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mikeszekely

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  1. mikeszekely
    I think all video reviews are too long. Tell me what's good, tell me what isn't, give me a few shots in both (or however many) modes, and let me go about my day.
  2. mikeszekely
    I gave up looking for Combiner Wars in my area (for now). Amazon had Silverbolt for $21.99, so I just ordered him there, and tossed Legends-class Bombshell in for the ride. Bombshell is pretty sweet. His transformation is nearly identically to the G1 toy (the main difference is that you also rotate the Legends-class at the waist 180 degrees). Each insect leg can move independently... not a ton of posability with them, but you can move them out of the way in bot mode better than Shrapnel. The colors are spot on G1, and the Legends size for him is perfect compared to other Deluxes/Voyagers (as opposed to Shrapnel, who seems a little smaller). Literally my only complaint here is that he doesn't come with any kind of weapon... but I don't recall the G1 toy having one either. Oh yeah, and the cannons on his knees are 5mm pegs, and his fists look like gun barrels on the end. It seems like he should have a third weapon mode, like Powerglide, but there's nothing in the instructions. Playing around with him, I think I got a reasonable weapon mode (better than Powerglide's, honestly), save for the fact that there's no pegs to keep the arms/barrels in place. As for Silverbolt... I like him more than I thought I would. Yeah, he's still a robot with a chunk of plane on his back in bot mode, and yeah, he's still a plane with a large chunk of robot on the bottom on plane mode, but the transformation is actually more involved and interesting than the previous Ultra Class. Even better, he's got lots of fold out panels and what not that actually makes him a pretty great torso, significantly better than Optimus... although I miss being able to peg some of limb's weapons into Prime's fists like shoulder-mounted guns. Then again, you can peg one of the guns onto the underside of the plane's nose, on Superion's back... then fold nose down, causing the gun to protrude up through Superion's legs. A juvenile part of me is amused. A shame that Hasbro sent out that 20% off coupon for their online store, only for them to be sold out of Air Raid and the other four Stunticons I need.
  3. mikeszekely
    Then I guess we'd better keep cranking out the kits, because after you finish Destiny you have a couple other Deactive SEED RGs, don't you? Your turn, Hikuro. How's that GM 2.0 coming along?
  4. mikeszekely
    It's not a complicated kit. Seriously, the only reason it took me two days instead of me finishing it last night is because I did paint some stuff. Way easier than the RG's you've been cutting your teeth on.
  5. mikeszekely
    "Imma destroy you, Newtypes!" So yeah, this is a pretty great kit. Solid proportions, lacks the pops-off-if-you-sneeze waist that's plagued a lot of the newer HGs, great range of motion, and is probably one of the most-accurate out of the box HGs you can buy. Seriously, aside from some gray on the inside of the knees, a little dot on the head, a few leg verniers (actually, I painted inside the gray parts, too), and a few touches on the shield, there really isn't any painting involved. Even panel lining is pretty minimal, because most of the panels are already split to expose the pink psycoframe parts. In fact, it's hard to imagine how an RG would even improve on it... maybe a little more color separation on the beam magnum's condenser packs, a little bit better layering of the armor parts to include the eight unpainted verniers on each leg, and a bunch of those little red warning stickers. Possibly a transformation gimmick that would make for a very fiddly model at the 1/144 scale. Honestly, I only have two fairly minor complaints. One, I really wish the D runner would have included one more part for the back of shield, which you can see in my pictures is left white even those all the artwork I've seen for it indicates that it should be gray. And it looks sort of thin. I really think just one more gray part to fit between the psycoframe part and the tube part would have been ideal. As for my other complaint, it's really just the lack of accessories. I mean, when I'm done building a model I get a sandwich-size Ziploc bag, dump whatever extra parts I have... weapons I'm not posing with, action base adapters, extra hands, whatever... into the bag, slap a label on the bag, and toss it into a box. All that's left in the bag for Unicorn is an extra right-hand fist that isn't making the trigger finger, and a small adapter to plug the shield onto Unicorn's backpack. That's it. As I mentioned a few