Shaggydog

The Toynami Masterpiece VF's were hated for many reasons, aesthetic and political, but there was not widespread breakage in that line. Check the threads. Breakage is MUCH more common in the Yamato valkyrie lines.

The Toynami Masterpiece Alphas suffered from minor breakage, but the more significant problem is that they simply didn't transform well.

The Toynami Masterpiece Voltron hasn't had any real problems that I'm aware of.

The 1/100 toynami valks were loose in the first run, and the second run has some cracked shoulders, but I'm unaware of any arms actually breaking off.

Overall, not a bad record, as far as breakage and stability are concerned. When you open a Toynami, you don't flinch at the thought of transforming the toy.

People have got to get over this 'exciting new design!' fallacy. The revoltech can barely stand. Seriously - if you want any kind of interesting pose at all, it'll take you a half hour to get the revoltech to stand up w/o immediately flopping over. Don't give anyone ANY credit for an 'exciting new design' that sucks. If you made an 'exciting new' airplane design that dropped out of the sky, would anyone want to buy it?

Toynami builds off of time-tested and proven designs, which is probably why they have fewer major problems with their toys than Yamato does (yes, that is a fact). Now, the Yamato 1/48 Valk is a 'home run' in the sense that it's fairly original and it works very well. But their 'original design' philosophy has also turned out a lot of duds. It's a risk. I guess you can give a company some points for originality, but I give a helluva lot more points for something that works well and doesn't break.

I'm seeing some pix of the Toynami Betas. Cripes, how many years will they trot those out before releasing em?

That said, any info on Bandai product (particularly 1/55 VF-1 reissues) being shown at the Toynami booth would be greatly appreciated.

Wait.. this toy uses fragile pin-in-plastic joints similar to what Takara used in the early 80's? To support the entire arm and shoulder, no less? I thought yamato was at the pinnacle of transforming toy design, far beyond what all others blah blah blah

Someone probably already mentioned this, but the wave 2 toys were much better than the 1a's from the first wave. I haven't had any problems with limbs falling off the 2nd wave toys.

Mighta been dumb to announce the vf-1d before the vf-1s strike was released. I canceled my strike order, I'll wait for the D. Wonder how many others did the same? Of course, it's sorta illogical on my part 'cause we already knew two-seaters were coming, but psychology is funny that way...

Other than the display stand, I haven't heard many reports of breakage on the toy. I think the plastic quality is decent.

BBTS is listing the super weapons set as 'in stock', btw.

http://www.yamato-toys.com/dev/cont_051/index_2.html

(scroll down)

Wow. They actually had a prototype there, and nobody got a picture? The Yamato security guards must be getting better, usually we see pix even when there are 'no photo' signs all over the place!

In the text underneath the pix of the other Yamato 1/60 stuff..

http://blog.hobbystock.jp/report/2008/06/126.html

it says Yamato is developing a 1/60 VF-11b . Yay! Let's loosen up a few of those tolerances for fighter mode this time, please.

Based on the recommendations here and elsewhere, I've ordered a set of these GNU toys. I'm not a fan of revoltech toys. In the past, I've been very unhappy with revoltech toys generally, they feel very cheap and flimsy to me. For example, the recent revoltech battle pod can barely stand. I realize revoltech is inexpensive, but I'd rather pay a bit more and get a good product. Is it fair to say that the GNUs are more sturdy and stable than the revoltechs?

The nose/cockpit section is held in place quite securely in battroid mode, by the two metal bars on the inner side of the intakes (point 19 on the instructions). These bars lock into the horizontal split (gap) below the cockpit that you get in battroid mode. With the nose locked in place correctly, it does not flop around at all when you pick the toy up at any angle.

Graham

Graham. C'mon man. The 'bars' you speak of are barely bumps. They're like a micron high. The nose is not exactly 'locked'. If I shift my toy abruptly to be face-down, the nose will pop out. Maybe you got a more secure connection by luck, but let's admit that this is not the most secure connection on earth.

AGAIN, this is a FANTASTIC toy and I'm NOT bitching.

Brief review: this toy rocks!

