Lolicon

Bandai would never release a shoddy product. 

Managed to squeeze my HLJ order in right before the red order stop of death appeared. 

17 hours ago, Angesdad said:

Very nice @Lolicon. Did you have to apply a layer of clear on top of it?I managed to break mine and in pieces currently, deciding what to do with it...

Yeah you have to apply a layer of clear acrylic over the printed decals and let it set before they're ready to use.

6 hours ago, Raikkonen said:

This is epic work. Well done!!!

Any chance of willing to share the digital file please? 

I'm not at home atm but I'll post it later.

20 minutes ago, Radioguy said:

I wasn't going to have a Dr Pepper Zero, but after so much quoting, I feel I have to now.

No one start a thread for it or else I'll be in serious trouble.

LOL!

Glossy finish is fine for commercial/civilian aircraft like Basara's. I prefer the flatter finish for military aircraft.

In toy form, matte all the way. That glossy finish really makes valks look cheap. (Unless photographed just right like the above pic.)

11 hours ago, Raikkonen said:

Where you get these from? And are they exactly at HMR vague scale of 1/100 - 1/88?

Printed them myself. HMR is non-scale so I used the Arcadia VF-0D as a reference on how big the decals should be relative to the aircraft. Even then I still had to upscale them slightly to make them look right. It reminded me of Yamato's 1/3000 SDF-1. Instead of doing a straight scale down of their 1/2000 kit, Yamato had to make some tweaks to the SDF-1 to make it look "right" at the smaller scale.

9 hours ago, seti88 said:

woah..doesnt look that jagged at all...crisp enuff?

Much less pixelization scaling down vs scaling up. 

Decals are tiny at this scale...

14 hours ago, Angesdad said:

THANK YOU VERY MUCH! Now I just have to figure out how to print this as custom decal printing is beyond me at this point but I'm inclined to get set up for it.

Slightly cleaner copy for ya. (Dusted off the scanner first)

On 8/22/2023 at 9:39 AM, MKT said:

The very first pic I took of my very first modern valk toy I acquired years ago. I was so impressed by it especially as compared to the KO toys I had as a kid, and the collection quickly ballooned, and grew even more into all sorts of other titles. It's been quite a journey since..

Old glossy still looks pretty good!

1 hour ago, Bolt said:

I think they fixed that with the releases following the cf disaster. None of my Alto, Maruyama, or Luca 171's had that issue. 

Alto's unit preceded the CF release so Bandai should have known better. They cheaped out or contracted it out to a different factory or something.

11 hours ago, seti88 said:

oh yeah baby! will you be applying the decals?

That's certainly going to bump up the realism to model level.

Yeah, though I'll need to clean them up and scale them down to whatever HMR scale is supposed to be.

6 hours ago, Angesdad said:

THANK YOU VERY MUCH! Now I just have to figure out how to print this as custom decal printing is beyond me at this point but I'm inclined to get set up for it.

I just use an inkjet printer to make decals, though it's more limited compared to a real decal printer.

9 minutes ago, Shawn said:

How come the white circles (always wondered when I see them on the sheets)
Is the kite inside the red circle clear or something?
Its not like they can't print white

The insides of the kites are indeed clear. Since it's a model kit, I'm guessing they probably wanted people to have the option of painting it to whatever they like and using the clear insides to match the color of the aircraft.

Wait, people actually read the instructions that come with their valks? 

Kinda lame if that really is everything. Glad I picked up a bunch of extra CF sets with the warheads back in the day.

On 8/22/2023 at 10:12 AM, Angesdad said:

Cool, can't wait to see the final product.😁 I'm going to break mine soon too!

Here's something that might help. 

Bandai also withheld the reaction warheads and MDEs on the hero armor set but included them with the CF armor set.

We'll see if they actually include them with the Alto 171 reissue.

It clearly snapped off. That section was always something that could break somewhat easily if you weren't careful.

Bandai used a metal bar on that section for the DX VF-1.

20 minutes ago, davidwhangchoi said:

Everytime i show a MetalBuild, I always get asked the same question: "Is this a metal model kit?" bc it says "build"  

I still don't know wtf the difference is between the "Metal Build" and "Metal Composite" line. 

1 hour ago, MKT said:

Revival CF from Frontier should be the version best received by collectors:

1. Unique teal colour. Also yellow 'resistant', providing the yellowing is even all around. My copy has yellowed but I didn't even notice until I took it out from display, even then it was a pretty nice shade.
2. The angular cockpit canopy design. Small difference but somehow visually makes a world of difference to the rounded ones on the hero schemes.
3. The triangles! Bandai should never underestimate how many fans want an updated copy to replace the old broken ones or those who never transformed theirs (like me) for fear of breaking them.

