jenius

It's really hard to say. The prototype at NY Toy Fair is NOT the same as the last prototype we saw. You can tell because their last prototype had the cockpit from the fighter mode Beta simply lean down in front of the chest in battloid mode. This new one has the more correct white finish piece shown at the chest. Here's the issue I'm having though, the "new" one being shown at Toy Fair looks suspiciously like the very first painted prototype they showed... the one where they hadn't figured out at all what to do with the cockpit so it simply didn't have one yet. That said, the combined Alpha Beta clearly has something going on above the arm that you can see if you zoom way in. My guess? They weren't happy with having the cockpit fold straight down in battloid mode so they're working on a cost effective solution to make it appear more like their first prototype.

You can see better in the Figures.com picture that the combined fighter also has a loop of fish wire holding it around the mid section which may be bolstering the effect of the plastic arm extending from the Beta... or, if you're less into conspiracies, that would also be an intelligent place to put a loop simply to support all that weight.

Figures.com has their pics up. I'm not a huge fan of their picture quality this year but they have some different angles than the ASM coverage.

Replacement locks for the swing arms... I guess they expect them to break eventually.

Since we saw MPC Alpha boxes for Maia's Shadow Chronicle's release I have to guess that would be the next release. It's rather dubious not a single one of these products is available for preorder yet...

Series three includes a strike Hikkie 1S. I love that all the TV Super parts also come with strike cannons. that's a nice freeby... ya know, if they ever come out.

I don't think it's a mistake. There's clearly a picture of the "Aoshima" Legioss next to it. That's an MH product in the Toynami booth. I don't know what the deal is with their Transformers section but I know Toynami does do all sorts of cinematic statues (they had an Indiana Jones I remember gawking at once). The Bumble Bee head struck me as something that must be from that same line as the Indiana Jones but I'm not TF guy and maybe it is just an ASM mistake. I also don't think we'd see the MH repackaged at an MPC. First, we already know that Toynami worked on an MPC and that it did have diecast. The MH doesn't appear to have any diecast at all. Diecast is pretty much the MPC calling card. The scale is also wrong for something MPC, I'm sure they know they'd have to make it at least as large as the MPC Alpha. If I were going to guess, I'd go with just a distribution deal to fill that niche for people who complain everything MPC is way over-priced. It also would relieve Toynami from the pressure of making a Ride Armor toy of its own. As to the pricing, I think you guys are way off and there could be substantial savings. First, this deal would mean more production and fewer costs. It would also mean your shipping would be dropped WAY down. It also means that US dealers might eventually drop their prices. Remember MPCs retail for $79.99 but it's usually not very hard to find them for $49.99 after a few months. You hardly ever see that with a product not released domestically.

We've been hearing lots of grumbling about MH QC already based on their other products. Seems like a Toynami/MH relationship might be a match made in heaven. Now, if MH makes a subpar product, you'll get two companies to hate for the price of one! We need someone to publish an interview that tells us what Toynami is doing with it. I think the most logical explanation is that they'd be distributing it and if that's the case we should all cancel our preorders and wait for the inevitably cheaper US version. Maybe some day Toynami will just be like Matchbox was for Robotech, make a few toys to fill niches but otherwise just act as the importer for toys other companies make.

This thread existed once already, hopefully someone can point you in the right direction but the conclusion was that there's a 1/144 model kit that was variable.

Curse my following instructions! I tried it without the notch and it seemed pretty sloppy but that'd work fine for display purposes since you wouldn't be handling it. All pics are done including comparisons to every other ride armor toy made by Gakken and the review will go up this week.

wow, guess i heard wrong and that solves that very short rumor session. Thanks SDK EDIT - WOW, that's a retooled Beta that now hides the cockpit in battroid mode (or they pulled back out the original Beta prototype to mess with people like me), the cyclone is no longer an MPC and looks ready for Japanese consumption, and some very interesting packaging on the MPC Shadow Chronicles toys. I'm impressed, I actually see PROGRESS here. Yes, of course that's impressed with HUGE over tones of "oh wait, it's Toynami" but at least I'm sure I'll eventually get more stuff to review from them EDIT II - A 1/100 GBP? They actually did find a way to put something new in there instead of just having a slightly improved version of last year's showing.

