Hey Graham.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Not sure if you read this in the enemy mecha thread but do you know if Yamato is aware of the significant 'other market' out there if they release either the Glaug or the Tomahawk (and to a lesser extent the Defender and other destroids).

I am talking about the rather large Battletech community who really love these 'lostmechs' over all the current stuff. Even Japan has quite a big Battletech community who might otherwise not be Macross fans. And the Glaug and Tomahawk are easily the mechs most identified with Battletech for the old timers.

I mean, they can't sell direct to the US or Europe, but those fans will definitely help their local wholesale buyers clear stock fast.

Edited March 3, 2004 by Retracting Head Ter Ter

[Graham]

Not sure if you read this in the enemy mecha thread but do you know if Yamato is aware of the significant 'other market' out there if they release either the Glaug or the Tomahawk (and to a lesser extent the Defender and other destroids).

I am talking about the rather large Battletech community who really love these 'lostmechs' over all the current stuff. Even Japan has quite a big Battletech community who might otherwise not be Macross fans. And the Glaug and Tomahawk are easily the mechs most identified with Battletech for the old timers.

I mean, they can't sell direct to the US or Europe, but those fans will definitely help their local wholesale buyers clear stock fast.

I don't think Yamato are really aware of the Battletech community.

Also, doesn't Battletech in Japan feature completely different mecha designs by kawamori?

Graham

[Neova]

Also, doesn't Battletech in Japan feature completely different mecha designs by kawamori?

Battletech is trademarked and own by FASA and now Microsoft who purchased them lock stock and barrel. I don't think Kawamori ever did any original design work for them. Perhaps through a recent contract?

I used to work in the gaming field so I know my first line is correct.

[Duke Togo]

Not sure if you read this in the enemy mecha thread but do you know if Yamato is aware of the significant 'other market' out there if they release either the Glaug or the Tomahawk (and to a lesser extent the Defender and other destroids).

I am talking about the rather large Battletech community who really love these 'lostmechs' over all the current stuff. Even Japan has quite a big Battletech community who might otherwise not be Macross fans. And the Glaug and Tomahawk are easily the mechs most identified with Battletech for the old timers.

I mean, they can't sell direct to the US or Europe, but those fans will definitely help their local wholesale buyers clear stock fast.

I don't think Yamato are really aware of the Battletech community.

Also, doesn't Battletech in Japan feature completely different mecha designs by kawamori?

Graham

Japanese Battletech Images

[wolfx]

Battletech was released in Japan with "anime-fied" mech designs. Not sure that Kawamori did them.

[Graham]

Battletech was released in Japan with "anime-fied" mech designs. Not sure that Kawamori did them.

Some if not all the Japanese Battletech designs are by Studio Nue / Kawamori. His destinctive style is easily recognisable. Plus, you can see the word 'Nue' and IIRC Kawamori's signature scrawled next to many of the designs.

Graham

[Neova]

Battletech was released in Japan with "anime-fied" mech designs. Not sure that Kawamori did them.

Some if not all the Japanese Battletech designs are by Studio Nue / Kawamori. His destinctive style is easily recognisable. Plus, you can see the word 'Nue' and IIRC Kawamori's signature scrawled next to many of the designs.

Graham

Wow! That sure looks a lot BETTER than FASA's old work! It is Kawamori's work.

You learn something new everyday.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

WTF?!?!?! If FASA had the rights to those images WTF didn't they use it for their US release? Sure looked much better then most of their crappy box on rectangles designs.

Anyway, my original point is still about the potential Battletech market Yamato can tap with the Glaug and Tomahawk.

[Lynx7725]

Battletech is trademarked and own by FASA and now Microsoft who purchased them lock stock and barrel. I don't think Kawamori ever did any original design work for them. Perhaps through a recent contract?

I used to work in the gaming field so I know my first line is correct.

That's not quite correct. The BattleTech.. franchise (for the lack of a better word) is not owned lock, stock and (gauss rifle) barrel by Microsoft.

Classic BattleTech (the boardgame) is owned by Wizkids Games, who also publish the newer ClickyTech game. Continual support for Classic BattleTech is achieved with support from FastForward Games and Fantasy Productions.

Microsoft owns the rights to the Mechwarrior and Mechcommander PC games, not the whole thing.

