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Chronocidal

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  1. Chronocidal
    Fortunately, I don't think that break would have any effect on anything but battroid mode. You could glue the leg onto the hip socket, and pretty much keep everything else working as intended.
  2. Chronocidal
    Still think the 19F and 19P are absolutely the most beautiful things to come out of Yamato. Grats on getting that F! The VF-1 squad looks really good as well, nice weathering/marking.
  3. Chronocidal

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Chronocidal replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    Guess it's just going to require entirely new parts to do the rotation and missiles then. Really no room in that shield to put the pivot, though you could make a different top panel to hold the pylons. Disappointing, but I suppose it's standard operating procedure for Bandai at this point, so I don't know why I was hopeful.
  4. Chronocidal
    Kind of a half post, but as a footnote to my last one, I noticed one of my stabs likes to pop out when rotated as well, and it might be the same one as yours David, since I flipped mine left for right. I get the feeling the rotation post on that stab isn't actually round. It fits nice and tight when level, but starts squeezing out when rotated. Given the obvious molding direction of the stabs, I'm thinking that post may just be oval shaped, so I might go at the edges of it with a file tonight and see if that helps the one that pops off.
  5. Chronocidal
    I think "niche within a niche within a niche" is a fairly accurate definition of the Lancer honestly. I mean, seriously, it's literally a box with guns barrels on one end, and a propeller-looking antenna that would have most kids thinking it's a helicopter, and promptly snap it off trying to spin it. People want it for the nostalgia alone, but it has absolutely zero marketable play value as a toy. I frankly think it's amazing that they even took the time and effort to make the kit of it. I don't think Arcadia is ever going to make anything cheap, bottom line. They know they're a collector-focused company, and make products for the people who have the money to blow on such things. I'm perfectly okay with this honestly, and I'll keep buying stuff they make if I like it. Macross is a hot property again with the recent series, and more and more companies are jumping on board, and filling the gaps in merchandising. Frankly speaking, I don't think Arcadia is big enough to compete with most of them, so I don't blame them for sticking to the high end collectors market, and hanging on for dear life to the few in-demand items they still have a license hold on. I mean, let's face it, all that stuff you want them to make may already be claimed by someone else with deeper pockets and larger production capability. We know how long Bandai loves to pre-plan, and I wouldn't bet against them already having licenses for everything from the Gnerl fighterpod to the Catseye waiting in the wings. ===================================================== That being said though, the pricing is a separate issue from the bootlegging. I've got zero issues with them making knock-offs of the exclusives that Bandai isn't interested in reissuing, or even making, in the case of Rod's super packs. That's their loss for being jerks to their customers. Maybe the bootlegs will give them a swift kick in the backside and make them realize how much demand there is for those items. Or maybe they won't care. Who knows at this point? But yeah. Knock-off VF-1s? No. Arcadia's still making them, and the costs aren't going to decrease any time soon, unless they overproduce again like Yamato. But I'd be astounded if they didn't learn from that the first time around, and will work to prevent it.
  6. Chronocidal
    Had the same thought on the finish, and I might leave the markings alone. They're too small to read at anything over a few inches, so they won't bother me on a shelf. Far as I'm seeing, they didn't glue the screw covers in, they're just friction fit. I was able to pop off most of the ones on the nose with ease. Should clarify actually, my nose cone is almost too tight, but the joint to fold down the entire forward fuselage behind the canopy is very loosely secured. I might coat the connecting surfaces to build them up, but they seem awfully small in general. For the stabs, I wonder how hard it would be to file the slot for them a bit deeper, without changing how they snap in. They sit a couple millimeters out from the fuselage.
  7. Chronocidal
    See, I would agree, except that it can damage the market. So far, Hollywood's struck out repeatedly on anime adaptations. They don't understand the material, they don't understand the audience, and when they try to adapt material they don't understand to an audience that the original material wasn't even targeted at, they fall on their face over and over again. How did GITS go? They tried to adapt a property that has a particular target audience and established fanbase by changing a bunch of things to appeal to a wider audience. In the process, they dumbed it down to the point where 1) the original fanbase wasn't all that interested, 2) it didn't draw in any new fans, and 3) it became a completely unremarkable money pit that will get relegated quickly to the $5 bargain bin at Wal-Mart. Hollywood's conclusion? "Oh, I guess anime doesn't sell well." What did they expect to happen? For all the market research they've done, they're trying to sell refrigerators to Eskimos, and still acting surprised that sales are tanking. Somewhere along the way, someone's got to realize that people don't want adaptations of stuff they love. They want original material that gives them more stuff to love.
  8. Chronocidal
    Eh, best case, at least the artists involved maybe got their names out into the marketplace, for better or for worse. Art-wise? The Rick and Lisa aren't terrible drawings. Not a particularly attractive style maybe, but not objectively bad, aside from some questionably creepy facial expressions Though, I don't know why I get the impression that the Lisa pose was taken from a Taylor Swift photo-shoot. The Minmay on the other hand just looks bad altogether. The face alone bugs me for the way her expression makes her look insane, but I cannot for the life of me figure out how her body is positioned under that dress. Maybe her pose is fine, but the dress is drawn wrong? I don't know, it just looks like she has insanely long arms, impossibly angled thighs, and no torso.
  9. Chronocidal
    Bandai also has several orders of magnitude more customers, licenses, and product lines, and several decades of existence to fall back on. If one of their products doesn't sell, they have thousands of others that do to soften the blow. Arcadia doesn't have those options, products, licenses, markets, or financial solvency. Yamato's early years provided the backbone for what they were able to build up to, but their early Macross products filled a relative market vacuum that doesn't exist anymore. Arcadia doesn't get that luxury, and if they don't build products that compete with Bandai's quality level, no one's going to buy them.
  10. Chronocidal
    Keeping the powermaster gimmick might not be possible, but I think there'd be enough room to conceal Dreadwind's original shoulder pods inside the front portion of the fuselage, under the front of the conformal pods. The rest of the arms would just have to lay along his back, and rotate to the front after sliding the wings down. You're right about the proportions though. Even without any arms, this thing makes for a really long and skinny torso and legs. Might have to squash him down, maybe do some VF-1-style nose collapsing to get him shorter. Might get better if I stick more of the rear fuselage to the tail section.
  11. Chronocidal
    Sheesh.. I think that Zero might even be smaller than 1/72... Edit: Yeah, the 1/72 kit is 9.5 inches... 200 mm isn't even 8 inches long. Pre-painted silver is nice, but that is a lot for something so tiny. And I actually kinda prefer them painted in a semi-gloss gray.
  12. Chronocidal
    Yeah, I want to hop onboard the NOPEtrain as well here... but... I can maybe think of one potentially workable way to make something entertaining. You focus the entire series on different characters. Other bounty hunters, police, government officials, etc. in the same universe, attempting to make a buck, do their jobs, and getting stymied by the original cast's shenanigans, arriving a couple minutes too late, and having to deal with the aftermath of things they already did. Most you would see of any original character is a suspiciously familiar figure in the background, walking the other way. Not saying it's a great idea, or even a passably good one, but the series established a pretty iconic universe, and I wouldn't mind exploring some of the other corners of it. Give things a different feel, pick a different soundtrack style. Don't try to compete with or even imitate the original, because that's just asking to fall on your face hard.
  13. Chronocidal
    I fear I may be on the verge of another hobby to engross myself in. Just fiddling with proportions for fun, an actual F-16 has some serious issues making an actual transformer. But I'm wondering how well the conformal tanks on the back would work as a way to hide the arms..
  14. Chronocidal

