Chronocidal

Wooo, my VE-1 and strike packs are sitting at the FedEx office for pickup. As if today didn't feel too long already...

Same, FedEx generally takes between 3-5 days. For me though, it's not so much the speed/cost as it is the fact that FedEx has the decency to stay open slightly past 5pm for all the folks in town that work, and will actually hold the package for me when I ask them to, so I can pick it up the day it arrives. I've lost count of how many times I've had to wait til the next day (or even week) because the post office doesn't seem to understand that I work during the day. Not to mention, they never bother to actually deliver anything even when I am there, because no one wants to bother walking to my apartment when it's so much easier to stick the note in my box to tell me to pick it up the next day.

Looking beautiful. I'll see if I can order a set soon and test it out, but I do hope there's a way to figure out the attachments for the legs without having to make an entirely new lower leg section. Darn, now you have my brain working overtime trying to picture what the issue you mentioned is. Does it just conflict too much with the tail section to add the plates onto the calves? Edit: DOH.. I just had a thought... too late to change things now, but I had a thought about the outer pylon. Technically, the rail you already have probably is the pylon.. so adding another pylon to that might look a little odd. I was going to suggest a different style outer pylon that you could attach another missile directly to, but then the question becomes, "which missile?" Having a universal mount is probably better anyway. But for a future idea though, maybe a single rail holding something like a sidewinder or AMRAAM would look good. Or just a plain rail with pegs to attach a single missile off one of the stock clusters (though.. the missiles would need work, since they've got the fins aligned wrong for a rail mount). Heck.. Maybe I should just start fiddling with this shapeways stuff and make a set of missiles and pylons to go with anything.

I still have to see this new short at some point (and the movie that's tacked on after it too ). I might wait til the video release, since my local theaters are like watching a movie on a portable phone through a cardboard tube anyway. Still think my favorite short is the magician act one though. I think I saw it right after playing portal, and I don't know if one was influenced by the other, but they certainly seemed like it.

Just a heads up for folks here, there seems to be a pretty large set of Hasegawa kits at good discounts right now. Looking through, there's a good variety of various scales, including a ton of 1/72 and 1/48 Idolmaster kits at 50%+ off. I normally wouldn't be interested in the crazy markings on those, but honestly? For the discounts they're offering, I'm grabbing a few of the kits to build up in normal markings I've gotten elsewhere. This sale is probably the cheapest I've ever seen 1/48 Hasegawa Superhornets and Tomcats.

For what it's worth, at the time I saw them, I thought the prequels were pretty awesome too, but I expect a good amount of that was my buying into the hype about them. Well.. II and III at least. Episode I was okay, but my best memories of that entire movie came from the N64 racing game that came out of it (and it's still one of my favorite Star Wars console games to this day). The thing that killed them for me was that I felt like the characterization just sucked. Qui-gon and Obi-wan managed to do a decent job I think, but everyone else just seemed so apathetic about everyone and everything around them. I mean.. I'm not going to claim the acting in Episode IV was all that great either, but at least they had fun with it, and the characters were a lot more entertaining to watch, specifically because they didn't all get along. Plus.. I'll never understand what happened to John Williams between ROTJ and Episode I. He seemed to completely abandon the Wagner-ish characterization and melodies used in the original movies, and went completely wacky with percussion, random brass, and whatever else he could find. There's pretty much one theme from each prequel movie that most people actually remember (Duel of the Fates, Across the Stars, and... whatever the Obi-wan/Anakin battle theme was called). It's just sad, because Williams ignored so much of what made the original trilogy soundtracks so memorable, and went in a completely different direction.

I can't blame him for that.. there's such a religiously devoted fanbase to the original stories now, that there's no possible way to meet their expectations. The novels definitely weren't universally liked, though I'm not sure they were quite as disliked as the prequels. But they also had a much smaller audience. Basically... no matter what's done now, it won't satisfy some, because the fanbase has become truly impossible to please as a whole.

Sweet, got my VE-1 and strike pack sets going to ship now.

Where'd you order from? I'm looking forward to getting this myself.

I'd guess no on this, since those examples from before showed it barely able to support a VF-1 with strike packs. The mounting points of the VF-19s and VF-17 are even further away from the CG, and it's going to be quite a strain to get those to stay up I think.

