M'Kyuun
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The Transformers Thread (licensed) Next
M'Kyuun replied to mikeszekely's topic in Anime or Science Fiction
Sorry for the misunderstanding; I absolutely didn't get the sarcasm as I've no idea what the Char Custom is. Got my shipping notice this afternoon for CW UM and MP Tracks. I think I'm more excited for UM than Tracks...neat transformation, and aggressive looking truck mode. As for MP ratchet, the white hip panels jump out at me more than Ironhide's red ones, and not in a pleasing way. I really wish they'd have found a way to incorporate them better so as not to be so conspicuous. Still, I'm just glad that this mold is pretty faithful to the G1 animated bot design...I had G1 Ratchet, and that thing was full of WTF. The Classics Ironhide/Ratchet mold was plastic origami that really affected the look of his alt mode- very seam-y. Moreover, the back window was his chest rather than the windshield; it was a compromise that worked, but just wasn't 'right'. So, I'm looking forward to adding MP Ironhide and Ratchet to the Crew. -
The Unlicensed Third Party Transformers Thread
M'Kyuun replied to slaginpit's topic in Anime or Science Fiction
Good on the 3rd parties for at least trying to provide little quality touches like that in their product, when Takara simply went the cheap route. I look at my Binaltechs, and those things are what I think of when I hear Masterpiece. If my BT Silverstreak fell off the shelf and hit me in the head, I'd probably receive a concussion. I can understand not using die-cast due to weight, wear on joints, costs, etc, but rubber tires should be a minimal given on anything labeled Masterpiece. At least, I think so. -
Thanks! With sweet-talkin' like that, perhaps I will. Kidding aside, I sincerely appreciate the compliment, ArchieNov. I consider myself a very mediocre talent at best compared to folks like Peter Morris, Tyler Clites, Brian Cooper, Mark Stafford, rong_Yiren, Sean and Steph Mayo, Alice Finch, and on and on. There's a LEGO convention held in Seattle every year called BrickCon where AFOLs like me bring their creations for a 2 day public display. Every year, I'm blown away by the sheer creativity that people are capable of. Oh, I forgot to mention a fellow named Erik Hagsved- check out his huge LEGO transforming Optimus Prime; I've seen it in person, and it's extremely impressive. https://www.flickr.com/photos/epsilon-eta Wmkjr, thanks for the vote of confidence. As with all of Kawamori-san's designs, I take a lot of inspiration and ideas, and I'm hoping the -262 will be unique and interesting in its transformation scheme, as I may find something there that I can translate into brick.
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Thanks for the nice comments, guys. Mazinger, there is a LEGO thread somewhere around here, but nobody's posted in it for quite some time. There's a dedicated LEGO Macross Flickr group, as well( some neat stuff, none of it mine ). My Classic Space Konig was a labor of love most of last year, and unfortunately, the final product couldn't handle the weight of the backpack, and just went ass over tea-kettle without a stand, which means I need to redesign the entire waist and upper leg area, or minimize the backpack area. Still not sure what I'm going to do with it. It's a big blue and gray paperweight right now, but I'm glad you like it. I'm thinking about building a Classic Space ship in two parts, a la the Legioss and Tread, fully variable. Taking some inspiration from Steel Battalion designs. I haven't gotten far with it yet, but I'm still testing ideas. Back to the 262, I was thinking, if the arms are indeed centrally located (like I hope they are) with the stab and gunpod, Bandai may have 'borrowed' Yamato's & Arcadia's VF/YF-19 sliding arm solution to enable the arms to be positioned so far from where we believe the shoulders to be. I wish they'd just show us the battroid already...I'm not getting any younger, and I need more battroid in my life...
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Yeah, if I squint, I can see that. My avatar is a custom LEGO VF-4...my version is light gray with dark blue and dark gray accents, b/c I like those colors, and b/c I didn't have enough white parts when I built it. Pics, if you're interested. Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and pg 2. https://www.flickr.com/photos/95379588@N08/page1 Concerning the 262's transformation, while the thought that the arms may store along or inside the leg is practical, I really hope they form the upper and lower central fuselage with the gunpod and vertical stab. It would make the engineering that much more impressive, and I love it in any transforming design when every major part of the robot forms part of the alt mode seamlessly. This is already a beautiful and interesting valk; I hope Kawamori-san brought his engineering A-game to the table when hammering out this design.
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A perfect transformation Motoslave and Highway Star would both be awesome. I recently picked up the Yamato Linna Motoslave set on Ebay for abt $50...good deal, considering Priss goes for over $400. But yeah, it's an ok toy, but certainly not perfect , and the Linna fig's arms fall off if you sneeze in her general direction. There's certainly room for improvement. Galaxy Rangers...now that takes me back. Good show featuring some really good animation for the time. I wouldn't mind having that series on dvd. Goose was the best animated Clint Eastwood representation ever. The episodes focused on him were always my favorites.
