1/1 LowViz Lurker

Scorponok doesn't look too bad though. Notice how they have put macross type markings on his body like "no step"? lol I found that with wreckages chest piece, I had to push the chest down while forcing the automorph part that usually pushes it upward, so that the chest would move one 'step' or 'click' point closer to the chest cannon. I think it is one step/click off. So It might need you to 'automorph' the part that pushes the chest piece up, while you have your thumb locked down on the chest so that the teeth are aligned to a 'earlier' click. Then once you do that, you automorph the chest as usual and it should be aligned properly where the chest sits flush on the chest cannon.

Caved in a bought brawl and wreckage. Very happy with them despite the small sizes. Took me a while to get used to trying to lock brawl's shoulders into the holes properly. The trick is to ensure the back plate clicks into place. The manual seems to have his back mistransformed so that the turret has the guns pointing downward, and the sides of the turret are not split away to fold to the sides. Took me a while to even realise you could bend the knees. These joints are very stiff Wreckage: I have issues with the way his face always looks downard which is similar to classics mirage. Looks like they want to force you to do the "thrusting his crotch forward" leg pose to get his eyes leveled if you want him to look straight ahead instead of down at an angle.

It's because wing ignored the baggage of existing gundam rules and broke from the "new type" formula. Instead you have what appear to be some no names (possibly Genetically Modified humans) who are less like frontline soldiers, and more like spies (ie james bond with lots of sophisticated tech) fighting against the world. The idea is that they hold the keys to the future since they have the most high tech robots and skill to use them. (not due to some psychic ability or because they are related to some family with special dna linking them to highly evolved people looking down on others and who want to commit genecide Too much like star wars) The vibe I get is that wing tried to make an action anime with emphasis on big explosions and which was fast paced while the other shows are more like a war story with frontline soldiers struggling to keep up in the arms race with the bad guys. (ie beam weapons being the saving grace of the good guy) Amuro is hard working and trains like mad doing nothing but training. Whereas Hiro is just skilled and we just see him use them immediatly. One is a "realistic" person, the other seems more like an "action hero" and allows us to cut to the meat of the story instead of seeing some person train and get better over time. (very boring - eats up a lot of time. But the benefit is that it allows us to see "changes" in behaviour and anime drama, of how people cope when faced with the realisation of having to fight so young and stuff) I think if macross 7 had taken a pace that was quick like gundam wing, it would have been more exciting. No filler episodes of talking heads, repetition, just cram as much as you can to get the story over with in one series to make its point, rather than stretching it over thinly. (animation in wing was just as bad as some of macross 7 fights with recycled frames and stuff) Because it told its story in 1 series, kept itself close to the five characters, and made its point quickly, it appeals to the ADD crowd. Also none of the characters dies, so there is no need to mourn over deaths like they do in the UC where people just gotta die "because it's war" even though you had no chance to get to know who they are personally. They just kinda kill them for no reason which adds nothing to the story. Because wing doesn't do this, it just reaffirms that this is an action anime with a war theme, than a war story with people struggling. Because of that they can ignore lots of history, and ignore the traditional need to make things realistic and instead focus on the style of the show without taking itself too seriously. It has emphasis on important main characters not the faceless crew member who fixes the robots and mods a few bits and pieces to improve the robot's performance by .00001 percent. Just show us the machine fighting more efficiently than before to make the point in one scene rather than talking about it. Talking heads < robots blowing things up and fighting. Although it might be necessary for things like the prequel trilogy star wars which sets everything up, (lots of politics in the first but improvements in the second and third) if any opportunity exists to have an interesting fight, you have to throw one in there to balance things, because that's why people watch robot shows. (unless you have something original to tell that seems completely new which is a good exception to slowing down the pace. I think an audience gets smarter the more exposed to repetition they are so you got to speed up the pace, instead of padding the series - one of the big problems with SDF:macross towards the last third of the series. It just slows right to a crawl putting me to sleep.)

