Chronocidal

I'd be pretty surprised if Bandai actually does the whale blood version, though a few people joked about that as a limited run for the Yamato when it came out. If they did that as an exclusive, and made the plain white one a regular release, I'd be perfectly happy, but I wouldn't put it past them to only make the bloody one, and never give us the clean version.

The one you're thinking of is the VF-19P, and so long as Bandai doesn't just drop the line abruptly, it's the most similar model to the Fire Valk, since it only needs a new head, gunpod, and leg panels, since they put back the lower leg fins seen on the YF-19. Something to note, the HMR Fire Valk already has the peg-holes necessary to mount those fins on the shoulders. Whether they actually make it remains to be seen, but this one would be the least work to produce after the Fire Valk. I wouldn't expect this one to be a regular release though, so probably more likely to be a webshop item.

Yeah, it's a mistake alright. There's a big smudge in the middle of the wing where it looks like someone just jabbed there thumb before the paint was dry. Unfortunately, I'm probably out of luck returning it to BBTS, since they don't offer returns for "minor paint defects," which.. I wouldn't call it minor, but it's not a huge glaring issue. I contacted ThreeZero directly to see if I can just get a replacement part for that wing, since I've read they do offer pretty good service for parts replacement. As far as transformation goes though, I'm actually pretty satisfied that I was able to fix the arm sliders myself. The backplate is pretty easy to completely disassemble, just a few screws, so I was able to get to the arm sliders to work on them. What it resulted in was me having to drill them out so they would actually move under a reasonable amount of force. Note, I didn't drill them completely, because then there would be absolutely no friction, and there's no solid locking mechanism for them in fighter mode. I basically drilled halfway into each slider with a 7/16" drillbit, and it reduced the friction enough that I can move them reasonably easily, but they don't slop around. So.. overall positives? It looks good. Probably best in battroid as others have noted, since the chunky arms don't work well for fighter mode. Like I mentioned before, the landing gear doors are a serious mechanical improvement over Bandai's. Paint all looks good, minus that wing, and the panel lining isn't as stark in person as it looked in early shots. The details like the lenses on the wrists and lower legs are a step up from plain tampo like the Yamato, or even the molded detail on the Bandai. I'm not sure they're supposed to be lenses, but they look nice that way. The wrists are just metallic paint, but it pops. The negatives of the design are pretty numerous though. No ratchets anywhere to be found, and it actually makes posing battroid and gerwalk pretty precarious. My ankles are giving me flashbacks to the Yamato Fire Valk's, and they take some careful balancing to make sure they don't just collapse. It even has issues standing on the feet in fighter mode, which is something I've never really seen happen on any VF-1 before, since most of the weight is low to the ground in that position. It's not exactly wobbly, but give it much of an angle, and it just flops over. As mentioned, yeah, there are no hands in the arms at all. It's really bizarre that the entire arm opens up with a ton of space, and it only stores the peg to mount the fixed pose hands on. If they had reversed the hands to put the socket on the wrists, there would have been no reason to open the arms at all, and you could have just snapped covers over them. I would have been perfectly fine with even some basic blocky G1 Jetfire hands to fold out, but there's just nothing in there. Generally the design uses the same attachment pegs for the legs and arms as Bandai, with all of the same detriments. They just sag overtime. Nothing locks the arms in place in fighter at all, they just stay up by friction in their joints, and that same vertical peg into the elbow. Only, unlike the Bandai version, the arm-locking pegs are actually metal on this one, which means it's much more difficult to sand them down to make them fit, and the arms just pop off constantly. No painted gear, like Bandai, and there are some odd exposed metal joint pins on the legs that probably could have been covered somehow. The locking buttons for the legs and feet? I admit they're a novel idea, and function as intended. But they're more of a nuisance than anything else. I'd much rather have simple clicking extensions. And there is absolutely no clearance for the gunpod on the gear. The arms are just far too thick, and it drags on the ground in front and back. The gunpod is also quite a bit larger than the one on the 1/60 Yamato, so that's part of the issue. It looks like it was scaled based on the Bandai DX instead. Now.. the weird bits. This thing.. is really hard to pin down. It feels like a three-way hybrid between a Bandai DX, a Yamato 1/60, and an HMR. It has a pile of features lifted directly from the Bandai DX design (the foldout support in the backplate for battroid mode, the shape of the built-in neck and shoulder covers, the hip mounting door in the nose, the sideways joints in the hips, the shape of the feet and thruster vents, the folding nosecone). But the overall shape of the valk in fighter mode though is closer to the more raked angular look of an HMR VF-1, with the arms angled so that the gunpod would probably blow the nose off when fired. It also has the exact same ratcheting joint content as an HMR, which is to say, none at all. All friction joints, all the time. Although.. the side view even reminds me of the 1/72 Hasegawa mold. The whole body is fairly angled, with the legs angled downward pretty noticeably toward the rear. The size is almost dead-on identical to a Yamato v.2 1/60, though the chest profile is a bit wider, and closer to an HMR, which probably helps the battroid proportions. It's just such a bizarre combination of best-of/worst-of from all of the major manufacturers. I bet if I had a KC 1/72 to compare, I would probably find features copied from that one too. It's just.. weird. Though, on a slightly hilarious note.. for those of you having issues with the missiles not fitting... If you happen to have that Fugu-01 Jetfire that just came out? The missiles fit it perfectly. I did also try the missiles from a standard Yamato release, and while the TV and box missiles don't fit, for some reason, the reaction missiles somehow do. Otherwise, the holes are slightly too small for the standard Yamato hardpoints, and there's no locking ring for the clips to engage with. As far as the stock missiles go, I'm leaving them in the box, because they're roughly 60% of the size of the Yamato 1/60 ones, and look ridiculously tiny.. besides also being far too big to actually fit into the mounts they're intended for. I'm just going to stick with the Jetfire set, since they look much better, and forcing the included missiles in would probably spread the mounts, and ruin their unintentionally perfect fit... though, on the other hand, spreading those mounts might make them fit standard Yamato missiles too.