I still love the take that several of the fanfics have gone with... that all of the "canon" endings are actually happening simultaneously in various dimensions of the multi-verse, or possibly are all repeated iterations of the same events, similar to the "Everything has happened before, and will happen again" attitude seen in BSG. It actually makes a ton of sense in some ways though. One fanfic actually goes so far as to explain that the other Shinji that appears in Shinji's thought processes is actually another Shinji from an alternate universe, and has his alternate self commenting on the differences between them. Yeah, they really have no fourth wall. Ridiculous as they are, I'd really love to see some of the fanfics done up as actual animation, just because they'd be so insane. "Nobody Dies" and "Shinji and Warhammer 40K" in particular, just because I seriously want to see the hilarious nonsense they deal with in real time. Gendo having a fight to the death with President Stephen Colbert comes to mind, or one of the Eva's somehow picking up an AI personality based on a mix of Optimus Prime, Liberty Prime, and Robo-Nixon.

Team up, nothing. After all the nonsense the prequels introduced, the emperor would probably dump Vader for Sephy like last week's laundry.

So.. wait. The mashup/crossover potential here is ridiculously massive. You could have G.I. Mickey teaming up with Luke Skywalker, Optimus Prime, and.... Lightning. And they wind up fighting Caius Ballad, who teams up with Megatron and the Emperor. My brain can't even contain the epically insane levels of awesome and nonsense that could be introduced in a new Kingdom Hearts game if this happens. I mean, the only thing that could top this is if Disney goes off and acquires Bamco and Gainax. Then we can have Gurren Lagaan, Shining Gundam, and Eva Unit-1 duking it out with Megatron and Sephiroth on the surface of the freaking Death Star. While Jetfire flies around taking out Tie Fighters with Luke and Mickey leading a squadron of Skystriker F-14s. My brain hurts now. I mean.. seriously here. We're about to come within a few inches of there being an actual "Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny" Stop the world please, I'd like to get off. (my freaking brain.. I just imagined Disney Evangelion. Don't ask.) Edit: Also, I apparently broke the forum posting this.. it turned into a massive mess of html when I typed it out.

The 19F is beautiful, I might get a second one to complete Emerald Force. This one used to be quite painful to the eyes, the new red color is a huge improvement really. I have to agree in general though, I still don't care for the overall scheme. If they had stuck with red and white without resorting to random yellow/tan/beige/whatever bits, it'd look like a tribute to Hikaru's 1J, but the random spots of other colors just looks weird. And I really still hope the shoulder speakers are easy to remove, because they're an eyesore to the design. I still think that repaint idea from a few pages back would work though. Replacing all the red with black is a low risk option, since none of those areas are heavy on the wear and tear from transformation. I'll probably keep my first one unchanged (except the leg strakes.. I don't know what dingbat decided that particular panel should be red, but it looks hideous that way). I really hope this version goes on heavy clearance sale, because I would love to buy a few. It's going to be the go-to version for customs, since even if we can't get some normal gray, at least white is an easy base to work from. In fact, I'm picturing what this would look like in a Supernova style test scheme.

That would be awesome, and might convince me to keep my other preorders. It's still a decent chunk of stuff for December, but I was really looking forward to getting the VE-1 and strike pack reissues this month.

Red is also much better now. Not so orangey, I probably won't keep my preorder due to the delay and the holidays, but I'll probably be getting one somewhere down the road.

Well... considering the Lucasarts logo is on there, they probably already own it, or at least own a portion of that game itself.

Actually, if you happen to have one of the VF-1 v2 kits handy, cut some spare sprue loose, and rubber band one of the erasers to it. Should provide a nice test to see if the plastic can react with them Granted, it might take a long time. I don't know how long my ruler had that eraser on it before I noticed it had melted into it.

Ok, warning here, I cannot recommend erasers of any type at all. Granted, it will depend on the type, but I have had horrible things happen to things left in the vicinity of some kinds of erasers over time. You're worried about the stands eating paint... I've had erasers dissolve plastic. I have a ruler with the imprint of a large rectangular eraser eaten into the surface as if by acid, because they were stored next to each other in my office supplies drawer. Others have eaten the coating off of colored pencils, melted rubber bands, and left sticky gooey messes where they touched other materials. If you plan on using erasers, test them thoroughly, and do research. I don't think all erasers will do this, but many types of art erasers will have this effect. It's nasty, and will do horrible things to your valks if you use an eraser with the wrong material formula.