I wouldn't know, but I was hoping they'd do something like the alaska base valk one day. We should just ask graham. With all the releases for macross 0 and plus (we think he has hinted and teased about the yf21 next) I would think most people are focusing on that. I still think vf-1 is the safest line from yamato to buy (no first release syndrome) but haven't considered buying any new vf-1 yet for a while as I want to get some zero valks. When I said tv series I mean toys from the new macross series that will come out soon not SDF:macross. There has got to be a new mecha in that that is worth getting and blowing money on at some point. (like the vf-17 was for macross 7)

I'm a fan of the old ones. Don't really know what the go is. Yeah, movies always want to change things. I thought that for movie Spiderman for example, he should never have just naturally shot webbing from his wrists imo. I liked the comic book spidey with web cartridges as it made him seem like he needed to use his geekiness to come up with the idea to solve problems, not just rely on his power. Same thing with wolverines claws coming out of his skin rather than having those metal things implanted there. Yucky Hollywood. I'm one of the people that didn't notice a difference in the logo. I hope they just leave it to the older ones. Meh...it's not going to stop me from buying anything without the old school logo though.. edit: the important part of why I like wreckage: Maybe him not appearing in the movie is part of it. Good balance of trying to make them out as aliens (no human faces on the head) but not sacrificing too much of what I liked about traditional TFs.

http://www.bwtf.com/movie2007/wreckage/rm5.jpg http://www.bwtf.com/movie2007/wreckage/vm1.jpg I like the look of wreckage. He is the upclose and personal fighter with blades in his arms. No empty space in the arms like jazz. If the arms were solid I would have already bought him. Decepticons seem the most appealing to me in this line so far. And his face looks menacing. I always like scary faces when it suits the robot. ( ie classic ramjet looking angry vs classic starscream's neutral expression) http://www.bwtf.com/movie2007/wreckage/rm4.jpg (closeup pic)

Macross should stay as an anime forever. Part of the reason I like it is that it is set in a world where characters can do things with fictional mecha that don't kill the pilots inside them. But I do wonder what a cg-infested space war would be like in the style of macross. Where you have people using mecha like the destroids to actually defend earth from aliens. Or have space fighters that can have alternate soldier modes to land onto a planet and fight without changing vehicles. I mean I like the idea of macross thinking of detail like that, just don't want live action to spoil some of he cool things you gain by being anime with crazy stunts that would be dangerous in real life. Remember when hikaru opens up the cockpit to rescue minmay falling and jumps back in the cockpit? That isn't something a movie audience would find believable. And then there is the idea that the battroid for its size should weigh something and be heavy. So it will be limited in what it does. No rolling or diving on the ground and fighting like you see in manga or anime. The actions will have to appear slow and heavy for consistency. They can break up a building by crashing into a row of it, unscathed, but they shouldn't move as quick as you see in the anime. (they would be slow like the robots in 8th MS Team or patlabor) But that means making a sacrifice and taking out some of the speed of a valkyrie fight that I like so much in animated form. I think a live action movie would better suit the battletech world.

Saw these. Very funny. I think the autobots rely way too much on optimus. I think it's all ultra magnus fault for not studying how prime would do things that caused all the problems and not rodimus who is just was kid when accepting the title of leader. In the cartoon where he is giving advice to rodimus on what step to take, I often wonder why doesn't rodimus just say "ok smart ass if you know all this why can't you do it, pussy? I just want to hang back, have fun, go on dates with RC, and be a young person with freedom, and have no responsibilies, you stupid white prime clone!"

I'm one of those people that don't watch trailers. Like when I went to see the Pitch Black/Chronicle of riddick movies I didn't know anything about the character, the actor, director etc ...Just decided to take a risk and watch it. It was actually not bad. Same with the first *matrix. I didn't think it would suck just because nobody talked about it or hyped it or through watching trailers to know if it was bad, I just went to see it. At the time it wasn't hyped up to be this big thing. I bet the same thing happened with the OT star wars when it came out. The thing I do read reviews of or watch trailers for are games though. I can't spend huge amounts of cash on something that gobbles up hours of time before knowing if it is any good. Although I have returned say a bad game, I've never walked out halfway through a movie. I sort of hope that it might have something worth staying through the whole thing for. Like all the boring stuff is building up to something. (the last movie that was like that was "Mr and Ms Smith". So boring at the beginning I couldn't bare it, but then it got good halfway and through the end) I just think part of the problem is expectation. 300 for example had heaps of hype behind it, but it had no story. It was just action. You couldn't really know much about the characters except for the main guy who orders people to fight. It was true to the graphic novel for the most part, just that it missed an opportunity to build up to the fight. (gladiator at least does this well, letting us hate the bad guy enough and knowing something about other characters involved) But a preview is only going to focus on those cool action sequences. (which many reviewers describe as being like a videogame where its just fight after fight like a videogame) Expectations for something to be awesome all the time only lead to disapointment. *this was before it became a franchise and nobody had any idea what the movie was about

