Mog

Damn, Kicker!! Ya' got any more cool customs hiding out in that massive air wing of yours?

Thanks, DH!! That link absolutely had me rolling.

Just got back from watching it. And honestly, I really wanted to like the movie. But the movie left me too disappointed. The human actors and the dialogue were either cringe-worthy or inappropriately laughable (though the military folk were for the most part solid). I don't know if it's due to the design of the bots or not, but there were times where I lost track of what exactly was happening during some of the fights. I don't know if it's due to all the shiney silver kibble or not being able to always tell who's firing at who (a nice energy trail for the Transformers' projectiles/bullets might've helped a bit), but it's kinda hard to follow exactly and precisely what's going on in a lot of the fight scenes. And I've got a nice little message to Michael Bay: PULL THE FRAKKEN CAMERA BACK!!!!!!! A few more mid-fight, wide-angle shots that last longer than a few seconds would have really helped to clear up the confusion that can happen during these scenes. Also, I'm really not a fan of watching these Transformer fights from the far-too-low perspective of humans. We get it: they're big-ass robots that tower over us. Now can you pull the camera back, or give us a nice clear action shot from above so we can take in the full grandeur of the fights? Man, I remember all the memorable action sequences from Dark Knight and that legendary opening scene of Nightcrawler absolutely cutting loose in X2, and I think to myself, "Why can't Transformers have a scene like that? Full of energy, gusto, and where you can clearly follow the logic of the action on-screen."

Just did some quick checking up in the MW Gallery. There's a few more Minmay Guard sets than the ones I'm gonna re-post here. But I figure most folks can check it out for themselves. Links to the ones created by the Three 1/48 Custom Masters: * Jung's MG * Anasazi's MG * Kurt's Moon Act MG Someone even made a 1/55 Minmay Guard! Sadly, no one has tried to make a Joke Machine Minmay Guard just yet.

^^Sorry, but that picture on the box doesn't remind me of the confident, "always keeping a positive outlook on life" Rand I remember. Dude looks like he just realized that he sat on some crap.

Honestly, I'm a bigger fan of his Jackson 5 and late 70's/early 80's (pre-Thriller) stuff. Hearing THOSE songs again on the radio today reminded me what made him so damn good. I mean I never hear "Got To Be There" EVER on the radio, and I heard it probably two or three times just this evening alone. It's just too bad most folks tend to forget those R&B parts of his catalogue and focus more on the later, more pop stuff. Is he a weirdo? Yes. But dammit, the music he and his brothers made before all the zany-ness and the nosejobs was pretty tight.

What's even scarier is that the general premise reminded me of this crappy sci-fi flick called Alien Intruder. Regarding the actual show, I guess this is what would happen if some idiot decided to slap a reality show vibe onto humanity's first interstellar journey. Given Ron Moore's rep, this might be worth a view.

^^So what name should they call Charlie Murphy's character? Jack (the Ass)? Darkness? Leroy Smith? Love the first film, thought the second one was okay (got a kick out of Fiona busting out the Shoryuken), and never bothered to watch the third one.

So tell me: how does comparing the situation at a domestic brick-and-mortar toy store (a store that generally sells items at a higher price and usually gets undercut by the clearance prices at stores such as Target and Wal-Mart) relate to purchasing a (most likely) imported toy that's unquestionably geared towards adult collectors and that a good chunk of us are gonna purchase from an online retailer? Chances are most online retailers are gonna set up a pre-order for the SDF-1 to determine how many of these items to purchase (hopefully reducing the storage and slow-moving inventory concerns). If Yamato's done their homework right, they'll come across a price point, size, and design where they will sell enough of these SDF-1's to recoup their costs and make a comfortable profit. Hopefully, Yamato already did this analysis and talked with some of its retailers before showing the prototype they did earlier this year. The other thing to consider is that Yamato announced this release over a year in advance, giving us all more than enough time to save and budget for this big bad-boy. Now, no one ever said Yamato is off-base about rethinking the scale. However, a good chunk of us are voicing our opinion that we would prefer it if Yamato kept the scale as is. Also, I still don't see how 2 1/2 feet is "ridiculously large." About a third of that length is gonna be for the main guns anyways. The main reason I referred to those other toys is to point out that toys have in the past and in the present been made at that length. For many of us, the reason we want the Macross at this size is because we want it to be obvious that this is the flagship and centerpiece of our collections. It's kinda sad when the namesake of the entire franchise gets dwarfed by its own Valks and destroids. Or in the case of the old 1/3000 versions, looking somewhat out-dated when compared to the more recent Yamato releases. Now does this mean I want something "the size of an '84 Buick" as you hyperbolizes? Of course not. But I do want an SDF-1 that obviously looks taller and a bit larger than a 1/48 Valk in battroid mode. To be honest, after getting the YF-21 and the Beta last year, there hasn't been too much mecha stuff that has caught my fancy as of late. About the only thing that can drag me out of my mecha semi-retirement would be a properly done, large-scale, TV-style SDF-1.