Just got my copy of this one from BBTS.. and I'm kind of just wondering what to do with it at this point. It's not badly designed, or badly made, but a couple of issues are making me consider just returning it. First off.. the arm sliders are impossible to move. They do not slide, they will not budge with even what I would consider excessive force on the entire arm, and even trying a drop of machine oil did not loosen them up enough to slide more than a quarter of the way, and that was only by wiggling the arms back and forth with the legs completely removed to give me room. The toy, in its current state, is completely incapable of transformation to fighter, because the arms cannot be pushed in with the legs attached. It.. otherwise works.. and looks fine. Maybe it's best left as a battroid only figure though? Just disappointing that the tolerances are so impossibly tight, because it otherwise looks fairly good. The funny thing about it to me is that it actually gives me the impression of being a bootleg Bandai DX. Some of the features are suspiciously similar, to the point that it looks like they just copy pasted Bandai's work and shrunk it down. Also.. I'm kind of pissed about the "protection" they installed for the paint, and wish they wouldn't have bothered. Whoever wrapped the wings to protect the paint managed to achieve the exact opposite, because they managed to slap tape directly onto the paint, and dissolve the stripe in the middle of the wing. It came off with the tape. Yeah. Not a good start to an unboxing. I don't know. I'm irritated about not even being able to transform it, I'm pissed off about the paint, and thinking it's just better off sent back. Really a pity because it looked so promising, and whether this specific one is just a lemon, it kind of satisfied my curiosity about the dumb elbow joint, because nope, it doesn't bend where it should, and maybe I'm just better off getting my money back for a failed experiment. I will give them credit though, they managed to design much better main gear doors than Bandai. They actually fold out without the sliding hinges I'm so tired of, and managed to get out of the way of the strut with no trouble, so there's none of the goofy sliding the door up and down to find the right position that doesn't conflict with the strut and leg fin like the DX has. Edit: On the other hand, I might be able to just order a replacement wing from the company directly, since ThreeZero might actually be able to provide after-purchase service. I'm not sure if I care that much if it can't transform, but we'll see what they say, and whether I can just order a wing without missing paint.