I know one thing for sure: I won't be buying any gundam toys and models. I will be saving all my money on macross tv series toys. No space for light saber wielding samurais when battroid with gunpods is the theme of my display.

I wish they would base gundam on a animal form like the gaia gundam in seed destiny for once. It would be cool if the main character used a fourlegged gundam like those cat robots in zoids. The ancient dog robot would be discovered from an underground cave as if it were hidden and left there from an earlier civilisation. The ancients worshipped animals and nature so based weapons around them. Maybe have it so the first mass produced mobile armor is a spider mech and then the four legged robots (which the bad guys base thier weapons on, hunting in teams like wolves to gang up) turn out to be faster and more powerful? Then treaded mecha come out with humanoid upper bodies to test the idea of human mecha, (too expensive to make a full robot at this time as the earth doesn't want to fund such a stupid idea) and gradually we see fully humanoid robots for urban combat whose reaction speed is quicker than armors due to being based on human body or something. Of course four legged robots would be better at long range combat because they have more stability for being fourlegged and can bend knees but as the fight moves to space they become clumsy for fighting in close combat inside colonies. (two sizes of robot will be made, smaller scale ones for fighting inside cities like the labours in patlabor, and giant ones for space combat with heavier weapons) Hopefully they will have a transforming valkyrie gundam like the one in seed destiny?

The zombies steal the spiritua from normal people and go towards creating a farm so they don't have to keep feeding. So spiritua must be what everyone has while the anima spiritua might be something unique to the characters? Why would sivil care so much about anima spiritua by stalking basara when she can just take spiritua from normal people? I always though the the anima spiritua must be that special power that was needed to seal the PD and only select few people who had it could have the effect on people. The music puts the person who is singing in a state that allows them to project thier feeling into the audience like a transmitter sending a signal to a reciever. So it might not even be music but the ability to telepathically transmit the thought or feelings you have to others. So maybe an actor in a movie might be able to create that same feeling, of bringing the character to life and affect the people watching it, which if the drama is good, can make a person cry or feel sorrow or happiness. Similarly minmay can make a song that makes a person feel sad or happy, and that might have been all that was needed to get the zentradi to tap into some emotion they once had which their training as soldiers was force to repress. The "strange feelings" the three spies had listening to music were just them experiencing joy, happiness, sorrow etc. If a person can transmit the emotion to the target (ie basara songs was one way, but maybe the same thing could have been achieved through a book or a painting or acting) then they might affect behaviour and cause the PD to change. I see the whole anima spiritua thing then as just the power to transform someone from one state to another state. In SDF:macross the effect of minmay's songs wore off over time possibly because she didn't put her heart into the singing and was forced to sing by her cousin just to escape. It might be a bit different if it was genuine singing on her part based on "how she was feeling at the time". Maybe it's like how you might not be able to take a piss in front of people if you are nervous. But if you are relaxed the piss comes out naturally because you are in the right state of mind. So I think minmay at the time of begin captured and put in the cage in front of kamjin was too nervous (wrong state of mind) to tap into the spiritua thing that the pilots in macross 7 were. Because the song came without her putting emotion and her energy into it, (just being told to do it) it might not have affected kamjin. Just my own theory on the differences. Some might resist the music and go back to the mind programming, which could explain kamjin's resistance to the music. (the feeling of revenge and hate being stronger than love from hearing a pop song and not making them as easy to affect) If it were just sound waves, they could play a tape and the effect would be the same but it's not the same in macross 7.

