandai one (save for maybe the nosecone pea-shooter cannon thing). On the other hand, I'm sure the Bandai one will probably lock together a lot more securely in Shuttle mode.

I imagine so, because it doesn't attach to any part that is unique to the Kai.

Damn, you have the Orguss Graffiti one! Love that artwork.

Thanks Danth, managed to download this finally. Will watch it later!

I'm so there.

OK, review time. VF-19kai option parts: You get two stand pylons, a base, open shoulders, fists, and a bunch of attachment parts, including "open landing gear" cradle pieces. With the exception of the base, I suppose, each and every item here should have been included in the original valk box. I and many others have been saying that for months but it's just so hard to get over. In particular the fists. It almost seems spiteful! Well, whatever, beggars can't be choosers, etc. OK, so first of all, the attachments. I haven't tried the gerwalk one yet, but the battroid and fighter pieces attach the valk to the base steadily enough that there should be no worry about it falling off at all, and the black stand itself is ratcheted (though the clear one for the Sound Booster isn't) so it's stable, even with Sound Boosters attached (more on that later). The problem with the way that the attachment piece for fighter mode connects to the valk is that it pushes the arms up which means you have to spend several minutes getting it to all fit together again on the stand, since the whole rear section of the fighter becomes a real mess as soon as you touch it. The attachment for the gunpod is interesting, but pointless since you cannot attach the gunpod and then put the valk on the stand. One or the other, baby. Next, let's take a look at the open shoulders. They look nice and all, but they're really missing paint apps. Why is it all dark? Whatever. The issue here is that you have to detach the standard shoulders, detach the arms too, and put everything together again. Simple enough, but for some reason one arm goes in easier on mine than the other. It's almost like it's straining the connection. Needless to say I'm afraid to leave the open shoulders on. I'm also afraid of taking it apart and putting it back together again too often. There have been reports of shoulder breakages because of those two tiny prongs that hold the entire arm assembly... I can see them being under a lot of pressure if you repeatedly reattach stuff all the time. Next, fists. OK, they're fists. Yay. Next, Landing gear. Dear God, this is hateful. As we all know by now, Bandai did a major cop-out by making the valk just sit on top of the landing gear which attaches via tiny off-centre prongs into the base. I only attached them to the base once and I will probably not be using them again, because as light as the valk is, I can really see those prongs just snapping off under the weight of the valk, since the pressure is put at an angle. This option set does not include the Sound Booster, you had to buy that separately. Sound Booster: The SB comes with an attachment piece to dock with the valk... and nothing else. Its stand is included with the option set described above. Displaying it in flyer mode on the stand is stable and poses no problems. I wish the stand was a little taller so you could display it above the valk itself in fighter mode, but whatever. Looks pretty good when it's all together. The plastic seems quite "Yamato"-like, and the shade of red used is a tad darker than the Fire Valk. I don't really have a problem with that. Transformation is simple, just take off the antenna, flip some stuff up, some down and and some round. Now, the SB needs a piece to connect to the valk. This piece connects to the two prongs at the back of the Battroid which plug into the backs of the legs in Fighter mode. I don't know what happened, but Bandai must have made a miscalculation as the piece, which is in a U-shape, bends outwards as it seems a fraction of a millimetre too narrow. This, again, causes immense pressure on the plastic of the piece and the two prongs in question. I don't get it. I'm really afraid of breaking everything on this toy!! Once attached, you bring back the two large speaker units over the shoulders... Now the problem is that the speaker units themselves are not long enough to fully clear the shoulders, so you have to tilt the shoulders back enough so that you can actually get them to come under. Which means that you have to have the shoulders constantly tilted back at 45 degree angles. Which is OK for posing, I guess, but still, it just seems like yet another oversight... So those are my impressions of the SB & "Options" (yeah, right) for the Hi-Metal Fire Valkyrie. I've only had it for a couple of days and just fiddled around for about 45 minutes in total so far, so there may be some things which turn out to be better than I feared with regards to durability, etc... But overall I guess I will just treat it as a placeholder until the true Fire Valk comes our way courtesy of Yamato. I just really hope they are designing the valk with the Sound Booster attachment method in mind from the start. Bottom line, I'm glad I bought both sets because it completes the Valk, and it all looks good on display, but there are major oversights in the design, which obviously comes from not planning ahead. That, combined with the whole attitude of "oh you want fists? Guess what they're limited" is just a big "F-U" which forever tarnishes my enjoyment of this toy. So I still have mixed feelings on this figure, we shall see if over time the good will outweigh the bad.

Well I think it's a given that it's just a small game since it's on the same disc as the movie itself. I imagine they would have made a separate disc otherwise.

