Seto Kaiba

Presumably the countermeasure dispenser in the VF-1's "backpack", which is known to contain tank-style smoke canisters in addition to chaff and flares. Macross Chronicle mentions a hypothetical "smoke generator" mounted in that same position for the purpose. Macross Chronicle confirms that the Angel Birds VF-1s were, in all respects, fully operational VF-1As (pres. Block 4 type) and that their laser weapons were not rendered inert. It does not, however, confirm or deny that the Angel Birds were pressed into combat service when the Zentradi attacked. While not strictly official, Variable Fighter Master File does assert that the Angel Birds saw combat. Like Macross Chronicle, it doesn't confirm or deny whether they fought during the initial attack. It does, however, claim that the Angel Birds were among the UN Forces personnel who were transported into space along with South Ataria island and became part of the Macross's crew. The unit is said to have been reorganized and integrated into the Prometheus's airwing as Angel Platoon, and served with distinction in several engagements on the ship's return flight to Earth. Following the war, Angel Platoon was retired from combat duty and once again became the Angel Birds flight demonstration unit.

My assumption would be that there's more than one "end" to the launch arm, and there's some end that slips into the gap in the foot and connects to the underside of the craft to move it.

Possibly. It's not said if there are rollers or some other concession to towing it or moving it across the deck. Given that they mention the landing gear/feet it has are mainly meant for emergency landings and parking, I'd assume there's some external mechanism or vehicle to move it onto and off of the deck.

The RC-4E seems to be intended mainly, if not exclusively, for use in space given how much is said about the amount of propellant it carries and that the "feet" it has are mentioned to be its landing gear.

Looks like some poor schlub in the Mines of Nostalgia dug too greedily and too deep if they unearthed this Balrog of a property. What's next? Tattooed Teenage Alien Fighters from Beverly Hills? I swear, I'd almost convinced myself this and Street Sharks were the products of some fever dream and not a real thing that existed.

Time will tell if Walkure's impact on the franchise will match that of Sheryl Nome or Ranka Lee... but I suspect we will not be seeing people clamoring for them to come back the way people have for Frontier's idols. All in all, I suspect we've probably seen the last of Walkure in animation since Absolute Live!!!!!!... It's a jab at Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury... which a lot of folks think is either painfully mediocre or just plain bad.

Nah, you won't whip the fujoshi into a furor with two tops (seme)... you need at least one bottom (uke) in the equation before they'll get excited. (Oh the things you learn dating fellow anime hobbyists... ) Same. Or, at least, make the PMC the villains the way they so often are in reality. The whole "hypercompetent heroic PMC" schtick was already a little stale when Macross Frontier did it, though at least they tried to make SMS seem superficially shady at times. It had crossed the line into being an awful cliche by the time Macross Delta was made, and it didn't help that Macross Delta openly acknowledged that Xaos personnel were unlawful combatants in a declared war the same way real mercenaries would be. Hopefully real world influence will push PMCs out of the spotlight in Macross. There's been an awful lot of news about war crimes committed by PMCs in the last year. Probably indefinitely. Kawamori et. al. seem to have taken the view that the events of Macross VF-X2 led to a major reorganization of the government and military which will likely remain in place going forward. IIRC, they've denied that HG had anything to do with the change in the military's insignia. My suspicion is that we'll see them go somewhere else in the galaxy during the reign of 5th Generation VFs and see some other government's new 5th Gen fighter.

It'll be interesting to see where they go from here with new Valkyries in whatever the next series ends up being. Relatively important, I think... since the main characters are almost invariably pilots in some capacity. Macross - like the real world - rapidly walked back the idea that the 5th Generation was to be the "Last Manned Fighter[s]". I don't think we're in any danger of unmanned fighters becoming the norm anytime soon in the real world or in Macross.

