Bariaburu Faita

Well, the last batch of Hikaru VF-1J 1/48 non fastpack that I know of in the Osaka area sold out. Volks had a 50-70% off sale today, on EVERYTHING. All the 1/48 were gone by the time I got there, even the 1A Hikaru Lets hope for a bundle pack release for the GPB

No, have not talked to either of them recently, but based on their most recent posts probably not. When all else fails, ask them via PM

Its still in the industry only half. It wont be open to the public untill tomorrow.

Old school fansubber signing in. Did some stuff in the early 90`s, on an Apple IIc! I vote for keeping it simple. just using lieutenant instead of adding Mr. or Second before it. Adding a MISTER before the lieutenant adds a bit of a overly serious tone, it is used slighly differently than the San honoriffic in Japanese. Keeping it in Japanese and adding addtional subtitles explaining it I am also against. Make it easy to read, trying to get a perfect translation is futile. Try to get a good overall feel for the sub job, and stay faithfull to the overall themes.

Right now, the Shizuoka Hobby Show is in the trade only portion, 12th through the 13th. It wont be open to the public till saturday and sunday. I was debating on going, but its over halfway to Tokyo. Would cost alot to go and dont have enough cash on hand to pick up extra CF`s.

Yeah, those were good times. Bariaburu Faita and Samurai Monkey, or anyone in the Hankyu Railway area may be interested in the "Eureka Seven Stamp Rally" that's going on for another couple of weeks or so (you may have seen the posters on the train). You can win a PSP. And a sticker. Yay. Hell, if you need to come all the way to Katsura to get one, I'll even meet you there since I just moved to Kyoto. I'm in Tokyo at the moment, though, so it'll have to be next week. Yuck, stamp rallys Silly ploy to get people to ride trains back and forth, and in circles. Sorry I`m going to pass on that one.

Where is this dead stock??? A few days ago i searched all over the net for a vf-1J, and the cheapest i could find it for was $168. Everywheres its sold out, except at hobbyonsale it seems... Where else is it availble? The Volks at Nipponbashi has a small number of the VF-1J Hikaru 1/48. Kotobukiya also has a small number of the super version.

Here is a possible way to find out the answer. What is his nationality? That might give a starting point on how it should be spelled. I was under the impression that he was Russian. And Gloval sounds a bit more Russian than Global. Anyone out there familiar with the cyrillic spelling?

Ok, so it looks like it is a Regult, I would have expected the katakana to be Rigaruto instead of Rigaado but as the saying goes, tomayto/tomahto. It would make more sense to be 1/72 since their previous destroids were all 1/72. But they were all priced under 10,000yen (except for the monster) so with this one being 28,000yen it will probably be 1/35. Although it is a strange decision, it would be kind of cool to be able to display it with all the military kits availible at that scale.

It seems that next Wonderfest there will be a 超時空要塞マクロスシリーズ©1982ビックウエスト 　 ・1/35スケール　「1/72イメージスケール リガード」 　 28,000円 up for sale from Patemori-Soba. Somewhat confusing description though. What do you other translators think? "1/72image scale regard?" Regult maybe? Whatever it is its going to be expensive.

Congrats also. I am also the owner of a KLM from serving in a HFZ in operation southern watch. Appreciated the combat pay and no taxes withdrawn from pay more though

Design of the toy and the marketing deals were very likely done before the first episode was aired. Was quite a risk for them to do this.

YIKES. Between THAT and the SOC Voltes V Bandai is gonna destroy my wallet BIG TIME. Thats about the same retail price as a fast packed 1/48 VF-1J. I`m guessing it will be worth it as Bandai has shown they put more than enough value into their high end toys

They originaly went for 1,200yen. Nowdays go for about 5,000yen. So $50-60 sounds about right.

The official publications state that the phase shift, and trans phase shift armor are ineffective against beam weapons. Phase shift is only a surface enhancement. If the beam penetrates it the next defense is the actual physical armor, and structure of the MS. In previous shows like UC Gundam the Gundams had better lunar titanium alloys compared to cannon fodder MS. This is probably the case in Seed, although its just speculation on my part.

Why did they release VF-1 then separate VF-1 with fast packs? Probably the same reason.

WTF?! thats not what I wrote

Woah, dont take this so seriously guys. Remember these are all speculations, we could all be wrong or right. If I were in Yamatos shoes, I would start out with a small, say 5,000unit run of the GPB armor only. Small enough that the average Macross fan on the street will say "Holy poo! Unless I get one now I might never get one!" If it tanks, and no one buys it, stop right there and cut losses and move onto BGC and Megazone toys. If it sells out, ramp up production and put out a medium sized production run of the GPB and 1J set, say 10,000units. Once thats done, wait a year or so. Based on reports from retailers, distributors and fans release a final run of just the GPB. This way, total run of both units is over 15,000 enough to cover development costs and decent profit. At the same time reducing financial risk by not putting all your eggs in one basket.

What do you mean "probably" Go up to K-books in Osaka and look at the display by the counter on the 4th floor. Not that I regularly shop on the 4th floor, just saying hypotheticaly that if there were any, thats the spot to find them at

Is this insider news or things you noticied while shopping for Yamato merchandise? This is stuff I just noticed shopping around in the Kansai area. Places that had the Hikaru VF-1J in stock before are sold out. And less of the fast packed ones remain.

hard to say, getting inside info from Bandai is even harder than Yamato. It does seem that Hasegawa has only been releasing M7 kits that Bandai didnt, the VF-22S for example. They have not released a kit of something already done, like the VF-19 custom.

Here is a not so surprising development. 1/48 VF-1J Hikarus non fastpack are selling once again, almost gone. The supers are also selling, but not as fast. Very smart of Yamato to just announce the GPB pack without VF-1J. The retailers who were sitting on dead stock probably are happy.

While luck is a big factor in getting rare kits, ChristopherB takes all the necessary precautions to reduce luck as a factor.

Oops, might have gotten some kits mixed up.

What, no one remembers my 3,000yen Club-M YF-19? A couple years back it was not uncommon to see Club-M kits going for a fraction of their original price. Specificaly the 1/72 scale VF-1, YF-19 and YF-21. This was obviously due to the same scale Hasegawa kits being released. The other kits like the 1/72 VF-17 stayed at their origninal price or higher. Its hard to make out the prices for the various plastic kits, but they look to be in the 2000-3000yen price range which is a bit excessive. If you check mandarake frequently you can find some of them for under 1000yen.