Bandai 1/60 DX Chogokin Macross Plus YF-21

[26662]

4 hours ago, Mommar said:

Or they could have made that part telescoping so it csn be both accurate and useable instead just stupid and wrong.

I'm not 100% satisfied with its current design - although I'm stoked it's coming my way - but telescoping or "accordioning" the backpack towards the figure's midline in order to provide full articulation in the shoulders and arms isn't a viable solution here.  Not at this price point using these materials.  And especially not for a figure in this scale.  Not that I'm slavish to the animation, but your proposed solution is not in the line art and it would be a remarkable reimagination of the valk's transformation.  More importantly, no one - not even "cheaper, faster" 3rd and 4th party - would attempt that engineering in this scale.  Look closely at the figure's dorsal surface in battroid mode and just imagine what would be required to collapse the backpack enough to free the shoulders and arms.  Then imagine how many additional hinges/plates that feat would require.  Then imagine how those additional moving parts would impact figure stability in fighter and guardian mode.  It would be even beyond the nightmare experience of transforming the 171.  My take, but someone convince me otherwise.

Edited January 30 by 26662
Clarity

[Mommar]

1 hour ago, 26662 said:

I'm not 100% satisfied with its current design - although I'm stoked it's coming my way - but telescoping or "accordioning" the backpack towards the figure's midline in order to provide full articulation in the shoulders and arms isn't a viable solution here.  Not at this price point using these materials.  And especially not for a figure on this scale.  Not that I'm slavish to the animation, but your proposed solution is not in the line art and it would be a remarkable reimagination of the valk's transformation.  More importantly, no one - not even "cheaper, faster" 3rd and 4th party - would attempt that engineering on this scale.  Look closely at the figure's dorsal surface in battroid mode and just imagine what would be required to collapse the backpack enough to free the shoulders and arms.  Then imagine how many additional hinges/plates that feat would require.  Then imagine how those additional moving parts would impact figure stability in fighter and guardian mode.  It would be even beyond the nightmare experience of transforming the 171.  My take, but someone convince me otherwise.

The massive gap in the back is already not lineart accurate.

[26662]

20 minutes ago, Mommar said:

The massive gap in the back is already not lineart accurate.

You're absolutely right.  It's a pickle for designers because there aren't any silver bullets at this scale.  Go larger - to what size exactly, IDK - and you suddenly have all sorts of elegant options where panels and tabs can be sized practically.  Where a figure can be "lineart accurate" *and* able to support its own weight in all three modes.

Edited January 30 by 26662
Missed a word

[treatment]

Maybe Bandai thinks they're making Gundam stuff instead of Macross...

 

Edited January 30 by treatment

[Chronocidal]

45 minutes ago, 26662 said:

You're absolutely right.  It's a pickle for designers because there aren't any silver bullets at this scale.  Go larger - to what size exactly, IDK - and you suddenly have all sorts of elegant options where panels and tabs can be sized practically.  Where a figure can be "lineart accurate" *and* able to support its own weight in all three modes.

The really weird thing about this YF-21 though isn't that it's not accurate because of compromises for transformation.

It's inaccurate in ways that have absolutely no impact on transformation whatsoever.  Bandai just straight-up ignored what the design is supposed to look like, and went down their own path for some reason.

Meanwhile, the 1/100 HG model kit nails all of those details that the DX ignored.  Again, nothing about the transformation at all, it just looks like they actually cared to match the source material, instead of inventing details and reshaping bits however they pleased.

[PointBlankSniper]

2 hours ago, 26662 said:

I'm not 100% satisfied with its current design - although I'm stoked it's coming my way - but telescoping or "accordioning" the backpack towards the figure's midline in order to provide full articulation in the shoulders and arms isn't a viable solution here.  Not at this price point using these materials.  And especially not for a figure on this scale.  Not that I'm slavish to the animation, but your proposed solution is not in the line art and it would be a remarkable reimagination of the valk's transformation.  More importantly, no one - not even "cheaper, faster" 3rd and 4th party - would attempt that engineering on this scale.  Look closely at the figure's dorsal surface in battroid mode and just imagine what would be required to collapse the backpack enough to free the shoulders and arms.  Then imagine how many additional hinges/plates that feat would require.  Then imagine how those additional moving parts would impact figure stability in fighter and guardian mode.  It would be even beyond the nightmare experience of transforming the 171.  My take, but someone convince me otherwise.