I'd honestly prefer they go fully animated/CG like with the Clone Wars, rather than try to hack together new movies by digitally de-aging the actors, or pulling the kind of shenanigans they did with Tron Legacy. Not that Tron Legacy was bad, it was pretty amazing how they managed to simulate a young Jeff Bridges; but I don't think the technique would hold up well in a natural environment, or for that long of a movie if it involves a main character. At this point, filming new Star Wars movies with the original main cast would be like asking William Shatner to go back and make a new movie as Kirk. Now... Ok, Mark Hamill might be capable of playing an Obi-Wan style role. I haven't seen him recently, but I could see him playing that part to a new crop of jedi students. If they go with the idea of him re-forming the Jedi Academy, sure, I could maybe believe that. I doubt he'd be doing much in the way of physical activity, but that didn't stop Alec Guinness back in the day. The rest of the cast.. I'm not so sure. Denis Lawson could come back as a grizzled old Admiral Wedge Antilles I suppose, and it's easy to dig up potential relatives/children for older characters (the EU is full of that already). This far after the originals, I just wonder what potential plot they could pursue. Given how you could say the entire "bring balance to the force" prophecy thing did actually come true with regards to Anakin (when he killed the Emperor), I'm not sure what they'll want to do. Or, they could reinterpret the entire thing, and say it was actually about Luke, then show that "balance" finally happening. But who knows. I still like Zahn's entire take on the way the force works though. My rough impression was basically, active/passive, dark and light. Luke and Vader were active light and dark, using it for active defense and offense. Yoda and Palpatine were the passive version.. no action, but using it for stealth, knowledge, and wisdom. Active use is like listening to your stereo too loud, it drowns out the quieter voice of guidance.

Actually.. now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure there was a particular model for Mara Jade who appears in a few different places. I want to say she did photos for the collectible card game, but I never played that myself. I only know she was in there because I had a roommate who played the game with his girlfriend, and I happened to be in the room one day when they had a total Jerry Springer moment, and Mara somehow wound up dueling with Padme. (trimmed due to size, and since they're not the one David was thinking of) Now, the thing about Mara though.. I'm pretty sure that she's one of the few EU characters to get semi-officially recognized by LucasFilm/LucasArts, since she was used pretty extensively in the later Dark Forces/Jedi Knight games. She kind of falls into the same oddball category as Dash Rendar, Thrawn, etc, EU characters that Lucas okayed to appear in official material. In her case, her background definitely isn't contradicted by the movies, and it makes perfect sense for Palpatine to have secret agents like her. This interview with Zahn about his novels is interesting though. http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.theforce.net/jedicouncil/interview/pics/marajade.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.theforce.net/jedicouncil/interview/zahn.asp&usg=__T544jhZYgmPvFHCjxPAK_OQYFmQ=&h=217&w=257&sz=39&hl=en&start=12&zoom=1&tbnid=nCWpHsDS6asdQM:&tbnh=95&tbnw=112&ei=oPqXUNzxO6rvigKb9YHYBA&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dmara%2Bjade%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26gbv%3D2%26tbm%3Disch&um=1&itbs=1

Maybe cuz Kate Beckinsale is freakin hot? I can't say I blame them. Seriously tho, could be the same artist, or artists with similar tastes. And honestly... I've randomly drawn people before who wind up looking like people I later meet in life, or know currently.. Sometimes you don't have to try to draw someone in particular, but because of tastes in features, your drawing winds up looking like someone you know, or know of.

I'll just stick this here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSe2FD9Vn1k Watch to the ending. It's really ... creepy. I shoulda known.. it was Jim Henson's evil plan all along.

They're probably just confusing it with the VF-25s, since all those are renewals. Plus.. releasing a renewal that includes super packs? This is Bandai we're talking about. They'd never do something that makes that much sense. Seriously though, it doesn't make much sense for them to make a renewal with the super packs already added, unless they figured the packs are so minor they couldn't market them separately. Besides, if this was a renewal version, I'd think there'd be a lot more buzz about it, and a lot more pictures taken.

I'm actually surprised those will hold a 1/48, though it's all about locating the center of gravity I guess. It's probably why they work so well for gerwalk. I just wish Yamato would work on coming up with better locations for their stand adapters. They're always so far forward of the CG. I'd think using the adapters is probably out for anything bigger than a 1/60 VF-1, maybe a VF-11. Heavy stuff like the Fire Valk is probably out of the question.