Chronocidal

I was going to ask, are you planning to reinforce those joints at all? If the plastic is thick enough it might not need it, but a large washer on either side of the bolt would help distribute the load, and keep that nut from stretching and breaking through the plastic.

I love how the box lists the scale as if it's a warning: "CAUTION: 1/20 SCALE"

But they're already loaded. The F-15 is where the term FAST-pack came from, as I recall, since it means Fuel And Sensor Tactical Pack. They're the bulging add-ons mounted beneath the wings. Of course, if they're going forward with the other upgrades proposed for the F-15, there may be even more missiles stored in those, but I seriously doubt they would put AIM-120s both internally and externally on those packs. What they should do is load it up with those 4-pack AMRAAM pods shown earlier, and then mount a UCAV on top for extra thrust. I'd actually be curious to see how many missiles an F-14 could have carried if it was fully packed though, just from a pure payload standpoint, and ignoring the aerodynamic limitations of mounting missiles everywhere. One of the early prototypes tested a load of at least 14 bombs on the belly, which I'm assuming were 500 lbs each.

Looks like an awesome remodel, can't wait to see it painted up. One thing I noticed though, is the top engine missing that inner 6-toothed ring the other two engines have?

I feel like this is beyond the issue of toon accuracy versus detail though, because those wing markings are just ducking fugly. They have no basis in any line-art, animation, or real life example, and contrary to how tampo is supposed to enhance a product, I feel like the wing markings actively detract from it. I'm all for more real-world detail, and the vast majority of the markings are fine, but those wing labels just make the entire plane look cockeyed, because they couldn't even bother to use the same reference line for the text on both wings. They did the same thing with the Advance version, but the SMS markings were reasonably sized, and didn't cry out like an OCD air-raid siren. I think the bare metal landing gear are just a purely Bandai thing though, and my impression is that they are going to cling to that inaccurate tidbit of nostalgia for the Chunky VF-1s until the end of time, no matter how obviously wrong it is. They do seem to love hanging onto historical errors as if they were trademarks.

Pretty much this, with a side of "Hold on, I have to put my hair in bun so it doesn't get caught." This is older than CGI helmets though, since I remember noticing the same thing about the Power Rangers, and how they never put on or took off their helmets on-camera (that I remember, anyway). CGI just lets you bypass the physical limitations of getting the helmet on and fastened while filming. Film-wise though, the CGI helmets have a few helpful uses. The quick on/off option makes them usable as an extension of the actors' expressions, like a way to express surprise, or end a conversation quickly. I imagine they can also be useful in post production and editing, allowing for tweaking in how much of an actor's facial expressions are visible. Far as it becoming a cliché, I think it's just the natural progression of super-advanced (possibly alien) technology. Everyone has a head and face (for the most part), and giving them a slick button-press helmet is a quick shortcut to say "yeah, this person's important in some way." From a practicality side of things though, yeah, if that technology existed and was easily accessible, I think everyone who rides a motorcycle would love to be able to press a button and have their sunglasses turn into a full crash helmet. It's just convenient.

Can't blame you there, the VE-1 is probably one of the best original Yamato releases. Soooo much tampo printing. Now, what you do with two of them is swap out parts on one for a combat loadout. You can snap the missile packs or strike cannons on in place of the tan sensor domes, replace the arm packs with some missiles and a gunpod, and load him down with some manner of missiles. I think some of the weapons like the rocket pods from the Arcadia YF-19 might look awesome.

AmiAmi is giving nothing but server errors, and now it's flipping out that I have too many in my cart... which is a single one.

So I discovered after sorting out my Bandai Star Wars kits that I'm missing one cannon for one of my Tie Interceptors. Does anyone know if there's a way to request missing pieces through Bluefin now that they're distributing the kits officially, or would I be better just attempting to mold/cast one, or scratch-build my own replacement?

Looks like it should be, and I don't know why it wouldn't be. Just looks like a bundle with the existing Thrustmaster stick, with a custom AC logo.

Probably taking inspiration from the F-14. It had those same ducts on its lower strakes.

