Master Dex

3 hours ago, dizman said:

I never thought about it before but you are right, I'm surprised they don't have a cool insignia at this point. Maybe it could be something like half a Zentradi and UN Spacy insignia slapped together (though that is pretty lazy).

I'm sure they could get more creative.. but yeah after all the Jenius family is the closest the UNG/NUNG has to royalty if you think about it.

I.. never considered that before... but it is almost obvious really. They look insanely similar.

Frontier basically implied the birdman was loosely designed based on the Protoculture's inspiration from the Vajra though. You can kind of see it in the quasi-organic technology that the birdman is made out of as well. I could be messing up the timeline but it is not impossible that the birdman was a precursor or test version of some of the tech that formed the super dimension organs used for the Evil series later (which as we know.. didn't end up working so well.. or really.. was a case of gone horribly right, once interdimensional vampires possessed them anyway).

Sometimes it is hard to believe we're talking about science fiction here...

Really by now the Jenius family should have its own emblem or crest that appears on a VF to warn the enemy "Take notice, you are flying against a Jenius... might as well just give up now."

Course... this is Mirage we're talking about... but maybe it would boost her confidence some?

In that light though, if this is a sequel of some form, I do want to see more focus on Mirage. She got none in Delta... stilted in the love triangle by design almost, given no development in her efforts to become a better pilot amidst the gargantuan expectations her name carries (which IMO was actually a rather cool plot element that went absolutely nowhere). Given she claims in the finale she is done overthinking her flying she might be able to discover her latent Jenius skills now. I'd like to see some of that.

7 minutes ago, HG Blows said:

The 31F is getting it's own armor release, right?  I can't remember if they ever showed an armored 31F in the anime.

Episode 6 at least... they were all super packed out then. Since that was the only time Messer flew it in space.. and Hayate never did for any notable scenes (and was back in his repainted 31J in the finale)... that was the only time.

42 minutes ago, Raptor One said:

I would love to see something like this. So much so that I'm doing something similar in the fanfic I'm currently working on

I had an idea for a fanfic that would use that as well.. but I have no time to write sadly.

48 minutes ago, azrael said:

How about 1 girl and 2 guys in the triangle for a change? Last time we had that was M7. 

I think that'd be fair. Or a 2 girls one guy but one of the girls is the center choosing between the other girl and the guy. That'd be different. 

As for 7, it was more of a love dodecahedron I think lol. 

15 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

To be fair, couldn't the same description of "a serious story with a silly plot" be applied to almost any Macross title?

I think that's part of its charm, really.  The focus on the love plot over the war plot and solving interstellar conflicts with bouncy pop songs or a power ballad isn't exactly gritty realism in sci-fi.  It keeps the story's overall tone light and optimistic and prevents it from getting bogged down with the WAR IS HELL amateur dramatics that most other mecha shows are so fond of.  It doesn't take itself too seriously, and that helps keep it fun... along with the knowledge that you're going to get something that passes for an uplifting ending.

For me, it's infinitely preferable to Gundam... which sometimes gets so caught up in its WAR IS HELL message that it feels like the staff is out to exact as much misery on the viewer as possible.  After watching Macross you can leave feeling pretty good.  After watching certain Gundam shows like Victory you leave feeling the need for an antidepressant or maybe a stiff drink.  It's become such a staple for that franchise that the rare optimistic Gundam series feels alien and wrong.

I'll be quite happy if that state of affairs continues in the new series.  Frontier did a good job of keeping it fun.  Delta's first half did too.

I'll drink to that (in a jovial celebratory way, not in a post-Gundam drowning miseries way as you described, lol).

_{Now that you've said that though, I'll give Gundam some minor slack, because while you are pretty much on point there, at least it still isn't as depressing or borderline sanity ripping as Neon Genesis Evangelion.}

What initially drew me to Macross was the mecha and the action (cause I used The-Show-That-Must-Not-Be-Named as a gateway like many), what kept me with it was the music which was a refreshing difference from most anime, and the uplifting nature of the narrative. Because even when all of humanity is almost destroyed, life force drained, conquered in some way, etc... there is still a happy ending to be found, and a good song to remind us of it.