The swivel calf already blatantly contradicts official transformation though... and doesn't seem to be meaningful or neccessary...

Meanwhile the yamie has the non canonical retracting nose and everyone seems to be in universal agreement that its the best reimagination ever.

Not sure how a retracting backpack can't be done "at this price point using these materials" either. The price is already way above everything in the product line with no discernable reason. These toys already often have smaller joints that need to carry more load than this. As far as I can tell, all we need is the collar plate to fold or slide over itself.

[26662]

4 minutes ago, PointBlankSniper said:

The swivel calf already blatantly contradicts official transformation though... and doesn't seem to be meaningful or neccessary...

Meanwhile the yamie has the non canonical retracting nose and everyone seems to be in universal agreement that its the best reimagination ever.

Not sure how a retracting backpack can't be done "at this price point using these materials" either. The price is already way above everything in the product line with no discernable reason. These toys already often have smaller joints that need to carry more load than this. As far as I can tell, all we need is the collar plate to fold or slide over itself.

Re: transformation cheats: designers have to choose their battles carefully.  An ankle swivel?  Easy decision all-day long.  Retracting nose for the best reimagination ever?  Wish I could comment on that but I don't own it.  Retracting backpack: you have no good reason to trust the voice of a stranger (me) on the internet...but I run a fabrication business on the side (currently a money pit because I'm still in R&D) and all of the telescoping backpack solutions I've come up with thus far are the definition of "bad idea" because of X, Y, and Z.  It's difficult to explain all of my imaginations in words alone and I'm not prepared to model anything, not even crudely, because there's no ROI, so maybe I'll end my contribution to this sub-thread here.  I may change my mind, though.

[26662]

27 minutes ago, Chronocidal said:

The really weird thing about this YF-21 though isn't that it's not accurate because of compromises for transformation.

It's inaccurate in ways that have absolutely no impact on transformation whatsoever.  Bandai just straight-up ignored what the design is supposed to look like, and went down their own path for some reason.

Meanwhile, the 1/100 HG model kit nails all of those details that the DX ignored.  Again, nothing about the transformation at all, it just looks like they actually cared to match the source material, instead of inventing details and reshaping bits however they pleased.

I don't own the 1/100...but that scale is stupid-tiny and can take certain liberties because of the fact that it's a model and is expected to be handled as such.  Regardless of what my wife says, size matters.  🙂

[Sanity is Optional]

Honestly, given how horrible the anime magic is on the source material, I'll forego lineart accuracy for either "looks good" or "poses well".

Yamato seems to have gone for fighter mode and looking good, whereas Bandai tried to optimize posing well and Battroid.

I'll reserve judgement until I get mine in hand, but the Yamato one certainly is not what I'd call the ultimate imagining of the -21, outside of fighter mode.

Edited January 30 by Sanity is Optional

[Chronocidal]

3 hours ago, 26662 said:

I don't own the 1/100...but that scale is stupid-tiny and can take certain liberties because of the fact that it's a model and is expected to be handled as such.  Regardless of what my wife says, size matters.  🙂

This doesn't have anything to do with size though, it is purely that Bandai completely ignored every source for what the YF-21 looks like, and straight-up redesigned portions of it.  Not transformation mechanisms, but just the shape of the plane, it's wings and tails, and various completely static surface details.

The 1/100 is far more accurate to the line-art than the DX even tries to be.

[26662]

13 minutes ago, Chronocidal said:

This doesn't have anything to do with size though, it is purely that Bandai completely ignored every source for what the YF-21 looks like, and straight-up redesigned portions of it.  Not transformation mechanisms, but just the shape of the plane, it's wings and tails, and various completely static surface details.

