sketchley

Yes. The only thing those events really prove, is how terrible a battle tactic the Daedalus Attack is! As a means to quickly dispatch your enemies: terrible! As a means to invade and possibly capture your enemy's ship: possibly ok, if you could sneak in really close without getting spotted (and shot) first.

Thanks. That's one of the reasons I included them - the other being the coolness factor. I didn't know the Su-35/37 had thrust-vectoring. I'm basing the idea off of the 3-D thrust-vector nozzle that was tested on the F-15 ACTIVE, F-16 VISTA, and the F-18 (sorry, can't find a link nor image - saw it once on a NASA website.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-15S/MTD http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-16_Fighting_Falcon Thanks. It is all hand drawn (.50 to 1.0 nibs on 81.4 g/m² Nakabayashi printing paper - neither the worst nor best,) scanned at 300 DBI and "hand painted" in Photoshop. In having completed what I have to date, I am tempted to say that the above submissions are a 'work in progress' and that there is some tweaking needed - especially to the battroid mode. I'm also currently thinking about what accessories it will get (gun pod, FAST pack, etc..) Sadly... work...

Actually they did. They let the SDF-1 punch the nose in one of the latter episodes, and had a bunch of Regults and Gluags waiting to storm the SDF-1 through the open Dedaelus front door. I believe that that was episode 22. Thanks for clarifying the Factory Satellite attack. Though it doesn't really clarify things either way - as the justification for NOT using the main cannon is that they wanted to capture the satellite and destroy the defenders - not destroy both.

I do agree that Macross II was probably intended to be longer and/or better (there is a noticeable drop in quality for the last OVA.) Nevertheless, for what was produced and what it is... see my comments above.

Without the human factor (people brought along with the technology,) I think it would have been lost on the Zentraedi - too little, too late. This is, of course, based on the Factory Satellite episode where, after retrieving it, they comment on how it is partially broken down, non-functional and in need of serious repair.

Then what is the weapon being fired by the ship when they go to capture the factory satellite?

Flashback 2012 - Hikaru, Misa, etc., ride off into their 'sunset' and "disappear" near the center of the galaxy after following some music filled transmissions from that direction. Mac Plus - portrayed a multi-layered colony world quite deeply, as well as pointing the direction of 'Macross future.' Mac 7 and Zero were great, with great themes. Perhaps they were lost on you?

That's humanity as a whole, and not the heroes in particular. Same show, but a different point of view on the story, I guess. I guess I like stories about people who are up against things that truly challenge them, and in the end, force them to change and grow into something else (hopefully a better person.) (Ex: Luke Skywalker, Neo, Erin Brochavitch.) Macross II just doesn't do that for me.

Doodled this up last night. It's the transformation sequence of the VF-5 that I've been whiping up. It looks like it *may* be able to do a gerwalk mode... but it's not going to be a very stable mode on the ground. Perhaps that's why it's so cheap? EDIT: the artwort is available here: http://studiootaking.deviantart.com/art/VF...mation-62766890

NVM - no delete feature !.!;;;;;;

Yes. That's the pre-tax sticker price. Part of the reason is the low print run due to the low demand. Given that I was able to get a new copy from a store that was discounted, you can guess that even the print run was greater than the demand... Some comparison prices: Macross Zero: 5,000 JPY/episode. Star Wars III: 3,990 JPY (w/ tax) Star Trek movies 2x: 2,500 JPY (w/tax) I'd give a ballpark figure of between 2,000 and 4,000 for the average new release. With DVDs that hangout too long in the shop, they get an easy 10 to 50% discount off of those sticker prices.

The 'big plot holes,' so to speak, are the post SWI to the Macross Plus/Macross 7 era. That 'hole' was partially filled with the backstory of both Macross Plus and Macross 7. In addition, Macross M3 went back and did an extensive story taking place in those 'missing years.' Another way to look at is - nothing interesting happened during those years. Well, nothing interesting enough to make it into animation or a video game. Sure, they have ongoing mass cloning and colonization, but is that really enough to keep the viewers interested? Heck, it was the backstory to Macross 7, the justification of being where they were, and it was only briefly dabbled on. IMHO, if we are to see more Macross series, it'll be in opposite directions. Given where Macross Zero took us, I'm not even going to attempt to guess where and what any new series will be.

Just to muddy the waters of this debate: wasn't Breetai operating under orders NOT to destroy the SDF-1 and capture it instead? There are many episodes in the series where the Zentraedi could have easily vaporized the SDF-1, but chose not to, with devestating loses. We know that the Zentraedi fleet has specialized cannon ships - why weren't they used? Until episode 27 we don't know if they existed either. I think this boils down to a case of 'maybe they wanted to do it, but they never found a spot to include it, until the movie.'