This is a very sturdy toy, and it looks fantastic in both fighter and battroid modes. My toy showed up misassembled a bit - one of the wings was sitting loose in the box. But, it was an easy fix, just unscrew the base of the wing and the screw inside the landing gear hatch, and you can lever the wing base open wide enough to pop the wing into place. I'm glad that Yamato is relying less on glue, as an earlier poster noted. I wish the forward fuselage locked down a bit better in battroid, as was also noted earlier. But this toy really nails my mental image of a YF-21, which is the only 'accuracy' that applies to anime-based toys as far as I'm concerned. I doubt there'll be many breakage problems, the materials seem very tough, with metal used for some of the key transformation mechanism parts. The toy is really damn tight, but once you know what you're doing I think transformation won't be bad. I transformed the first time only checking the instructions once (for the lock-down of the back) and I was fairly rough, and the toy held up beautifully. Great job Yamato!

Maybe some pix later...

This is rapidly devolving into one of the dumbest arguments on the internets, and that's really saying something. Why don't we just wait til the god-blasted toy comes out, then we can start a new round of idiotic arguments because the yamato drones will bitch that the macross logo is 2 mm too low or some such insanely nitpicky crap.

BTW, the idea that bandai hates macross (or has 'to prove themselves' when it comes to making macross stuff) suggests a prepubescent mentality amongst those who suggest it. The reason Bandai hasn't sunk more resources into macross toys is BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T THINK THEY COULD MAKE ENOUGH MONEY DOING SO. Yamato disagreed, and maybe they were right. Bandai evidently agrees with Yamato now, because they're making Macross F toys. This entire toy-making enterprise is just a quest for the most efficient way to remove money from your fanboy wallets. There's nothing special whatsoever about Macross, it's just another extended toy commercial designed to sell crap you don't need. Get over it.

Love,

Shag

this bbs is impossible to parody

FYI, it's 'faze' you're looking for.

I think the Yamato 1/48 VF-1 toys are amongst the best adult collector-toys that've been made. I just wish all their stuff would live up to that high standard. The warnings about the faulty products on this forum have been VERY valuable to me, I always check the MW forums before buying a Yamato toy that's been out for a while.

I think most of us would rather wait a few extra months, rather than having to buy a corrected version 1.5 or 2.0. IF Yamato is using this extra time to iron out bugs (which we really have no way of knowing, other than maybe Graham), it's a good thing in my book.

Dont' forget that the prototypes for those one where hand made.

my VF-11b didn't broke after about 100 transformations it still fille, no stress marks etc... I think this "problem" depends of the one that transform it .. or the way it's transformed.

That's sort of the typical response to QC problems by someone who happens to get a perfect specimen. However, I can assure you that it had nothing to do with me, or how I transformed it - the toy was just insanely tight. Please let your imagination fly for a moment, and conceive of the possibility that some people didn't get the same toy you did.

Don't forget:

1/72 YF-19 Ver 1: generally crappy (greatly improved with ver 1.5)

1/72 VF-11B (non-fast pack version): too tight to transform without breaking (greatly improved with fast pack ver)

1/60 VF-1 toys (the old ones with removable legs): chest locking mechanism very difficult to operate (probably greatly improved with the new 1/60 toys)

It's not that Yamato can't get it right. They just can't get it right the first time.

Yeah, I thought we agreed on "toycrappi" although I did notice one of the hands included with the 1/100s did look suspicious like a heil...

Well, they're both so dazzlingly clever, I can see how it's hard to choose.

It's not that Bandai's perfect. It's just that they're practically perfect compared to Yamato.

Good for them, I hope they sell a million. And I like the playset features. But the only feature that forces it to be obnoxiously fat, as far as I can tell, are the smuggling compartments. That particular feature is pretty meaningless to me personally, I'd much rather have a sleeker profile. I guess somebody must care about it...

I figured Macrossworld, with the detail- and accuracy-oriented people around here, would be the one place I'd get some agreement on my issue with the upcoming 'BMF' Falcon. I HATE that they've given it a 'fat' profile AGAIN! It looks like the Falcon is pregnant or has been converted to a snowplow. Screw the stupid 'hidden smuggling compartments', I want a Falcon that looks sleek from the outside. (yes, i know there are uber-expensive replicas and smaller toys.)

This does make me more optimistic about the ELINT and ostrich, but it's still probably a long shot. Simple reason: Bandai needs to make money on the line or they'll can it, and I just don't think these initial releases will sell very briskly.

Found pix of the reissue.. not so sure I like the changes.

http://nov.2chan.net/y/src/1209141251357.jpg