F-ZeroOne

Russias building a Legioss fighter?!

Full Metal Panic?

That could be good and help avoid the fate that befell F-91. This is unrelated to Unicorn but seems the best place to put it; someones back: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2009-...undam-previewed Start making arrangements for the will, Mobile SUIT pilots; Death is coming...

You can imagine the GMs calls to his agent, can't you? "Whats this about a new Universal Century series set on Earth during the One Year War? You've got to get me this gig, baby! Theres no way Bandai will make a series solely about GunTanks, and Amuro wossname will be off fighting Zakurellos in space! Its my time! Its what we've been waiting for! I'll finally be able to get that swimming pool Mrs. GMs been nagging me ab - - what do you mean, 'RX-79[G] Gundam Ground Type'...?!!" Apparently the Ground Type Gundams were made out of spares produced for the RX-78. There are precedents for this - the Bristol Beaufighter used parts from the Blenheim bomber to speed up production - but its yet another twang in the elastic fabric of Gundam continuity...

Currently watching Cutey Honey, the original series. Its a blast, Sailor Moon as written by Ian Fleming.

Yes, 8th MS Team wasn't quite what I was expecting - its a decent series, and it features some of the finest ret-con designs in the franchise, but going by the opening sequence you're sort of led to expect Apocalypse Gundam and what you get is a bit more like M.A.S.H. Gundam. Having said that, the final episode is one of the best things Gundams ever done. Also, in one episode and for about thirty seconds, a GM gets to be unquestionably, completely, utterly awesome. Of course, shortly after that its ordered to commit a major war crime but then GMs never get the love...

At this point Turn-A Gundam sticks its 'tache in the door and compels you to get 'tache too.

Okay...! T.V. never lies, it just omits information sometimes.

Er... I thought it did have a time limit? According to the book "First Quarter", Bushnell set up a new games company called Sente in about 1984, having been prevented from doing so by the clause before that. However, Sente did not replicate the success of Atari...

Currently alternating between VOTOMS: The Pailsen Files (for those who weren't looking forward to the CGI, I have to say that although at times it tends took like a last generation video game they actually use it pretty well generally), Getter Robo (original series), Great Mazinger (ditto), L-Gaim, Galaxy Express 999 movie, Panzer World Galient and the just awesome Aura Battler Dunbine OAV. Yes, I happen to like the old stuff. How could you tell?

I think no-one wants to admit having watched it... A friend who has seen it (ahem!) tells me that its basically a pr0n version of Project A-Ko or Kimagure Orange Road, in terms of artistic style. Basically about 10 minutes of plot and twenty minutes of relatively mild hentai. Or so I'm informed. cough!

Oh, its real all right. Here in the UK I used to be able to receive some German channels through an analogue satellite receiver and Sailor Moon would be broadcast about the time I got home from work. At the time, anime in any language was a bit of a scarce commodity so I would watch it whilst having lunch (and no, I don't speak German). I can still find myself - to my horror - humming that theme when I'm distracted...

I can't get a good view of them but they look like they could be special, "real" colour versions of the Masterpiece Starscream (and similar Masterpiece Seekers). If thats the case, they're likely to be web shop or other exclusives. It could also be that they're unrelated to Transformers and just on the same page...

True - I love the way that "fitted for" implies that a capability is there when its not - but what I'm trying to get at is the reporter appears to be exaggerating a known thing into a big "great unknown oh look the governments messed up again!" thing

Hmm. I can't speak from actual flying experience, but having read a fair few accounts by test and combat pilots, I'm not sure that advice totally works for heavily loaded combat aircraft... (I can imagine some civil aeroplane manufacturer lawyer saying "Whats this in the manual about 'spin recovery'? You can't make airplanes that spin, gentlemen!") And, yes, the P-39 was apparently infamous, possibly because of its unusual (mid-engine mount) configuration... also, Jeffrey Quill, one of the most well known Spitfire test pilots has commented that the Spitfires stability was always slightly marginal, and the situation got worse as more powerful and more heavily loaded variants were developed...

Apparently the reporter in question is extrapolating (i.e making things up... ) from things that are already known. The B model is still the UKs preference, however, it has always been the case that the C is a possibility if there are severe development or cost problems with the B. Likewise, the carriers have always been planned with the potential for being fitted with catapaults (naval Typhoon, remember?).

Yes, it was something of a surprise to me too; I only found out about it a week or so ago. As I mentioned, don't go expecting the full-up PC experience - its definitely been "console-ised" - but going by what I've seen so far, I don't think anyone will be too disappointed.

I've only played the demo a couple of times, but one thing I've noticed is that its seemingly quite easy to stall on the Realistic setting; I don't know if thats similar to the PC version. And if you do stall, theres an even nastier surprise waiting for you - spins!

I downloaded the demo for this from XBox 360 Live. Its a title that flew under my radar until very recently. It may well fill your aviation warfare itch until the next Ace Combat comes out. The two scenarios in the demo are a Battle of Britain mission and a Battle of the Bulge ground attack mission. It strikes an interesting balance between realism and arcade; you can fly it like Afterburner (well, After-full-war-emergency-power) but still enjoy some realistic aspects; throttle control is quite important, and if you plough into an enemy bomber formation you'll get cut to ribbons by their defensive fire. Theres some lovely touches; damage causes holes (big ones) to appear in your aircraft, gun recoil slows you down, and if you get too close to a bomber you're shooting up oil spots might splatter your windscreen. Theres three different difficulty modes - Arcade, Realistic and Simulator. Annoyingly, Simulator seems to default to the in-cockpit view and as far as I can tell can't be changed. Ammunition is handled interestingly on the higher settings; you have unlimited ammo but it "charges"; fire too long and you have to wait. The difficulty also affects how hard enemies are to shoot down; on Arcade He-111s are made of tissue paper but on Realistic they're made of much sterner stuff. Theres a nice little deflection shooting mechanic as well. There could be some annoyances in the full game - targets selection isn't quite as smooth as the Ace Combat series, and ground attack missions seem a bit under-cooked. Still, going by the demo its a decent try at a semi-realistic console air combat simulator (don't go expecting the You-Must-Earn-Your-Wings-Before-Playing PC predecessor) and seems much better than Blazing Angels.

I can't help but notice that the really tight space armour is in for the ladies this year...

No, effin' is the fact that price will translate directly into 55 to 60 UK pounds...

The missile vs gun debate is as old as... well, missiles, but 180 rounds is about typical for a modern day fighter. The Vulcan needs more ammunition because it fires at a much faster rate. Even during World War II, the 333 rounds carried by each of a Spitfires 8 Browning machine guns (for a total of approx. 2,664 rounds) was expected to last for no more than about 8 - 12 seconds of continuous fire (and those were .303 calibre, roughly 7.62mm). As has also been pointed out, the F-35s gun will also fire a much larger and more powerful round. The argument about volume of fire vs destructiveness of rounds that actually hit the target is probably as old as guns themselves, but theres a famous story that when they were testing the MiG-29s 30mm gun, it would tend to jam after about three or so rounds, but those rounds would be so accurate the target was usually destroyed (the MiG-29 was one of the first aircraft to use a laser to aid gun aiming)...

I seem to recall that they got round this by saying the screenplay was written by Kubrick, based on the book by Clarke, and the book was written by Clarke, based on the screenplay by Kubrick...

Planetes. It is Patlabor on TV in Space. This is a very good thing. Buy it, because like Patlabor on TV, I've been told that it sold roughly minus two copies, and supporting this sort of excellent stuff might mean Bandai will see fit to release Turn-A Gundam at some point before the heat death of the Universe. You copy?

I assume you mean the character there, and not the actress...