KOG Water Dragon

I asked to get notified when a Death Stranding kit was back in stock. I've been getting an email to let me know the item has come back in stock every day for like a month now.

Oh I know. Most of my Bandai stuff is bought locally now. I just wish HLJ wouldn't open pre-orders until they're sure how much stock they're getting. It seems like they just guess how much they'll get. I'll keep using HLJ for non-Bandai. They've been great for getting the new PLAMAX stuff, kotobukiya stuff like Ikaruga kits and Legend of Galactic Heroes ships, moderoid stuff like the Horizon Zero Dawn kit, and Hasegawa in general. I also get my hobby mags there.

I also just got notice on my Kotobukiya Steel Haze. So I guess it's still mostly a case of HLJ having problems fulilling Bandai orders. And maybe a chance of delay with other popular products.

I fully expect it would cost me over a grand to ship all my stuff.

I'd love to get my stuff shipped from HLJ. But right now, the cheapest way to ship my Queadluun Rau TV version is over 13000yen. That's almost triple the kit cost. It's insane. Queadluun Rau TV version plus Glaug? Over 25000yen to ship. So really, what am I supposed to do?

HLJ got my VT-1 gerwalk in. Better late than never.

The power armors are very cool but I feel like Hasegawa has forgotten what it means to do a new tool fighter in 1/72 or 1/48. 🥲

I assume if you leave the pre-order in place, it'll either stay there forever unfulfilled, or they'll charge you in 2-4 years when they finally have stock for you. Well after you don't want it from them anymore.

My main problem is they are no longer at all reliable at fulfillng pre-orders. But they don't want you to cancel when they can't fulfill your pre-order. They don't want you to be free to cancel and buy somewhere else. I have open, unfulfilled pre-orders at HLJ for the following: HG VF-22S Max HG VF-22S Miria HG VF-31C DX HG VF-31C decals RG Wing Zero EW MG Gundam Barbatos Lupus MGSD Aerial Armored Core VI 30MM Open Faith Armored Core VI 30MM VE-40A Armored Core VI 30MM Weapon Set 06 Kotobukiya AC Steel Haze Hasegawa VT-1 HG GquuuuuuX decal set 1 HG GquuuuuuX decal set 2 ALL of these were pre-ordered right when pre-orders went live. ALL of these are still unfulfilled. I've bought most of these local now. For the MGSD Aerial, I already bought 2 local. But under HLJ's new policy, I can't cancel these. They're just supposed to sit there. Until maybe they get stock in a year or 2, by which time I no longer need them to send me a kit because I got it local. And this is JUST stuff unfulfilled lately, I had to cancel a ton of stuff before they changed their cancellation policy. I bought almost all my HG macross, Armored Core VI 30MM, and recent RG and MG Gundam kits locally, after pre-orders with HLJ all failed. It's the lack of ability to fulfill pre-orders, paired with the new policy of not letting you cancel pre-orders that they fail to fulfill, that sucks.

Well. It's happened. For a while I was just having trouble getting new Bandai items from HLJ. New Macross HGs, Gundam RGs and MGs... And I was like, OK, I'll just have to get these local when domestic retailers get them. At least I can still get other brands normally through HLJ. But now... I wasn't able to get the Hasegawa VT-1 gerwalk, or the Kotobukiya Armored Core Steel Haze. Both went to backorder without my VERY early pre-orders being fulfilled. What even is going on? Between this and the shipping fees and tariffs, HLJ is becoming a lot less useful.

This reaffirms my wish for a VF-11 battroid. Preferably a Hasegawa in 1/72. If PLAMAX does one, that's also cool. And a YF-21 battroid.

If I'm not mistaken, this is the first time the movie version has been available in any scale, and the first time any version has been available in this scale (in plastic)?

Oh lord, it's finally happening. I'm glad it's the movie version first! Now that all the enemy mecha are on the table (at least from SDFM/DYRL), maybe we can get some new fighter types next?

You may not need to join the FB group if they can send you a direct invite to the discord group. But the FB group is good. Lots of builds, news, etc.

It's connected to the Five Star Stories America facebook group. Contacting the admin of the group would probably get you headed in the right direction. I also messaged him to ask how you can get an invite.