David Hingtgen

So when will you be making a 1/72 "Grace in flightsuit" for the inevitable Bandai VF-27 repaint? (and I'll take a 1/6 one, too)

Anyone know the current trade-in value for a 360 (console/cables only, I want to keep my HD and controller) at Gamestop, EB etc? Mine's disc drive is really acting up lately, and I'd rather sell it and get a new one than to spend 2 hours on the phone to India just to have them say "it's normal". Or if anyone wants to buy a "working, but I'm not happy with the noises its making" 360 let me know...

Not AFAIK. Hasbro doesn't seem able to copyright paint schemes--otherwise you wouldn't have seen the zillion "rich golden yellow with black stripes" Camaro toys the past year...

God I hate it when HG starts acting up again---mainly because we mods have to read through all the name-calling and flaming on the boards...

Anyone got links to more places with custom parts for 25th ann Joes? (I already know of Broken Arrow, but had never heard of Trigate--though they actually seem to have more of what I want)

Just FYI, apparently she finished recording her lines for the movie Dec 4th.

I've just gotta ask--so did you not look at the instructions at all? There's like an entire chapter devoted to the removable fuselage gimmick...

Quick Matt Trakker review: Everything's great except the color. Has "Starscream syndrome", in that instead of being distinctly light GREY, he's off-white. The card-art is perfect---light grey. But the actual figure is "Yamato valk-white". Ends up looking even more like Ace than the mold already does. If he was actually GREY, he'd look more unique, more accurate to the original, overall better, and the red accents wouldn't make him look so "medical". Here's a great pic of the original Matt Trakker fig: http://www.albertpenello.com/mask/trakker_thunderhawk.jpg

Yes, I'm aware of that---I'm just responding to all the people (not just this board) who think that the 360 only ever scratches when it's "moved roughly". The lawsuit is only mentioning the "guaranteed to scratch" situation, but that's not the only issue with the 360 and scratches.

Today was a good day--saw a Rattler (3rd one ever), saw 2 Airbornes (but I have no interest in them), found 2 Trakkers and bought one, found 4 Paravipers and bought one. Found a pilot Scarlett with a good jaw (first ever) but her nose had paint chipped off. My Paraviper's right elbow had a severe case of "excess rubbery plastic all over the joint". Spent a while slicing it off. Still can't figure out what the problem is, I've only seen it about 3 times. It's like the plastic is still liquid while the figure's being assembled, and it "bleeds out" over the joint. (that, or the plastic is too loose, and it's supposed to form like a second skin over the joint for the parts to slide over--hard to tell)

Ventral fins. Not finlets or winglets. (how could they be winglets? They're not on the wings...)

Sigh, yet again--- MANY PEOPLE HAVE HAD THE DISCS SCRATCH WHILE THE 360 DIDN'T MOVE AT ALL. Nada. Frozen. Rock-solid. I think one guy even filmed it and put it up on youtube---took a pristine disc, put it in his horizontal 360, closed the tray, stared at it for 30 secs, ejected disc--and it was all scratched up. Yes, moving it while a disc is in it is stupid and your own fault. But a decent number of 360's are so bad, they will scratch the disc no matter what---THAT is unacceptable. (though not mentioned in the lawsuit it seems)

Superion would be cool but no way--making decent limbs and storage for hands/feet would be very difficult, especially on Skydive and Slingshot. Mainly because gestalt members are also triple-changers in a way (some more than others). Devastator's the only one famous enough to do it, but with the movie and all---unlikely until like 2012... Frankly, all the gestalts have the "separate parts" issue---I doubt we'll ever again see a combiner that comes with a bag of head/foot/hand parts. They are NOT going to do a masterpiece version that requires that, and it'd be VERY hard to incorporate some parts. If any could be done, I think Menasor, due to Motormaster's trailer providing lots of space etc, and the cars could pretty easily hide feet/hands in their hoods etc, without compromising robot mode. Hot Rod---G1 was pretty good/accurate, though definitely unarticulated. Fairly pointless IMHO, like Grimlock. Rodimus Prime---no challenge. His vehicle mode is robot mode with arms and head folded in, with the trailer covering up his legs. Galvatron sure could use a masterpiece. And Cyclonus.

Dang. Same as a Charger/Challenger though---the SRT costs WAY more than the R/T, but doesn't give you THAT much more performance IMHO. PS--what color? IMHO, the G8 looks best in white, and I'm not a fan of white. But on that car, it looks good. PPS----hey, an Xmas avatar! There's a lot fewer of those net-wide this year for some reason.

