jenius

No, actually the OP's question hasn't been answered by anyone... but you guys sure had a fun argument about nothing on topic. So, getting back on topic: Argument 1: The tail fins stay out to elevate the VE-1's radome I don't think this makes a lick of sense. First, why not just put the radome on a bigger pole? Why use the backpack as a prop? If that's unfeasible, why not a telescoping pole for the radome? That's probably the best solution for something that will also transform. Argument 2: It has something to do with it being a 2 seater The altered canopy does require some altering of the chest area but it doesn't seem to necessitate the awkard folded out tailfins of the backpack. Here's a hypothesis for you (and I have no proof whatsoever) I hypothesize the tail fins stay out for the Elint and VT-1 because they are the only ones with fast pack boosters than can actually spin on their attachments to the backpack (again, an unsupported hypothesis). The fixed fast pack boosters on the traditional VF-1 are tucked tight against the body and only can propel the vehicle forward with their main thrust. If the thrusters could be spun up or down then their main thrust could be used for increased mobility. In the VE-1 this might help it get out of a tight jam with limited offensive capabilities and in the VT-1 this might allow an instructor to stabilize the craft or get out of a tight squeeze a rookie pilot might put the plane into.

Yes, I was talking about fighter mode. I went strictly by the instructions the toy came with (which shows the armor being applied in fighter mode) and I knocked off most the armor trying to get the wing nubs to stick in the leg armor. I also knocked off the arm armors several times but again, knowing what I do now I'd probably just put them on last which is a bit tricky but do-able and way less frustrating than knocking them off constantly. I haven't transformed the toy into the other modes, and I scratched some paint putting the armor on in this mode.

I just added the armor to mine for the first time, the locking nubs for the wings took a tremendous amount of effort. My advice, don't put on the missile bays on the legs, the hip pieces with removeable armor, or just about anything else. Get the main leg armor together and then try to lock the wings to the legs. After that you can worry about fitting on the rest of the armor when everything is locked together nice and snug.

psst... QuinJester, Yellowlightman is a bit of a curmudgeon, he was being very sarcastic and making fun of all the people who were saying Yamato should take a stab at the license.

It would put an immense amount of pressure on the backpack joint when the boosters fired but I'm sure there's some lock for that.

Yep, Robotech.com is not the Macrossworld of the Robotech universe. Robotech.com is a business, not a fan site, and they pro-actively do whatever they can on the realm they have created to protect their own business interests. Usually one would think this means that they would have a set policy in writing and any time someone broke the rules they would be in trouble. I would have never thought they'd have so much free time (likely the result of everything being in hiatus) that they could actually monitor their users' activity on other forums and then invoke punitive measures based on perceived infractions that had nothing to do with their own written P&Ps.

I'm not really sure where I stand on this. I'm a huge Mospeada fan, I'd buy one of each if they were made, but I have some doubts about the 1/60 scale. At 1/35 the Tread ends up being overwhelmingly large and isn't enough of an "it" toy to likely warrant being made. However, 1/35 (or thereabouts) is the PERFECT scale for the Legioss. Would I love to see both made in a 1/30ish scale? Absolutely, but the realist tells me that just would never happen. At 1/60 the Tread can be made perfect, especially if it was designed with an attachment to a 1/60 Legioss toy always in mind (which it seems no manufacturer has really done... although Aoshima/Toynami did a good job after the fact of making things work half-decently). A 1/60 scale legioss, without opening missile bays, opening cockpit canopy (honestly, I don't care if the canopy can open so long as there's a decent looking pilot inside and a detailed cockpit), and without landing gears could probably be done alright... but I think people would pan it for having all those features absent.

Are you 100% certain on that? I was pretty sure the courts ruled against BW (again, while defining what BW actually did have the rights to) and found in favor of Tatsunoko having certain rights. It was Tatsunoko having those rights that made BW give up on the whole Macross trademark issue and everything else and focus exclusively domestically.

I don't think it really should ever be said that "BW won" anything. BW actually lost quite a bit. I kind of think of it as BW owning a really sweet car but having Tats tell them "Hey, if you want to go on this street you're going to have to pay us a usage fee." BW took Tats to court and the court said, "The car is definitely yours but you are going to have to pay Tats if you want to drive it down that street." People say BW won because the court case made it clear that they actually were the IP holders for Macross but what they were upset about (from my understanding) was that they couldn't sell Macross Plus merchandise in the US without paying Tatsunoko/HG a cut. The courts said "Without Tats there was no original Macross so you're going to owe them a cut for anything you sell with that name outside of Japan." Since then BW has shrugged, said "F it", made it so all their licenses restrict the licensees to selling in Japan, and have let the Internet and exporters solve that pesky issue about not being able to distribute internationally.

When Hikaru was flying around on Earth in the VT-1, did he fold the backpack all the way down in GERWALK?

I've been tempted a couple times... but never pulled the trigger. It's way over-priced for what it is.