The 1/100 is far more accurate to the line-art than the DX even tries to be.

Please upload/tag some pix of what you're talking about.  I want to see your point, but I don't own the 1/100.  "...completely ignored every source for what the YF-21 looks like, and straight-up redesigned portions of it:" absent a compelling and overwhelming practical/financial reason, that's just not how the toy design process works from a simple R&D point of view because reinventing the wheel is just too darn expensive.  In my experience, the norm today is to 3D scan an existing figure to resize and tweak.  If Bandai did exactly that, then it would make sense that they would be handcuffed later into making certain accompanying and compensating design choices.

[Chronocidal]

For starters, the posts throughout this thread comment on a lot of the changes, but the comparisons to the kit in its own thread are also a good reference.

Compared with the Yamato YF-21:

Compared with the DX:

The cockpit shape has been a sticking point mentioned in various points in this thread. It has nothing to do with transformation, and they just decided to make it a different shape.

For me, the tails are also a sore point, because while it's a small detail, the tips are absolutely not supposed to be clipped flat.  No source shows it looking this way, it's just the way Bandai decided to make it. 

33 minutes ago, 26662 said:

Please upload/tag some pix of what you're talking about.  I want to see your point, but I don't own the 1/100.  "...completely ignored every source for what the YF-21 looks like, and straight-up redesigned portions of it:" absent a compelling and overwhelming practical/financial reason, that's just not how the toy design process works from a simple R&D point of view because reinventing the wheel is just too darn expensive.  In my experience, the norm today is to 3D scan an existing figure to resize and tweak.  If Bandai did exactly that, then it would make sense that they would be handcuffed later into making certain accompanying and compensating design choices.

What I'm talking about isn't essential functional design, it's purely in the aesthetic category.  But what Bandai does makes no sense.  There is no logical reason for why those details should not be a perfect match to the source material (you know, the thing they're actually calling it, and saying they're making), because those details have no bearing on the functionality of anything.  They're just surface details.  But apparently Bandai just cannot stand to make things accurately, and instead decides they know better what the design is supposed to look like.  If there were functional reasons related to the transformation it would be one thing, but there aren't.

The overall design is one thing, and they've done an "acceptable" job at it, but the changes in details they've made come down to aesthetic choices that should not be even on the table if you're making something meant to replicate something else.  They just decide they like their own version better.

Edited January 31 by Chronocidal

[Reïvaj]

Holly crab!!!

[IXTL]

39 minutes ago, Reïvaj said:

Holly crab!!!

Wow! Looks wide enough to act as a stage for the whole of Walküre to perform on. 

[26662]

43 minutes ago, Reïvaj said:

Holly crab!!!

Hahaha!  I swear, it took me a full 5 seconds to appreciate what exactly I was peeping.  But importantly, thank you: this provides good (albeit still incomplete) insight into how the backpack connects to the body proper.  This angle alone makes it clear just how daunting it would be to add a functional and value-adding (value-preserving?) accordion mechanism to reduce the gap that currently exists between the backpack and body.  That said, this tight shot is unfortunate and perhaps misleading because its angle and depth of field obscure important contextual clues related to size and proportion.

 

Edited January 31 by 26662
clarity

[davidwhangchoi]

43 minutes ago, Reïvaj said:

Holly crab!!!

is this the high speed mode? 

i think the yf-19 high speed wings look a little better...

[26662]

4 minutes ago, davidwhangchoi said:

is this the high speed mode? 

i think the yf-19 high speed wings look a little better...

I think this is the famed explode-y mode that looks impressive even when it burns up.

[MKT]

Something I also don't get is Bandai shortened the belly plates to get a shorter hip skirt. And then they add back the length of the skirts when the fast packs are installed. 

On another note, this could be the first valk toy where there are articulated rudders just for its sake. The rudders on the YF-19 / VF-19 Advance don't count as they are full folding flaps for transformation purposes. 