The fold generator presumably ran on electricity, which was used to A. alter spacetime around the vessel, or B. punch through to another dimension(AKA hyperspace). The fold effects would seem to imply the latter. There's nothing to imply any sort of exotic energy is needed to operate the fold generators. In-continuity, I'm not sure why it was dubbed the Super Dimension Fortress. Maybe because it COULD fold, or maybe just because it was really huge(large dimensions). Of course, out of continuity, it was intended to be Super Space Fortress, and was engrish'ed. 405660[/snapback] http://macross.anime.net//story/encycloped...fold/index.html I believe the intent is simply that the fortress can go to and travel via super dimension space, and not that there is anything super or extra-dimensional about the fortress (beyond that it can go someplace special.)

We'll I'll be damned. They actually do call it ASS-1 (comes across as ae-esu-esu-won, mind you,) in the animation. I stand corrected.

Interesting... my first tries with the overlay mode ended with mixed results - stronger black lines, but the dark blue went to neon blue... will play more with this later. I should note here that I'm more 'fluent' on Adobe Illustrator than Photoshop... I should note that I had to rescan the original image, as in the creation process of the gif above, I vaporized the 'white' pixels and made the background blank/empty. The white pixels eat up far too much disc space, IMHO.

Notes: legs rotate just above the knees, to expose the knee joints and protect the water skis/keel. Transformation is "like" the VF-17, with the nose/cockpit section first going down (to form the hips) and then the cockpit sliding up into the protective 'cocoon.' I'm not 100% happy with it - specifically the head and chest details. Also, my Photoshop is not behaving itself and it is a struggle getting all the 'white' of the paper out of the original image so that the colour layers underneath show through. Gah! Edit: the artwork can be seen here: http://studiootaking.deviantart.com/art/VF-5-62767743

"Heard?" As in the spoken Japanese? Or in the fan-created English subtitles?

I never said I was including Active Stealth. The claim that I was making when I made that post is that it is possible for every and all VFs except the VF-0 to have it.

Well, why not GASB? It's technically one less keystroke than ASS-1, AND it's official.

Yes, but didn't that mostly occur in the form of a trial, in a space station around Jupiter? (Or was it Earth?) I don't think the point of that episode was about the academy, but more an individual failing to understand what 'leadership' truly means, as they strive to be the best.

I've heard the Gun Destroyer referred to as the Monitor Class too. To be honest, a lot of the info on the QMDB is... how shall I put it? Creative. My recommendation is to refer to the original source material (animations, video games, and lineart books), and Macross Compendium, in that order. Other websites do have information, but you must be careful to avoid the common myths and falicies. For an example, a lot of English web information refers to the SDF-1 Macross, pre-crash, as ASS-1 (Alien Star Ship 1.) In the original series, it is NEVER refered to by this name. In reality, it is refered to as "Macross" or "Giant Alien Space Battleship."* *"Macross Perfect Memory" pages 10 and 11. "デフォールドã—ã¦ãるマクロス" and "西暦1999å¹´ã€å…¨é•·1200mメートルã«ã‚‚ãŠã‚ˆã†ã¶å·¨äººãªå®‡å®™æˆ¦è‰¦ãŒåœ°çƒã«è½ä¸‹ã—ãŸã€‚"

I didn't recal Kamjin's splitting anywhere.I remember BRITAI'S splitting in the factory satellite episode, though. 405395[/snapback] I think he's referring to the final episode - Kamjin attacks the SDF-1 with an underpowered and heavily damaged Gun Destroyer. But yeah, the Zentraedi had only two ships with the big gun (Breetai's flagship) and the Gun Destroyer. The quantity over quality - in the Macross DYRL for the PS1 and Sega Saturn, a single shot from a 'regular' Zentraedi ship cannon vaporizes a good couple of city blocks, with cuncusive force spreading damage further beyond that. They show only 4 or 5 shots hitting the city on South Ataria Island - and those few shots destroy a good half of the city. So yeah, who needs the big guns when you have a fleet of a 5 million plus ships, each carrying at least 8 (conservative estimate) of those 'standard' cannons?

IMHO, the only reason they are contemplating an academy film is because: - it's the one thing that hasn't been dwelved into at great length in anything Star Trek released to date. Sure, they've had flashbacks and 'back in the academy...' dialogues, but nothing definitive. Thus the producers de jour probably feel that it is new territory. - cashing in on the 'Harry Potter' wave. HP = an academy with magic. The HP 'formula' is turning into an "it'll make money" concept... will it work for ST? Doubtful, as ST is supposed to be science fiction* and not Sci-Fi. * Pseduo-science and action aside, the last five ST movies have been great science fiction ones - all meditating on some type of an issue. Only Generations, and First Contact doubled as decent sci-fi movies.

Here's the rear 3/4 view from the underside. The water landing skis, and the nose undercarriage doors have been removed (from the picture) - as they made those parts of the jet visually confusing. The rear landing gear doors have been left in. Edit: the artwork can be seen here: http://studiootaking.deviantart.com/art/VF-5-62767743