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Southpaw Samurai

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About Southpaw Samurai

  • Birthday 07/30/1974

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    Southpaw_Samurai

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    Twin Cities, MN

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  1. Pretty much the only way to avoid a death sentence as a Rebel pilot was to be named Luke or Wedge And even then, I remember someone saying that Lucas almost forgot Wedge when writing ESB because he thought he killed him off. Janson (Wedge's tailgunner) and Hobbie are the only other two named (in the movies - not counting EU or side material) fighter pilots to possibly survive (Hobbie kamikaze's Veer's AT-AT in some of the script versions and related material). Non-hero Rebels in general are true cannon fodder... even Stormtroopers can accurately hit them!
  2. David, you're killing me here. I have at least one more wave I'd want... probably two.... A. Night-Viper - one of the few figures I HAD to pick up even though I was getting too old for Joes as a kid. B. Cover-girl - cheating a bit (since she's a ROC figure), but I'd really go for a leather jacket, tanker CG, whether you give her short brown figure hair, long blonde cartoon hair, or anywhere in between... manly featured, camo'd arm candy ROC CG just fails on so many levels.
  3. I may have to get this figure for my work desk. For the longest time I used a Senator Jar Jar as a Jedi Jar Jar figure myself before I eventually got rid of my Jedi shelf. I'm a decade old fan of Jar Jar from the TPM days myself. Always felt that he was unfortunately the focus of all the childish jokes of the first movie. Jar Jar himself would've made a fine, if over the top, 'everyman' character had the movie not been flowered with poop jokes and Jar Jar unfortunately being involved in just about all of them. Sure his voice would've annoyed some, but he could've had such a nice arch. I do sort of dig his role in the overall story still, but wish Lucas hadn't been frightened by the fan feedback and relegated him to such a tiny role. Back in the TPM days, I lead a fan fic on the Force.net that had Jar Jar become a Jedi and there were a number of others. If you look at what he accomplishes despite his carelessness and uncoordination, you have to start wondering if there's some kind of mystic energy field helping him out....
  4. I don't know if I'm willing to pay $10-12 for another Viper, especially when most of that cost seems to have gone into additional redundant packaging. The chrome is nice, but might make him stand out too much against the rest of my Viper hordes and I'm not about to get enough over-priced repaints to hide the olders ones. The Hall of Heroes might wind up being a bust except for those who are speculating and maybe a few of the harder to find figures for those who missed them. Speaking of busts, I finally picked up the Ultimate Battle Pack at Target.... mainly because it was just under $15 on multiple markdowns (previous sticker was $38). Sadly, I already paid $15 for Short-Fuze (even though he's a semi-disappointment... I just need my Original 13!) and have my original 25 year old MOBAT (but now I have a shiny one like Steeler, Clutch, and Breaker sweated to produce for the parade in an early issue ), but couldn't pass it, as it has a HISS of a different color, even if that red looks very plastic-like and the extra Cobra drivers are nice. This set must have been a major mistake for Hasbro. Pretty much the only 'new' things were the re-issued MOBAT and a Short-Fuze made from old parts, so its no wonder no one bought it. Strangely enough, one of my favorite parts of this set is the I.G. Destro done up in classic colors... at first I thought, "Meh. Another Destro." but he's grown on me unexpectedly. I think we still need an officer-quality Steeler. The black visor on his desert-color helmet in the UBP does help (lost the mold to the old binocular-visor of the original?), but Steeler had some spiffy paint apps out of many of the Orig.13. I'd also like to see a Short-Fuze done up in cartoon style with a blue-grey helmet, visor, and no glasses with correct webbing. I might go ahead and put the Doc/glasses head on him anyway because I liked the nerdy comic look, but that would be an excuse to re-release him.
  5. Hey David, don't be cruel to my Yarna. She's the holy grail of my Jabba Palace diorama shelf; my dream girl in that I always figured the ONLY way I'd ever see one made is in my dreams or if I decided to customize one (probably would've had to mod the Rancor Keeper ). She's just about the only really identifiable character left.... heck, my one friend who enjoys gawking at my toys even realized Yarna was new and knew exactly who she was and she's not all that into Star Wars. That's more that can be said for a number of the obscure background aliens. But, yes, it really does shock me that Yarna was made as a standard assortment figure. I didn't think I'd even see her as a mail in or exclusive figure for the very reasons you mention above. The only people who would have bought her were completists (either for a collection or, like me, for a scene)... maybe somewhere someone is troop building a Yarna army....
