tekering

You may be interested in how the vintage LS figures scale with Kitz Concept's "Dana Sterling with Southern Cross Amour [sic]," if you're a modeller like me...

Well, they don't. 😝

While the old model kits are barely 1:12th scale, Kitz Concept's Robotech figures are closer to 1:10th...

...although the male figures were so ridiculously large, Bowie actually scales better with Dana's figure than the armored Jeanne. 🤪

17 hours ago, sh9000 said:

Very cool collector checklists from Product Director Steve Evans of Hasbro.

You'd think his TVC multipack checklist would've included the SDCC 2011 Revenge of the Jedi Death Star set:

He acknowledged the individual Salacious Crumb and mouse droid figures, after all. 🤨

Awesome content, nonetheless. 

19 hours ago, Big s said:

So, what’s under the mesh?

Impossible to determine, without damaging the fabric. 

12 hours ago, jvmacross said:

Does the black fabric have the same pattern as the lower white arm fabric?

No, it's all completely different material...

The forearms on the duty uniform are a soft nylon material, closer to plastic than fabric.  I really wish they'd used it for the whole figure.

10 hours ago, Convectuoso said:

What are your overall thoughts on the Dana figure, @tekering?

Well, I wish the heels on the armored figure were as substantial as the ones on the duty uniform boots...

The armored figure doesn't balance quite as well, and Dana's head went flying off as soon as she toppled over. 😟

The ball-jointed neck for the helmeted head is smaller than the ball joint for the other figure, so Dana's head only sits loosely on the body of the armored figure.  They clearly weren't designed to be compatible. 😒

And even though the heels on the duty uniform boots appear higher than the armored boots, the armored figure has longer legs and therefore stands taller. 🤨

Jeanne Dana has at last completed her three-and-a-half year journey from Hong Kong to Japan. 😅

As has been well-documented by now, she's in fact two distinct figures:

The mesh is unfortunate, but looks okay from a distance, I guess. 

The armor is just glued on to the fabric bodysuit, and not very securely; this immediately fell off as I tried to move the arm.

Note the plastic flash on the shield handle, and the damage caused to the forearm paint if you actually attach the shield to the arm... 😬

Also note the mask can be removed from the helmet, but there's no face underneath.  The face is, in fact, an optional piece you would install instead of the mask.

There's no hoverbike to scale, but who needs a hoverbike if you've got a Cyclone? 😝

Man, this kit is a bear.  Moscato Hobby's come a long way since 2009. 😬

The cockpit's finally ready to paint:

Testing colors...

16 hours ago, Paco Grande said:

My experience is that people in my area are cheap as hell and refuse to pay anything decent for these things.

So don't sell to people in your area!  Sell online, where you can reach a much larger market for your toys.  I've made a decent profit on every Macross collectible I've sold.

4 hours ago, Anasazi37 said:

Just ask @tekering about attics....

I'm not dumb enough to store toys up there.  My attic is just for boxes.

My surplus DX Valkyries are stored outside. 😜

23 hours ago, MKT said:

I PO'ed 2 units specifically to display one in each mode, but looks like I only need 1 unit now.

I'm sure a lot of us are in the same boat... and since we paid up front over three years ago, we're certainly not likely to get our money back now. 😒

So what's the solution?  Class-action lawsuit?  An ineffectual boycott?  DNS server attack?  

8 hours ago, borgified said:

Guaranteed that someone has room in their home plot. 

I don't even have the space to display the 1:48 DX Valkyries I've bought over the past couple of years... I certainly wouldn't have space for a 1:18 VF-1!

Heck, my 1:18 F-14 hangs from the ceiling above the stairwell, 'cause that's the only possible place I can display it... 

And to be honest, I still have no idea where my PLAMAX 1:20 VF-1s will go once they're painted, either. 

"First-world problems," as they say. 😅

18 minutes ago, seti88 said:

bandai's got to pull out some more magic for the VE-1 since arcadia has the premium version VE-1...

What if Bandai came up with a larger scale than the Arcadia?

Say, 1:48? 😝

On 1/13/2024 at 6:33 AM, treatment said:

Ooh, never seen one of those.  Is that a custom-painted 1:60 Yamato VF-19 Excalibur? 😯

6 hours ago, grogall said:

So price is 32,500 yen!

Actually, it's ¥35,200. 😐

11 hours ago, Scyla said:

To my understanding is that in Japan these items are not a scarce as we believe they are and you are able to go to a store and pick one up.

They are more plentiful in Japan, to be sure, but there's a much higher demand for them here; and yes, many of these items do eventually show up in stores...

...at significantly inflated prices, mind you. 🤨

The fact is, finding a new Macross product at conventional retail is next to impossible, even in Japan.  Arcadia's distribution is too limited, and Bandai's production runs are too limited.  Unless you manage to score a pre-order, you're stuck paying secondary market prices... no matter where in the world you happen to reside. 

26 minutes ago, Big s said:

most of the translations til recently had it either as Milia or Millia, and most of the recent Hasegawa models have it as Miria

That's just it; they're translations.  Robotech, being in English, has always had established spellings for all the proper nouns.

Macross, being Japanese, has established phonetic katakana readings, but not many consistent Romanji transliterations.  Even accepted spellings like "Regult" and "Nousjadeul-Ger" are way, WAY off their proper Japanese pronunciations, and yet they've been standardized for marketing material and packaging art (so we're stuck with them). 

Thanks to the Internet, however, we now have consistently-applied spelling conventions that are easily referenced across a variety of Web sites.

40 minutes ago, jenius said:

I think it's been accepted that the 'l' versions were an early translation error and Miria is the proper Macross name and Miriya in Robotech.