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That is, unless they have some sort of bond to their machines, so that damage to the valk is felt by the pilot, and if enough damage is sustained, it can literally kill the pilot through psychosomatic shock, or drive the pilot insane. I like that idea actually. I think it'd be cool if they enter these suspension tanks full of Evangelion-like LCL, suspended in this sensory gel that transmits their commands and feedback. It'd be a first for Macross, and a neat new bit of tech to add to the series. And, there's still peril to the pilots, so the danger to them is unmitigated, even if they're not in the valk. As for the SV-51 GERWALK, I'll be the first to say I think GERWALK is lame. Throw your virtual stones and pitchforks, but I've always thought it rather dumb and pointless; it's mid transformation, not really a 'mode', IMHO. BUT, the SV-51 sways me, and I like it's GERWALK b/c it was inspired by and intended to resemble a bird, and I think Kawamori pulled it off well in this design. The -51 and the VF-9 Cutlass both have groovy GERWALK modes that appeal to me..along with the VB-6 and Variable Glaug. The rest of the valks' G modes..meh.
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The Transformers Thread (licensed) Next
M'Kyuun replied to mikeszekely's topic in Anime or Science Fiction
With red leggings, you mean. I'm not feelin' it either. The red torso with blue legs have become iconic to Prime, to the point that anytime I see any vertical object with red above and blue below, the association with Prime is instantaneous and subconcious. I guess it's cool that they're producing all these colorations for collectors, and milking a good mold in the process, but I'll take my MP-10 in the standard Optimus colors. I'm surprised Takara haven't rolled out at least a resin test shot of their MP Optimus Primal at this point...there've been several large venues since the original announcement. I was curious to see what they came up with, and how accurate they could make the beast mode while hiding most of the bot parts. I'd be blown away if they actually used some kind of faux fur rather than just molded plastic...not sure how well that would hold up through the years. It's gimmicks like that that really boost collectibility and value over time, though. Hoping Tracks will release on Saturday, as I've had the Takara CW Ultra Magnus sitting in Private Warehouse for over 40 days now, and I'm hoping to bundle them for shipping from HLJ. -
So much vitriol for the lovely VF-4 (it's in my avatar, if you haven't noticed). It's one of my favorite battroid designs, but to each his own; if we all liked the same stuff, it'd be a really boring world without much variety or progress. I think the B and G modes are being withheld for suspense, at least that's my hope. I doubt anything can be worse than the extraordinarily fugly VA-3. I have a feeling the legs might be reminiscent of the VB-6, but beyond that, I'm not speculating too much. Even if it turns out not to be as pretty as most valks, I think it'll be interesting. If the nose becomes the lower torso like the SV-51, I won't mind that either...the 51 is another of my favorite designs. That may also explain the opaque canopy. Or the 262s are all unmanned drones, controlled by their respective pilots through their hair-diamond things. Even though Macross has always been about the excitement of having pilots fighting from the cockpits of their valks, real world tech is edging ever closer to unmanned fighting machines doing the fighting with their operators afar and safe. Considering Macross takes place in our future, it's only practical that Kawamori incorporate the current direction in warfighting tech to the Macross series. The Ghost X-9 was a prescient piece of tech that's becoming our reality.
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Def one of Kawamori's sleekest designs. Love the blue, but hate the gold (I have an aversion to gold and yellow coloration), so I'll likely wait for a different color scheme.
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The idea of another space race is romantic, and competition does certainly motivate and incite inventiveness, but of all human endeavors, I wish space was a truly Human Endeavor...all the nations, tribes, and peoples of the world, regardless of ideologies, ethnicities, religions-regardless of the differences that have served to divide us throughout history- would come together in this single pursuit: to create a global space agency dedicated solely to research, exploration, science, and technology to the benefit, and hopefully betterment, of man as a species, and to ultimately remove our sole reliance on this one planet for the survival of our species and culture. But in the meantime, yeah, it'd be good to see the UK involved in the space venture. Grigolosi, thanks for your service. I was a bubble chaser for 15 yrs, and worked in the MOC for 5. Fun while it lasted, but I'm glad I'm done. No more hydro stains to wash out.
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Me three.
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I agree with your suggestion for the leg (strong VB-6 vibe), and I think the wings will fold onto the battroid's back, in similar fashion as the SV-51. The case for the arms lying along the spine and and lower central fuselage, with the vertical stabs attached to the arms (there's a corresponding vertical stab on the lower fuselage as well) seems very plausible, even likely. I can see a hinge at the base of the stab where it will likely fold to be kibble or form a shield. From a practical standpoint, it doesn't make logical sense to utilize a primary flight control surface as a bullet catcher in battroid, but then again this is Macross. The same can be said for the YF-19, having your primary lift surfaces dangling off the legs by a single small pivot point...one little snag and tear, and your fighter mode is moot. Anyway, this speculation is fun, but I'm ready to see this thing in battroid.