6 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

"Depth" is definitely not a property I would ascribe to Macross Plus's story... it's fast-paced, simple, and straightforward.  There aren't any real twists in the story, no deeper meanings behind people's actions, everything is laid out neatly and precisely with the bare minimum necessary backstory to frame the events without getting bogged down in exposition.  That's fine for an OVA, but a series should have a bit more to it than that. 

I think Kawamori's actual description of Plus was something along the lines of 'It's a serious story with a silly plot.' Even he knew it wasn't an award winning narrative (and for the record, I love Macross Plus... but then again I like all the shows in some form, except Macross II which is only cause I haven't really given it a fair chance yet. I'm open to it.)

I worry my initial effort to try and curb some negativity about an unreleased show with no details before it even gets made sparked a far worse series of arguments. I wasn't even bothered by people hating on Delta. I'm used to that by now, and it's done at least so people can have their views. I just didn't like the idea that some seemed to be automatically setting their opinions of the new show to negative when we literally only know that something is being made for 2018.

We need to get Basara in here to make us listen to his song and somehow solve all our problems even though that doesn't really do anything to address the actual issues... but it'll sound fantastic! Now that is how a Macross show would end this conflict, lol!

40 minutes ago, jenius said:

Frontier wasn't perfect but overall I thought it was very good. I felt like Delta was a 'careful what you wish for' moment for me. During Frontier I wished we got more on Galaxy... then Delta was like 'you want to peek being the curtain? Here spend several episodes there.' I still think the Frontier movies were dreadful so I hope this new movie steps it up. 

*thinks the Frontier movies are a way better overall telling of the story than the show... slinks back into his hiding spot to listen to Fire Bomber*

16 minutes ago, Mazinger said:

Maybe I'll stay off the forums when the new show hits.  The waves of complaints and general backlash against Delta didn't make it easier to enjoy the show, which I generally did after all.

There are times, but I can shrug off negativity luckily. Don't be afraid to say you like something even if others hate it. Delta did have a lot of issues, mostly in the back half, but I didn't hate it. I like it for what it was.

3 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Eh... for my money, Macross Delta was a mediocre mess that did a lot to undermine the confidence I had in Macross's creators after the huge success of Macross Frontier.

No exaggeration, I loved Macross Frontier.  It was, for me, the closest a Macross television series has come to perfection... with everything that makes Macross what it is, and almost all of it perfectly balanced.  Its only noteworthy issues were that the pacing was rushed near the end and Ranka's participation in the love triangle was less than it should have been in the second half.  She never made that same romantic comeback that Minmay achieved in the post-timeskip arc of Super Dimension Fortress Macross, and that left the outcome of the love triangle feeling a bit like a foregone conclusion.

All the same pieces were there in Macross Delta, but the writers did a lousy job putting them together.  The music was fantastic, the main trio were some of the most likeable characters Macross has ever had, the mechanical designs were gorgeous, the character designs were mostly excellent, but the writing was a bloody trainwreck that failed miserably to seal the deal and tie it all together.  That the potential was obvious, and obviously being wasted, made the show incredibly frustrating to watch.  It could've been better than Frontier.  It could've handily been my new favorite Macross series... but the writer tripped his team up at the starting line.

Based on the last two shows, I have every reason to expect that the new Macross project will be visually stunning and musically exceptional.  It'll take the Macross universe to somewhere new and different and add a few new wrinkles to the setting.  What I have less confidence in is their writer's ability to tie it all together into a seamless package the way the writers of DYRL?, Plus, 7, and Frontier did.  That's a tall order, and we're spoiled in that what's workmanlike for Macross is exceptional by the standards of many other franchises, but I'd love an excuse to keep my standards high.

A fair and cogent analysis. I'm gonna sum it up as.. cautiously optimistic? Probably the best view to take now. As you imply, they have the capability to do great, we just need to wait and see if they will.

8 minutes ago, Cowboy17 said:

 

Well, the thing is that for some of us (i know i'm not alone), Macross has been taking a dive ever since Zero. MacF was bad, and Delta was horrid. I know not everyone shares that opinion obviously, but there's some of us that feel that way.  

 

Personally, I don't really look forward to more Macross honestly.  I don't think Kawamori is all that competent at anything other than designing mecha.  More mecha and sometimes the music is good, but everything else lately I can do without.  