Okie-dokie! I'm bored AF anyway. It's that once-quarterly Agile planning period called Big Room Planning and I've got ****-all to do until tomorrow because of how far downstream of the requirements activity my organization is. EDIT: On the other hand, today brought me what might be my favorite worst mental image yet. "The anatomically-incorrect Halloween skeleton for a biblically accurate angel." I am horrified enough by what this would look like that I would probably buy one just to annoy my brother. So... the actual origins of the Fold Wave System are a bit mysterious still. We know the technology originated in the Macross Frontier emigrant fleet as part of the YF-29 program. The remarks in Variable Fighter Master File: VF-31AX Kairos Plus seem to suggest that the the Fold Wave System is a convergence of two or perhaps three distinct lines of research. First is the work of Dr. Mao Nome into fold wave theory and fold quartz, sponsored by Critical Path and possibly having culminated in the so-called "Manfred Thesis" on the applications of fold quartz in the late 2040s or early 2050s. Second is the work of Dr. Gadget M. Chiba in codifying first the Song Energy hypothesis and then his Unified Fold Wave Theory. Lastly, it may also have developed out of the ancient knowledge and practices of the Windermerean people, who Master File alleges used to specifically wear fold quartz jewelry and create all manner of arrangements and alignments specifically to produce resonant amplification effects. The Fold Wave System (Macross Frontier/YF-29 version) Developed by engineers in the Macross Frontier emigrant fleet during the Vajra conflict, the Fold Wave System uses four 1,000 carat-class ultra-high purity pieces of fold quartz to detect, analyze, and amplify fold waves. This basic function allows it to do three things: Act as a fold wave sensor. Amplify fold waves with synergistic effect to improve the performance of the Valkyrie's thermonuclear reaction engines beyond the normal operational limit. Exactly how is poorly understood, but probably involves improving the operation of the Gravity and Inertia Controller inside the compact thermonuclear reactor to allow it to run at higher temperatures and pressures both inside the reactor and inside the turbine. It's believed that it also improves the function of the Inertia Store Converter and potentially any dimensional beam weapons the Valkyrie may be carrying as well. Use fold wave resonance to draw energy directly from higher dimensional space, providing the Valkyrie with an inexhaustible power source that can allow it to run energy intensive systems that would normally be mode-dependent in ALL modes. Macross 30 and Macross Delta materials imply the YF-29 is extremely impractical to reproduce because the necessary size and purity of fold quartz to build the Fold Wave System borders on impossible to find. Master File came right out and said it, indicating the original YF-29's Fold Wave System can't be reproduced because the fold quartz needed is just not obtainable and using smaller and/or lower-quality fold quartz reduces the system's performance. One additional detail mentioned is that the YF-29's Fold Wave System does not require an external fold wave source to activate, it can be forcibly activated. The Fold Dimensional Resonance System (SMS Uroboros/YF-30) Developed by SMS Uroboros in partnership with Shinsei Industry and LAI, the YF-30's Fold Dimensional Resonance system is an improved version of the YF-29's Fold Wave System with one additional function: it can allow the YF-30 to independently traverse fold faults and the dimensional fault barriers used in realspace by the Protoculture and Vajra. Exact details of its operation are a mystery. The Fold Wave System (Xaos Valkyrie Works/VF-31 Siegfried version) A reduced-capability version of the YF-29's Fold Wave System adopted by Xaos Valkyrie Works on their custom VF-31 "Siegfried" used exclusively by Delta Flight. It uses less, and less pure, fold quartz and as a result the performance improvement it offers is much lower. It still has the same functions as the YF-29's version, but the reduction in performance was enough to permit more than one system to be manufactured. Master File alleges that its use of (relatively) lower quality fold quartz (compared to the YF-29) prevents it from being activated at will. A strong external source of fold waves (e.g. Freyja or Mikumo) is required to trigger activation of the system. When active, it provides a 15% improvement in engine output over the maximum, but with rough handling this can overstress the VF-31 Siegfried's airframe and cause damage. The Fold Reheat System (Windermere Royal Aviation Factory/Sv-262 version) Another take on a reduced-capacity version of the Fold Wave System. Master File seems to imply that this was potentially something developed by the Windermereans based on their own unique and centuries-old understanding of fold quartz resonance effects. It lacks the ability to serve as a fold wave detector and amplifier and it cannot carry out fold dimensional energy conversion to provide the Sv-262 with power. Its one and only function is to provide a short but substantial improvement of the Sv-262's engine output. By dedicating itself to that one area, it produces an improvement almost double that of the VF-31 Siegfried's Fold Wave System (25% on the Ba type, 30% on the Hs type) and it can apparently be mass produced. If the Macross Delta TV series is any indication, sustained use of the Fold Reheat can cause damage to the Sv-262. The Twin Quartz Drive (Windermere Royal Aviation Factory/Sv-303 version) All info is per Master File. An improved version of the Sv-262's Fold Reheat. It has higher output improvement and longer continuous operating time than the Fold Reheat system on the Sv-262. It was developed for the manned Sv-300 and later adopted by the unmanned Sv-303 where it was used to run the drone's overtuned engines in "overdrive" mode constantly. This had some negative consequences for engine durability, to the extent that engines were only good a few sorties before requiring replacement. Needs must as the devil drives and all that...

