Chronocidal

Whether it gets released or not, it won't look anything like that prototype. I'm genuinely concerned about them attempting to make that into a transforming VF-11 derivative, because it shares almost nothing with the source design, and I have no idea how it will hold together in fighter mode with completely round arms and legs.

Copy or not, clear plastic has different structural properties than most others, and it tends to be much more brittle, or just fail in other unexpected ways. The clear plastic adapter that came with my TV super packs can attest to that, as the plastic formed a stress fracture after a few hours holding the valk. I boxed back up the stand before it could fail and dump the valk off a shelf.

Definitely not just you. However.. I am all for this sort of behavior by Bandai. Yes, please Bandai, keep making these sorts of event exclusives for all your future events. Saves me a ton of trouble trying to get them if you keep making them this ugly.

I do remember seeing a teaser of something like this a few months back, probably a tiny teaser attached to something related to the VT-1 release. Otherwise.. yeah, no thanks, that's a nice chunk of money saved. Helps me recover from the summer salvo hitting this year with the monthly releases stretching from May to probably September.

Ah, good. Something I can skip with no regrets.

So that's definitely an interesting development. I think I have a grand total of one Fujimi kit in my collection, and it's an ancient 1/48 F-14A kit from 1978. I'm not going to attempt to compare the accuracy of it, but it's probably the best fitting 1/48 F-14 kit I have, and I remember it being several huge steps above any other manufacturer in terms of ease of assembly, even to this day. It just went together perfectly.

Guess I'm glad I at least got a pair of good Tie fighters out of the deal to match with a Vader version if I ever get one, but the X-Wings are pretty bad by comparison. My initial instincts about the mold were unfortunately on the nose. Pretty sad, the quality of the Y-Wings I grabbed got my hopes up, but these things are just weirdly sloppy and mis-molded messes. I guess that's what you should expect as the first product in a line, but still disappointing.

Boy I wish Bandai would give its folks a lesson in how to pose mecha so they don't look like they're bored out of their minds.

What I'd really love to see is them exploring the larger variety of VF-19 variants in this cheaper line. Maybe pull some of the racing designs in, or more paint options we saw in games, or the Master File.. maybe a Nothung? Please?

Might be tricky to color-match (either with paint or plain plastic), but I want to think it would be pretty easy to scratch-build those parts out of some scrap plastic. The hinges might be tricky due to their size, but you might be able to substitute a piece of metal wire, if it's too hard of a shape to make. I'd probably attempt to make something out of a sprue clipping, but I love punishing my fingers that way.

Ok, I wasn't really sold on that X-Wing mold, but for that price I'll absolutely bite. I think what's really more baffling is the original list price though. Yeeesh.

I forget which version it is that has Ranka and Sheryl on it (Sayonara no Tsubasa variant, probably?), but I always liked the darker green and brighter gold tones on it. Sadly, what I always really wanted was one with just the mouth and eye markings on it.. which, if you actually look carefully, they printed the character art directly on top of it.

I picked up both of the old HM VF-19 releases years back, and they're distinctly "okay" in most respects. They work well, and transform easily enough, but they're pretty long in the torso, and pretty gappy in fighter mode. I think the biggest issue many had with them was the complete lack of any landing gear (they eventually made a base with gear that you could rest the valk on), and I don't believe they were able to mount the gunpod at all (whether the later VF-19S fixed this, I don't recall at the moment).

This is actually kind of the reverse. The production line is complete, and all they have to do is make more. The problem is that making more takes production line time away from other products. Going off of how they tend to produce everything in one go, adding more stock to a production run will absolutely throw a wrench in whatever schedule they have for that factory.

I don't want to defend the price increases, but from a distribution and manufacturing standpoint, I can see why it had to happen. Consider that Bandai's production and distribution planning for Macross products has always been focused on the Japanese market alone, since international distribution wasn't "possible," at least not from an official point of view. So, how are you going to begin addressing the international demand officially? What changes have to be made to manufacture enough for the perceived international demand? You don't want to hike prices for Japanese customers for the same products to support expanded production lines, and you don't want to even consider expanding them until you're sure sufficient international interest exists to support that expansion in the first place. So, I'm kind of in the mindset that the WWM releases are a market study. I don't even know if Bandai is producing more stock. What they are doing is studying whether there is enough demand outside of Japan to start paying more attention to their international customers. I'm thinking the international markup accomplishes two things, really. On the one hand, it'll help cover the costs of increased production and distribution without passing that cost onto the Japanese market that didn't ask for it. On the other, it gives them a measure of international interest, determining whether the extra cost hurdle is enough to offset the convenience of getting stuff from places like Amazon. The exchange rate and current economy being what they are, I'm curious whether they'll think it's worth the effort. If prices keep everyone buying from Japanese stores anyway, Bandai really doesn't have any incentive to expand.