[26662]

8 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

For starters, the posts throughout this thread comment on a lot of the changes, but the comparisons to the kit in its own thread are also a good reference.

Compared with the Yamato YF-21:

Compared with the DX:

The cockpit shape has been a sticking point mentioned in various points in this thread. It has nothing to do with transformation, and they just decided to make it a different shape.

For me, the tails are also a sore point, because while it's a small detail, the tips are absolutely not supposed to be clipped flat.  No source shows it looking this way, it's just the way Bandai decided to make it. 

What I'm talking about isn't essential functional design, it's purely in the aesthetic category.  But what Bandai does makes no sense.  There is no logical reason for why those details should not be a perfect match to the source material (you know, the thing they're actually calling it, and saying they're making), because those details have no bearing on the functionality of anything.  They're just surface details.  But apparently Bandai just cannot stand to make things accurately, and instead decides they know better what the design is supposed to look like.  If there were functional reasons related to the transformation it would be one thing, but there aren't.

The overall design is one thing, and they've done an "acceptable" job at it, but the changes in details they've made come down to aesthetic choices that should not be even on the table if you're making something meant to replicate something else.  They just decide they like their own version better.

Many thanks!  Unfortunately, I'll need to handle the 1/100 and compare one to the other directly in order to add anything of value to our discussion.  I thought about firing up photoshop on my other laptop and deconstructing your combined image: one valk, it doesn't matter which, needs to be scaled and aligned at various common points (e.g., the tips of the nose, the tips of exhaust rudders, wing tips, etc.) .  But even doing that wouldn't be sufficient to understand design choices.  I'll keep checking this thread, but I'm leaning towards tabling this discussion until I can make a proper comparison.  But good discussion.  Thanks!

[PointBlankSniper]

12 hours ago, 26662 said:

 An ankle swivel?  Easy decision all-day long. Retracting backpack: ... all of the telescoping backpack solutions I've come up with thus far are the definition of "bad idea"

This franchise as a history of telescoping leg segements, it's too late to suddenly say its too hard to be done. There have also been plenty examples of roll pins in panels no thicker than a credit card or two, and the toys still hold up. Considering the product line and the price point, metal parts should not even be off the table either.

Its not that complicated to give the collar plate two or three folds into a V or U shape, and then run a peg or tab through them, to be an "accordion". The vf-31's body is basically already vertically held together like that, despite being much more disproportionate. it's even simpler though, to just turn that collar plate into two trays that slide under and over each other to double up as locking tabs on opposite ends and double the total thickness if strenth was a concern. If anything, collapsing the plate to reduce overhang in any way, and adding thickness and fastening points between the backpack and the body should only make the whole toy sturdier. Bandai regularly does far more fiddly things than this.

The crux of the problem though, as seen above, is that none of this would actually be neccessary if the proportoins weren't so arbitrarily inaccurate in the first place. Since they are going the inaccurate route, they could have made the proportions into anything to avoid the gap as well. In either case, the size of that gap didn't need to be there in the first place.

[26662]

14 minutes ago, PointBlankSniper said:

This franchise as a history of telescoping leg segements, it's too late to suddenly say its too hard to be done. There have also been plenty examples of roll pins in panels no thicker than a credit card or two, and the toys still hold up. Considering the product line and the price point, metal parts should not even be off the table either.

Its not that complicated to give the collar plate two or three folds into a V or U shape, and then run a peg or tab through them, to be an "accordion". The vf-31's body is basically already vertically held together like that, despite being much more disproportionate. it's even simpler though, to just turn that collar plate into two trays that slide under and over each other to double up as locking tabs on opposite ends and double the total thickness if strenth was a concern. If anything, collapsing the plate to reduce overhang in any way, and adding thickness and fastening points between the backpack and the body should only make the whole toy sturdier. Bandai regularly does far more fiddly things than this.

The crux of the problem though, as seen above, is that none of this would actually be neccessary if the proportoins weren't so arbitrarily inaccurate in the first place. Since they are going the inaccurate route, they could have made the proportions into anything to avoid the gap as well. In either case, the size of that gap didn't need to be there in the first place.