posts back, there aren't even any beam saber blades in this kit, despite the fact that there are four beam saber hilts on it (two on the backpack, one in each forearm for beam tonfa mode... you can just see the holes to plug in the saber blades in my third pic). To get saber blades, Bandai wants you to buy the Unicorn mode kit, which also includes a hyper bazooka but no beam magnum. A part of me feels like this is a cheap cash grab by Bandai (especially because, while I sort of expected to buy Unicorn mode anyway, I plan on skipping both regular Banshee kits and the Unicorn mode of Banshee Norn, and now I'm kind of worried about the Banshee Norn Destroy mode kit missing stuff). I mean, I don't even mind that Unicorn's weapons are divided between the two kits, but would it really have killed Bandai to toss in a runner of saber blades? On the other hand, a part of me has to admit that it's effective marketing... I mean, I did immediately order the Unicorn mode kit before I'd clipped the first piece off Destroy mode's runners. Speaking of, Unicorn Mode and Delta Plus should be here tomorrow. Now I just have to figure out how to afford the rest of the Unicorn kits I want...
  6. mikeszekely
    Well, I've never built an MG, so the only comparison I can give there is based on what I've seen in pictures. When it comes to size, that's a very personal preference. One man's "nope, too small" can be another man's "sweet, you can fit more in a display!" To give you an idea, I believe this is a pic of the MG Gundam Mk-II next to the RG version. Now, one thing you might notice is that the RG is arguably more detailed. In my opinion, this is their greatest strength. RGs tend to use lots of parts to both create accurate colors and give solid areas some physical seams and color separation. They also use tons of stickers, especially the SEED and Federation UC kits. They're just regular stickers, so they're relatively easy to apply and add a ton of detail, but in the right lighting you can still see the backing. On the whole, though, you're getting near-PG detail for less than most MGs when you buy an RG kit, which is why I prefer them and why I've built the entire line (minus the Skygrasper plane). If you consider MG a lot of work, though, I'm not sure how you'll feel about the work involved in an RG. Like MGs, there's an inner frame, and you build the parts onto the frame, plus stickering can be tedious. On the plus side, there's so many natural seams, accurately-colored parts, and color separation that an RG kit looks fantastic with no additional painting or marking. In fact, I built 14 of 17 RGs without even panel lining them. HGs are sort of a different story. On the plus side, as you've said, there's a ton more to choose from... but quality can vary, depending on how far back in the line you go. For example, I have the Nu Gundam from the HGUC line, and while it doesn't look bad it does look a little out of place next to the RGs. But more recent releases, like F91, Turn A, Gouf Custom, etc, look fine, although with fewer markings. HG's tend to be pretty easy to build, too. If you just build one, with no painting or marking, it can take as little as four hours. However, due to their simplicity, HGs tend to have an "almost not quite" accuracy. It's not as bad as the old Wing kits... I remember building the HG Wing Zero EW, and the entire foot was basically two red pieces, so you had to paint most of it white. It really isn't that bad. But you'll find lots of little things, like vents or veniers molded into white plastic that should be black, yellow, or black with a yellow border. Head vulcans are often left molded onto the head but uncolored. Weapons, especially, will be molded in a single, solid color, which is fine if it's a solid gray rifle but less fine when you find yourself trying to paint the trim on, say, the Crossbone X1's weapons. Sometimes, Bandai will throw in stickers to add back some of the detail, but it's maddeningly random. For example, on F91 Bandai threw in some yellow-bordered black triangle stickers for its knees, but not the waist armor. Depending on your perspective... heck, depending on the mobile suit, trying to add back the missing detail can be a chore, or part of the fun. In fact, probably the favorite kit I've built was an HG Sinanju where I painted all the red parts with a metallic red spray-paint and did all the gold detailing with a metallic gold sharpie and some clear coat. Whatever you decide, I'd say you can do RGs just fine with nippers, a hobby knife, and some tweezers, with q-tips and a brush-style Gundam marker optionally for panel lining. If you do HGs, you may find yourself wanting a few more options for adding paint. Personally, I don't mind it, and I think HGs can be pretty fun.