It's probably due to all the other stuff being released as well. If they space releases apart rather than have everything release at once then there is more healing time for wallets and people don't have to prioritise thier purchase and risk having something there they cant buy yet, with an item just sitting on a shelf. Low vis is an example of people reacting to it with "meh" and then wanting one as they apreciate it. Even though it looks boring and cannon fodderish. I bet they were thinking:"I must get all the other stuff first and maybe I will get the lv after I have got all the existing releases. (ie the buyer must prioritise purchase instead of get it all at once) The order of importantce probably goes like this: 1. popular characters (seen a lot in the anime, or a character-specific color to it like tv max. The ace pilots get distinction above the others) 2. unpopular characters (cannon fodder, kakizaki) 3. non-canon paintschemes (low vis, stealth, woodland camo valk) 4. canon schemes that are special (angel birds) So the ones at the top are the ones to buy first. The ones on the bottom are, "I might buy these once I have all that I can buy of the stuff above it". Does not mean it won't be wanted in future. Just that right now the wallet is limited in its ability to buy everything. Space them apart to fix the probs and in time I bet all the others who have cleared space, or decided to sell some of the duplicates they have, will eventually buy the less popular schemes.

I was thinking to save money maybe HLJ can just ditch the boxes and make a more compact box (something solid enough to protect the toy), to put it all in? I want to buy stuff but save on shipping, and don't care too much about the box if it means it is going to add extra cost. I hate the yamato boxes! I understand it is for presentation purposes for retail that they won't make small boxes, but if the box is going to cost extra I would love to have an option to have the toy and accessories removed from it, chucked into a better and smaller more compact one and save money.

But how will you know it sucks unless you see it for yourself first? It might have some redeeming feature that saves it from being *bad. Macross has some pretty crappy animation in certain episodes, and you see macross fans still defending it from noobs who refuse to watch anything old with choppy frames. Some of my fave old movies which look low budget are things like mad max. No Cg stunts, (just stunts) no expectations that it has to live up to any reputation or that it's going to be the biggest thing ever, or that it needs to be hyped. Sometimes having big expectations can lead to disapointment. (ie later matrix movies, phantom menace, spiderman 3) Other times you might not care so much about something living up to expectation and go and see something anyway for something to do, and hope to be surprised. (first matrix, batman begins) *no garuantees it won't suck just saying that it might be good if given a chance.

They need to clone the jedi and make clone jedi-soldiers (as opposed to knights) who can use both blasters and lightsabers. Cut out the morals and make them into mindless berserkers trained to not think for themselves but to be elite killers who can sense any sith evil doers who might try to sneak around and try what palpatine did. Like the zentradi only with force powers. That would be post-OT. Luke would have to fight them as the last jedi knight who has aged and become senile. It would be like how you had AEUG fighting the Federation in gundam, once the federation got too powerful and corrupt. So similarly you have luke trying to fight these elite jedi-soldiers who were made after the war against the empire as a lesson to all future sith still out there plotting new schemes and trying to hide under the radar. So instead of clones of jango fett, you would have clones of obi wan and yoda running around hunting sith. They elite soldiers would call themselves newtypes. The next evolution of humanity.

Spotted the toys being out here in australia. Resisted actually buying anything though, because I need to hunt for the alts I still want to buy. Starscream looks chunky in the plane mode.

QFT If yamato know what is causing the problem, such that they can actually correct it, that is all that matters to me in the future. That, in the end we do get a "closer to perfection" toy each step. It's good to complain about something that needs to be fixed, but at least try to do it in a way that explains the problem or they might think you are just being rude. Help fix the prob, not the blame. Like for the xbox360 overheating problems there are things you can do to fix this problem so it's never an issue anymore. Something that was fixed by owners with the problem who decided to do something about it. There are many happy people now that the solution has been found for a permanent fix, who now don't have to chuck it in the bin. It now means any future owner of an overheating system has the knowledge to do something about the overheating problem if it ever comes about and the warranty is up. What's better? just sitting around doing nothing, (generic complaint about yamato qc) or actually trying to figure the problem out by coming up with a theory that causes it, and helping others to come up with ideas on how to get it fixed to improve the later releases so we can all get the best version we can? I'm thinking that yamato might be ignorant that there is a problem altogether, so any suggestion is going to help for future buyers as they will apply the combined knowledge from owners on what is needed to strengthen and improve the durability. That's one of the reasons I didn't get the original release garland, or toynami alpha. I was waiting for the company to try to find a way to apply some kind of fix or solution. But not put off from purchase altogether. That doesn't mean I am easy to please with low standards. Just that instead of anger, I wish for a better and better version as time goes by, through being in support for a given product on a case by case basis where I expect each new release to have problems unique to it that may not be issues with other products which were made differently. It would be easy to just be angry at toynami or bandai, but it doesn't achieve anything if the company doesn't know (is ignorant of) what is so bad about the thing they made. Helping them make it better is going to make future people happy. (fixes on xbox360 is the best example I can come up with. We've all established that MS are to blame, now focus on the solution. Phase 1 is over) Similarly we know yamato screwed up, now we have to explain the problem clearly, let them know through giving the relevent info, not just generic bashing and emotion. (which is understandable from the viewpoint of someone who has just blown all that money, but isn't necessarily going to lead to getting things done faster, as they might just misinterpret it as the ravings of an internet troll and not a unsatisfied customer who they would value)