Uh uh.  We'll have to agree to disagree.  There's no way a set of sliding collar plates (the way I'm interpreting your use of the term) would be sufficient to close the distance significantly.  We don't have a sense of absolute scale here, but I'm guessing from the images you'll gain maybe 2-3 mm, even assuming that would be a viable option given that we can't see beneath the surface "plane" and appreciate what compensatory changes would be required underneath. 

 

But there I go again.  I said I'd table further contributions until I had the figure in hand.  Pfft! Anyway, I appreciate the engagement and company.  Thanks!

Edited January 31 by 26662
spelling

[Lolicon]

Is this thing any good? Should I order one?

[26662]

Just now, Lolicon said:

Is this thing any good? Should I order one?

?  I've paid for two.  I was late to the DX party and am tired of paying the late tax so I pick up 2 of each now.

[Sanity is Optional]

2 hours ago, PointBlankSniper said:

This franchise as a history of telescoping leg segements, it's too late to suddenly say its too hard to be done. There have also been plenty examples of roll pins in panels no thicker than a credit card or two, and the toys still hold up. Considering the product line and the price point, metal parts should not even be off the table either.

Its not that complicated to give the collar plate two or three folds into a V or U shape, and then run a peg or tab through them, to be an "accordion". The vf-31's body is basically already vertically held together like that, despite being much more disproportionate. it's even simpler though, to just turn that collar plate into two trays that slide under and over each other to double up as locking tabs on opposite ends and double the total thickness if strenth was a concern. If anything, collapsing the plate to reduce overhang in any way, and adding thickness and fastening points between the backpack and the body should only make the whole toy sturdier. Bandai regularly does far more fiddly things than this.

The crux of the problem though, as seen above, is that none of this would actually be neccessary if the proportoins weren't so arbitrarily inaccurate in the first place. Since they are going the inaccurate route, they could have made the proportions into anything to avoid the gap as well. In either case, the size of that gap didn't need to be there in the first place.

It’s worth mentioning that the places you see pins in thin segments are light load. The backpack connection would be a high load area, and see much more force than for example the various collapsing fins on other toys.

[MKT]

Not sure if this can be of value to discussion, but I'm now thinking of some of the 3rd party Transformers today of similar size to this YF-21 and they have at least double or triple the parts and complexity. There are endless panels & parts that fold, swivel, collapse, unfurl & rotate, and most of them are engineered well enough to be quite stable & sturdy. Heck, a recent one I saw even had the landing gear transform to become an integral connecting joint piece for robot mode.

Not to say I want the YF-21 to be this complex or breaking canon too much, but I think engineering-wise anything is quite possible these days. It could be a matter of how far Bandai wants to take it seeing that they are already tweaking quite a bit on the YF-21's aesthetics.  

[26662]

2 hours ago, MKT said:

...thinking of some of the 3rd party Transformers today of similar size to this YF-21 and they have at least double or triple the parts and complexity. There are endless panels & parts that fold, swivel, collapse, unfurl & rotate...

Exactly.  I'm a OG TF fan as well.  [Oof!  I collect both.  My poor wallet.]  Those endless panels and parts make for a nightmarish user experience.  I'm looking at you, Fans Toys Powerglide:

I have loads of TFs that I don't even bother pulling out of the box just because their transformation is an exercise in frustration and I value my mental health.  The ridiculous parts count gets the job done, but please dear God, let's not go down this path with the DX line.  I don't necessarily like when concessions are made with my bots, but I'm firmly in the camp of making an allowance within reason, especially if I can understand conceptually why particular design choices were made.  Thanks for pulling TFs into the discussion.

[MKT]

28 minutes ago, 26662 said:

The ridiculous parts count gets the job done, but please dear God, let's not go down this path with the DX line.  I don't necessarily like when concessions are made with my bots, but I'm firmly in the camp of making an allowance within reason, especially if I can understand conceptually why particular design choices were made. 