So, one thing that might shed some light on the intake gaps.. I think I've seen those done before. I want to say that the 1/48 Hasegawa kit has something similar, but I would have to check the assembly instructions. In terms of actual aircraft, there's a reason for those sorts of structures, and it usually has to do with airflow boundary layer separation. Lots of older generation aircraft had those separation gaps behind intakes. Obviously they're not always necessary, but there's at least a real life precedent for that shape. Far as that backplate and backpack hinge goes though... What were they smoking there? Aside from looking ugly in general, there should be a flat edge to merge with the backpack in the lowered position. Are there extra parts included in this one to use in a pack-less fighter mode configuration? I'm really curious to see what the parts for a normal fighter would look like by comparison. Those quirks with the mold are really baffling though. Sorry to see how much extra work this will take to be presentable.

Heh, thanks, fixed that, I meant the custom from the end of the series. Just goes to show you, even the merchandise from that series was convoluted and inconsistent.

Glad to see it's working out better than it sounded initially. Looks like it's going together very cleanly at the very least, and the details look pretty crisp, though that might be hard to judge at this scale. I'm actually surprised they went the length to add an AOA probe on the side of the nose cone, and I don't recall seeing that on any art before. The kit definitely demands some lighting though, and it's big enough that you could probably put self-contained lights in the boosters so they can be removable. Trick would be rigging the mounting points to be sturdy enough, since those packs have got to be pretty heavy in this scale.

See, you're right, and for the majority of Bandai's releases, they only release things in "canon" combinations, as far as what was seen on screen. But the 31 release schedule screwed them up there, I think. They should have included the missiles with the packs from the start.. but as the half-assed arm shield hardpoints would imply, I don't think they even thought about it until after the fact. They released the Hayate packs too early, before they had a chance to incorporate the missiles. So, in one of their typical "I hope you bought the exclusive ahead of time!" moves, they released the missiles with the Hayate custom scheme version, and just waved a casual middle finger at anyone who would have bought more packs to outfit the repaint. In the VF-1's case.. the missiles are entirely universal to all versions, so if Bandai stays true to form, they'll make one release of them, and we'll never see them again. One thing to consider though.. depending on how many VF-1s Bandai intends to release, one missile set may be enough for all of them. If they only release Hikaru's 1J and a Focker 1S, a single missile set will cover both of them. Even if they produce a Hikaru 1S as well, it'll be enough for him too, because you'll have TV missiles for the 1J, reaction missiles for Roy, and the box launchers for Hikaru's 1S. Each of those are iconic loadouts from key scenes, and it fits with Bandai's trend of canon configurations. If they open the floodgates and we get releases for every VF-1 under the sun again, I'd hope they start bundling the missiles, but they may just be testing the waters for now. Only time will really tell. For the time being, I'm just planning to buy at least two or three of each of the exclusive packs to future-proof Bandai's release machinations.

I don't think you can make that assumption with the VF-1, because nothing about the missile sets would be unique. The VF-31 situation is an aberration in their standard operating procedure, because they clearly couldn't make up their minds about how they wanted to include the RMS missiles. First they were a Hayate custom exclusive.. then they were packed in with Mirage's packs.. then they started including them in the normal release valks? Unless the missiles are color-keyed to each valk, there's no reason to make individual releases for them. Now, maybe the exclusive missile pack is a release to test the waters, and help decide whether to pack them in later releases. One can at least hope. The missiles and TV super packs are an oddity compared with all the other exclusive packs Bandai has released though, because they're not meant for a specific valk. In the HMR line, Bandai doesn't have a good history with that sort of thing, because people are still waiting for them to reissue the generic super packs produced for the original HM VF-1s, and the brownie VF-1As they're meant for didn't even exist until the HMR line. Once we start talking about the strike packs, yeah, they'll have to issue individual ones for each release because of the color-coded markings. If they get as far as releasing M&Ms, I wouldn't expect their packs to be bundled either, because then we're just back to the modern pattern of custom packs for each release.

