AcroRay

That's because he is actually voiced by Stephen Hawking.

A vintage Takatoku piece I picked up thanks to YahooJP (Y1000 in a water-damaged box). This is a classic Chogokin-style figure about 5" tall - probably 1/12000 scale. Colorful metallic paint and decals, soft details, rather like the old pocket-size or 2-in-1 Shogun Warrior toys. And much like those older chogokin, its got heavy slabs of diecast to give it some nice heft. In this case, its legs are diecast: Background was an old NASA black and white I jazzed up in Photoshop and added stars to.

Klan looks amazing. Quite the strut she's got going on there!

Ooh! Magnets to hold on the FAST Packs. Finally!

Thanks for the feedback! I did shoot a couple of solos in the same angle of the Monster, so I'll work one of those up similarly.

Much as I love the Monster, I thought it looked a little plain by itself and I wanted something for a good sense of scale. When I get one of the 1/100 Bandai VF-25s, I'll re-shoot it. (And I also totally love the Toynami Valk. Its a great little item, expecially for the price and the detail.)

I'm the proud new owner of a Yamato Konig Monster! Been waiting a couple of weeks for some decent outdoor weather to shoot it with another 1/100 mech: ...includes a little Photoshop help for the background. Hopefully this summer I can do an SMS custom job on the Monster.

I'm in agreement with sidearmsalpha and Nb4M. I absolutely love the Milia 1J and FAST Pack set I have - and I've got 'em all decaled up and panel-lined. Looks gorgeous. I just have to be really carefull how I play with it - kind of like my Yamato stuff, but much less expensive. I'll be a happy guy when th GBPS set comes out... but luckily I'm not in a huge hurry.

Happy to share! A buddy of mine who can read some Japanese says it looks like a promo included in one of Gakken's manga publications. The 'date' is actually 9:30 AM - the broadcast time for the show when the shitajiki was printed up.

Very, very nice indeed! Oddly, though - I was really proud that I'd bought one of Yamato's earliest efforts when the MacPlus VF-11B was first released - even pre-ordered it! - and I'd even repaired and improved the eventual broken hips, carefully tweaked the joint ratchets and the tightness of all its screws, and left little tabs on the canopy cover so I could fold them under the canopy to hold it on mechanically rather than rely on a piece of tape like the instructions lamely suggested. Now I'm finding myself feeling a little miffed that if I want one that's actually really well made I have to buy it from them all over again... Guess I'm now in the same boat as the rest of the VF-1 1.0-to-2.0 owners! Hah!

About $9 or so, including shipping to the US with a bundle of other stuff. A friend picked it up for me. The auction price was Y400.

The pencil board arrived! Really nice graphics. There's no price on it, so I think it was a magazine omake insert of some sort. There's also a date noted in the text at the lower right. The image on the other side is sort of clipped together from other Mospeada sources, like the gang looking skyward from the credits, etc. A little lame, actually. I may post it later.

Hot blond scientist babes are such cliches. Remember the scientist woman from NADESICO? (Not that I'm complaining exactly...)

The series is pretty lackluster, story-wise. I'd loved the mecha and especially the powered armors since they showed up in US hobby and toy shops back in the mid-80s. When Rog sent me the first 5 or so episodes a few years ago, I was pretty disappointed. I still love all the mechs and toys, though - some of my all-time favorite things in my anime hobby interests.

YahooJP. After fees & shippings, I probably paid about $30, tops. The auction price was Y2000.

I think the hyper-detail and articulation had some initial appeal and novelty for collectors - much like the recent super-articulated Microman toys (which have many of the same problems, but much better tolerances). But the fiddley quality is quickly tiring and frustrating. Unless I stumble across a Fuke or Shinobu for $10 of $15, I won't bother with any more myself. I'm also kind of keen on the Drone, though! (But not enough to pay that price.)