Hopefully it plays for you, but this clip shows him doing the zip line. I also picked up a long distance shot that gives perspective about how big the valk is relative to the buildings around it. You can barely see the head peeking out on the left.

The Yamato might be closer in scale, but the overall functionality and stability of the Bandai release generally tops it in almost every way, from what I recall. It's definitely based on the Frontier styling though, which has some differences from the original VFX game artwork. If you're not opposed to building kits, there also is the VF Girls kit of the VB-6, and it's engineered to mostly function independently as a fully transformable model without using the figure intended to ride it, but it makes some compromises on the proportions. It's also closer to 1/150 I think, so significantly smaller by comparison, but also closer to the VFX lineart than the Bandai Frontier interpretation. The only real benefit though is the price, and relative availability compared with the Bandai and Yamato versions. It does display pretty well as the shuttle, but not as well in the destroid or battroid modes, due to the scaling and size compromises. https://www.hlj.com/macross-delta-vb-6-konig-monster-reissue-aos06428-2 Here it is compared to the Bandai version: The lack of the backend is due to turning the chassis into a motorcycle-style mount for the figure it came with. I'm not entirely sure why the guns are so undersized though, since the shuttle proportions worked out so similarly.

Boy, I will always have a weakness to this design and mold, in pretty much any scale. I'll be curious to see what shade of blue Bandai settles on for the VF-19F/S if they do them... but I will probably buy multiples of all of them regardless. I feel like the lack of canards makes the nose seem longer, with less of the LEX issue, and it just looks so good. : Interestingly, the Fire Valk should be the only one that actually needs any parts swapped on the head, since it's the only one with the side lasers that fold in. They aren't actually ball jointed, the lasers on the 1/60 just had a tiny hinge that let them fold inward, and there was no way to replicate that on the HMR. Aside from those, it's pretty impressive that Bandai replicated all of the other necessary panels and moving parts to get the Fire Valk's head completely hidden exactly the same way Yamato did in 1/60. The S and F head lasers both stick up above the shield, and while the VF-19P's arrangement is closer to the Fire Valk's design, the side lasers stay elevated above the shield, so they won't need to be swapped.

I wouldn't necessarily count on there being a VF-11B/C if they do Sound Force, since there's pretty much no commonality between the MAXL and the normal VF-11. I can't think of a single part they could actually share... maybe landing gear? Everything is a completely different shape. I'm right there with you wanting them to make both designs though, along with Ray's VF-17, since neither have ever been done in any sort of transforming format that I know of.

Mnn.. below MSRP this soon isn't a good sign though, unfortunately. I was hoping Bandai was somewhat committed, since it includes the details necessary for a VF-19P, but I guess it wouldn't greatly surprise me if they just walk away from the series after this, despite the Sound Force tease.

I would probably wait to see what the plans are for the VF-19 mold. Whichever you actually like better, the old one is likely to drop in price once a new one is released, and be easier to pick up from people upgrading. I think it's fairly likely they will do the other 19 molds, since the conversion is so simple, but what's kind of funny is that the VF-19P is actually the most direct color-swap from the Fire Valk, so I would not be terribly surprised if we see that next as a webshop release.

There are a few reviews I've seen on Youtube of the Fugu Jetfire, and at least one compares it directly to the KC version, if you want a more specific comparison. For me, the existence of the Fugu version stopped me from buying the KC option, since I've never cared for how their 1/72 looks in fighter mode.

Oh, I was thinking of all of the copy-pasted knights that got next to no development or even dialogue. We had Keith and Ketchup, then there were creepy twins, the actual cannon fodder character who died early on, and the two vets, and I can't remember the names of any of those. I want to say the two older guys were treated better, but I barely remember anything they did.

Looks really good for a first print! Yeah, auto-supports will do that a lot, and learning what direction to orient prints is an art unto itself. The process I've gradually developed for larger prints is to build thin supports into my models that will give protection to any hard edges, and essentially give me what resembles a pour stub on a resin kit. It's much easier to cut and sand down those supports than it is to rebuild a mangled shape, and when you are printing long thin parts, it really helps to have the extra margin for error. Depending on what material you're using, you might also be able to just use a filler primer, or even make a putty with some of the filament, and use that to smooth over the ugly parts.