  7. mikeszekely
    Yeah, I checked, and yeah, it's right. Hilts only. I can't speak for the GM or PG versions, but for the HGs the Unicorn Mode kit has saber blades and the bazooka, the Destroy Mode has the Beam Magnum. It's like Bandai is strong arming you into buying both kits. ...and it worked, too. I ordered the Unicorn Mode kit.
  8. mikeszekely
    My advice, then, is to pick up a Tailgate and a Swerve while you can, then read More Than Meets the Eye. The other IDW ongoing (formerly Transformers: Robots in Disguise, now just The Transformers to avoid confusion with the new cartoon) is ok, but More Than Meets the Eye is probably my favorite piece of Transformers fiction since... well, probably ever.
  9. mikeszekely
    Yeah, I know about the problems with the Zaku III. It's why I was really hoping for an updated Sleeves one after its showing in Unicorn. The fact that there was a Zaku III in the first episode of Build Fighters Try didn't diminish my desire for a good Zaku III. As for AGE, I mentioned in the show thread that I actually liked the first two arcs, but that it fell apart in the 3rd arc. That's why I wanted the AGE-1 Normal, and the AGE-2 Normal is on my Amazon wish list. I haven't really thought about getting an AGE-3 (it reminds me of ZZ, which I never cared for... too bulky with bits hanging off at weird angles). I figured that if I got a kit to represent that arc of AGE, I'd just skip to the AGE-FX. I don't mind partsforming gunpla. While Macross is about pretty jets that turn into pretty robots, I've thought most "waverider" modes look kind of like a folded up robot. When I do Zeta Plus, it'll be forever in robot mode.
  10. mikeszekely
    You picked it up, though, didn't you? I could have sworn I remember you mentioning it... EDIT: I opened the box up, had a look at the runners and the instructions. Looks like a pretty easy, straightforward kit. But I noticed something really weird. Despite having a runner of pink translucent parts, despite including four beam saber hilts (two for the backpack, one in each forearm), there are no beam saber blades in this kit. I mean, I guess it's not a huge deal... I have plenty of blades from other kits, and I tend to arm my mobile suits with ranged weapons anyway (the only guys in my cases holding melee weapons are Deathscythe Hell, a Gouf Custom, V2, Destiny, Crossbone X1, my custom Crossbone Maoh, and a Sengoku Astray, and of those the V2, Gouf Custom, and Crossbone X1 are also holding a gun). Still, it seems kind of odd.
  11. mikeszekely
    I'll definitely post pics for you guys when it's done, but I doubt it'll be as impressive as Hikuro's or Nekko's PG version.
  12. mikeszekely
    For some reason, the Loto doesn't really do it for me (I preferred the ECOAS Jestas). Neither does any of Angelo's mobile suits (his Geara Zulu Custom or the Rosen Zulu) or most of the older Zeon suits used by the Sleeves/Neo Zeon in Gundam Unicorn. Ironically, two Zeon suits in the anime I'd love to have Sleeves versions of, the Bawoo and the Zaku III, didn't get Unicorn kits. For me, maybe because I grew up on Gobots, Transformers, Robotech (I'm a Macross purist now, I swear!) and Tranzor Z/Mazinger Z, but I tend to prefer my robots to be more humanoid. The less humanoid a mecha is, the less interested I usually am in it (for example, stuff like the Metal Gear Rex, Metal Gear Ray, or the Tachikoma from GitS don't interest me at all). Even in Gundam I'm not a fan of mobile armors, hybrids like the Jamru Fin, stuff that's half mobile suit, half tank like the Guntank and the Loto, or even just stuff without legs like the original Zeong or the Dra-C.
