Chronocidal

Apologies for the zombie resurrection, but just received an interesting email from Master Replicas.  They are running out the remaining stock of their Trek ships, but it looks like they are planning to continue some of the other franchises they've picked up, and look to be expanding in the future.

Happy to see they are continuing the BSG line, and expanding more on the Stargate products, but the last section has me intrigued.

"Ships from one of the greatest games ever made" has me incredibly curious, because it's such a broad subject to cover, and I have no idea what genre they might even be talking about.  Given the recent sequel, I could easily see them making some Homeworld ships, but I would be absolutely over the moon to see anything from something like the Wing Commander or Freespace franchises.  There are probably a lot of other options in arcade shooters as well, but I can't say those sorts of franchises would fit the sort of "collection" format they tend to focus on.

The "classic sci-fi TV series" could also be any number of things, but I'm crossing my fingers for Babylon 5.  The wild variety of designs from that show would make it easy to build a collection from.  I'm kind of struggling to come up with more candidates than that though, outside of maybe a ship or two from Buck Rogers.  I know there are a lot more series they could pull from (Space Above and Beyond, maybe?), but I don't know of a lot of really popular ones with more than one or two ship designs they could market.

I'll need to expand my display space if they start making too many more classics though.   

That might be where some of the price discrepancy comes from then.  I was just looking at the 40k yen as the normal retail price, but it looks like every retailer selling it is just adding a typical proxy fee on top of the MSRP for ordering directly from Bandai.

I never tried any of the PSP ones, but based on what I read of the controls, Macross 30 was a huge leap in functionality.

I did try the DYRL game included in the Blu-Ray release, and that felt very frustrating to play in comparison, but the combat for 30 was much better.  I think the only "bad" part was that the battroid sections never felt as natural as any of the fighter or gerwalk sections, and it never felt like you had a reason to use battroid, unless it was a specifically contrived requirement that forced you to use it.

19 minutes ago, jvmacross said:

How are folks getting a 66% markup?  The price comparisons really need to at least take into account the cost of international shipping....No Japanese retailer that I am aware of is going to ship you anything for free....likewise, some US retailers provide free shipping for certain sale amounts and some do not charge you tax on your purchase....you need to compare the total cost, not just the MSRP....I agree, so far, all initial PO's from non-Japanese retailers will cost you less in total, but I do not think you are saving a whopping 66% by simply buying your WWM straight from Japan...

There might be an inverted percentage involved in that 66%, since I think it should be 33%.   But no, it's not accounting for shipping, tax, or whatever other international blood sacrifice we're paying to Bandai to get them to ship things here.

Raw shelf price of about 40,000 yen comes to about $255 right now.  BBTS is adding $95 on top of that, plus $4 shipping.  Coupled with a local tax rate of about 10% (calling California the worst case scenario, because let's face it, it is), that's about another $35 on top, which while I've never used it personally, I'm betting would probably cover slow boat shipping.  Ends up being roughly $290 vs $390.

Definitely not a 66% difference, but depending on tax and shipping, you're still looking at a difference of up to $100.  You might be able to work that down to closer to $50 depending on circumstances, but however you look at it, they're really not making the import options attractive.

It almost feels like a tolerance test to gauge just how desperate international customers are to actually get any of these products imported.

Yeah, the local markup makes this way more expensive.  That's about a $100 markup over my copy from Japan, and that's not even taking sales tax into account.  The free shipping at BBTS does help a little, but even then you're still saving over $50 importing it.

To be sort of fair though, I think the original cost at release for the combined VF-25S and proxy-bought armor set was about that much when all was said and done.

I really think the VF-1, and maybe Macross releases as a whole, threw an orbital strike-sized wrench into Bandai's typical mentality and approach to exclusive items.

When all of your exclusives are one-off custom upgrades to individual mechs that you don't plan on re-releasing, yeah, single-issue exclusives make more sense.

Once you cross that bridge into releasing vehicles that all use the same standard set of equipment, you've introduced a huge problem to that way of thinking.  You've now made an item that every release in the franchise can use.  If you intend to keep releasing more things that can use those add-ons, you'd best revisit the idea of making more.

At this point, I think they're finally at least slightly waking up to the ridiculous market situation their practices have produced.  As insanely overdue as it is, if we're finally getting a reissue of Ozma's armor pack in any form, I think pretty much anything is possible.

I think what prompted them to release as many runs of the missiles as they did though is a byproduct of their past history.  Collectors know how Bandai behaves, and so they may have attempted to stockpile all the missiles for all of the VF-1s they ever planned to buy in the future.  Bandai was probably not prepared for that level of demand, because the orders they received could very well have exceeded the number of DX VF-1s they had even produced by that point.

Oh I definitely remember how dark that transfer was, I had to max out the brightness on my old TV when I watched it.

And.. oof.  Those giant stacks of plates for legs do not look even remotely conducive to any sort of ability to pose.  Looks like we're getting another action torso.  

21 hours ago, davidwhangchoi said:

i will pay 190 for DYRL with english subs and new dub. 

 

So this will have a new dub and old dub and jyp language with subtitles? 

I loved @Bryan Cranston doing Isamu's voice in the original dub.

I just wished the dub tape for part 4, they didn't destroy the music like they did during the fight scene. I had to switch over to the subtitle to listen to the original musical score. 

