mpchi

Don't know about the Takara 1:18 Scopedog. But people usually refer it as a modern day Dual Model, which I got both the vintage one & the reissues. The Duel Models are great, with generally tight joints and very solid construction. The re-issue Red Shoulder is awesome quality and loads of goodies. So I am thinking the 1:18 won't be too far off. The Chirico microman, which I have, doesn't look that hot though. His face sculpt is pretty bad. The TV show is awesome. As long as you are not looking for pretty & smooth animation, Votoms is a very good show to pick up. Too bad the OVAs never got any domestic releases. I wanna check those out too.

Dude they did. Page 16, item 13, side picture. They did again, page 15, item 12. Genius. Keeps the valk minty fresh too. I'm gonna try it with that plumbing tape (the one u use to wrap around water pipe joints) which is soft and discreet. 399602[/snapback] Dooode. I just got home and checked the menu. I wasn't smoking crack afterall. The instructions you pointed out weren't the ones I was mentioning. It was the backpack bottom hinge, not the snap lock on the sway bar. The second one simply is that you have to put the sway bar & legs halfway in, then have the nosecone bottom cover close together. I had the bar all the way in first, then couldn't close the cover at all. The instruction didn't point that out. And in VF-1, you put the bar in first, then close cover. I know I am not that bad at following the instructions, especially I can understand a little bit of Japanese. Just to clarify.

I would stay away from the 1/60 if you are being selective with your budget and want a better toy out of your money (except the new VF-0S, which has a totally different toy design and almost just like a 1/48 in terms of size and build).

Man. No wonder some of you guys don't have much problem with looser joints. You have enough copies to pose in all modes that you don't even need to transform them. J/K

Dude they did. Page 16, item 13, side picture. They did again, page 15, item 12. Genius. Keeps the valk minty fresh too. I'm gonna try it with that plumbing tape (the one u use to wrap around water pipe joints) which is soft and discreet. 399602[/snapback] Awww man, must be late night. I did see pictures showing the parts, but not circled or told me to pay attention to like they did on some other areas. Even read the smal print instructions, but I must have missed it somehow. I picked the floss without minty or any flavor of course. Used that to fix some swivels of other toys before and worked pretty good. And you can always take it out later if you want to get rid of it. Just give the swivel more friction, while the floss can get to many tiny gaps like these. Works for me. Nail polish(or super glue) is pretty good too, but I use it more on ball joints or thickening a loose peg. Probably would work on the swivel, but you need to take the legs apart to get to the swivel joint area you need to apply those.

Yeah. I find that too. Wonder why they do away the hook and just use the hex nub.

Finally got to play around with my newly arrived VF-0S. Transformation while similar to the VF-1, but some areas seem less straight forward to figure out. Funny that the instruction left out a couple tricky areas (like the bottom hinge of the backpack to lift it so the back pack sits closer to the back of the Battlroid mode, and the way to close the nose cone cover when storing the leg sway bar). Need to really take my time to figure out how to get those right, without forcing any fieces too much and snap it off. QC-wise, mine is pretty good overall. But I do find both upper arm swivel and knee swivel all pretty loose. I fixed them by looping those swivel joints a couple times with dental floss. If you do it right, you can hide the floss pretty good inside the gap with an Xacto knive. Just be careful when cutting the floss and pushing it in without scraping the plastic. Now they are nice and tight, with a bit of cushiony feel. One of the head cannon is looser, but not enough to cause an issue. All the other ball joints, ratchet and wings are nice and solid. Love the painted markings, and those fast pack snaps on marvelously. Magnet is pretty strong, working better than I've expected. Pretty happy with it overall, regardless need to do some minor fixes. Good stuff.

If you guys like both Huckebsin MKII and Alteisen figure, might as well get the Unifive diecast version. Save you a lot of pain assembling, when the fitment seems a nightmare. Doesn't save you money though. The MKII is awesome and very poseable, and I am still waiting for my Alteisen to ship. Its 1/144 scale, so should be same size as these Kotobukiya.