  6. For me, the one saving grace of Home right now is that it is still a BETA, so the lack of options is to be expected. I didn't go in with much in the way of expectations. I'm not even sure what they were hyping it up to be, given I didn't read much on it once I found out it was a basically just a social network. At one point there was talk of having trophies be in-Home objects. That might be neat, particularly if they're different looking items (for example, a 'Defeated the Big Bad Monster' trophy in a game resulted in a trophy looking like the monster's head mounted. There would be some incentive to vist homes just to see some of the stuff, particularly the trophies you may never have a chance of obtaining and it would have some advantage over just looking at someone's profile. The microtransaction-based environment (granted, which is how many free MMOs run) irks me a bit. I wonder how many people are going to spend $100+ just to make their avatars and avatar homes look pretty. I'm willing to give it some time to develop, but agree that it's basically just a console-based graphically rendered social network... and we've had those on the computer going all the way back to Club Caribe on Q-Link for the Commodore 64.....
  7. The original figure of Short-fuze was one of the three or so generic heads (the same as Hawk's if I recall) with a visored helmet, but in the comics (and I believe the cartoon) had him with glasses and I, for one, am happy he's got them (I was going to convert my extra Doc to a Shortfuse). I do sort of wish he had the correct webbing that he and Zap had and not the typical Hawk/Grunt/Snake-eyes/etc one.... Speaking of comics/cartoons/figures, I am disappointed with the Steeler that comes with the Armadillo and Serpentor... and not for his 'Duke arms'. Very lackluster. It may just be nostalgia (Steeler and the MOBAT were favorites as a kid and he's my one MIA as he was lost in sandbox), but I liked the way the original Steeler looked and the new one just doesn't cut it. His webbing is a single shoulder holster (which is like the old design), but doesn't fit right and unfortunately leaves a lot of his shirt bare... and the shirts on the 'original 13' 25th anniversary figures look like really tight, form-fitting shirts. I'm thinking of getting an extra Vamp and giving him the same vest as Clutch, which will keep the holster, but give him a somewhat bulkier look. And while I like the head sculpture and it sort of works for a Polish-descended steel town native, it looks a little old for the brash, young lieutenant Steeler was. Part of me almost wishes for the semi-wild, definitely non-regulation mop of blonde hair he had in the cartoons, even if I usually prefer the comic look for the Joes... it was distinctive if nothing else. And speaking of the MOBAT, I REALLY hope they do some remodeling of its figure compartment. The old MOBAT was always small in terms of scale, but old figures can stand up to their waists in it. 25th figures, though, barely get mid-thigh deep if you're lucky and it makes it look ridiculous having someone exposing 3/4ths of their body in an armored vehicle. At least Steeler will keep his kneecaps safe, I suppose.... This line's killing me. I'm in the process of trying to move away from toy collecting... running out of room and it often hinders certain pursuits (I've been lucky to mostly date women who don't obviously freak out about shelves of toys) and yet the 25th line still pushes out figures I want....
  8. I sort of like the purple/golden Scarlett (although not necessarily in perference over the darkgrey/beige... just sometimes I lean more towards one than the other) and were he a little darker or with more grey/black blended into the blue, the Silent Interlude Snake-eyes would almost be more true 'night ops' than his black outfits. The Silent Interlude Storm Shadow is nowhere near his normal color self, but passable. I think it's basically the day-glow Duke/CC pack and Destro that are really the bad ones. But, yes, I totally agree that the 'classic' nature of those old comics were more the story than the colors and painting the figures in the limit, often over-bright colors of an 80's comic really doesn't work. You might as well have painted them with the printing dots of the original comic art and heavily lined all their details in black. Actually, the latter might have worked (sort of like the new 'original TMNT' figures based on their comic appearances).
  9. This might be better off in the Halo 3 thread, but that's gotten some dust and while Halo 3 is 'so last year', it might be interesting to folks here. Awhile back, happy with my Halo 3 Master Chief, I preordered the wave 2 Spartans and Arbiter. As time wore on and my excitement about Halo waned, I almost canceled. I'm glad I didn't as they're actually pretty cool, whether you like Halo or just like armored future soldiers. The Spartans. Thankfully they're starting to come with different weapons (Rifle, Carbine, Spartan Laser, Shotgun, etc), but I do wish each would come with a second firearm and not just a grenade. Since they utilize a peg system which allows each to carry weapons/grenades on their back, thigh, and rear waist, it'd be cool to see each decked out without having to buy duplicates and then strip them of their weapons. I'm somewhat surprised and very satisfied that the ODST grunts are actually scaled to the Spartans instead of just using the same base body (they're maybe a scaled foot or so shorter than the genetically enhanced, armored Spartans). If I told you these were done by McFarlane Toys, you might not believe me. These guys have a lot of articulation and a good range for armored-up figures. They can't really kneel well, unfortunately, but they have a number of ball joints that allow for good positioning of the hips and ankles. They're also surprisingly study. When did McFarlane Toys start