On the contrary, most online sources use the "Milia" spelling.

Very clean work, Goodman. 

11 hours ago, Big s said:

I do think there are some here that have gotten pretty far having certain allegations against them, they were running major criminal organizations and having murder accusations thrown around about them.

Oh dear... has my past finally caught up with me? 😟

Well, this is disturbing.  Mike's photography is so crystal-clear, I can make out the granular texture and telltale layering of a 3D-printed prototype...

...on a mass-produced factory figure. 😒

Why would steel molds have this layering evident?  Exactly what kind of molding process are they using in Vietnam? 🤨

So while Mike's gushing on Reactivate, let me introduce my favorite new Arcee figure. 😘

This is Flame Toys' Furai model version, and it's in keeping with their IDW-style modern take on these designs.

It's also exactly the same height as the other Furai models, meaning Arcee's definitely not to scale... 😒

...but if you collect MMC figures, she fits in perfectly with their scale and aesthetic.

Being an officially-licensed figure means she's non-transformable, of course...

...but just because she doesn't have a vehicle mode doesn't mean she can't haul ass... 😊

...or kick ass, for that matter. 😉

Most third-party Arcee figures tend to be retro G1, hyper-sexualized, or hyper-moe...

I think this one is a nice blend of all three aspects. 

As you can see, she's finely articulated...

...and extremely photogenic. 😍

In fact, I've never photographed a figure so much before... 

...at least, not from the back. 😅

Being a model kit means she needs to be assembled, but no glue or paint is required...

Even that Autobot symbol on her chest comes pre-painted on.

And the level of detail is remarkable.  Note part E1_1 here, that fits behind the hubcaps:

They're brake pads! 😯

Some parts even have metal inserts.  It's a really high-quality kit.

Of course, there are optional parts you probably won't make use of...

...but they're entirely superfluous. 

So's her chest piece, incidentally. 😶

She makes Ocular Max's "Azalea" look super old-fashioned...

...but fits right in among MMC's "Reformatted" line. 😎

So what if she never appeared in More Than Meets The Eye? 

On 1/15/2024 at 4:14 PM, Big s said:

It wasn’t until years later that I actually saw the original series and it’s tough for me to go back. I think it’s probably a similar reaction to fans of Dragon Ball or Sailor Moon.

Dragonball featured some significant digital alterations to censor content for North American audiences... Sailor Moon was slightly edited (and at least one character was gender-swapped in the dub)... but neither example compares to Robotech.  I mean, forget cuts or name changes; Southern Cross was set on a whole 'nother PLANET!

A more accurate comparison would be Battle of the Planets, or the infamous Captain Harlock and the Queen of a Thousand Years.

Where's The Marvels?  Or No Way Home? 🤨

I realize Agents of SHIELD is a grey zone (despite how hard they tried to work around the Phase Two films), but don't the Venom films (and Morbius) count, at least?  Certainly, their inclusion on this timeline would make a helluva lot more sense than including What If...  😒

IGN, your timeline sucks.  🙄

21 hours ago, MKT said:

Nice! This being a CharaWorks 1/144?

The very same.  

13 hours ago, no3Ljm said:

Do you participate on these preorders online over there or wait on the release day and get it from the store directly?

Online pre-orders are your only chance to get DX Chogokins at retail prices.  They don't show up in Japanese stores.

Not, that is, until they hit the secondary market:

So yes, I have to face the preorder madness along with the rest of you... although it's a different kind of crap show for Japanese collectors.  Unlike HLJ, Anime Export, and the other specialty shops, most Japanese retailers could care less about collectors.  Bandai tells them they can't list a product until after 4pm on a certain date, so they list that product a half-hour later, an hour later, several hours later... and unlike AmiAmi or Nin-Nin, they don't provide any indication of when exactly the preorder will go up. 

Amazon.jp had their listing up at 4:06, but their stock was superseded by third-party sellers asking ¥12000 above retail (!), making it impossible to access Amazon's own listing in time; I got close, but was cartjacked before checkout.  Yodobashi Camera listed at 4:26, BIC Camera hadn't listed until after 5:00, JoshinWeb didn't up up their listing 'til nearly 6:00, and it looks like Edion didn't add the YF-21 to their site until sometime the following morning!  The only shops that respected the 4pm schedule were Akiba Sofmap and Bandai's own Tamashii store, and both of those only offer lottery sales, so... practically useless. 😒

3 hours ago, kazuo said:

I may have an opportunity to have someone preorder for me in person, but unsure if local shops in Tokyo/JP are still accepting preorders.

I've tried telephone enquiries before, to no avail.  Online preorders are the only option I'm aware of. 

In fact, I remember seeing a sign at the customer service desk at BEST Denki turning away any customers trying to order a Metal Structure Sazabi. 

22 minutes ago, dur said:

I am seriously considering waiting the long game for the WWM releases to go on sale later

On sale? 😟

That seems highly unlikely. 🤨

Pretty impressive detail, for 1:144 scale... 😶

Especially the waterslide decals. 😯

17 hours ago, Perxion said:

I used a 3D model for the cyclone and AI for  the background.

Great concept, but AI has difficulty understanding perspective and foreground scale.  That pic makes your cyclone look as big as an Alpha. 😅

2 hours ago, Dobber said:

the main 3 “young” people are so unlikeable

On 1/5/2024 at 10:39 PM, TangledThorns said:

almost all the main characters are unlikable

I can't believe you guys don't like Keiko... 🥺

I'm becoming a big fan of Mari Yamamoto, thanks to her portrayal of Keiko Miura. 😋