Can't argue there. I think I'm mostly just looking at this and thinking how impractical that sort of propulsion system might be on a large-scale for an aircraft, and then getting this really weird picture of using it on sailing vessels as a way to essentially produce your own wind... and then I'm having flashbacks to "Treasure Planet." It might be a good way to power blimps, really, since it needs a fairly large structure. What gets me is that this isn't new technology. It's been around since the 1920s. The theoretical limits of something producing force in that manner are pretty well known, and have been studied for a long time. It's most efficient at producing a low thrust over a very large area, and any significant thrust generation could very well take millions of volts. I feel like if this was really viable as a propulsion system, it would have received more attention by now. I'm always slightly skeptical when someone revisits an old concept like this. Part of me wonders if large scale application of this sort of system would be detrimental to the environment in some unforeseen way, and negate the benefit of not using fossil fuels, kind of like the claim some people have made that the production of electric vehicle batteries on a large scale could be more harmful to the environment than the gasoline engines they're replacing. Another part of me kind of goes with the Ian Malcolm-esque "You were so busy figuring out if you could, you never stopped to ask if you should" school of thinking, but from a technological standpoint. Any time you can apply the phrase "But no one's every tried it that way before!", you need to pause and ask the question: "Is there a good reason no one's ever done it that way before?"

I'm not talking about markets so much as what they did with the VF-25s, Ozma's in particular. From what I recall, they ran at least three separate production runs of the VF-25S. The armor packs that Ozma spent 90% of the series in, and Bandai refused to reissue when they started popping out more VF-25s? Yeah, good luck with those. If you didn't order them in the first production run, you're pretty well screwed, no matter what market you live in. No, they're not producing enough to meet international demand, and no one should really expect them to. But when they repeatedly reissue the base product without reissuing the exclusive add-ons, all they're doing is driving up demand and raising aftermarket prices across the board for items they never intend to revisit.

Yeah, that's my concern as well, and one they could completely alleviate by just including the darn things from the start. If they do a single super/strike/missile/whatever release, and then they unleash the VF-1 flood gates, and the add-on packs are never seen or heard from again? Not a happy thought, and it's the exact same situation they have with the HMR super packs and VF-25 armors, so it's not like they haven't set a precedent of screwing their customers that way. Fortunately, there are enough weapons in one set to outfit a few valks, so I'll probably order doubles or triples, and just pray Bandai doesn't 31A the whole market, and drive the prices into the stratosphere. At that point, I'll just use the Hasegawa weapons sets.. they're only about $15-$20. I'll be honest, I don't like the big missile boxes anyway. I just want what was seen on screen in the series, which is pretty much what every HMR release has provided thus far. I know it's not Bandai's status quo to include any missiles. Doesn't mean I don't think they should change that policy, and start throwing people a bone. They've been adding hardpoints to everything since the 171.. the least they could do is consistently offer something to use them for. Also.. I'm only comparing the 1/60 to the 1/48 in terms of included content, because comparing to the original Yamato doesn't account for the overall price increases across the market. If we ignore inflation, the stand-alone DX VF-1 is more expensive than a super/strike bundle of the Yamato 1/48 as well.

I have a hard time comparing to the PF version when they tend to slap whatever markings they see fit willy-nilly across the valk without so much as a thought to look at a real aircraft, nor can they be arsed to paint the landing gear, or even put the ejection seat markings. Bandai's tampo is a grab bag of good, bad, and obnoxiously stupid, as the YF-19 exemplified. Far as the missiles go though, won't this be the first perfect transformation VF-1 ever released that didn't include at least some of the missiles? (Joke Machines aside, but they included the super packs.) I have a hard time letting that slide, and I don't think anyone would agree that 4k yen extra is a reasonable price for something that's been included with pretty much every single VF-1 going back to the Chunky. For something extensive like the YF-19 weapons set, I'd agree, but not even including the bare minimum TV missile clusters? All of the HMRs have included those. Why are they making a separate pack with all the missiles, when they could have easily packed the relevant versions of them in with the matching super and strike pack sets? Really though, at the bottom line, I'm just sick to death of Bandai's exclusive nonsense.