As for the anime design, IIRC, it was done to introduce BattleTech to the Japanese market, but they considered the licensing issue (Macross being one of them) and simply redid the design. Ironically, US BattleTech took some of the designs for the Solaris 7 release.

Definitely, there will be an additional market for Glaugs, Tomahawks, Spartans, Defender and Phalanx (to an extent) -- these are clear copies that exists in BattleTech. Regults, less likely. In particular, the Glaugs, Tomahawks and Spartans are popular designs and will sell well. Unfortunately, I'm just not sure how big the market will be.

Please reference here:

http://www.macrossworld.com/mwf/index.php?...opic=5583&st=40

Honestly, if Yamato (or any party, include Kaiyodo!) can produce cheap BattleTech miniature scale models (around 1/160), then it would be a great boon to the community -- but perhaps at the cost of Ironwind Miniatures.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Can anyone tell me if the Battletech ostol and ostscout were based on the Regault?

[Uxi]

Some pretty good designs in there... too bad most of that never saw US release I bet (i'm not into BT, so I could be wrong)...

[Neova]

That's not quite correct. The BattleTech.. franchise (for the lack of a better word) is not owned lock, stock and (gauss rifle) barrel by Microsoft.

Classic BattleTech (the boardgame) is owned by Wizkids Games, who also publish the newer ClickyTech game. Continual support for Classic BattleTech is achieved with support from FastForward Games and Fantasy Productions.

Microsoft owns the rights to the Mechwarrior and Mechcommander PC games, not the whole thing.

Being the in PC gaming field, we forget about our dice, miniature and board gaming cousins often.

Thanks for the clarification.

Edited March 3, 2004 by Neova

[imode]

They all kind of look like the Macross Zero destroid

[Angel's Fury]

Japanese Battletech Images

Pretty good designs!

[Guppy]

Yes.. they all look kinda familiar.. especially this one..

monster?

[Mr March]

Those designs look great! Wow, I sure wish the original Battletech looked like that over here in NA. Most of the great Battletech designs like the Vulture/Mad Dog, Mad Cat/TimberWolf or Daishi, didn't show up until many years later.

[JELEINEN]

Yes.. they all look kinda familiar.. especially this one..

monster?

That's the point. The original BT designs were from Macross, Dougram, etc. These Japanese re-designs basically keep the same general shape while trying to hid the source well enough to keep from being sued.

[ewilen]

Wow, so much praise for those Japanese versions that I had to look twice.

Nope, still don't like 'em. At least, not for Battletech. When I think of Battletech, I think of enormous, lumbering mecha that can soak up tons of damage. Without any scale context, these things look more like Southern Cross body armor (okay, somewhat more lethal) or Exosquad E-Frames. I.e., little more than powered armor or "small" vehicles (not much bigger than a modern tank).

I also don't think they look very distinctive. Too much rococo detail layered over a few basic structural types.

The Cheyenne Destroid is much cleaner. But Kawamori didn't design the Cheyenne--and I don't think he designed the other destroids, either.

[Hurin]

Ewilen:

I'm with you. As a guy who played Battletech all the way back to when it was "Battledroids". . . I think battlemechs should be ugly, blocky things. Walking tanks. . .

I liked how Technical Readout 3025 (original, out-of-print, not the newer one) made some of the Macross designs more utilitarian looking. . . blunting some of the edges and make them seem more "tank-like". . .

But that's just me. . .

H

Edited March 4, 2004 by Hurin

[Terrance Wong]

Guppy: If you're a BattleTechie, what you're looking at is the redesigned Stalker. I have no idea why it was redesigned, but it looks really good...

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Guppy: If you're a BattleTechie, what you're looking at is the redesigned Stalker. I have no idea why it was redesigned, but it looks really good...

Thats because the original Stalker was real ugly. Football on chicken legs.

[Blaine23]

Yes.. they all look kinda familiar.. especially this one..

monster?

That's the point. The original BT designs were from Macross, Dougram, etc. These Japanese re-designs basically keep the same general shape while trying to hid the source well enough to keep from being sued.

Too bad they couldn't have just done that in the first place... give credit where it's due and get some kickass designs out of the deal.