  13. mikeszekely
    It works for me. Aside from RGs, which I buy all of, I tend to only buy the suits that I like. For UC series, that can be almost all of them; for other series the hero Gundam is usually enough. For example, the RGs I have are plenty of SEED and 00 suits for me, for G-Reco I picked up the G-Self and that'll probably be all, etc. Long story short, right now most of the HG kits I want are Unicorn. With the Sinanju I already have, the Unicorn I received today, and the Delta Plus I just ordered, that still leaves me wanting the Jesta, Zeta Plus, Silver Bullet, Anksha, Dreissen, Jesta Cannon, ReZel, ReZel Type C, Geara Zulu, Kshatriya, Byarlant Custom, and Banshee Norn Destroy for sure. Possibly Full Armor Unicorn Destroy, Unicorn in Unicorn Mode, Phenex Destroy, Delta Kai, and GM III Desert Colors. Maybe also, if the stars align for it, a Neo Zeong. I think besides that, my HG wish list is maybe a few more AGE kits (say what you will about the series, I like titular Gundam) and a Zaku III right now. I mean, I'd like a ton more UC suits represented in my detolfs, but a lot of them have older kits that I don't think will look as good next to the RGs for the Gundam, Mk-II, and Zeta.
  14. mikeszekely
    Hey, my HGUC Unicorn Destroy came from Japan today! Even better, looks like Toy Shop Japan Hobbyone moved some of their inventory to an Amazon warehouse or something. I was able to snag a Delta Plus from them that's fulfilled by Amazon, so it looks like I get to do Gunpla this week.
  15. mikeszekely
    I agree that the color doesn't make sense as a tank, but I actually dig the look. Well, I had to run a few errands this morning, and while I was out I hit two Targets and two Walmarts (basically, my neighborhood ones and the ones in the next town over). My local Walmart is a joke. They have no Transformers larger than a Deluxe except for the Robots in Disguise 3-Step Changers. They two other pegs of Robots in Disguise one-step changers, and no Combiner Wars. They have several pegs of AoE toys, and generic army guys taking the rest of the Transformers space. Both Targets were a little better. They had some Generations Rattrap and Tankor in the Deluxes, plus Rhinox, Roabduster, and Whirl in the Voyagers, and a decent selection of Robots in Disguise. They also had some Combiner Wars Legends, but just Huffer and Blackjack. The other Walmart had a large selection of Robots in Disguise and a single Alpha Bravo. I did find Legends Cosmos again, and this time I picked him up. Once again, I'm really impressed with the quality of these Legends-class figures. I mean, there has to be some perspective... they're obviously not MPs, but they're not that far off from the Deluxes anymore. Really, if they do Kickback, Brawn, and Seaspray like this I'll be pretty happy.