Development of the VF-25 was a joint venture between the Macross Frontier fleet's local branches of Shinsei Industry, L.A.I., and the Macross Frontier fleet arsenal. (It's also worth noting that basically everything that isn't a weapon, engine, or structural/armor piece is electronics... so L.A.I.'s contribution was quite substantial, and refinements to things like the airframe control AI, sensors, and esp. the L.A.I.-manufactured Inertia Store Converter can have a HUGE impact on performance.)

L.A.I.? A lot of their contribution to the VF-25 was electronics. I'd assume there've probably been incremental improvements (either software or hardware) made to the various radars and other sensors, as well as software improvements to the ARIEL II airframe control AI "Brunhilde". Overall, I'd expect there to be a lot of little updates here and there between blocks to address issues and improve overall reliability. Maybe some minor improvements to the output of the FF-3001A engines and the buffer capacity of the ISC. The big one I could really see them going for would be making a beam gunpod a standard feature for space operations.

Not reactants, just propellant. Thermonuclear reactors in Macross are extremely efficient in terms of fuel consumption and energy generation because they use the gravity produced by heavy quantum for fuel compression and plasma confinement. It requires relatively little energy to maintain the compression once it's established so the reactor's own energy requirement is low and its compression can achieve MUCH higher fusion temperatures than most modern reactor using electromagnetic fields or lasers can. Operating temperatures inside of the engine's compact thermonuclear reactor can exceed 400 million degrees Kelvin. With such high compression and high temperatures, very little plasma is needed to flash-heat air passing through the engine to produce thrust, and consequently very little plasma needs to be introduced to the reactor to keep the reaction going. This allows VFs to operate for several hundred hours in atmosphere because the amount of fuel needed to keep the reactor running and sustain flight is very low since intake air is used to produce thrust. In space, the fuel efficiency of the engine is poor because the plasma produced in the reaction is used in place of air as a propellant to produce thrust... leading to the engine consuming its fuel thousands of times faster. To give you an idea, based on Master File's numbers, the VF-1's atmospheric flight fuel consumption rate is 0.28ml/sec per engine. In space, it's closer to 1,175ml/sec at maximum thrust. Consequently, yeah... the VF-1s seldom strayed very far from the Macross prior to the introduction of the Super Pack. Master File introduced a few interim solutions which were allegedly used to bolster the VF-1's internal fuel tanks during the war, like fuel bladders inserted into the intakes. In most Gundam titles - the only exception that leaps to mind is Gundam 00 - the fuel(s) consumed by the reactor and the propellant used for flight propulsion are different and separate. I know that, in the Universal Century, Mobile Suits use compact thermonuclear reactors that consume deuterium and helium-3 for energy generation and to direct-drive the primary joints in the Mobile Suit's limbs. Main flight propulsion is often presented as a monopropellant thermal rocket system that flash-heats a liquid fuel using heat from the reactor so that it explosively expands out of an exhaust nozzle to generate thrust. Using Minovsky particles to compress the reactor fuel provides similar benefits to what heavy quantum in the Macross setting does, albeit with more drawbacks. Of course, they're not made for long-duration space operations or high linear speeds, so much of their propellant consumption is producing sudden bursts of acceleration and in turning. Not really... most of the attention goes to the beam gunpod and the new railguns, armaments-wise.