Amen, and I'd love to see proper kits of more of the designs as well. Maybe we need to convince Project Aces to make a Yukikaze Ace Combat game to convince them... and now I'm sad that that doesn't exist. (Though it might exist as a Project Wingman mod, which is almost as good, just without any licensing potential.) In terms of the resin production though, I'm curious what the financial comparison would be, in terms of effort and production cost. The printers drastically reduce the initial part design cost, completely eliminate the expense for the molds, but add a lot more cleanup, and probably a fair amount more production time, not to mention the setup for dealing with the fumes and other hazardous materials. Some of that applies to normal resin casting as well, but being able to completely skip the molds feels like a nice benefit.

I hate how accurate this is. A flying tentacle space monster makes a more streamlined and more airworthy-looking aircraft than the bots that actually turn into aircraft.

The last console generation I bought into was the PS3/360/Wii, and I think it's just going to stay that way. I might get a Switch II, just because Nintendo is still a rather unique perspective in the market. Playstation and XBox consoles at this point though are just glorified PCs with custom UIs, and very few games for either don't wind up being on PC later anyhow. I'm generally in no rush to play any game, so sticking to one platform to play everything makes much more sense, especially when my primary genre (flight simulation, with or without VR) is something that only exists on PCs to begin with.

Not quite 1/100, a lot of the HMRs come out closer to 1/90. I'd say this is about as close to perfect transformation as you can get at this scale. You will need to swap to fixed pose hands to hold the gun, and the landing gear struts snap into bays with opening doors. There are also a pair of swappable head antennas that stick out to the side further, but they included narrower ones that let you transform the head without any parts swapping. I think the only one closer to perfect transformation at this point was the VF-4, just because you don't technically need to swap the hands, since it was never supposed to hold a gunpod. I think Bandai just included one because Yamato/Arcadia did with theirs.

Or.. you know. His super parts from the original series that we've been waiting on for several years now. I don't think Bandai is going to attempt a series with this many characters again. The way merchandise gets pushed based on character popularity is completely at odds with a series like this where every minor schmuck gets their own paint scheme. We need to go back to brownie units.

It's going to be strange not seeing him pop up in seemingly everything. Agreed on the roles he took.. he didn't lead, and he didn't seem like he wanted to lead. But he had all kinds of quirky supporting roles in so many films and series, and you could tell he was enjoying himself. It's funny, one of the scenes I remember the most was his guest appearance on Frasier, and I didn't realize it was his first role on any sitcom. One of the interview clips shows him specifically calling that one out as well, since he had worked with Kelsey Grammer on stage in the past, and felt it was a great introduction to the genre, being able to reunite with an old friend. He is going to be sorely missed.

Yeah, agreed on the blue canopy. I'm tempted to swap out the yellow one on the Arcadia and just keep that canopy hidden forever in a battroid display. Fun fact though, you can actually hide away the head lasers on quite a few of the various designs. From what I remember, both the old VF-11 and the rest of the VF-19s are able to slip the center head laser down between the arms and under the shield, just like the crest on the Fire Valk. The 19S and 19P both have side lasers that don't collapse, and won't fit inside like the Fire Valk's, but the central ones all have a sliding hinge that lets them sink below the shield, and between the elbows. It even works with the Arcadia YF-19, but since that one doesn't use the shoulder flaps, and the shield is designed with the notch for the laser, it just winds up looking gappy.

Yeah, very much this. I've been wishing we had the Ba since day one of this line of products. I'm frankly amazed they even bothered to revisit this design at all, but I guess when they have an existing "functional" product, it's low effort cash to just spit more out of the molds in a new color of plastic. Still would have rather had the Elvis version, but I actually question whether Bandai would be capable of making that one without the plastic absolutely disintegrating if you looked at it funny. That swirly sort of pearlescent plastic is generally constructed from at least 50% explodium.