Was thinking more about future Masterpieces---I think most people agree than MP Grimlock is kinda "pointless". (and I'm a big Grimlock fan). Frankly, it's simply a very large gimmick-filled version of the G1 toy. It's not THAT much better looking in either mode. He always was one of the more "perfect" toys. So, my question is--what toys really could USE a Masterpiece treatment? As in, not because they're a fan-fave character, but because their G1 toy really didn't do them justice at all? I'm currently leaning towards the triple-changers. IMHO Blitzwing and Astrotrain had pretty good alt-modes, but robot mode suffered (especially Blitzwing). And Springer is just sad in all 3 modes. (never had one, but I've seen pics). Octane's in-between, in being fairly decent in all 3, but good in none. (truck mode's probably the worst though) I'd say Astrotrain was the best of the G1 triple-changers. (yes, I'm leaving out Broadside--good luck doing a good-looking carrier/F-14 hybrid at ANY price-point) Finally, any of the cities, especially Trypticon. Imagine how many skyscrapers and roads etc could be incorporated into a Masterpiece version. (I'd remove the walking ability in favor of appearance and transformation) For a city, it's all in the details/sense of scale, and a larger toy with tons of intricate sculpting could really "sell" the look of a mechanical city-scape. (kind of like the newer Unicron/Primus toys--but even more so)

Except that HG seems to have the mechandising rights at least for DYRL, which is "derivative" and not part of Robotech. So they have rights to more than just the "core animation used for Robotech". Perhaps it's a time thing? DYRL existed prior to Robotech's first airing AFAIK.

Tiger Rat box artist sure likes flames, even where very inappropriate. Also--gotta wonder about an ugly repaint exclusive. If Target had a clue, they'd order another run of Rattlers, and nothing but, in the original color. Conquests don't sell! (not nearly as well as the Rattler, at least). Now we'll have Conquests, repaint Conquests, and repaint Rattlers clogging the shelves, and still no(or very few) original Cobra Rattlers. "Case assortment theory" really needs to be a required course at business college. (and it's the manufacturer's fault, not the retailer's) Even grocery stores fall prey to it----"Nummy Snack A" comes in strawberry, and green apple. Nobody wants artificial green apple flavor. But it ships 50/50 with strawberry in the case. Strawberry always sells out immediately, and there's always a bunch of green apple clogging the shelves. People ask the manager etc to order in more strawberry, but he can't/won't as he knows he'll just get MORE green apple ones too, to the point that the entire shelf is green apple, and not a single spot for anything else, and he'll be stuck with 4 dozen boxes nobody will buy even on sale. Later, that entire product is cancelled due to low sales----because the manufacturer never altered the case assortment so no store ever ordered more, knowing they'd be stuck with flavors that don't sell. If they made it like a 80/20 strawberry/apple split, then it'd consistently sell. (I've seen this personally happen several times with some stuff I really like)

Well, I can add +1 permanent "man points". I changed my own brake pads for the first time. (I also confirmed my front calipers are dual-piston).

IMHO, 99% of the "regular DVD sucks on an HDTV" comments come from people who have their TV set to "ultra-contrast mega-bright dynamic-super-awesome mode!!!!". That will make anything that's not 1080p60 look like crap, as it makes even slight flaws 100x worse. But simply turning everything "off" and watching things "normally"---most DVD looks just fine on a HD set. Too many people don't seem to realize that "making the grass look THAT green" is screwing things up---grass isn't really that green in the real world! Even the fake ultra-green better-than-real grass at Disney World isn't that green. If it's THAT green on your TV, then you've screwed with the image. But it sells sets, which is why every demo at BestBuy etc has football featured, with ULTRA GREEN grass...

Just a little side-point: It's much easier/better to downscale, than upscale. (a small but notable reason I have a 720p TV rather than 1080p----you can downscale 1080p to 720p nigh-flawlessly, but the reverse is not true. Conversely, upscaling 480 to 720 is not as hard as 480 to 1080) Most programs etc have a much easier time "filling in" 50%, than trying to double. Think about resizing a JPEG---if it's 600x600, you can shrink it down to 400x400 and it'll still look "perfect". But if you resize it to 1000x1000, even the best graphics program on a high-end PC will make it blurry/grainy/pixelated in areas even when given several secs of processing time for a single image--so don't expect greatness from a DVD player doing dozens per second .

BBTS must sell a LOT of Voltrons to make Toynami "worth more to them" than Yamato. I mean, if it's one or the other, I'm surprised that Toynami sells more apparently. (maybe there's just that many hardcore Robotech fans that really want Rick and Miriya toys, despite the availability of far superior Hikaru and Milia options...) PS---since this is page 50 of a resurrected thread, who's in favor of splitting off the new posts into a new thread?

Nah, I'm the type that gets depressed going to ARC, as they're all far better than mine will ever be. I like to stop for a LONG time when I get depressed modeling. And buy LEGOs. Really, LEGOs are great building fun. Already colored, no glue required, and they look "perfect" when you're done. You know they just brought back the Pirates theme, go buy the big new ship...

It's been doing better the past 24 hours for me at least. PS---I notice MW's mini website icon (the one that shows up next to the URL) has been missing for a while. (though I also know my PC is always the last to have it show up when it's changed)

Yeah, but we're only looking for a subtle difference...

Ok, that's the worst Ozma's has ever looked. If it was human, his hips would be right under his nipples...