I just got my CMs Dark Mospeada set in the mail yesterday. Thought I was getting the Shinobu Bartley, but either the seller or I made some error in the auction and I got the dark Ray type. Old news for everyone else, but new to me since this is my first Brave Gohkin Mospeada. I think that this thing is laughable. Perhaps if it were 2 or 3 times bigger then the overabunance of engineering, features and articulation would be appropriate. But as it is, the thing seems like some weird scaled-down bootleg of a larger toy. Of course, the windshield fell off when I took it out of the box (the glue had melted away the attachment point on the windscreen part). Loads of cracks and stress marks after assembly. It stands OK in a basic pose without the plastic twig enclosed to help it. Otherwise, the thing is a plastic rag doll, possessed of all the things people normally b1tch about of Toynami's Alphas and Yamato's 1.0 1/160s. But considering the fiddly, problematic results of CMs efforts, $20 was an appropriate price for it (about $15 for the more common Stig & Ray versions) in my estimation, even if the cost of its over-abundance of parts and accessories is far beyond that. The thing is really far overdone for the size or results, like an over-engineered candy toy. I can't imagine the annoyance and frustration of the factory workers who have to assemble these rediculous little tangles of plastic, metal and paint. Yikes! It'll go on display, and I'm glad I have it just so I can have an example of the line. Its pleasing to the eye because of the raw appeal of the source design and the toy's accuracy, but its no fun to 'play' with at all.

Wooooooooooooooowwwwwwww! That's a real beauty to look at. True toy porn!

Save, would you be willing to share scans of the Collection Supplement? I've seen pictures of it, and its got some neat little things in this.

I see the CONVERTORS version usually in lots of Transformers items from the 80s. Since it has no markings, it usually remains unidentified by sellers. There was one of the multi-colored knockoffs of it offered on eBay last week. It may surface again, but the seller wanted $25 or so for it, which was way overpriced unless you're a completest. Attached are pics of the original Takatoku version, pulled from a YahooJP auction a few weeks back. I see very few of these cheapie Takatoku pieces these days. This is the edition repackaged by Select as a CONVERTORS toy back in the 1980s.

I'm doubtful of an all-plastic Legioss from Toynami as well, or any significant revisions of their current tooling. Sadly, I don't think the economics are much in favor of that at the moment. Those I-men look like fun! I picked up a Ben Dixon set cheap at a Gamestop some time ago, and was really very pleased with the little things. All playworthy and no fragile 'collectible' quality to them. Ben's been smirking sideways on our refrigerator for a couple of years now...

I dunno, Jenius. I think I have to nitpick with you there. I don't feel Aoshima's Legioss was really different enough from Toynami's base design to consider it a different design. As I see it, Aoshima's differences simply amount to the revision of a handful of sub-components (upper legs/hip assembly), the little extra missiles and a material grade change on the hands (which might actually have been initiated by their sub-contractor, rather than a deliberate choice on Aoshima's part). What do you have when you separate Toynami's engineering from Aoshima's? A tiny handful of Aoshima parts, a tooling lease agreement and a manufacturng order. Nothing I'd consider all that different from a design standpoint. Aoshima's work amounts to some very minor revisions. Both companies got boned by their factory (I'm assuming the knuckle-draggers who made the Aoshima Legioss set were the same dump that made the recent Toynami Shadow Chronicles Alpha disaster.), so I'm going to spare each company the results of their actual manufacturing as a measure of design. I doubt either company willfully chose utter incompetance as the deciding factor in their choice of a manufacturing vendor. Admitedly, I don't have one of Aoshima's to do a direct comparison to my Toynami examples, but that's the conclusions I come to based on your website reviews and comparisons. But that's my 2-yen: Aoshima's Legioss design is Toynami's, with a couple of small - and unfortunately temporary - revisions. One might hope that Toynami somehow include Aoshima's upper-leg/hip revisions in some future run of the product, but the design is still Toynami's. (BTW - Thanks very much for the I-men review!!!)

I think that's pretty nice! It may not be completely accurate or in-character, but its obviously a real work of love on the part of the creator. And I think the price isn't too shabby as far as garage kits go.

I thought Aoshima's Legioss set were worse quality than Toynami's run, and I don't believe Aoshima has relased a Tlead. And why would Tommy Yune do any head sculpting for them? What the h3ll are you talking about, Danth? Get some more coffee in ya, man.

That's a really astoundingly good little chunk of news, as far as I'm concerned! I'll observe that if all-plastic gift sets are in the works, then I think it may be safe to assume that we may indeed see some tooling & design changes in the Alpha/Legioss - particularly if they're in elements that would have previously been diecast. (I'm thinking of the upper legs in particular, like how Aoshima had revised them.) The molds used for diecast parts can't be used for plastic injection, so if Toynami's going to invest in new tooling to convert the diecast elements for plastic, they would probably consider making a few changes as long as they're making the new set of molds. Of course, with the caveat that they're actually able to invest in a whole new set of steel for the line - considering the state of the economy right now and its effect on the collectibles and hobby market. (Heck, people are even buying 20% fewer Girl Scout cookies now...)