There was a little discussion about this when Bandai's DX came out with the same 102 on it, rather than the 607. I'm not sure where the 607 may have come from, maybe some obscure lineart? Hasegawa may have made it up, and Yamato may have copied them. It might be a Tenjin creation. There aren't any numbers printed on the VT-1 in DYRL either, except for a single frame. There's a close-up of some part of the valk in a flyby that gets zoomed in so close you can't even tell what part it's printed on, but there's a nice freeze-frame of a "102" text label in at least one frame. Edit: Found the post here:

Thanks for saving me the trouble of digging that up again, and helping me not sound like a broken record. I've been messing with my copy for a few days as well since I just got mine with a couple other items from HLJ, and agree on pretty much everything said. It really is a perfect little Yamato Mini-Me, with pretty much all of both the positives and negatives carried over. That long leading edge has bugged me ever since the first CAD teasers of the Yamato release. It really comes down to the proportions of the wing sections, and how wide they are relative to the fuselage. One of these days, I really want to experiment with making a wider wing glove that lessens the sweep angle of the LEX, and pushes it back further along the neck like the original HM. It's part of why I like the YF-19 layout so much, and the VF-19F/S are also a little better, just from not having the canards highlighting how far forward it extends. Interestingly, the new 1/100 HG kit plays an interesting compromise by having the LEX slightly curved, which I don't mind. I'm really curious to see where Bandai goes with their DX version, if it ever sees the light of day, but the initial teaser display seemed like it was leaning toward the long LEX again. Otherwise, all good points, and pretty much my same experience. The metal joints are all terribly stiff, and need some working back and forth and lube to function properly. The arm extensions also gave me a little trouble, taking what felt like excessive force before they would lock in the collapsed or extended position. The right hip definitely seems to be a problem spot. Mine was ridiculously resistant to rotation, and the two halves of the hip didn't quite line up as they should. I wound up taking both apart to loosen up, and in the process noticed that the tiny metal hook shapes that loop around the screw tunnel were both slightly bent. I was able to correct one, but the other snapped off as soon as I gave it any pressure. Not a problem though, the hip still screws together rightly around the joint, and the alignment is better now without the off-kilter hook. A few little differences I did notice were related to how the valk does or doesn't lock together in this scale. Bandai removed a lot of the smaller alignment tabs in the wing and leg areas, and the transformation is better for it, I think. It's also missing the torso lock in fighter mode from the crotch plate, but the metal hinge is stiff enough that it really doesn't need that mechanism to stay together. It's not nearly so overly-sensitive to things being out of alignment, and the legs and wings can just be pulled down without any massaging that you needed to do on the 1/60 versions. The shoulder locking tabs are still a little overly strong though, and it's worse in this version because instead of being a pinned hinge, the shoulder covers just snap on, rather than being on a pivot. You really just have to twist the legs out from under them, rather than popping the shoulders as the first step out of fighter mode. Happy to see the ankles are either "resolved" or just not an issue anymore. Whether that's due to a design change, or just the valk no longer weighing enough to make the ankles feel sloppy is up for grabs. Overall though, I'm really impressed at how close to perfect-transformation they got this one. I was really expecting more swapped parts for the head, but they managed to fit everything in, provided you just use the straight antennas, rather than the angled ones. Paint looks like a dead match for the Yamato, and the matching is very good, though I wish they'd gone a bit more golden and less lemon on the yellow parts. The tone used on the HG kit feels like a much better, warmer gold than pure yellow. Far as the gear are concerned, I haven't had the doors pop off of mine, but the rear gear have always been those sort of blocky constructs on the VF-19, so that's not something Bandai did. Now the wait begins for whether they decide to put out the other variants, and the rest of Sound Force. I'll probably grab a few of the Blazers if I can, and hopefully the P as well, since the parts are already engineered for the shoulder fins.

That's what I was wondering, I remember hearing that discussion once or twice with different Starscream releases. Amusing to me that he picked up on that and carried it over into those pins.

I have to ask, are the upside-down logos on his lapels just a coincidence, or a reference? XD