  16. mikeszekely
    I went to visit a buddy about 45 minutes away, and they have a Walmart out there so I figured I check along the way. Honestly, their Walmart is pretty beat. A lot of movie toys, a handful of Robots In Disguise, and all the Sky-byte and Roadbusters you could want. Absolutely no Combiner Wars, but I did find something that might be better... a Legends-class Swerve. I don't know how the Legends figures have been in your areas, but for the most part stores in my area had tons of Optimuses, Bumblees, and Starscreams. Occasionally a Megatron. I don't know if they just didn't sell or what, but you could go into most stores in my area as recently as a month or two ago and still find Legends Optimus. So, naturally, most stores never bothered with newer waves. My local Target, after finally ditching the remaining Optimi, started getting a few Combiner Wars Legends, as I mentioned. Around the holidays, I managed to find Tailgate and Gears at my local Walmart, but that was about it. But as a big fan of IDW's More Than Meets the Eye, Swerve was the one Legends-class figure I really wanted, so I was pretty stoked to find him. They had Shrapnel/Skrapnel and Cosmos, too. I passed on Cosmos... he's bigger and more articulated than the original Legends CHUG Cosmos, but nothing was really screaming "buy me!" about him. I was going to pass on Shrapnel, too, since I was never able to get my hands on the Deluxe Kickback from awhile back, but something about him made me change my mind. Maybe because I had the G1 Insecticons as a kid, and Legends CHUG does a pretty good job of capturing that look? Now I gotta find me a Combiner Wars Bombshell, and pray they do a Legends-class Kickback... Just as a kind of side note, you guys... between Tailgate, Swerve, Gears, Shrapnel, and Powerglide, I have to admit that the Legends-class Transformers that are coming out now are way better than the ones from a few years ago. They usually have ball-joints at the hips and shoulders plus decently bendy elbows and knees that give them a fair amount of articulation for a simple toy, transformations that are more complicated than their original G1 toys but simple enough to fiddle with at your desk, and an appearance that really captures their G1 cartoon appearance. My only gripe is that they don't come with weapons (like Powerglide), or their weapons suck because they're supposed to be some kind of tiny triple changer that looks terrible in at least two modes, has almost no articulation, is a decidedly-large thingy that doesn't look like a weapon in weapon mode, and usually has a terrible transformation. Seriously, Shrapnel comes with Reflector, and to transform him from robot to camera, you basically just knock him over.
  17. mikeszekely
    No, I don't have any kits to work on right now. Still waiting on Unicorn and AGE-1 to come from Japan, and G3 to actually be released. Maybe I'll indulge on a kit this week, but a lot of what I want to build right now are Unicorn kits that Amazon doesn't have in stock. If I order them, I'll be waiting on Toy Shop Japan Hobbyone or whatever, and waiting a month (I kind of want to do the Delta Plus, but I could see if Amazon still has some Silver Bullets...). Don't feel too bad, though. Today I watched my team sneak into the NHL playoffs (sorry, renegadeleader1), and tomorrow is tabletop game night with my buddies, so it's not a bad weekend to have no Gunpla.
  18. mikeszekely
    I just finished G-Reco. To anyone who thinks that G-Reco is worse than the two SEED series, you're nuts. But that's about it. Honestly, after the weak stories, dull and cliched characters, and ridiculous mecha porn of SEED and 00, I'm glad that the Gundam franchise tried to take a different tack with AGE and G-Reco... but maybe they over-corrected? Well, I actually liked AGE until the third arc, when everything just fell apart. But, as much as I genuinely liked a lot of the characters in G-Reco, the story was just all over the place. I mean, it starts off simply enough, with a believable conflict between two groups over economic reasons, but then the pirates turn out to be the pirates AND Ameria, and the Capital turns out to be the Capital Guard AND the Capital Army, and all four groups have different motivations. And while they're fighting, Tomino throws in the Towasangans, whose plan to retake the Earth gives the series its name, but if that wasn't enough we also have Venus Globe, and G-IT who is part of Venus Globe but has different intentions. Then Tomino brings all these factions back to Earth, alliances are formed and broken, everyone fights a big battle, then... it just stops? Really? All these factions are introduced for absolutely zero payoff. We don't know if any of the economic factors are resolved, or why Towasanga wanted to upset the status quo and move back to Earth. The fighting just sort of stops, and we're given a few scenes to show that everyone lived happily ever after, or something. To make matters worse, a lot of the ideas like a more advanced group in space wanting to migrate back to Earth, the dark history of the Universal Century, etc are pretty much copy-pasted from Turn A. It was kind of cool, though, that Bellri and Mask wound up fighting in the ruins of Jaburo.
  19. mikeszekely
    It's looking good, David... but you gotta get that backpack done!
  20. mikeszekely
    That is a better price, but I did an in-store search and none of the stores in my area have it. I'll just grab it at Target, since I know they have copies there and it's five minutes from me.