But this being Bandai, they are remarkably hesitant to release non-hero schemes now, even secondary hero ones get the short shrift. We still waiting for Chuck's 31E super parts?

But yes, those awful swappable wings should go. They were not toleranced well, such that at least one wing if not both will always have a sculpt-breaking gap against its wing root in Fighter.

 

Those crappy swappable wings were a cynical ploy by Bandai to force collectors to buy two different armor sets for the CF and hero versions of the 171 as the armors themselves are identical.

I'm guessing this will be a "full pack set" with the armor included, so that crap isn't necessary. I would love it if Bandai redesigned the wings to be non-swappable, but c'mon, this is Bandai we're talking about.

Yes, please give us a PF VF-0A! And reissue the PF 0D while you're at it! And also a "premium premium finish" version of the 0S with all the weathering effects like the PF 0D!

15 hours ago, ValkAddict said:

Wow, really? Is this the "norm" on MW? #highrollers lol. I'm trying to get one of each valk that I like/want, but I do have 2x of a few valks - thanks to some recent reissues.

These days it's one, maybe two. Before it was not unusual for me to get 3 or more.  I mean I have at least 3 of Delta squadron, and I didn't even like the show. 

On 8/22/2023 at 11:43 AM, davidwhangchoi said:

doesn't look hi metal to me. leaving bad review

"Hi Metal" is just a brand name, just like Subway's "foot long" subs. Only a fool would expect a sandwich called a "foot long" to be 12 inches. 

I hope they got rid of the stupid swappable wings, but that's a fool's hope with Bandai.

15 hours ago, DewPoint said:

I haven't bought a lot to begin with.  But I get you.  I'm feeling like I'm spending a lot of time chasing the item and not spending any time enjoying the item.  I got my DX VF-25 Revival Alto weeks ago and I haven't even taken it out of the box to check it out yet.  Kinda makes me think "what am I doing?" 

I'm trying to focus more on the Hi-Metal R line now as it offers more of a variety with the Destroids and Enemy mecha.  It also helps that it is a lot easier to store.  I personally find them better to play with than the larger more detailed offerings.

8 hours ago, MKT said:

I see quite a bit of myself here and am at the stage of trying to free myself a little. Too much obsession with collecting, FOMO, and the dopamine high when purchasing & receiving packages but not enough time spent on enjoying. There's was also the fear of being away from the collection for long periods of time; an invisible chain tying me down. So I started to sell my collection extras, very anxiously at first to see how I would personally handle it, and the good news is that I don't miss them at all!

The next stage would probably be selling the only copies of items I have, which will entail a hard look at what I really want to keep. That would require quite some mental fortitude. 

Yeah I buy a lot less than I did way back when. It's not an income issue as I make a lot more now than I did 10 years ago. I think you just reach a point where you're like "why the heck do I have 3-4-5-6 copies of such and such valk?!"

Over the years I've found that I get the most fun out of fixing these toys up the best I can; basically what I wish they were "out of the box" considering how expensive some of these toys are. I think the PF editions of the 0D, YF-19, and VF-4A are the only valks I've bought that I've been 100% satisfied with without adding any additional work of my own.

0D already broke. Lame!

We finally got a Bandai valk with proper white landing gear! 

Got my copy last night but only had time to fiddle with it a little.

After being disappointed by the 0S, I lowered my expectations accordingly, and I must say the 0D is a nice step up from the 0S. Just out of the box, in battroid mode, I'll go as far as to say this is the best looking valk to date in the HMR line.

Haven't transformed it yet, so I can't speak to its transformation and fit quality or fighter mode.

I've always been lukewarm to the quality of HMR valks, but if this is the kind of quality Bandai can put out in this line, then I'm much more excited for future valk releases.

The Arcadia PF version is still the best 0D, but this is a good (and much more affordable) alternative.

I think I'm going to have to scrounge up some decals to pretty her up some...

On 8/10/2023 at 4:42 PM, Raptor One said:

Why is the option that we either get a toy that perfectly represents the lineart in all three modes, or we accept anything they give us? Is there no room for hope for a reasonable balance? 

The problem isn't that it doesn't look perfect in both modes, the problem is that Bandai has made seemingly unnecessary changes to the lineart that make every mode look worse. Now maybe they made those changes for reasons of sturdiness or longevity, but we can't really know that until the toy is out.

Either way, it's not very productive to discussion to berate people for complaining and not being grateful enough. If you're happy with the design then just say that. No need to imply others are bad people for discussing their perceived issues with a product they would otherwise be interested in/excited for.

Yep.

I'm showing my gratefulness to Bandai's efforts in the only way that actually matters to Bandai: by forking over a bunch of my money for one.