That may be true, and I respect your opinions, you are allowed that for things that exist already (Though I see an overwhelming majority of fans saying they love Frontier, including me, so your comment there is a bit surprising). I'm just saying we don't need to bash something new before even knowing what it is. Also.. if you really are honestly dreading it, and not at all convinced it will be worth your time... then just ignore it, no harm done, but if we're lucky then both of us can be happy. We'll always have the good stuff.

10 minutes ago, Devil 505 said:

As someone who migrated from The-Show-That-Must-Not-Be-Named to Macross, I've definitely enjoyed what Macross has to offer in comparison to those other guys.  The fact that I have a "ponified" Basara as my avatar should say enough.  I'm always looking forward to what comes next for Macross, for better or worse.

BOMBAA!!

4 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Bingo... let's just say I've been down this particular road about half a dozen times before and wanted to head that one off at the pass, both due to the press's bad habit of forgetting that important bit of context about stability when talking about the applications of metallic hydrogen and because they tend to overstate the benefits of the stuff as well.

 

Based on Variable Fighter Master File: VF-1 Valkyrie Vol.2, it's not clear if the hydrogen slush in the internal tanks is used as a coolant as well as the fuel for the compact thermonuclear reactor in atmospheric service.  However, the book does suggest the fuel slush in the CTF-04 tanks was used both as fuel and as coolant for operations in space where radiative cooling isn't as effective.

Overtechnology materials are acknowledged to have incredible thermal resistance, though.  The hypercarbon composite armor of the VF-25 is noted to have a temperature resistance of 3,200 degrees C (that's about 5,800 degrees F).  Reentry heat normally clocks in at about 1,650 degrees C.

I too get annoyed at the press oversimplifying things. By their metric we've found dozens of perfectly habitable Earth-like planets around other stars by now (when really we just keep finding potential candidates for such which we can't prove in the slightest to be habitable, only that they are roughly the same mass/size and at a good distance from their parent star).

For atmospheric I can believe it doesn't even need to get super hot, most of the reactor heat is going into the intake air anyway and back out the nozzle, plus as you suggest, the whole atmosphere is there to draw heat away outside the aircraft. In space, I'd bet money on it, as cooling is very important on spacecraft regardless of your super technology. Glad to see I was pretty much on the money that the materials are unobtanium-tough and can handle the temps regardless though.

Reposted from my post in the SCOOPUDA thread, tis relevant here too:

Quote

Alright then... I'll go ahead and be a person with some optimism. I need good news about now anyway, and more Macross is always better. Hell we have no idea what it is exactly or in what form (with the time table I am less inclined to believe it is a full length series. I could believe movies or an OVA though). So bring it on, I find something to love in each Macross installment, even when some people can't.

And if it is a continuation of Delta, good! It didn't really end anyway after all, there is still threads that can be tied up there (hopefully a bit better this time). If it is a movie retelling of Delta like Frontier had, even better! Because... well.. that should be obvious... story can be done so many ways better. If it is something new and original, awesome too!

We're here because we love Macross, and while the last thing we got didn't go perfectly doesn't mean it is "ruined FOREVER" it just means we should expect the creators, SK especially, to acknowledge the mistakes made and do better. We know they can, they've done it before. We don't know what this new thing is yet, at all, but it is Macross and I look forward to it.

Alright then... I'll go ahead and be a person with some optimism. I need good news about now anyway, and more Macross is always better. Hell we have no idea what it is exactly or in what form (with the time table I am less inclined to believe it is a full length series. I could believe movies or an OVA though). So bring it on, I find something to love in each Macross installment, even when some people can't.

And if it is a continuation of Delta, good! It didn't really end anyway after all, there is still threads that can be tied up there (hopefully a bit better this time). If it is a movie retelling of Delta like Frontier had, even better! Because... well.. that should be obvious... story can be done so many ways better. If it is something new and original, awesome too!

We're here because we love Macross, and while the last thing we got didn't go perfectly doesn't mean it is "ruined FOREVER" it just means we should expect the creators, SK especially, to acknowledge the mistakes made and do better. We know they can, they've done it before. We don't know what this new thing is yet, at all, but it is Macross and I look forward to it.

All of the above by Seto (and JB0 on his part) all correct. I didn't really bring up the metallic hydrogen to actually suggest it is being used. It was more or less a thought experiment. In my original post I actually go out of my way to point out how the reaction engine technology in Macross makes it entirely moot when it comes to main engines. Seems like Seto felt he had to double down on a point I wasn't even making, lol.