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Chronocidal replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    Got my super packs yesterday and slapped them onto Hayate's valk, they look pretty good. Was impressed by the mechanism to hold the boosters onto the wings, and everything seems to fit pretty well. Was disappointed to see that there's no mechanism to rotate the arm shields for the reaction weapons though, and no possible mounts for pylons, so either they're planning on making a new shield for later, or I'm going to have to make something myself. I might have to go build up a copy of the shield with built-in pylons tonight, and see if I can't rig a simple rotation mechanism into the hardpoint mount for the wing.
  15. Chronocidal
    Yep, it's the Robot Heroes CG-02. I might have to get myself a Thundercracker in the near future too, but these are a little too big to collect them all. It's a revised MP-11 mold, but with the bigger legs sadly. My ideal mold would rework the original MP-03 to use the newer fold out heels, but keep the slimmer legs, and fold the tails and stabs up into a backpack like some of the much smaller seeker molds do. Honestly, seeing what people are doing with transformers is making me seriously consider getting into designing my own. I know I could work some magic on a custom seeker mold, and I spent half of the afternoon today brainstorming how to make an MP-level Dreadwing combiner out of an F-16 and Tornado.
  16. Chronocidal
    I've never had much interest in the X-Wing tabletop game, but the little ships are top notch for the most part. I've been meaning to pick up the Falcon and Shuttle for a while, but I've had the Tantive IV set for a while, and it's probably the best mass-produced representation that ship has ever gotten. Far as what I've been picking up, I'm worried I'm about to fall down the third-party transformers rabbit hole.. my two newest acquisitions.. and yes, that's the DX VF-31J.
  17. Chronocidal
    Just got my Robot Heroes CG-02 delivered... I might have to pick up a Thundercracker, and Ramjet if they do the coneheads. This thing is beautiful. And huge. I'm thinking he's close enough to 1/48 to use a few decent sidewinders, but I'm definitely ordering the add-on pack when it appears. Only a couple of minor quibbles. The stabilizers were mounted on the opposite sides (easily fixed), and the nose mount in jet mode is a little loose, making it easy to knock the whole nose section down. The wing flaps are also a little loose, but they stay just fine if you don't hit them. Also, I'm contemplating using some actual decals to replace all the engrish "NO OVER" markings on the wings.
  18. Chronocidal
    There are a lot of comparisons of the various models in the DX toy thread, if you browse through the earlier parts. Don't have the time to go hunting at the moment, but they appeared early on, right after Bandai started announcing the VF-31 DX, and everyone began debating which type was their favorite.
  19. Chronocidal