It's actually a lot more consistent than you make it out to be because his primary motivator in The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett's flashbacks is revenge. He'd reformed and become a chill dude while living among the Sand People, only going back into the killing business to take revenge for his adoptive tribe being wiped out. He killed the daimyo and a bunch of his subordinates because the real killers left another gang's calling card at the scene of the crime and he didn't question it at all. He killed the daimyo and the biker gang to whom the emblem belonged in the name of revenge for his murdered tribe and, with his mission complete, returned to peaceful living because he believed justice had been carried out. It wasn't until later, when he met Cad Bane, that he learned he'd shot the wrong men and got a chance to shoot at the right men. Considering how often "there is still some good in <dark side user>" is a thing, this strikes me as a very silly complaint indeed. Especially when we're talking about someone even more damaged than the usual dark side user. We're talking about a brainwashed PTSD sufferer powered by Evil Makes You Crazy. Luke knows that there is an actual goddamn afterlife and can speak with (and get hit by) the dead... he's kind of short on reasons to be terribly upset. Especially since he himself is terribly depressed and waiting to die. It's Star Wars, man... multiple rescues are the norm, and silliness and a strained-at-best relationship with common sense is the order of the day. Luke gets rescued three times in Empire alone. Yeah it's a passing-the-torch sort of story... but the cast of Willow was already dysfunctional as all get-out in the original movie. They have NOT changed much. Who are you kidding? His whole schtick in the OT is that he's in hiding because he F'ed up and his student went over to the dark side and became a 7'2" tyrannical asthmatic gimp and lying to his final student to avoid admitting that he F'ed up in the hopes that he'd tie up the loose ends by killing his own father. Welcome to Growing Old™. Like I said, if there's a pattern to Disney Star Wars's success... it's forget the main movies, focus on original stories. The Mandalorian can do better by distancing itself from its obsession with fanservice and focusing on developing its original characters. As it is, because the connections to the films are largely cosmetic, it's far better off than most other projects that are just repeating the same mistakes the old Expanded Universe made.

Normally when Macross publications talk about a Valkyrie's operating time in space what they're referring to is the amount of time the main engines can deliver maximum thrust. Without any Option Packs, the VF-1 Valkyrie's maximum operating time in space was somewhere between 6 and 10 minutes with the Super Pack's conformal tanks extending that to approximately 30 minutes. The Sv-303 Vivasvat's got twice as many engines delivering almost 18 times (17.7x) the thrust of the VF-1's engines, and without any supplemental hardware to speak of it can manage 20-25 minutes of operation above its normal maximum output while the twin quartz drive has the engines running in overdrive and it's fighting something with comparable mobility to its own. Against anything less than a YF-29, YF-30, VF-31AX, or VF-31 Siegfried, it'd probably have a significantly longer operating time.

The problem I see with this line of reasoning is that "stupid" is subjective when it comes to ideas and characters are meant to be people in the story... and people change over time. They're revisiting characters years before or after their first or last appearances in the main series. It's not surprising they'd be somewhat different due to various traumatic events or having not yet experienced those traumas yet. Boba Fett's had five years after a humbling defeat and near-death experience to get his life together and he wasn't exactly young. Luke had three decades of misery after a confidence-crushing personal failure, the betrayal of his best student, the destruction of his life's work, and the return of a threat he believed was defeated for good. That kind of trauma changes people. All in all, if there's a pattern, I think it's "stay the hell away from anything to do with previous Star Wars main series titles... just go hard on original content to avoid any sacred cows", and The Mandalorean does that reasonably well at least.

"Everyone knows RGB lighting effects make your PC faster... so we added RGB effects to our new unmanned Valkyrie to make it faster." "Oh, that explains the massive invoice from Corsair."

The general vibe I get from Disney's Star Wars is that there's a room of suits somewhere who are just completely bewildered and occasionally frustrated to tears trying to figure out what exactly Star Wars fans want from the franchise. First they tried giving fans more of what they loved with a nice, safe sequel based on A New Hope and got reamed for it. Then they did a side story that tied into A New Hope directly and audiences LOVED IT. Then they tried to go in an original direction with the story the way fans demanded and got reamed for it. Then they tried to go back and do another nice, safe side story tied into A New Hope and got reamed even harder. By that point, it's clear everyone was down on their knees weeping and begging the fans "Please, just tell us what you want" and then they tried to make EVERYONE happy and ultimately made nobody happy. It's the same deal with the TV shows. They did The Mandalorian as a fanservice extravaganza devoted to the culture of a fan favorite background character and fans loved it. Then they tried to expand on that with a spinoff featuring that fan favorite background character with similar quantities of fanservice in The Book of Boba Fett, and fans hated it. They tried appealing with a different fan favorite via Obi-Wan Kenobi and got torn to bits for it. Then they go completely off the rails and do a prequel story about a supporting character from the Rogue One movie fans loved and it ran away with the fanbase's hearts somehow. There's little apparent rhyme or reason to it if you're looking at it from a high level or an outsider's viewpoint. To me at least, their confusion is quite understandable. They're trying, but they don't seem to quite grasp what the fans want and many fans couldn't really explain it if asked. They're throwing EVERYTHING at the wall to see what sticks in the hope that they'll find a pattern somewhere.