As for the real world tests now, I also mentioned how it is not confirmed and I've also been keeping up on how it might not even be true yet than they've created metallic hydrogen at all. The scientists themselves in the experiment said they don't know yet if it will prove metastable when the pressure is removed or just fall apart like Seto said. Perhaps Seto just likes to get ahead of talk and make sure people don't get overexcited, which is a good thing to do, but this isn't my first science rodeo either, heh. Thanks though, you did elaborate on the important points in any case.

The aerogel part was really just me wanting to mention it cause I think it is cool, I know it isn't a good heat transfer material.

JB0's description of running fuel around the engine is referring to a process in modern rocketry called regenerative cooling. Very common in liquid propellant rocketry these days (though simpler motors do still use ablative cooling too), and it is usually just the fuel (RP-1 or LH2). To start often it needs to be run into a pre-burner to power the turbopumps that move it around though (except in pressure or expander cycles, but you won't often find those on the commercial scale rockets in lieu of gas turbine or staged combustion). For VF engines, this type of regenerative cooling may happen with the hydrogen slush, though I feel the fuel doesn't need the pre-heating since it is going into a super-fusion reactor. Plus I expect some magnetic nozzle hi-jinks are occurring anyway to keep the extreme heat the reactors create from destroying the VF nozzles (as well as them being made of otech super-materials of course).

Speaking of compression and hydrogen, though this is off topic a bit. There is news recently that we might have finally synthesized metallic hydrogen. It's not 100% confirmed yet and more tests will be run, but if true.. it's likely the breakthrough of the century. This is an advancement that likely got skipped in the Macross universe due to Overtechnology and easy to make fusion reactors. That said, the big problem with overtechnology is it is a clever mix of unobtanium and handwavium simply because we don't know what half the advancements actually are. We know hypercarbon is an advanced lightweight super strong material but we don't know what it is exactly (we can guess, but that is all we can do), just that it something we haven't developed but is physically possible (which is the definition of unobtanium btw). Bringing it back to metallic hydrogen, I wonder if any otech achievements utilizes that. It'd be a great fuel for RCS and vernier thrusters, since obviously it isn't needed for the main engines. It also has room temperature superconducting properties so perhaps it could be used in the power conversion systems as well, or other electrical uses (though carbon nanomaterials also are potentially good for this too).

All just speculation really, but it seems like something overtechnology could do, so it led me to wonder. It is entirely possible the technology leap provided made such a material unnecessary.

1 hour ago, Devil 505 said:

The same goes for the SV-52γ Oryol, which is described as "a customized Valkyrie of unknown origin produced to imitate the SV-52."

Getting back to a previous discussion about heat exchangers and fusion engines in space, I've been looking up research into helium being used as a heat sink, and if I remember correctly, helium is a fusion product.

It depends on the fuel fuels actually. Helium can be a byproduct of H-H fusion, or even D-D, D-T, D-He3 and He3-He3 are wonderfully aneutronic if you can get enough He3 fuel. That'd be easy enough with Macross tech... but not even necessary. The overtechnology of the Thermonuclear Reaction Engines (in any generation) is so advanced with its super dimension physics and heavy quantum... it can pretty much fuse anything. Hydrogen is cheap, so one could argue they use that a lot.. but it packs like crap, so I'd wager they use something easier to store. Otech materials probably make neutron radiation a non-issue, and the same is likely true for heat sinking materials.

Speculative unobtanium aside, helium is good, but for solids ceramics are good too. Various forms of lithium are supposedly good as well. Aerogel is great for absorbing heat too.. and is just plain cool.

45 minutes ago, Ryoma said:

I agree, but supporting to me means also defending, attacking, destroying, dog-fighting etc. things that we do see quite often during the series(well, at least the first part). Now i understand that the color scheme of the kairos would have been out of place for the tone of the show but a compromise between the "rainbow brite" color schemes and a more serious pattern would have worked much better for me(Look at Messer's unit: i think it's the most badass among the five and it's the one who had more appeal for most of the macross fans. And whoever tried to pre-order one would agree with me).

Natch, and it is my favorite, and I did pre-order one. Though it isn't the color scheme that gets me so much that it is the ace pilot model. I also pre-ordered Keith's Draken for the same reason... though I do also really like his color scheme (and plus this allows for the perfect rival display).