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Chronocidal replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    Obvious texture copy-pasting never stopped Bandai from duplicating everything in toy form before, why should they stop now? I'm actually surprised we haven't seen tons of mirrored tampo markings in a lot more places than just the "SWS" issues.
  20. Chronocidal

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Chronocidal replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    It works the same way Arad's shoulder can magically pass directly through his canard in that pic above.
  21. Chronocidal

    Bandai DX VF-31

    Chronocidal replied to UN Spacy's topic in Toys

    They might, but I don't see why actually. The radome doesn't have some big piece of art across it, does it? I think that's the only gripe about the 262's shield, is that the hinges interrupted the Windermere royal crest. What I do wish they would include is a permanently opened charger pod front. The giant bulky hinges on those tiny doors kind of ruin the look of that piece, and three of the doors aren't the right shape.
  22. Chronocidal
    Bad designs aside.. who even approved all the trash they thought people would actually buy? It's like Ric Olie all over again..
  23. Chronocidal
    Yeah.. I'm grabbing two at the first sign of a restock, I forwarded a link to someone as a "this would make a great gift idea" thing, but they didn't know there was any urgency to get it.
  24. Chronocidal
    Yeah, even if it's currently out of stock, they don't seem to limit production too much. Generally, UCS sets are available for a couple years after first release, and this one has so much press behind it, Lego would be crazy to cut off the supply before demand is met.
  25. Chronocidal
    So after digging through the assorted discussions about third party seekers, I'm almost to the point I want to design my own, and mix the MP-03 mold with the DX9 Stormtrooper style solution for the tail sections, and a few other assorted tweaks to get the thing to stay together. More than that though.. seeing all of the recent takes on Skyfire's animation model makes me want to attempt a real-world twist on his design, and maybe give it something that looks more airworthy. I don't know if anyone would actually buy it, but just can't help thinking the recent Phoenix release looks an awful lot like a particular aircraft. Obviously the backpack doesn't work the same way, but I could see it being an add-on with more weapons and such similar to the recent Jetfire molds. But I've been wanting to see someone use the Vigilante design for a long time, since it's one of those rare "box with wings" aircraft that would have plenty of room for boxy arms and legs.
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