I wonder if yamato would ever do a weathered gbp like what they attempted with the low vis? (but failed since the stuff rubs off on your fingers) GBP looks like it would be good with weathering. Maybe people who have no time or skill to do it themselves would go for it? (provided it looked decent) If they ever did destroids in the future I would love to see weathered ones. (make up for the fact they are non-transforming) I think it would suit destroids since they are likely to get all dust and dirt on them from walking around on the ground all the time and are likely to get battle worn from not being able to manuever, so all kinds of used slightly damaged parts from rushed repairs would be used. I think a monster with mars dust on it wouldn't look too bad. In the tv series I think there is one point where a regult actually destroy a monster like a cannon fodder valk with a single shot though. So I don't know how strong the monster would be and what damaged armor would look like if it were 'real'. Would you see all kinds of burn marks? Holes? stuff showing underneath like the structure inside the mech where their used to be armor? (like how you can see the insides of the fast packs if you take the FP covers off)

I'm just glad they don't go with the swappable parts idea they were originally going to do with the vf0. VF-0 shows how you can have a nice fighter mode and robot mode together. PT all the way!

So will this be the 2d cartoon made in cg or a seperate story altogether? I liked the toon.

It weird but not as weird as what they did to blanka! Carlos Blanka = Charlie :D So that's what happened to him. Bison captured him, experimented on him, and he became blanka! The one thing they did right was allow van damne to do a somersault kick. SF special moves normally don't translate well into live action. I knew in the back of my ind this was going to not be like the game where you can just accept that people defy gravity and float in the air (yoga power?) and do spin kicks that allow them to hover on the ground, (hurricane kick) or just project some magic chi energy from their hands to finish people off. Mortal Kombat can get away with it since the game used people. So anyone who had seen Big Trouble in Little China was prepared to except some of this. (remember that guy with the chinese hat who had lightning coming out of his eyes and mouth?)

Just watch all the UC universe storyline. Or do wing, X, seed, etc first because they can be watched without any knowledge of previous shows. If you want to watch all of UC you need to follow the timeline from shows that were out from decades ago. (so that means you can't watch zeta or anything later than 0079 without spoiling the story) Wing is a show you watch if you like sports model gundam. Where the pilots have suped up versions of robots that the mass production zombie robots can't defeat by themselves and which pretty much become as useless as the macross "cannon fodder" valks you see in SDF: macross. Wing is good if you can't stand the goofy 70s mecha design or characters. It's not as influenced by star wars which go into space a lot, can't lock onto anything due to primitive weapons, (so fights must take place at close range) and focus on people with psychic abilities.

I don't like how he has a big head with the helmet on. What they should have done is given him a tiny head like mirage so the helmet could be small. And yeah he may not pose as well as prime, but he has a nice aggressive apearance in robot mode with all the weapons. Maybe Kawamori should have helped with the design for classic jetifre instead of masterpiece starscream? Who wouldn't want a yf19-style jetfire at this size? Or maybe they could have made a line of cybertronian fighters reimagined from g1? Instead of pyramid shaped seekers, make them look like valkyries instead.

The SV-51 is one big mecha. I wonder how huge the yamato boxes are going to be?