In terms of its combat record, Master File had the following to say: The SV Works and Dian Cecht completed the Sv-303 shortly before the final battle of the war between the Kingdom of the Wind and the Brisingr Alliance. When they nevertheless got a request to manufacture and deliver 5 Sv-303s, 3 spares, maintenance parts, replacement engines, and 50 mini-Ghosts after the death of their client and his government's decision to pursue peace negotiations, Dian Cecht's corporate leadership became suspicious of the order and launched an inquiry into the legitimacy of the request. After receiving instruction to proceed as directed by the Epsilon Foundation, they proceeded with trial production and were informed by the Epsilon Foundation messenger who came to retrieve the aircraft that a plan to mass produce the Sv-303 had been formulated. These trial production Sv-303s were taken by Sydney Hunt and handed over to the anti-government organization Heimdall along with the cell samples from the Star Singer. Heimdall proceeded to construct the Siren Delta System by cloning the genetic material obtained by Sydney Hunt. The cloned Star Singer cells were used to generate the Siren Delta System's biological fold waves, while amplification, tuning, and processing of the fold waves produced by the cloned cells was carried out by the Sharon Apple-derived quantum AI system. The Siren Delta System's basic personality was modeled on Walkure's Mikumo Guynemer using data recorded by Roid Brehm after her capture during the war. The system's fold wave output was exceptionally powerful, and it was capable of erecting a dimensional fault barrier large enough to protect a Battle-class Macross. By studying the bio-fold wave patterns and behavior of Walkure's members, the Siren Delta System created independent pseudo-personalities "Yami Q Ray" which would operate five Sv-303s and fight against the five members of Delta Flight. There's also a brief section that attempts to explain Star Singers. They're described therein as artificial life forms that were able (created to) connect to the Vajra's intergalactic zero time fold wave network. Since they were designed from the genetic level up to incorporate the Vajra factor, it's possible for star singers to convert thoughts into fold waves directly. It's hypothesized that this may have been done in an attempt to communicate with the Vajra in a way the Vajra would understand. The book assumes that, since the Frontier fleet's population were attacked, that the Protoculture either failed or aborted their attempt to communicate. It goes on to remark that later analysis revealed the genes of singers and singing priestesses like Lynn Minmay and Sara Nome bore some similarities to the Vajra factor used in star singers. ... and that's basically the end of it, except for a few marginal notes near the picture of the Sv-303 battroid that reiterate points from earlier, with the only new noteworthy item being that the "Charya" mini-Ghost being similar to the Sv-262's Lilldraken.