making figures that aren't statues and don't fall apart if you breath on them? "...and this one is juuuuust right." The Halo 3 Chief versus his larger, but less limber and detailed earlier incarnations. The wave 1 Cortana glowing in the dark. It's not perfect (I think there's a statue coming out that might be doing a better job using some fiber to actual have her illuminated instead of just running some LEDs on the figure, but I'm not really willing to pay 10x+ the money for such). You can swap around the helmets, shoulder and chest plates, but since right now there's only one of each color, you can't really mix'n'match like you would in the game without it coming out looking like some kind of harlequin mash of colors. I wish there was a greater range of gun holding positions, but the bulky arms and chest get in the way of any cross-body stances (as one would expect with armor). What does everyone think of the upcoming dashboard interface? It sort of moves away from the uniqueness of the Xbox blades and goes for what some might consider better parts of the Wii (the avatars) and Playstation interface. I'm actually sort of ambivalent about it. While I liked the blades, I can live with the reverse Playstation-style navigation (vertical for categories, horizontal for options). The Wii-like avatars are a mixed bag. They don't insult me like some feel and they might coax the same crowd that fell in love with the Wii (as long as the 360 still keeps its share of good games and doesn't become inundated with crappy casual fare like the Wii). The potential interaction with other avatars (a la the upcoming PS Home) might be nice to see... but I wonder how unique avatars will look and (on the flip side) how much it'll run us to buy clothes/accessories to get the unique look we want.... I'm a big time, long term fan of Fallout (going back to the old Interplay Wasteland, which is the inspirational ancestor of the series) and am looking forward to see what Bethesda does. I am nervous, though. Oblivion was fun, but there was a bit of 'soullessness' to it and I hope they don't also suck the life, choices, and feeling of freedom out of Fallout. We really need some more 'true' RPGs this generation... even on the PC. And by 'true' I mean ones that give some even half-hearted attempts to allow you to roleplay as opposed to just taking you down set paths and utilizing roleplaying statistical game elements. Fallout was a series that gave you enough options, freedom, and long term consequences to come as close as technologically possible to playing a paper and pencil RPG. And I just realized that I never posted in any of the 360 threads before and therefore aren't on Apollo Leader's list. I haven't been playing much competitive online games of late, but I am known to occasionally hop on and play some FPSs from time to time and certainly wouldn't mind hooking up with Macrossworlders... appropriately enough, my Live ID is SouthpawSamurai (only difference between here and there is the lack of a space in the Live name).
  10. Well, my experience isn't the best example because they both went in before the actual start of shipping, but my original Doc order from at the end of January shipped at the end of April (among the first batch) and my second (done as a backup) was put in at the beginning of April and arrived mid-June. If nothing else, it gives you an idea of the backlog they had from before the first shipping date.
  11. Unfortunately, it doesn't work nearly as well with the figures. It's not just a darker blue, but an almost midnight blue... it's leaning towards having purple in it to match well, while the corrected buckle body is a purer blue. Depending on the lighting, it can look okay, but in most cases, it stands out as much more than 'well, maybe different materials'. Still, there definitely is something for the two color look... If I had a second CC, I'd might consider a paint job just to see what it would look like it a more cartoon accurate dark blue.
  12. Duke Nukem 3-D was definitely paying homage to They Live, particularly in the 'kick ass and chewe bubblegum' line. It is REALLY cheesy... from music to camera work to acting (Piper should get an award for successfully stifling his usual charisma), but it while it's not a great film by anyone's standards, it's a fun enough flick to watch if you haven't seen it and you have a book/computer/hand held game/some other distraction during the slow points where they just pan across the poor person park and play the theme over and over... It is hysterical on television on a station that does regular commerical breaks because it might just be the one movie where a fist fight in an alley (the one I alluded to above) actually can span over two breaks. Just put the damn glasses on, will ya!!!! Does the Piper figure have a black Serpentor mask? Why? I don't remember the Iron Grenadiers using snake motifs at all. That's sort of a disappointment.
  13. Why does Piper's card painting make him look like Roman, your cousin in Grand Theft Auto IV? He should come with a pair of sun glasses so he can fight Roadblock for twenty minutes in an alley to get him to put on the shades and see the aliens walking among them.
  14. If it means waves having some characters in their classic looks (or something close), I'm in, even if the packging was all pink and was just the generic Canadian explosion. But if we're talking all the remaining characters done up in Joe movie, Crysis-inspired, all-black super-suits, I'll happily start saving that much money again.
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