Cool review Graham. Much more positive, and do the toy justice in pointing out all the improvements on the VF-0S that I wasn't even aware of. Definitely won me over on putting down my money on one. Didn't expect the 1/60 would turn out to be just like a 1/48 in terms of size, design, and details, with even some improvements to boot. Without keeping up with the news, I thought it was just like the older 1/60 designs with just a new look. Glad I am quite wrong on it.

Man, all these cool pics and news made me want one too. Wasn't paying much attention to it the whole way, as Macross Zero didn't grab me as much as the classic did. So I feel less desired to collect any Zero toys, especially when its on 1/60 scale. I try to keep my collection only 1/48. But seeing it being that big and that detailed, it seems to match with the 1/48 just fine. Can't help myself start wanting one. I do hear all these stories of QC issues, but looks like its just a widespread of very few unfortunate customers' stories(mainly the HK thread), not that they are not valid. Buying this would definitely jeopardize/sacrifice some of my planned purchase on other cool stuff in the coming month or two. Really gotta think through this one... Still love the VF-1 more, but the VF-0S started to grow on me. And for once, getting a Focker valk. So tempted now...

wolfx. Don't mean to pin point at your comment. Its more like I saw other people at different forums also referred Karas as sentai or Power Ranger-ish. If all else, its closer to Kamen Riders if someone really have to make the comparison, rather than Power Rangers.

Hmm. Not sure why I hear some viewers refer Karas as Sentai or even Power Ranger rip off. Don't really see a team of five battling here to call it Sentai, nor does it have mecha or style like Sentai shows have often. What is the parallel here? It almost to me like someone saying Big-O is a Gundam rip off. LOL In terms of the storytelling, it works for me. Sure I don't catch all the details the first time through. But the way they reveal more details bit by bit gives me a sense of discovery when watching it, rather than making it very straight forward and predictable. The storyline is nothing we've never seen or heard of before. But at least they tried to present it unlike all the similar action shows we've seen, making it a more unique experience from a otherwise, more straight forward story presentation of something we have seen before. So it may be confusing for some. But I like it that way actually.

Man, talking about those actions. I mentioned to a friend about Karas and he went out and bought the DVD. He end up watching the opening fight sequences for 5 times. Thought I saw a good load of cool action sequence, until me sitting in awe after the first 6 minutes of the DVD. Got to see it to believe that some talented artists out there can really push the art further & further as long as they are willing to.

Oh Big O. Its been a little while since I watched this on my DVD. I still like it quite a bit, even with the unusual 2nd season ending. While I don't thoroughly understand the ending, I still kind of like it. Have to rewatch it again to remember all the little details. But from what I recall, its quite interesting still, and I believe the whole thing circles around the character Angel, like the whole Paradaigm City is a reality she created with her imagination or something of the sort. Again, can't remember the details. But I thought its kind of cool. And she even have her own version of Big! Though I know most people hated it. All I have is the Bandai Big-O action figure. Good sculpt, not very poseable, but build like a rock. It would probably survive being tossed across the room. And stack well along side with my SOCs.

Hey guys. The R1 U.S. DVD release is out, and I picked it up pretty cheap at Best Buy $12.99 (sticker says $14.99, but it actually $12.99 at the cashier & online) and watched it. I was amazed by the quality of this show. Literally everything is done right in this show, from designs, color palette, animation, CG animation, effects, sound, music, storytelling...everything. So surprised a show this caliber was never widely advertised. In fact, I've never heard of it until a friend mentioned it a few months back. And was sitting in awe when finished watching it the first time through. Even the extras in the DVD is pretty good, with some 'making of' material and a old demo trailer from 2003 when the CG technology is not as nice. Interesting stuff. Heard that the vol.2 is coming out in Sept 2006. Gonna be a very long 5 months wait. P.S. The R1 release has episode 1-3, but with the opening & ending in between episodes edited out, and pieced together into a 80 min movie. Don't seem to annoy me much, and maintained the flow of the show pretty well. But just thought some of you that are picky might want to know what Manga did on this release.