  21. mikeszekely
    What head is that? I went out today looking for Combiner Wars. It's frustrating that Wave 2 is supposed to be out and Wave 3 is imminent, but aside from a one week period where Walmart had the Wave 1 Deluxes (did they not restock after selling out?) and TRU having the two Megatrons last time I was there, Combiner Wars are (nearly) nowhere to be found. No sign of Wave 2, no sign of any of the Voyagers. Half of Walmart's pegs are Robots in Disguise, half are still Age of Extinction. Target is mostly Robots in Disguise, but they're practically choking on Whirl and Rhinox, and their Generations Deluxe pegs are all Rattrap. I did manage to find a solitary peg for Legion/Legend/whatever the little size is called now. It was almost all Huffer, but I managed to snag the sole Powerglide. It's pretty hilarious how this one tiny figure is light years better than the Ultra class from a few years back.
  22. mikeszekely
    Hey, I found a copy of Ni no Kuni on clearance at Target for $10. Worth it?
  23. mikeszekely
    RG Casval is done. This kit... this mobile suit... nothing matches it. It's got a maroon/salmon/pink that makes you think it'll match his Zaku or Z'Gok, but the maroon is more purple, the salmon is darker, and the pink is this neon safety plastic color. On the whole, I'm really not a fan of the color scheme. I get that Char's known for red, but the various colors of Gundam don't work when the runners are basically re-done straight up in various shades of red, which is what they did here. More black, some white, something to make you think you're looking at a repainted Gundam instead of Gundam through a red filter would have been great. One interesting thing about this kit is that, rather than replace the stickers with a sheet for Casval, you get the same sheet as regular Gundam, replete with red marks that won't show, an incorrect model number, and markings for White Base that you wont' use. All they give you in one tiny sheet with six waterslides (two on the chest, one on each shoulder, and two on the shield). Personally, I'm not big on waterslides. It's nice how the backing kind of dissolves away, leaving the decal looking as if it had been painted on, but it seems like if they're too small or too big they fall apart or tear, I have a hard time getting them in place before they start to dry, and wetting them and drying them is tedious. In fact, I did manage to destroy one of the ones that should have been on its chest. Luckily, it was just a model number. I found some small Zeon symbol waterslides I had from a different kit and used that in its place. I used on on its backpack, too. Colors and waterslides aside, it's identical to the regular RG Gundam, for better or worse. It's a kit that suffers both from the fact that the engineering in the RG line has improved over the next 16 releases, but also from the ambition that went into it. There's a lot of stuff going on that really isn't done much anymore, like putting a piece of armor on with a gap, then putting another piece of armor in that gap for no other reason than color separation. Something else, I don't recall if this was true for the original or not, but some of the plastic seems like a lower quality than what I'm used to. The neon pink, especially, was very soft, which made my breaking a leg part much worse than it had to be. At the end of the day, while I think the RG Gundam is probably the best plastic representation of the RX-78, I don't really recommend Casval's unless you really like pinkish-reds or are a completionist (like me). Despite my gripes, I can't wait or the RG G3 to complete the set.
  24. mikeszekely
    I think you guys are way overestimating my gunpla talent... not to mention my inventory of paint supplies! Still, this is where I'm stopping for the night, and I don't think it looks too bad. I don't think, even knowing that I broke a part, that you can tell. Review to follow, but if you go way back to my thoughts on the regular RG Gundam, it's mostly the same.
  25. mikeszekely
    Dang, that's like three kits in two days, Hikuro! I started the RG Casval Gundam... and I broke it. I was kind of not paying attention, fit some of the leg armor to the frame, but forgot two of the inner frame parts (upper thigh area). The front of the thigh reaches through the missing part to connect to the frame, and it was a tight fit on some relatively soft plastic. So when I tried to pull the part back off to put the missing piece in, it cracked in three parts. I glued it, and you can't really see that it's broke, but I think it might limit the range of motion on that leg now. I'm bummed.
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