The Energon Pub

Sat Apr 30, 2011 4:05 pm

Yet another Epyon pic, this time with Beam Sword (deactivated) included. Given the size of the hilt, i'm expecting the blade to be ludicrously large (not that it was very small in the anime >.>)

MGGundamEpyonimage00.jpg

Sun May 01, 2011 11:08 am

Blurrz wrote:I watched a little bit last night.. but I dunno i just don't like how it's set as movies instead of a season.

http://anime-media.com/gundam-unicorn-episode-3/

I'm right there with ya on that. Although, I still haven't made it through episode two yet...mainly because i don't like watching a stream for that long. Perhaps I just need to break down and order the first two on bluray.

News Credits: 1452 · Wed May 04, 2011 5:11 am

Building MG Noir Strike is pretty fun.

Speaking of Strike, the third RG is set for release;
http://hk.myblog.yahoo.com/iam-cybergun ... ?mid=69710

I'm also kind of peeved they're releasing a MG 00 Raiser. It's really pointless. Where's the profit after.. the release 1/100 OO and Raiser, than 00-Raiser together in a box set, then the Designer's Color editions? Only Hasbro can toss me around, how dare you Bandai!

News Credits: 2 · Wed May 04, 2011 8:01 am

Blurrz wrote:I'm also kind of peeved they're releasing a MG 00 Raiser. It's really pointless. Where's the profit after.. the release 1/100 OO and Raiser, than 00-Raiser together in a box set, then the Designer's Color editions? Only Hasbro can toss me around, how dare you Bandai!

It's not pointless when the NG 1/100 00 Gundam kits are overshadowed by the HG 1/144 kits, let alone the soon to be released MG 00 Raiser. The MG 00 Raiser should easily surpass the NG 1/100 kits in all areas, ie. proportions, sculpted detail, articulation design, etc. That isn't to say that the NG 00 Gundam kits are poor by any means but from how both the MG Astray Blue Frame and Astray Red Frame Kai sold out for some time during their first production runs, we see that despite having good NG kits, many people are still clamouring for even better MG incarnations of Gundam model kits.

As far as the profit, if the sales of the Metal Build 00 Gundam Seven Swords figure is any indication, there are many people who want a 1/100 scale 00 Gundam that's better than the NG 00 Gundam kits. HLJ, AmiAmi, and Hobby Search, have all sold out of their first shipment of the MB 00GSS units. Consider that the figure is 130,000 yen at MSRP and the lowest price I could find for it was 100,000 yen(around $120.00 USD at the time I pre-ordered the figure). If such a high priced figure of the 00 Gundam could sell out so easily, I'm sure that Bandai isn't taking a gamble with the MG 00 Raiser.

News Credits: 1452 · Wed May 04, 2011 2:03 pm

Aye, never really looked at it that way. For me I felt that 1/100 was just pure wicked and I didn't think there was much to improve upon. The NG 1/100 OO Raiser is a huge improvement to let say.. 1/100 NG Seed or Seed Destiny kits. It even has the light up eyes and GN Drives. Haha, who knows though, Dalong will probably sell me on it or something.

News Credits: 2 · Thu May 05, 2011 10:08 am

The NG 1/100 00 Gundam/Raiser is a good model kit and I'm sure some people are content with that and will pass on the MG 00 Raiser. It's a perfectly fine model kit.

I'm curious as to how the Metalbuild 00 Gundam compares to the MG 00 Raiser as far as proportions go. I think that the CAD template for the MB figure might be used/shared in modified form for some of the molding of the MG 00 Raiser trees, specifically the parts for the Gundam's outer armour.

News Credits: 1452 · Thu May 12, 2011 1:10 am

Aye, the Metal Build looks interesting.

Speaking of interesting...

Thu May 12, 2011 1:58 am

Damn. Beat me to it. Heavyarms still looks like a display model, but Sandrock looks ready to go. Probably gonna be next. Sigh... still no Tallgeese

Thu May 12, 2011 9:57 am

MG Delta Plus is the best announcement in a while. Could also lead to a Hyaku Shiki 2.0.

Thu May 12, 2011 8:10 pm

One could only hope. Despite it's age, Hyaku-Shiki was one of my favorite builds. It just looks so damned good on completion. Perhaps we'll get a Delta Plus in gold plating.

UGH! Damn you Bandai. I just got a raise yesterday and already you're coming up with more and more ways to take my money!

News Credits: 1452 · Sun May 15, 2011 11:19 pm

Just picked up the Seed Astray 1/100 Gale Strike. Looking forward to another project..

Tue May 17, 2011 2:46 am

Despite my aversion to Zeon suits, I was considering picking up the MG Sinanju. Decided against it after i learned you have to do all that gold trim yourself. Seriously bandai, wtf? I thought the point of Master Grades was that they required little to no paint to be color accurate

News Credits: 1 · Tue May 17, 2011 6:23 am

Aluus wrote:Despite my aversion to Zeon suits, I was considering picking up the MG Sinanju. Decided against it after i learned you have to do all that gold trim yourself. Seriously bandai, wtf? I thought the point of Master Grades was that they required little to no paint to be color accurate

What would be the gold areas are raised up, so it is quite easy to paint. Plus you get to choose whatever style of gold you like. So your Sinanju can be very cartoon-y or more photo-realistic. Took me less than an afternoon to spray all the black pieces and paint on the gold trim. Throw on the first and second Gundam U.C. Unicorn OVAs, and you'll be done in no time!

Bandai includes gold metallic stickers like their eye stickers, but who uses them?

News Credits: 2 · Tue May 17, 2011 9:00 pm

Aluus wrote:Despite my aversion to Zeon suits, I was considering picking up the MG Sinanju. Decided against it after i learned you have to do all that gold trim yourself. Seriously bandai, wtf?