[Ginrai]

What they like like more than anything is the ACs from the Armored Core series of video games, which Kawamori also designed. Almost the exact same designs in a lot of places. The only US use of these designs that I'm aware of is MechWarrior 1 for SNES (not for PC), which has pre-rendered images of them.

[Myersjessee]

The interesting thing about this is the fact that the Glaug is also represented in Battletech...and as a result gets higher values in the US (for models at least)

[wasp]

Can anyone tell me if the Battletech ostol and ostscout were based on the Regault?

I am not sure if they were, but they were close enough that they were pulled along with the rest of the "Unseen" Anime mechs. The Battletech folks atleast made an attempt at trying to change the design by turning the legs around to a more human knee action.

[ewilen]

According to this, they were.

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

I don't understand why the Battletech 'Longbow'which so closely resembles the Macross Phalanx is still in use. It recently appeared in Mechwarrior mecenaries.

How come this one got through?

[Hybridchild]

I don't understand why the Battletech 'Longbow'which so closely resembles the Macross Phalanx is still in use. It recently appeared in Mechwarrior mecenaries.

How come this one got through?

Because its been redesigned twice since it looked like the Phalanx, the first of these is on Mechwarrior

Hybridchild

[Hybridchild]

Graham if Yamato done 1/60th destroids and Glaugs, which are in scale with the armorcast resin Battlemechs, id by at least 2 of each most of my friends in the battletech group would too and i can thing of about a couple of dozen other people that would do the same and i doubt we're the only ones so theyd probably sell like hot cakes to battletech players

Hybridchild

[wasp]

I don't understand why the Battletech 'Longbow'which so closely resembles the Macross Phalanx is still in use. It recently appeared in Mechwarrior mecenaries.

How come this one got through?

Because it is a completely redesigned Longbow. The original was of course the Phalanx. The one in the MW4: Mercenaries is actually the 2nd redesign of the mech since the "unseens" were pulled. The first one was rounded off Longbow and the most recent "reseen" squared off Longbow

from the computer game. The unseen's were altered enough to not fall under the lawsuit and to represent different battletech technology from when the first ones were released. Some of them were more radically altered than others. Check out the new Rifleman or any of the new OST series as compared to the new Archer. I am sure the artists and scuplters working on the "project pheonix" mechs, as the new designs were called, were very mindful of what would and would not be acceptable as far as tempting the lawsuit agreement.

Edited March 6, 2004 by wasp

[Retracting Head Ter Ter]

Graham if Yamato done 1/60th destroids and Glaugs, which are in scale with the armorcast resin Battlemechs, id by at least 2 of each most of my friends in the battletech group would too and i can thing of about a couple of dozen other people that would do the same and i doubt we're the only ones so theyd probably sell like hot cakes to battletech players

Hybridchild

Yup, thats my point when I started this whole post.

Battletech players (and there are loads of em outside Japan) really love the

Glaug/Marauder and Tomahawk/Warhammer.

Now we just need Graham to convince Yamato. They might not be doing the Glaug since they can't recolour it and sell many batches, but having Battletech fans buy em would help offset the no-recolour factor.

GLLLAAAAAAAUGGG!!!!!!

[ewilen]

Actually, it would enhance the color factor. I'll bet if Yamato did several nonstandard Glaug camouflage paint schemes (say, desert tan, jungle camo, olive green, gull grey), they'd be even more attractive to BT players.

[GobotFool]

I don't understand why the Battletech 'Longbow'which so closely resembles the Macross Phalanx is still in use. It recently appeared in Mechwarrior mecenaries.

How come this one got through?

Because it is a completely redesigned Longbow. The original was of course the Phalanx. The one in the MW4: Mercenaries is actually the 2nd redesign of the mech since the "unseens" were pulled. The first one was rounded off Longbow and the most recent "reseen" squared off Longbow

from the computer game. The unseen's were altered enough to not fall under the lawsuit and to represent different battletech technology from when the first ones were released. Some of them were more radically altered than others. Check out the new Rifleman or any of the new OST series as compared to the new Archer. I am sure the artists and scuplters working on the "project pheonix" mechs, as the new designs were called, were very mindful of what would and would not be acceptable as far as tempting the lawsuit agreement.

Actually if you want to mention new school BT mecha resembling their ripped off counterparts, look no farther than the vulture. The whole torso screams Spartan.