For some outside perspective, the recent Star Wars BMF (Millenium Falcon) is around the same size as the proposed 1/2000 SDF-1. And the old G.I. Joe Phantom X-19 Stealth Fighter is roughly around the same size (and is nowhere near the biggest toy to come out of that old line ). Again, this would be the centerpiece, the capstone to anyone's Macross collection. My main reason for not wanting it is because it's in the DYRL scheme, not my more preferred TV-style scheme. If it were the TV-style SDF-1 coming out, I would definitely be already saving up for it.

If anyone's thinking of making another VF-11 custom or repaint (nylcbv already made a nice custom Jolly Rogers VF-11 here), I came up with a somewhat appropriate nickname to design and build a custom -11 around: The Double-Down.

My sentiments exactly! The show is called Macross for a reason. Now if you could just convince Yamato to also make a TV-style version.

So, I take it no one saved pictures of that transformable model VF-2SS that was posted on the board a couple of years ago?

^^YF-21 going for a late-night, moonlight sortie. Nice!

Anyone save any of the pics of the VF-2SS that used to be posted in this old thread? : Linky. The transforming model they showed in that thread before made me appreciate the look and design of the VF-2SS.

1) "Excuse me, Alpha-Beta flying through. . ." 2) Was futzing around with the hue settings on some old photos and wound up with this cool color-scheme for the Alpha (reminds me of the VF-19 from the VF-X video game and the VF-171's from Frontier) :

Finally took some time to edit the massive backlog of pics I have saved on my computer. Got a little bored, decided to screw around with the hue setting on some of my older pics, and stumbled into these "interesting" color-schemes: 1) YF-21 in the VF-11's color scheme (sorta ): 2) Brera Sterne going old school:

Talk to us after you've watched DS9. ----------------------------------- Finally watched the movie earlier today but am too lazy to go through every page of this thread. It was entertaining enough (Definitely, dug Kirk's smugness during the Kobayashi-Maru test). But didn't really enjoy those close-up and "shakey-cam" shots during the fights and battle scenes. Also, I found Nero to be a less-than-engaging villain. He just felt like some standard, cookie-cutter bad-guy who was evil just for the sake of the plot.

^^Bellyplates and the battroid face are different, if I remember correctly. Still have a thing for the -21 though. Being able to use the gunpods in fighter mode has its advantages.

The "dark mystery" surrounding Shawn is not the man himself but rather whatever causes the forum server to go down or the boards to go offline. If something major and crazy on the technical side goes down with the MW boards, Shawn's the go-to guy that will get the board back up and running. He doesn't post all that much nowadays. But you'll usually see him pop up the first few days after the server has been upgraded or after the boards come back online after being down for awhile. While Graham gets us some news and info. from his Yamato contact(s) and the mods take care of the day-to-day running of the board, Shawn's the guy taking care of the more technical/server-related aspects of our little message board. I'm sure the older posters here can give you a much better and more in-depth biography of the man than I can though.

I don't think anyone's snap a shot of the fighter combo from this angle before:

Since no one has said it yet: At least, they're not like Toynami's overdone MPC boxes. In all seriousness, I would like it if they could be a little more stylish with their newer 1/60 boxes (I'm just looking at the ones in ff95gj's post). * Like how about putting TV Max 1A in the pose where he's gunning down Millia in Macross City? * Or how about putting the TV Hik' in the pose that he was in at the end of the opening (in front of the SDF-1 bridge)? * Or put Kakizaki in front of a hot, sizzling steak? I'm not saying the older box designs were always great. But every now and then, they'd hit on a solid design and scheme. Those 1/60 boxes on page 1 just all look too similar to one another. Mix up the poses, angles, and modes a little bit more. But of course, if the toy inside is crap, no amount of window dressing is gonna remove that stank.

Ah hell, if we're talking about the BGS soundtracks, you've gotta add Prelude to War to the list of "must listen to" tracks. It was absolutely pitch perfect for the ending of the first Pegasus episode, and it's one of those non-stop, tension-building pieces that gets you ready for a FIGHT!!

Yes, that trailer was mighty effin' entertaining. Didn't notice any of the signature yellow lightsabers of the Jedi Sentinels though. At the least the trailer showed off all of the major classes doing their thing (with the Republic troopers' main skill being saber and cannon fodder! ).