Completely in agreement here. As long as we understand why the deviations are necessary then it would be acceptable. The DX YF-19's folding leg panels are probably the most TF thing Bandai has done for a valk (although I understand it mimics the SHE kit), but it works nicely for its form. Yamato's nose shortening mechanisms for the 21/22 and the v2 VF-1 may not be canon too but they make the final form look good, with the added elegance that they could very well be something that SK himself designed. 

[Slave IV]

Panel Formers are the WORST! One of the things that always put Macross over Transformers for me was the "realistic" transformations that at least had some consideration for how something like that would work in the real world. The way most Transformers, especially MP style toys are these days, I don't even want them and have pretty much stopped buying them completely because of the recent Panel madness going on. It's such a cop out...anything can transform into anything if you have endless folding to force it into whatever shape you want.

[rematron]

Panel Formers make sense to me in the world of Transformers because those guys are metal-based aliens that sort of morph from one form to another, right? But it doesn't seem appropriate in Macross because, how would that work in real life engineering? Maybe the more complicated panel formers are appealing to collectors who also appreciate a good 3D puzzle.  

[twich]

This discussion seems to remind me of the discussion had with transforming the Bandai DX Chogokin SV-262Hs toy.  Still the only Macross jet to give me actual anxiety to transform.  I have one of these on pre-order and am remembering the glory days of Yamato’s 1/72 YF-21, then the revised version that came with fast packs and extendo hands/wrists that Yamato included due to feedback.

Twich

[26662]

11 minutes ago, twich said:

This discussion seems to remind me of the discussion had with transforming the Bandai DX Chogokin SV-262Hs toy.  Still the only Macross jet to give me actual anxiety to transform.  I have one of these on pre-order and am remembering the glory days of Yamato’s 1/72 YF-21, then the revised version that came with fast packs and extendo hands/wrists that Yamato included due to feedback.

Twich

I'm jealous because I missed out on nearly 2 decades of Macross goodness thanks to being a dirt-poor grad student and post-doc (x2).  In fact, money was so tight at one point that I broke down and sold a ton of MISB Macross figures to BBTS in 2004 for just over $5,000 to help me eat and pay rent.  Those who bought the Haslab Unicron will understand the volume of material I'm talking about when I say that I shipped BBTS 18 Unicron-sized boxes.  They made so much money off me.  If you bought from BBTS back then, you're welcome!  Sweet Jesus, I was sitting on a goldmine.  F... student loans, car payments, hot women with expensive taste and questionable morals, and a permanently immature brain.  But mad respect to BBTS because they really helped me when I needed it.

I digress.  I LOVE the SV-262!  I splurged hard one night about 2 years ago while floating on Jack and Coke and bought every last DX available on Mandarake and Jungle Entertainment.  I ended up with half a dozen 262s and love them to bits.  The first transformation was nerve-wracking but I didn't mind.  I love everything about it.

[IIymij]

16 hours ago, Reïvaj said:

Holly crab!!!

How can the HG YF-21 make it work width wise but the DX can't? Not to mention the beefy forearms either 

**sigh**

 

Edited February 1 by IIymij

[davidwhangchoi]

16 hours ago, Lolicon said:

Is this thing any good? Should I order one?

Hmmm 🤔 i ordered a few but on the fence. 

[seti88]

13 hours ago, MKT said:

Heck, a recent one I saw even had the landing gear transform to become an integral connecting joint piece for robot mode.

Who is the superstar product designer who came out with that whole transforming sequence?  Bandai needs to harness his '"talent" 🤪😄

And transforming it back....hmm i dont think you would want to... 

seriously impressive tho but nuts! I like the pilot seat transforming into the head gimmick ...i wonder if that would work in macross..🤣

Edited February 1 by seti88

[aurance]

This is the weirdest fandom where people can say “I don’t totally love it, I’ll only get two.” 😛

But seriously, YF-21 is my favorite Valkyrie design, but this, just no. Yamato needed beefier legs, but the rest looked perfect to me. The DX has the legs… but is off in so many more ways. The trade off is not worth it.