BW forms its contracts to forbid its licensees from doing business with HG (although I'm sure the words are less explicit, something akin to "the licensee is prohibited from entering into corresponding licensing agreements with international bodies.) So there can't really be an agreement where some company (like Bandai was trying to line up) can do business with both BW and HG. EDIT - I have never seen a BW contract and can not swear to this but it seems pretty clear by the number of attempts Japanese companies have made to bring their products to the US officially only to later cite "licensing issues" after Toynami/HG reps stated they were on board.

Yep, unless CMs does some mold milking I'm pretty sure we're done with Mospeada. Toynami seems pretty disinterested in making Shadow Chronicles toys. They were supposed to release superposeables and Imen at some point and instead all that's going to come out are two limited edition repaints of existing Alpha toys and MAYBE a Beta (and fan feedback on that Beta was icy cold when Tommy asked about it at Comic-con).

I wonder if CMs is going to give us a black or general soldier version of Yellow's ride armor.

It makes sense though that Rand would be a pretty tanned guy. He's an outdoorsman from South America.

Meh, I don't care what you haters say, Bandai took a scheme seen in the show as a lighting affect for only several seconds and made a toy of it. That's pretty cool. I'm not saying it's for everyone but if Bandai is going to make exclusives I think this was a great idea for one.

ha, I was editing when you replied. Yes, it sounds dated and lame, but a lot of stuff sounds dated and lame and is still successful. Call it R-Tech, or some fancy name and then put "from the Robotech Sagas" somewhere down below. The name is still the only thing that HG has that they can market. Imagine them going somewhere and trying to pitch a totally NEW and unproven series. They'd be laughed out of the room.

If the story is going to be set in the Robotech universe (even if it's a different era in that universe not directly affecting the original cast, or even an alternate version of the universe) and the story can be told in such a way as to be inviting to new fans then it wouldn't really make sense to ditch the name Robotech. Even if the fans are a tiny niche they're obviously quite dedicated so why not take advantage of that? Heck, they even have a voracious appetite for merchandise, that's not the kind of thing you turn your back on. The "ditch the name" campaign only works if you really believe that more people will be turned off by the name then will gravitate toward it. Since the vast majority of new viewers wouldn't have heard of Robotech they wouldn't be turned off by it. Just so were clear, I'm in the "I don't think the name matters so much so keep it (even though it sounds really dated) but do move Robotech in a direction where it is completely unhindered by the first three wars and Sentinels." I think the Shadow series should be a necessary cleansing for Robotech to wrap up all those loose ends and give the fans the send-off to the characters they want. Then, a future Robotech show can just be any futuristic military show featuring transformable crafts. Heck, at that point the "Robotech" brand can just be used as a vehicle to import dubbed Japanese anime again.

Why not stop now? Protoculture needs to go... and it essentially already has gone by the end of the first Shadow Chronicles movie. Eliminating protoculture from Robotech also serves as a fantastic reason why all new mechs would have to be made and new mechs are really the name of the game when it comes to sequels.

Seeing as Tommy essentially told the crowd "I'm just trying to make as much money as possible with Shadow Rising" I'm going to have a hard time accepting any theories that involve WB having an opinion on that Shadow story arch. Indeed, I find it entirely more plausible they simply don't care about it. Transformers is the the ball that got this rolling and it's been reinvented a billion times and still qualifies as an 80s cartoon. Beast Wars and all that jive didn't stop anyone from advertising that LAM via nostalgia.

Tommy said at Comic-con that Shadow Rising was sitting in pre-production because he's hoping that WB will make the Robotech brand more widely known so he could get better sponsorship deals. He didn't mention anything about WB not wanting to make the movie. It seems to me that it's in WB's best interest if Robotech isn't just the answer to some 80s trivia when the LAM goes into production. Exosquad is good and is on HULU for those who haven't seen it. The animation is bad. The first three episodes are ruined by the show's intro (it's really stupid). After that though things kinda pick up and it's fairly mature as far as cartoons go. Lots of people die, there's some enslaving going on, entire shuttle crafts full of prisoners are flung into the sun... pretty entertaining.

Shadow Chronicles should conclude Robotech as we know it. At the end of Shadow Chronicles the Robotech universe should be brought entirely back together, Earth should be at calm, and everyone should be happy and rebuilding. Then, if Robotech continues from there, it should have a fresh start free of everything that ever existed in the original show. Since Tommy is sitting on Shadow Rising until there's more developments with the LAM I suspect this won't be the case. I think they should have used the Shadow series to keep fans interested in Robotech during the development of the LAM. A new RT animated film every year and then boosh, the LAM and the Robotech universe is cleaned up of the shadow arch and ready for a new tie-in animated series to go with the film.

That's why the scout should come in a 1/10 and 1/55 gift set. The other mechs should come packaged together as a different gift set. Then there should be a Corg gift set (featuring the blue eye and damaged scout). Then there should be a scout in 1/55 gift set featuring three of those mechs with snap on parts including space booster.

Just got my box, here are the contents: 1) VF-25 Michael 2) VF-25 Alto 3) VF-1A Kakizaki 4) VF-1J Max 5) VF-1A Max 6) VF-1J Miria (MacrossTV) 7) VF-2SS VF-19K Basara 9) VF-19P 10) VF-19F 11) VF-19S 12) VF-0D

Shouldn't be snooty and mispell the name of the planet