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The only remaining XB-70 was towed into her new home last week at the National Air Force Museum near Wright-Patterson AFB, Dayton, Oh. I was there a couple years ago, and unfortunately, due to budget sequestration and space limitations, a number of aircraft were not available for public viewing, including the YF-23, JFK's modified Boeing 707 Air Force One, and the XB-70. They recently completed a new hangar, and this video shows the Valkyrie being towed in. Still a majestic bird. Watching that tow team gives me a warm-fuzzy. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to return in a another year or two- definitely recommend to anyone remotely interested in aircraft, USAF history, or just aviation in general.
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I was thinking that the engines are actually within the legs on either side of the feet, but the angle of the pic doesn't show. For the battroid, that would make sense. Interesting that the canopy is completely opaque, which makes me think the little diamonds in their hair may be a telepresensence transmitter/receiver, essentially a more advanced version of the YF-21's BDI system. Can't wait to see battroid. I still think the intakes are going to form the chest, a la YF-21, and the small squarish blocks behind the intake are going to be swivel blocks for the shoulder, like the -25, and the shoulder pauldrons are the large section that form the fuselage behind the intake. I imagine the arm itself either folds, or inserts into the leg. All conjecture, but I guess we'll see.
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I think Kawamori took what worked on the 25 and the 30, and made a hybrid of the two designs in the 31. The 30 has a novel transformation based around the waist swivel, but the alignment of head, shoulder, and hip was off a bit on that valk, and as much as I wanted to like it, it just didn't appeal to me enough to get one. Looking at the pics of the 31, I'm finding it far more appealing, if derivative. I wish he'd gone a different direction from Frontier on both Delta valks, but at least the 262 will allegedly be different. I hope so. The valks are really what make Macross so appealing to me, and a huge part of that comes from the design differences from valk to valk. Also, is it me, or is the missile container missing in battroid? You can see it in the fighter pics, but I don't see it in the battroid...just a lot of empty space due to the angle of the backpack. I know a lot of folks here don't care for the 25's wing configuration in battroid, but I like it quite a bit; I imagine his HFH based it off of Renaissance depiction of angels. And, it was called the Messiah. Just thinking in text. Gotta say, I like the paint job on that sample...something about blue, white, and gray. Really nice. That red stripe on the canards/shoulder armor really pops from the rest of the thing.
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That sentiment goes for most fighters, due to compact fit of damned near everything, and also for large aircraft. I was an Aircraft Pneudraulics Technician in the AF with experience on the MC-130E , the B-1B , and the KC-135R & T models. The B-1, for its size, was not designed with maintenance in mind in the slightest (except engines...abt 2 hrs with a good team), and why should it be?: Rockwell sold it to our AF Brass saying it would never break, and it was self-diagnosing. The first is blatantly false, and the second to an extent. I could rant about that POS for hours, but I digress. My point, most aircraft are generally liked or loved by the crews, or the pilots at any rate, with Maintenance generally taking a more diplomatic view based on personal experience (mileage varies). That said, I knew a number of old-timers who gleefully recounted the hardships of working some of the old planes, esp F-4s, B-52s, and F-111s, like battle hardened warriors who'd fought the good fight, not without scars to prove it. I still have scars on my fingers from the B-1. I absolutely hated working on that plane, but I still can't help but feel a small pang of pride when I see footage of them bombing the crap out of some a-holes who've earned our ire. Just the way of things, I guess. On topic, Good God, I hope Delta isn't M7 part 2. I've not seen 7, nor will I probably ever, but the garishness of it, plus pacifistic singing pilots, just go against the very grain of military bearing and mindset. I hope there's more of a Plus feeling to it; I loved the grittier, more mature feel of Plus, not to mention it mirrored the real life competition between the YF-22 and YF-23. Macross of late doesn't seem to have that edge about it, other than the death of Michael in Frontier. The poster makes me think this'll be another light-hearted anime with more silliness than seriousness, but I hope it's at least in equal parts. Hopefully, too, it'll be streamed with some decent subtitles. As for the 262 itself, I get a little YF-21 vibe from the forward fuselage, so I'm wondering if the intakes form part of the chest. Hopefully, all will be revealed soon.