I also like Max a lot in SDFM for the same reason.. and his colors are rather flashy compared to others in that show.

2 hours ago, Ryoma said:

The kairos looks great! I hope we will see a DX from bandai soon. It also reminds me of how much i l hated the multicolored VF-31 from the Delta squadron. I mean, i loved the general mecha design of the series but there were way too many colors on the main characters mechs. They really didn't look like war machines and that was some sort of a let down for me, especially after the Frontier mechs.

Well that is because they were not supposed to be war machines, not the Seigfrieds anyway. They were designed to support Walküre from the start (though they are more advanced than the Kairos even so). Besides, the Frontier hero valks were pretty colorful.. but that is because they are the heroes after all.

23 minutes ago, VF-27_driver said:

HI all,

Then Walkure isn't german?

The name is German. I'd venture the members of the group are multinational in universe. We never hear exactly where Makina and Reina are from, but we know Freyja of course is Windermerian, Kaname is from Divide (a planet named, apparently, specifically because it is in constant civil war, but still somehow part of the NUNG?), and Mikumo is from a test tube, lol. There are hints that Makina's family goes back to Earth though (what with the Nakajima name and the mechanic in Macross Zero) but as far as I know Word of God has not confirmed that.

Still by the names we can gather most of them have at least some Japanese in them (except for Freyja), which is not surprising, it seems to be implied that large portion of humanity that survived Space War I is Asian, with most of them being from Macross City on South Ataria Island before the war. It isn't clear if the genetic manipulation and cloning that followed later restored other ethnicities to pre-war levels though. I think in a post-Space-War world though such things probably just weren't considered a big deal anymore though. The real world reason though of course is because it is a Japanese show.

Finally, the real life version of Walküre, with all the singing voices from the show, is of course all Japanese.

I am convinced despite no existing photos yet that the sword will come with the 'super parts' (i.e. the drones and missile packs).

1 hour ago, Lolicon said:

Yes I know that. But those were their existing craft. 

This is a brand new aircraft built / painted well after their promotions. 

It's the least of the show's problems in any case. 

Mirage was still flying Unit 04 though, Hayate couldn't just take that number, and Unit 02 still existed as Messer's plane, even if he wasn't using it anymore. Besides, it isn't a production number, it is the designation of that aircraft. The new Unit 05 was a replacement for the nuked one. The only change is paint and some flight data from Unit 02. It seems to be exactly as it appears, aircraft designation is independent of their team position/call signs.

42 minutes ago, no3Ljm said:

That's true. It should be just Delta 04. Since Arad moved Mirage to be Delta 02.

But the most important question is why did this show even lasted beyond episode 11. So they can milk the 31J mold with different paint scheme down the line?  

 

Actually, their call signs and their plane numbers were never matching. Hayate flew 05 even after he became Delta-4, and when he flew Messer's plane it was still 02. Mirage also always flew 04 despite her promotion.

44 minutes ago, wm cheng said:

I just did, thanks!  That might be just what I needed to get me started on the series again - although if the other episodes don't match up to this level, I'm blaming you

 

Not to combat the effort, but that moment is something of a highlight for the show. Really though, most of the first half of the series is pretty good. The second half... your mileage may vary.

1 hour ago, Graham said:

Examined my two DX VF-31J while wearing my reading glasses last night (yep, old age is catching up, needed reading glasses since last year).

Both have no noticable paint wear so far after about 2 weeks.

My first one has been transformed 4 times and currently resides in Gerwalk mode and is handled every 2-3 days.

My second one has never been transformed, but gets handled (swooshed around) daily and the canopy and multi-drone bays get opened regularly.

Personally, I'm fine if I do get a bit of paint wear not really an issue for me, as planes rarely look pristine in real life. But anyway, hasn't happened yet on mine.

 

 

I like this viewpoint. While a clean display is nice, it is very true. I work with real jets every day, and they are almost never clean or perfect looking. So there is a sense of truth in toys going on if the paint scratching is seen as a realistic result of a transforming fighter jet, heh.

It also absolves me of doing extra work on my VF-31F when I get it, lol.

22 minutes ago, Sandman said:

I was comparing my 31J with my VF-25s. The 31 is way taller. But it got me thinking about the feet. I've never been clear on weather the feet should be extended out all the way in battroid mode for both the 25 and 31. I've seen it done both ways but which is the official way?

What do the instructions say about it?