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Does anyone know if DS-01 Crimson Wing has any quality issue or weak points other than the rather complicated transformation?

6 hours ago, Lolicon said:

Prices on Kakizaki hovered around the 20000-22000 range on Mandarake for quite a long time after release, though they were often snapped up pretty quickly and I rarely caught one with the "Add to Cart" button available. It's only recently joined the 30k club. I chalk it up to being Kakizaki for the relatively slow price climb.

 

It is, but it shouldn't be that way. It's artificial scarcity created by Bandai.  I wish Macross was more popular and/or Big West would allow more companies to produce quality Macross toys, but alas we're stuck with Bandai making us beg like circus seals for every fish valkyrie.

This whole situation reminds me of an old PA comic and we're the unfortunate fans.

https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/05/27

Agreed that it should not be. Macross is popular, but Bandai won't let it threatens Gundam. Having said that, the whole Arcadia saga where prices are jacked up so much and yet some fans justify for their high prices. Well, they reap what they sow. But the ones with more than half a wit pay the price.

Since Legioss is iderived from F/A-18, it's fittingly to have an F/A-18 in Legioss scheme. The model looked awesome until I put a flat clear coat, it completely ruins the blue paint. 

Kudos to them for taking on J-15 (a Su-27 derivative). It's a slick plane and hard to make it less kibble. But it looks like the underside is totally off, no air intakes of sort and the vertical tails are off too. But the images said that it's still work in progress. Hopefully they can sort out the underside.

13 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

Maybe not a fair comparison in terms of existing designs, but I'm mostly referring to the complexity and creativity of the mechanisms they used in the design to hide so much of the robot inside the jet. 

Mostly I just love the way they unfold the entire foot from inside such an otherwise clean leg.  I'm really looking forward to how they make the Su-27.  

 

I too looking forward for their  Su-27 and the J-10

Looks like after the Chinese Flanker, it would be their J-31, the S-70 equivalent helicopter and Y-20 transport aircraft. Finally, we have some good looking robots transformed into good looking aircraft. Bring it on!

38 minutes ago, Guyffon said:

When 10k yen more is considered decent.......

When there are so many willingly to folk out that much for things that don't worth more than their original price...

It is just a SS Jetfire remold. But arguably looks cleaner.

Is that from X-Transbot?

Looks like this line is dead.

Nice engineering, like the warship, just wish that it's not Jetfire. They could have create a new character. There's a reason it's called Jetfire. It's because it transforms into a jet. This should call Boatfire or Shipfire.

Nicee is a very good quality product. Worth every cent of it. The only third party product that I'm really impressed. FansToys products have good quality too but the transformation seems rather over complicated. Ocular Max and XTransbot have good engineering but all the ones that I have, have QC issues one way or the other. May be it's my bad luck.

Someone needs to show this to Takara Tomy on how to make transforming jet robot without super bulky underside (sneering at MP-52 Strarscream).

MP-11 has the most accurate alt mode (it has the correct vertical tail fins) except the leg kibbles. The bot mode for the new one looks good but the centre piece kibble in the jet mode is a killing blow.

The transformation is surprisingly simple! I like it.

Probably I should. Instead I took a knife to fix it 

Season one was great. Joel was great in Kovacs shoe. Season two is kind of meh.

Finally plunged ahead and got the Ocular Max Azalea high heel version. Unlucky me, one side of the tab from the leg cover is deformed.

Well when you are in a dog fight and can't shake off your opponent, that would be it.

How do you guys find about the quality of third parties, generally speaking? Over the years I collected some. Many are over complicated to transfom and clearly their moulding/product quantity cannot match their design. Too many times the products break the first time it transform. So far, only my Unique Toys Peru Kill stands the test of time and multiple transformation.

I think I'll keep my v2 Starscream. Not a big fan of cartoon accurate. I'd rather they are real world accurate in their alt form.

Finally got my hand on Studio Series - 59 Shatter. There are already many reviews on this, so I just want to share a few things I noticed. Since Hasbro has not licensed the official AV-8B Harrier, they make it looks like a Harrier and they definitely brought a few clues from the Russian equivalent, Yak-38 (https://www.jetphotos.com/photo/6538288), the lift engines aft of the canopy and rotating jet exhaust. Besides, this figure is solid and have a good weight in hand. It definitely worth to get.

Not another remake again! They should concentrate on making Masterpiece Astrotrain, Blitzwing, Snaprdragon, etc. Price increase is 'inevitable', seeing Macross fans can simply throwing north of $300 to $400 a piece, they would tempted to try to increase the price each time. I like the earlier Masterpiece, they might not be whatever accurate, they are easy to transform. I don't need to study the manual, look up YouTube and spending half an hour to figure things out.

Just glad I didn't buy it. A toy that can't be played. Is it still a toy?