From a wallet perspective, it's already ugly. What was the retail price, 18,000 yen? That's just the raw valk, no accessories, no missiles. Comparatively? The Arcadia super pack bundles are going for under 20k. That's a valk, and alternate hands, and all the missiles, and super packs. Bandai's priced the missiles at 4000 yen, so we're already at 22k. Super/Strike packs, I'm not betting we'll see for under 12k, so we're up to 34k yen. And since Bandai absolutely refuses to bundle anything, or sell them at the same time, you get to pay individual shipping on each item. By the time all is said and done, we'll probably be paying close to 40k yen to get the same contents in one of the Arcadia bundles. Honestly, it's not the prices that are driving me away from collecting Bandai stuff.. it's their freakin market strategy.

I don't want to be too much of a naysayer, but have they even conceptually worked out the necessary upscaling of this mechanism to support anything approaching a human payload? Very frankly speaking, I can power a glider with a rubber band for just as long as that prototype flew, and that doesn't need a 20,000 volt battery. They need to get over the "we made an airplane!" buzz, and produce an engine. The rest will fall into place once they have something that produces enough thrust to out-perform all the other purely electric engines that already exist, and don't require massive networks of high-voltage lines to function. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's cool that they can produce an engine that uses no moving parts, but without more information on the performance envelope of the technology, it's hard to know whether it'll be the next quantum leap in propulsion, or if you'll need to be lugging around a nuclear reactor to sustain enough voltage to lift a marketable payload.

Wonder if they'd be willing to sell the pilots separately. Makes me glad I don't have room for that huge kit though, it looks bafflingly underwhelming in all the worst ways. The lack of waterslides is especially egregious, since it's not like 1/20th scale aircraft markings are something everyone just has laying around like they would for more common scales.

The private warehouse hold is usually long enough to overlap multiple releases between some companies. I was able to bundle a YF-19 and Messer Movie Version together that I'm picking up today. I haven't made any really big orders in a while though, so I forget what the shipping gets bumped to when you get their jumbo-sized box. Congrats on the pickup though, that's probably about $200 off when it first released.

AC6 was kind of absolutely "okay." Nice superplane design, and pretty to look at, but the story and dialogue were pretty cringe-worthy in a few ways, and the selection of aircraft was pitiful compared with the previous few titles. Music wasn't anything amazing, and I don't think it was recorded live like the 4/5/Zero, but the main theme in the trailer was pretty memorable. Zero was one of my favorites though, and I thought it was even more memorable in some ways than 5, since it explained the backstory of that conflict pretty nicely. The live action cutscenes were a little odd, but I liked the story quite a bit, and the aircraft designs and music were amazing. I still listen to that Spanish guitar theme and the end credits on a regular basis. I may be confusing Ace Combat with Hawx or some other flight game, so I wouldn't worry too much. I just know that HOTAS support on consoles can be flaky, and they often lack the configuration customization possible on a PC. The diagram below for War Thunder looks like it should be perfectly workable though. On previous AC bundles, the included stick was based on the old Saitek X-45, which had a rudder rocker switch on the back of the throttle. One of the best features of that design in my opinion, and I always preferred that to the twisty-stick design more recent sticks tend to use. The one linked above for AC7 is the PS4 Thrustmaster T.Flight HOTAS 4, and looks like it uses the same sort of rudder control, but might offer a twist stick too. What's odd is I'm actually seeing two sticks being released for AC7.. and the second is a Hori stick that looks like a more modern evolution of the Saitek X-45. No idea how those two will compare, but I like the look of the second one, and wouldn't mind something like that for PC gameplay, since it looks like it incorporates full thumbsticks as hat switches, which is one issue most PC sticks have with the AC series in general. PC sims generally don't use the same sort of view control as the AC series, because they rely on up/down/left/right key presses to slew the view, and don't automatically center. The hat switches on PC sticks that generally get assigned for view control act more like digital + pads, because their real life counterparts are used for the equivalent of 4 individual button presses. The co-opting of hat switches for view control in sims is as old as the genre, and is a sort of necessary evil in the world of high fidelity PC simulators. Lots of HOTAS setups allow for modifier buttons that will allow you to switch to the realistic functionality of a view hat. One of the things I'm really looking forward to as VR becomes a more viable option for simming is finally moving view control off of buttons, and replacing it with a true-to-life hands-free option.