Lookin' at more Sv-303... The airframe overview reiterates a few points previously expressed or otherwise obvious... like that the unmanned Sv-303 lacks any pilot safety systems, EX-Gear, and ISC. Curiously, it's also described as having done away with a lot of other operational safety features like IFF, conventional communications systems, and conventional sensors. All of the omitted systems make the Sv-303 extremely lightweight as a fighter. The space vacated by these systems has either been used to reduce the size of the aircraft or repurposed as fuel storage. The so-called "Mirage Package" system seems to border on a "does-anything" system in this description. Not only does it function as the Sv-303's energy conversion armor and a bio-fold wave transmitter/receiver/amplifier distributed across the entire surface of the airframe that allows it to be controlled remotely by the biological fold waves broadcast by the Siren Delta System, it also: Allows the entire surface of the aircraft to serve as a multidimensional sensor system. Functions as a point-to-point communications system allowing Sv-303s to communicate with each other. Produces an active stealth effect by phase shifting it slightly from normal space using amplified fold waves, making it difficult to detect with radar and laser detection systems. Illuminates the surface of the aircraft. The weirdly multifunctional nature of the Mirage Package is noted to come with a significant drawback. In operation, the Sv-303 is constantly emitting fold waves. The same fold wave energy that conceals it from radar and laser/LIDAR systems makes it paradoxically high visibility to anyone looking with fold wave sensors. The only reason this is not considered to be significantly disadvantageous is that aircraft-mounted fold wave sensors were relatively rare at the time it was developed. Another mentioned drawback of the Sv-303's design is that the excessive power of its four engines and the support needs of its six attendant "Charya" mini-Ghosts means it can only carry enough fuel for about 20-25 minutes of combat maneuvers against an enemy aircraft with similar performance. It's noted that it has the ability to refuel and recharge the mini-Ghosts from its own generators and fuel tanks, though this reduces its operating time accordingly. The control AI system is stored where the cockpit would have otherwise been. It lacks a canopy because the Mirage Package functions as an integrated multidimensional sensor, but when in Battroid mode a fold wave focusing array sensor stored in the cockpit area unfolds as a "mono-eye" that can be used for precision scanning. To conceal its true nature as an unmanned aircraft, the Sv-303 was outfitted with a dummy cockpit for part of the manufacturing process. The cockpit block would later be removed and replaced with the quantum AI system. The main quantum AI system is supported by a pair of Brunhilde II airframe control AI systems, an improved version of the Brunhilde+ on the Sv-262, which performs the normal airframe control AI functions (with the quantum AI as a "pilot") and also coordinates the operation of the Charya mini-Ghosts. The two main engines are reiterated to be the same FF-2999 series engine as the one planned for adoption on the Sv-300 (an improved version of the Sv-262's engine), performance boosted by the twin quartz drive system. The two sub engines are noted to be the same as the YF-29's auxiliary engine (meaning the 1,970kN is almost certainly incorrect since the correct figure s 1,470kN). The transformation can deploy the engines in an X-shape, and the main engine can rotate 360 degrees, dramatically improving maneuverability in space. The wing area is small, to the point that they can be thought of more as a support frame for the engines and a place to hang weapons. The engines themselves have been reinforced to better withstand the increased output, but the additional strain on the engines imposed by constant operation of the twin quartz drive for combat maneuvers means the operational lifespan of the engines is only a few sorties. As such, the engines were designed to be quickly removed and replaced. Armaments-wise, the Sv-303 is also a rather bizarre aircraft. It has no internal missile bays or micro-missile launchers to speak of. Just a pair of 25mm beam machine guns on the sides of its nose and a build-under-license version of the YF-29's TW2-MDE/M25 MDE twin beam cannon mounted dorsally. It has four underwing pylon stations for high-speed small reaction missiles (variable yields of between 25Kt and 100Kt) and a General Galaxy-designed 35mm beam gunpod outfitted with Mirage Package armor by Dian Cecht. The mini-Ghosts it supports (six in total) function as support beam guns and micro-missile launchers when docked, being armed with two small micro-missile launchers (each holding six micro-missiles) and a 30mm beam cannon. The mini-Ghosts have no reaction engine of their own, and are powered by a high-energy capacitor recharged off the Sv-303's generators and can be refueled by tapping into the Sv-303's internal fuel stores. The Sv-303 can control up to twelve mini-Ghosts at a time, and can take over control of mini-Ghosts from destroyed Sv-303s to keep them in the fight. Communication between the mini-Ghosts and Sv-303 is carried out via fold waves. They have energy conversion armor, which can be externally powered by the Sv-303 when docked. Because the mini-Ghosts have no independent generator and run on a capacitor only, their operating time is very limited (assumed 5-6 minutes). Its reaction weapons are noted to be low powered ones with less stopping power than the VF-1's RMS-1, but compensate by being very small and difficult to intercept.

Credit where credit is due, they're trying and they're putting in some serious effort and doing a fair amount of innovating. It surely does not help that their audience is infamously difficult to please... or that they're competing against decades of rose-tinted memories and fevered imaginings. I'd definitely like to see The Mandalorian go less hard on the fanservice, but it does offer some good hefty action sequences if nothing else.

The bugs didn't start packing heat until partway through the MOSPEADA/New Generation storyline tho. Mind you, the whole scale problem rears its ugly head again there because the bugs being able to shoot you at a distance of a few hundred yards isn't especially threatening if you can flatten the entire continent they're on from hundreds or hundreds of thousands of kilometers away. (And that isn't even unique to the Zentradi, it was Humanity's fallback plan in the original MOSPEADA too and the attempt alone was enough to convince the bugs to get out of Dodge.) As with most things with that property, the longer you look at it the more you notice how threadbare and full of holes it is... and as admirable as it is to see fans attempting to paper over the worst holes, a lot of the time the fix is every bit as ugly as the problem. Like how the explanation that was settled on (and later became official) for the odd design choices made in Southern Cross's mecha was "corruption, incompetence, and administrative butthurt"... which didn't go over well with the minority of Southern Cross fans for some reason.