Check it yo. I can't really do a whole review right now, but I should point out that while I'm at least glad they made this thing, it is by far perfect and I'm disappointed with a number of things. Looking forward to the Yamato 1/60 version!

OK, I'm back. I really don't get it, is there a reason why Megaupload takes so long? I've used it lots of times to download much bigger files and it's never been this slow. I can't even see any progress, it just seems stuck.

Heh, I remember this, it came out alongside "10 Lil' Gall Force" in the UK. Thanks so much!

Hi, Area88, I cannot thank you enough for essentially bringing a whole new lease of life to these rare gems. After I moved to Tokyo from Kyoto I found out I was better before when I had my local huge-ass local old school rental shop with a lot of this stuff in it. Now I don't have anything. I can't even find Layzner, for God's sake. Anyway, I will download this first thing in the morning! Off to bed now. Thanks again!

Yeah, by now I've replaced almost all the tracks with other songs. Like one of the VF-19kai's song weapons is now Magic Rhapsody from the new album, another is "Fukugan" from Fukuyama's latest album, and the AFOS stage is badass because the BGM is the actual Song of Destruction opera from the M0 soundtrack. Apart from that, I randomly replaced Ishtar's song with Moloko's "Bring it Back", the menu screens now have "Carnival/Sunset Beach" from the Macross Digital Trip album, and most of the "WARNING! A dangerous enemy appeared!" moments now play against that famous Mousse T/Libertines mashup "Horny like a Bohemian" from a couple of years back. Oh, and I think I replaced the instrumental version of DYRL with the Hawaii 5-0 theme sung by Sammy Davis Jr. and the title screen now sounds like a level from Zanac Neo on the PS1. I even think I stuck Jamiroquai's "Use the Force" somewhere in there. I love this game.

The YF-23 was a real world plane, so Kawamori most likely avoided using that designation on purpose (seeing as how the setting of Macross Plus is basically a future version of the real life YF-22 versus YF-23 ATF project, it would only needlessly confuse things).

I just got an email about this. I'm as angry about this as I am sad. He was only 46! I loved Tokyo Godfathers. The man's movies were perfect for showing people uninterested in animation that the medium had so many possibilities. And his manga work with Katsuhiro Otomo is worth checking out too. RIP. You were one of the people I was counting on to pull anime out of the mire (I believe) it's in. This is a major blow to creativity. Alas, you will be missed.

No pics of the event, but while we were out walking around waiting for Mikimoto to show, Tochiro snapped some great shots of the temporary Macross Shop in the UDX building just round the corner. Here I am trying to "right the wrongs" in my own way. Thanks so much for the pics, Tochiro. Sorry I never emailed you back, I was away for a while, but I'm back in town now for a bit. I do have one more which I took with my mobile, it's of the side of the shop with the image of the VF-25 holding the Akihabara sign. I'll upload it as soon as I find it again. EDIT -- Also, I'm attaching a portion of one of the artworks on display, from Mikimoto's own website:

Agreed. I am actually reading this thread for the first time in weeks and lo and behold, the posts read the same as they did back then, despite it being constantly at the top of the board. This is actually one reason why I made the "Limited Exclusives" thread, so we can discuss the business practices of Yamato et al, instead of having it plaguing all these threads. The Japanese otaku market is all about the girly doll figures now, there's no room for obscure enemy robot Sheldons from "Orson's Farm", so even though I do believe the price is prohibitive to say the least, I'm with the "hey, at least they're making it" camp. If they sell well enough they may make a cheaper version later down the line, like the SDF-1. You never know.

There is no "casual audience".

Calling BS on that. This page: http://www.gpara.com/comingsoon/macross_t_f/100806/ ...and this one: http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/news/20100806_385738.html ...and a whole bunch of others have lists of all the characters and mecha included in the game and they're all from MacF only. If the other series were included they would not hesitate to reveal such a major selling point. That said, I think it's safe to expect a full blown game further down the line. Most likely they're using this to test the waters and gauge interest.

Not a real realization, really.

Sample pics of the Sound Booster. Will be shipping out on the 26th of August.

Thanks for the link! Heh, I like the ending with the 25-year HG/BW feud. Maybe you, Richard and I can meet up one day and do some multiplayer sometime! (I do agree that the computer-controlled wingmen are stupid).

Thank God for Anime52k8. At least someone pays attention to my posts. OK, trying to put the fallacies out of commission (again) here: Anime Friend is Hiroshi Iwata's company, the co-produced most of the episodes along with Tatsunoko Productions. Yes, they outsourced some footage to Korean studio Star Pro: It is Star Pro that are the culprits for the off-model bad animation. Lastly, BW/StudioNue are not animation studios, they did not actually animate anything at all.