Parts 1-3 though, i liked the dub. 

 

I hope this new dub fixes corrects the music for part 4.  

I'm really hoping this release does fix that issue, but I've also never really been much of a fan of the 4-part story.  I found the movie cleaned it up and streamlined it nicely, and since I saw it first, part 4 will forever feel weird for not having the same ending sequence.

26 minutes ago, no3Ljm said:

You know what, I forgot about that.

It is a pretty minor issue to correct though, since the HMR doesn't pin the wings like the Yamato 1/60, and they just click in and out of place, so there's really no risk of damaging them.

It would probably be pretty easy to make a permanent mod, I just didn't feel like messing with what worked.  

It's about as simple a mod as you can get, just about a quarter-inch square of a business card, doubled up, and bent so it wraps under the shoulder, and up through the gap next to the wing hinge, pressing it down.  It'll fall out any time you transform it, but I keep this one in fighter mode on a shelf anyway.

Might have to just wait this one out, since they basically just flipped off the customers and made it an international webshop release.  It'll probably show up down the road at various places like the HMR Max VF-0S.

I wouldn't be surprised if they do that later, but what I would like clarified is the situation with the dub.. and it's probably been discussed before.  Did they lose the original dub audio for episode 4?  The way this one is described sounds like it has two dub options for that episode.

Really though, I'm mostly just happy to see the old Manga subs back for the movie version.  The re-translation for the 2013 release felt weird after growing up with the other one.

15 minutes ago, Shawn said:

Just FYI it says it has both the movie and the ova

But that sure is expensive! 

The stupid Japanese one has gone for 28000 plus yen forever...never drops. Maybe this is the price point I'd have to do to ever get this set lol

 

Funny, with the current exchange rate.. that's about the same price as the new release.  

5 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Well, I placed my order... the Crunchyroll member discount and coupon code took a neat little chunk off the top and the shipping's free.

The asking price didn't seem that outrageous to me.  Then again, my standards have probably been skewed pretty badly by years and years of paying the already hefty prices fans in Japan are shelling out for "limited edition" media PLUS international shipping. 😅

Pretty much this, honestly.  I would have rather picked it up from a Japanese vendor, since we're probably paying the same import premium we get applied to everything reaching the US these days, but the entire reason to pick it up locally is to actually get all of the materials in English.

And.. looking back?  The Japanese release in 2013 cost me about $170 shipped.  If $20 is the premium to get it imported and fully translated, I don't feel too bad about that.

I think my one persistent nitpick with the HMR VF-4 is that they just completely leveled the wings.  At least the Yamarcadia mold had them slightly drooping, but the HMR's are just straight across.

I didn't make any permanent mods, but I ended up jamming a folded clipping of a business card into the hinge to force the wings down to match the upper surface of the inboard sections.

I will add that I'm.. "satisfied" that the artbook is significantly larger than the one included in the original Japanese release, but mostly I'll just be happy to be able to finally read it.  

Up on Crunchyroll, but sheesh.. $190.

Also, the search is broken.  "Macross Plus" doesn't bring it up, doesn't even appear in the "Macross" listing, had to search "Macross Ultimate" before it came up.

https://store.crunchyroll.com/products/macross-plus-movie-ova-blu-ray-ultimate-edition-5037899090312.html

Sheesh, that would have been the best option if anyone would have announced when those were going up.  Stupid ninja listings.  

Just one is probably plenty though, I just like having a backup in case Bandai does a Bandai.

I'm actually kind of tempted.  I already have the Japanese release, but I'd like to get the complete dub and sub options, since that one didn't include them all, and the new subtitles for the movie were.. a bit weird.

I don't really feel bad double dipping on this one though, it's my favorite of the franchise.

1 hour ago, jvmacross said:

Although I am not personally interested in double dipping (even though I really like combo sets) on this release, I think that this is the first Tamashii Web Shop WWM DX release...the only other TWS 'Macross' WWM release I can think of were those silly Macross F microphones....hope anyone who is missing this VF and armor is able to grab a set....I may cave and get one on sale if it ever is available on some US retail site

I think the VF-0S Max release might have been the only other one, but obviously not a DX.  I think that one did later wind up going to Amazon and places like BBTS, so who knows where this one will wind up in the long run.

I imagine so, but if it's going the P-Bandai route, that might complicate things.  I'm not sure who will carry it.

I did just grab one at Big In Japan though, they've been a solid site for me in the past, came to about $330 shipped.  The exchange rate is really helping.  

Eh, if it shows up on Amazon at a discount, I might bite on one, but I've already got a half dozen VF-4s at this point.  

You know what I just realized, regarding the tilted-up Ghost...

Bandai muffed the whole process by pairing the Yamato Ghost with the Arcadia VF-0 mold.  They weren't meant to go together, and the issues attaching the Ghost to the newer 1/60 VF-0 mold are exactly the same as what you get from the HMR version.

Namely, the chest plate is narrower, meaning the Ghost's canards had to squeeze together tighter, propping it up higher than it should have been.  Bandai just straight-up copied the error by making the canards the original length.   Not that there isn't precedent for this.. since they also copied the incorrect tailhook/gunpod positions...

Those are some incredibly fine looking hinges on those flaps, bravo!  Can't wait to see where this project goes.

I mean, it's really easy when the original release came out several years ago.