I think this is actually a good series. The fanservice is not necessary for the most part. But there are some funny moments and the action is very good for a TV series. For an action robot show, it actually has pretty good story, mainly focusing on the tension of the love triangle, and also a lot of nods to old shows. I think it deserves a much higher score, as the production quality is quite high and its very entertaining for the 1st season I've seen so far. And having a recent cool gokin toy does help.

Thought I could get some good suggestions of low quality anime shows that one should stay away from. But turned out its just a ranting thread of one don't like whichever show just because its not their cup of tea, not because the shows were actually bad. Now if I were to complain, who is going to give me back those minutes reading this? LOL

Gemini sure is the badass of this line. Good to be a Gemini collector.

The head actually looks very nice. Not as nice when the classic mask is on. A bit bulky on the face. But looks very organic and elegant with the mask off, mimmicking the Sirbine look from the OVA a lot! Though the clear brown 'goatee' bothers me a little. But one can always paint it if you want. Vol.2 Virunvee is HUGE compare to Dunbine, which is already pretty big.

Here are my thoughts on this great but delicate figure. The joints are not as sturdy as I thought it would be. Toes on mine are loose, one of my knees is quite loose, while others are tight enough, but not really tight. I did realize that the clear PVC & ABS for joints they use on Dunbine is less rubbery/sticky compare to the regular black ones used for SIC line and causing the joints looser, in order to get the 'see through glowing' look on the Dunbine. This makes the Dunbine a step back from being an action figure, and more of a delicate poseable statue. There are multiple joints on neck, shoulders, and waist, but unfortunately the range is very limited due to parts in the way, making it hard to pose really dynamic poses. And after handling the figure, the spine stand is a god sent! It attaches securely to the deeper ball socket in the back, and making the figure displays very solid in any pose without any worries of toppling over. Without the stand, there is no way the joints would last with all that weight the figure has. After getting familiar with the delicate nature of the figure, this is afterall a work of art by Takeya. So beautiful and so detailed. Accessories are nice as they attaches tightly on the figure. And the hand holds the diecast heavy solid really solid regardless how skinny the fingers looked! The black wash on the figure looks great, similar to other SIC figures. Don't look cheap to me or made the purple paint look any less good. Very nice actually, with an organic dirty feel and brings out a lot of sculpted detail/texture on the figure. Other than the loose joints(which is not much of an issue thanks to the stand), this figure is well worth the $40, and one of the most beautiful figure in my SIC collection.

Agreed.

Drifand, great pics & review. Surprised it matches so well with the HCM Galliar. Fortunately, I am not a big fan of Xabungle, and your review helped me to make up my mind not getting this one. I don't mind the figure small, as long as its well made & very sturdy. But if its fiddly like you mentioned, and a bunch of part swapping, its definitely a big no no for me.

Have DVD vol 1 & 2. Pretty good overall, but not a whole lot of story going on. More like a show just to showcase the few OG robots that featured in this short OVA series in combat action. And there aren't any big bad enemies like in the game. Just a swarm of the same, smart AI robots they fight the whole time. The action figure the limited edition came with is ok. Inferior to MSIA quality in terms of sculpt & construction, but pretty good poseability with double joint knees & elbows. Since a nice SRW action figure is very hard to come by without a big price tag, fans might just pick this one up. With volume 1 - Weisbritter, volume 2 - Cybaster, and volume 3 - Alteisen Reis. These are all smaller compare to the Dengeki Hobby exclusives, and the same scale as the limited Alteisen figure that came with the SRW Impact Limited edition.

Man, I actually took a couple minutes to browse in that website looking for a Gundam...

Its confirmed that all main characters have new casting on the anime, not just radio drama. http://sj.shueisha.co.jp/contents/seiya_hades2/index.html