For the record, the Kingdom of the Wind didn't develop the weapons its Aerial Knights use. Their ships, their Valkyries, and presumably the rest of their military hardware is all purchased from the Epsilon Foundation's many subsidiary corporations. A lot of their ships seem to be build-under-license versions of General Galaxy warship designs (modified reuses of the Dulfim and Kaitos classes). All of the Sv-# Valkyries were/are developed by the design lab called SV Works* and manufactured by an Epsilon Foundation subsidiary company called Dian Cecht. Official materials had previously suggested that the Kingdom of the Wind (and more specifically, its royal family) had provided essential materials (read: "fold quartz") to support Dian Cecht's manufacture of the Sv-262 for their forces. Master File seems to be suggesting that the Royal Aviation Factory on Windermere IV was more involved than previously believed, and that some of the more exotic systems used in the Sv-262 and Sv-303 were developed locally by Windermere IV's Royal Aviation Factory and then provided to Dian Cecht and the SV Works for inclusion in the final design. That list seems to be limited entirely to systems based on Roid's research into fold quartz resonance effects like the fold reheat system used on the Sv-262 and the Sv-303's twin quartz drive and bio-fold wave communications system. As explained above, Windermere IV didn't develop any of their VFs... but they did provide requirements to the team that developed them. The Sv-300 seems to have been a fairly traditional 5th Generation VF that simply aimed to exceed the performance of the Brisingr Alliance's next main fighter. Somewhere along the way, Chancellor Roid Brehm seems to have decided that an unmanned fighter operated by bio-fold wave remote control was a better way to counter the numerical superiority of the New UN Forces. (It may have been motivated by Prince Heinz's failing health.) * Established within General Galaxy by one of its cofounders that worked on the SV-51 program before defecting to the UN Government, and apparently later either spun off and sold to the Epsilon Foundation or operated as a joint venture with them as Epsilon's Dian Cecht seems to be responsible for manufacturing the SV Works designs.

In the parts I have read thus far, they don't say. It is simply noted that the other two engines were omitted when the VF-31X conversion/upgrade parts the Macross Gigasion was carrying were hastily adapted to repair Delta Flight's badly damaged VF-31 Siegfrieds after the retreat from Windermere IV. Not a clue. If I were to guess wildly based on nothing but vague intuition, I'd assume it was so that the VF-31X could accommodate the same FF-3001/FC3 engines mounted inside of the legs in the wing mounts. I do appreciate the beautiful irony of Master File's development history for the Sv-303. Windermere IV put a tremendous amount of time, effort, resources, and energy into betraying their former allies in the New UN Government and developing weapons to conquer their territory only for their new ally to betray them and for them to wind up conquered by a new enemy with designs on their territory using the weapon that was meant to be their trump card. It couldn't have happened to a nicer pack of xenophobic arseholes.

Huh... what a conundrum. Do I mock this obviously half-arsed PV for the unasked-for TNG cast reunion Picard was never supposed to become? Or do I praise the Paramount marketing team for putting the absolute minimum amount of effort into trying to polish this already-cancelled turd propping up the bottom of Star Trek's franchise page on Rotten Tomatoes? Worf is the character with the most appearances of any character in all of Star Trek (272 and counting!) and they promote his return with that?

None that I can see... the publisher hasn't accessed Kickstarter since mid-December and hasn't posted an update since October, when they announced a 6+ week schedule slip due to the game's art and a tentative plan to release to backers in Q1 2023. Mentions of the game seem conspicuously absent from the publisher's Facebook page, and the page devoted to the book on the publisher's website is just a plug for the Kickstarter. Kinda, yeah. None of the three shows used in Robotech's haphazard creation worked on the same scale. It didn't pose much of an issue for the TV series because the three "sagas" all were kept segregated with no crossover, but it started to become quite silly in original materials when you had things like the Invid posing an actual threat to the Zentradi.