We just heard new release dates from Toynami a month ago and they just released all the Aoshima Legioss toys a couple months before that. Maybe they suddenly went belly-up but I'd suspect we'd hear about that from a publication somewhere. Tommy was just talking in his rounds about the fact the Beta really was still going to come out so I'm hesitant to expect their sudden death. Stranger things have certainly happened though.

Maybe Yamato just reissued the 1J and told retailers to vacuum seal a GBP set to it to move GBP stock?

For what it's worth, I had a deuce of a time getting him to ride properly also. I too used the notch on the seat. It was easy to do a one handed rider pose (with the other hand opening the visor or bitch smacking a passer by).

If what I understand is correct, Toynami didn't show at the Toy Fair? That seems scary since I'm pretty sure they were there in force last year.

To be fair, CMs said they'd be releasing their Legioss/Tread combo last summer... not this Spring. The Ride Armor toys were also supposed to be out before Xmas. Now MH appears to be delaying their ride armor toys. Nobody in this new Mospeada grouping has a spectacular record as far as hitting proposed release dates goes. No excuse for Toynami though, they seemed to be way ahead in Beta development but fell behind on actually releasing the toy. I think the big difference in why CM's miniscule ride armor isn't getting the same heat as a Toynami product is because CMs is giving us a toy WE are destined to break rather than giving us a toy that might already be broken.

I'm sorry SaveRT, were you planning on being the daft ebayer or are you going to be in Japan through these CMs releases? If you're going to be in Japan I could use the help. Weren't you planning on getting the greeny? Make it two and swing by TRU for a red one please . PM me to discuss money matters if this all sounds do-able!

I'll get in on this: Mac Zero - 3x SDFM - 2x (RT's TMS probably another 4x) DYRL - 4x Mac Plus - 3x Mac + Movie - 2x Mac7- 1x Everything Mac 7 related - 1x Mac F ep 1 - 2x MacII - 3x (each time was like 5 years apart)

You guys are insane. I stick to Macross and Mospeada and I still can't believe how much money I spend... God only help me if I collected toys for any other shows.

I'm with you. I suspect some daft eBayer will get a bunch and make them available at a big premium, the same will likely happen for the red guy, but I'd be a bit happier if we had a (very much trusted) member in Japan that could help us out.

at least with BBTS you know you can return it.

I just got done with Stig an no breakage. I was examining the broken windscreen on Ley and you can actually see where the glue has eaten away at the plastic on the windshield. I wouldn't be surprised if people buy this a few months from now and find the windscreens already broken away in the package.

I've got mine and are photoing them for the review. By luck of the draw I opened "Ley" first and transformed him. Detail is great but yeah, these things are way too small for their own good. They've got more going on then Gakken did on their 1/8 scale toys and it shows by making it a fidgity pain in the ass. They would work great as display pieces, they're nothing short of beautiful. I did transform mine all the way to armor mode but the windscreen broke off when I was posing it for the first time. As you can imagine, posing it doesn't really involve touching the windscreen, the contact with the windscreen was entirely incidental so please do not take the warnings about it lightly and know even if you're doing everything you can to avoid it you might still end up snapping it. So, anyone got any suggestions for what glue to use to get this thing back together?

XStoys is a member here, not a company.

The CMs ride armor didn't get reviewed until it was out and this looks like more of the same. I'll review it... it probably won't be the first review you'll get to though . People come back to threads about toys they don't like to see if someone has responded to their criticism. It's just rude to make a remark about something and walk away... then people say mean things about how you're just trolling and are unable to back up your opinion with any sort of reasoning. There are also people like me who already see a ton of faults with it but still will be buying one. I have the fact I'm buying one keeping me interested and the fact I don't certain aspects of it keeping me complaining