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The Unlicensed Third Party Transformers Thread
M'Kyuun replied to slaginpit's topic in Anime or Science Fiction
MP-10 is already a good size. Mp-01 was a nice big chunky fig, but he took up a bit of space. Moreover, I imagine Uber-Prime is gonna cost a pretty penny, and given all the choices we have these days, I'd sooner spring for one of the combiners, the Dino bot sets, or just figs that Takara likely will never produce. For those who bite, though, I hope it's a nice figure. -
The old F-4....quite a bird in its day. But yeah, it's a brick. I'd like to see Kawamori do an A-10 based valk...I don't care what kind of story he'd have to make up to justify it. For now, I'm happy with Combiner Wars Powerglide. I'd also love to see a Ho-229 based valk...really old school, but a flying wing valk would be different from just about anything else he's done, other than the FBz-99G, which is one of his weakest designs IMHO-quite fugly. If he could incorporate the legs into a really streamlined aircraft, that would be a must-have valk. There are so many 5th and 6th gen concepts and designs that would be great to see in valk form... a helicopter would be nice to see, too. I still like his Gazette (TF Whirl) design from Dorvack. I'd also welcome a Macross installment where the story is more terrestrial...maybe a rogue group of Zentraedi have a land claim that's in dispute, requiring variable tanks to fight the big guys in their new variable battle pods, or variable motorcycle armor. I just want more transforming vehicle types in the Macross universe. Like everyone else, I'm really curious to see the SV-262's transformation into battroid; I hope it's unconventional and cool.
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+1 I never cared for the design, but I do like that Kawamori is looking at some of the old fighters for inspiration and variety. I hope the SV-262 surprises with a novel transformation. Though I'm not crazy about the plane itself, I like the two-tone grey scheme with the big orange 1 on the wing...sharp. One other thing I just thought of; by virtue of the legs containing the engines, it looks like the 262 will have two exhausts rather than the single engine exhaust of the Draken. Two engines are preferable...in real world and Macross.
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Shelby's a worthy grail. A fully poseable G1 Prowl was my longtime grail toy; fulfilled by MP Prowl My grail now is to have all the bots from the first season of Transformers in MP form in the current scale, esp a new improved seeker design. Macross-wise, a new improved all-around well proportioned YF-21 to match Arcadia's YF-19, the Variable Glaug, and VF-14
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Man, I used to have the BT vs Airwolf debate all the time with a kid I knew in middle school. At the time, I had a fascination with helicopters, and read a number of books about the mechanics of flight and the structure of the rotor drive mechanisms and such. Anyway, Blue Thunder seemed very plausible, whilst Airwolf was a lovely piece of fantasy. I'm not an engineer or a metallurgist, but I'd say the majority of helicopters in existence, if equipped with the means to achieve Mach by virtue of JATO or some such mechanism, would suffer catastrophic failure of the rotor, or the main shaft, due to the stresses, especially in turns. However, given our knowledge of carbon nano-tube structures, high grade steel, titanium, and various alloys, the feasibility of producing a chopper capable of supersonic speeds is currently considerable, in my uneducated opinion. But, given the helicopter's traditional roles, where maneuverability takes precedence over speed, I doubt many companies are interested in building one or I imagine we would have seen a couple attempts by now. I'm not aware of any.
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Bandai Gobots/Machine Robo Series Toy Thread
M'Kyuun replied to David Hingtgen's topic in Anime or Science Fiction
I was never too crazy about the deluxe Gobots, as most just used the cabin as a head. Deluxe Spay-c is different in that respect, and yeah, looks better than the small version. Even though the new design borrows from the smaller version, I still like it. I also like the SR-71, even iif the main fuselage is full of hinges; it's better than the bot under a plane design that Takara, and Hasbro by default, generally go with. Anyway, I like most of these, and hope they are still planned for production. That Leader-1 alone would be worth their while to produce...pretty sweet. -
I'm happy with my 2 Yamato VF-4s, but I would have considered an Arcadia had they modified the shoulders to articulate, and maybe lengthen the forearms enough to retract the posable hands in fighter. As a straight re-release, I'll pass. I'm happy for those who didn't get one the first time around, though, and at lower prices to boot...lucky bast@rds!
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"I always imagined Star Wars vehicles as space vehicles. Sure, they might be able to move around in atmosphere, but for the most part they're natural environment, and full maneuvering capabilities are in space..." -Myk Still, space vehicles are basically existing in a suspension, requiring a method of achieving thrust in all directions around the craft in order to maneuver, start, and stop. Most SW vehicles have apparent thrust mechanisms for forward thrust, but that's about all. The Millennium Falcon demonstrates landing vectoring jets when touching down on Bespin, but real world examples such as that are few and far between in SW. Much of SW is easy to swallow if you concede that they have mastered various ways of controlling, manipulating, and nullifying gravity by virtue of tech we have yet to discover and develop. If a certain Ben Rich quote is true, the knowledge and tech already exists.