The MG Sinanju has 16 runners for the main bulk of the kit with 2 runners of beam weapon effect parts, 1 runner for the mono eye and cockpit, and 2 runners of polycaps. If you aren't willing to put in the effort to apply the minimal amount of paint for the Sinanju's gold trim parts, why in the world would you even want to assemble a MG kit of the Sinanju's significant part count and build complexity?

Aluus wrote:I thought the point of Master Grades was that they required little to no paint to be color accurate

The main point of Master Grade kits is to employ more complex and intricate design and engineering in Gundam model kits in order to provide greater articulation and a higher level of mechanical detail for display. The concept of the inner frame is the main facilitator for this intention.

Colour accuracy in MG kits is a secondary consideration at best. The only reason that MG kits possess more colour variety in the parts is because of the more extensive part separation possible at 1:100 scale. Even then, MG kits have evolved significantly since the first MG RX-78-2, which was released in July 1995. That original MG kit only has only 10 runners in total, which includes the polycap runner. Modern 1:144 HG kits can match that runner count and often exceed 10 runners.

Wed May 18, 2011 6:55 am

Aluus wrote:Despite my aversion to Zeon suits, I was considering picking up the MG Sinanju. Decided against it after i learned you have to do all that gold trim yourself. Seriously bandai, wtf?

The Sinanju is one of the best MG's you can buy.

The stickers work really well if you don't want to paint. I use them for masking when painting. On my custom Shin Matsunaga Sinanju, I painted the blue trim and then used the stickers to mask the trim and then sprayed the grey. Remove stickers and done.

Wed May 18, 2011 9:11 pm

Meh. I suppose i'm just being lazy. I don't really enjoy painting my models to be honest. I'll panel line, and paint where the colors are obviously mismatched, but usually i don't apply paint to MG kits (please don't hunt me down with torches and pitchforks for this) unless I have to. I'm not very good at it. I'm also HIGHLY critical of myself in this area. On top of all of this, I am sort of trying to talk myself out of the purchase as i have not even started watching Unicorn yet. The last MG i bought from a series I hadn't watched was the MG FAZZ. I got halfway through that kit, then it sat at the top of my closet for FOUR YEARS. I just lost interest. I did finally decide to finish it earlier this year, however i only had it out for a month before i boxed it back up. I was tired of how bulky it was and how prone to falling apart it was.

Despite all this, I do think i raise a valid point. Considering the tech put into Sinanju, it really WOULDN'T have been too difficult to add another runner or two of gold parts. I mean for god's sake, the damned thing has articulated fingers (yes, i also realize that i shouldn't bitch about the gold parts BECAUSE the kit has articulated fingers.)

News Credits: 2 · Wed May 18, 2011 11:15 pm

Considering how much the design of gunpla generally provides a less intensive process to assemble a model, I do think it's valid to question why Bandai didn't provide gold parts for the MG Sinanju.

My answer to why Bandai decided not to provide gold plated parts is that it's simply not practical. The trim areas are small and mostly curved to a fair degree. To mold runners of such parts would be a hassle and their durability would be questionable. The only model kits I've worked on that have such small parts are Kotobukiya's Armored Core and Super Robot Wars model kits and let me tell you, they're very fragile.

Now imagine having such small parts gold plated. Even with the best sprue placement to minimize the visibility of nub marks when the parts are removed from the runner, it's likely that you'd have at least a few spots where the plating would be marred by the removal process and plain plastic would show through.

Due to the raised nature of the areas of the trim on the MG Sinanju, you could paint them with relative ease using a gold Gundam Marker if you want a fairly easy method for painting them.

Thu May 19, 2011 12:45 am

layer the pieces. bottom layer is one solid gold piece, with holes in it for attaching a black layer. they use this technique sometimes when they want to create a multicolored outline effect

News Credits: 2 · Thu May 19, 2011 10:02 am

The multi layering of parts is actually more beneficial to the modeler who paints their kits because they can paint the parts separately and ideally have the entire assembled component ready sooner than masking and painting a single part several times to apply several colours of paint.

The multi layer method is not usually used with a base piece that is chrome plated and not usually with several small components like the Sinanju has. Usually you see this done for shields or other relatively large components of a model. The Sinanju would need a pair for the knees, a pair for the wrists, a pair for the hips, one for the abdomen, one for the upper chest, one or two for the collar, and one for the shield.

To implement multi layering just for the gold trim areas of the model would add at least one more runner for the kit with so many base chrome plated parts required and the multiple black parts to fill in the non gold areas. This would also increase the cost of the model kit, which is already 7000 yen at MSRP.

Multi layering of parts works well when applied for something like a shield, which normally appear a little thick. If you did this for the Sinanju, you'd have a bulky appearance wherever the gold trim areas are or if the parts were thin enough to layer up without making the assembled piece look accurate to the design, then you'd risk having fairly fragile parts.

Why would Bandai go to all this trouble when it's so much easier for modelers to paint the gold trim areas? Bandai's primary market is the Japanese market where their customers are comfortable with either using stickers if they don't want to paint or partially painting details themselves with products like the Gundam Marker.

Mon May 23, 2011 11:51 am

New Epyon photo. So badass I had to upload it.

News Credits: 1452 · Mon Jun 13, 2011 4:10 am

GUYS GUYS GUYS GUYS GUYS

NEW SERIES

GUNDAM AGE

Model kits;

http://hk.myblog.yahoo.com/iam-cybergun ... ?mid=75646

News Credits: 1 · Mon Jun 13, 2011 6:42 am

Looks a little bit too 'super robot' to me, but time will tell. The 'bad guy' MS look pretty nice, very organic and fresh compared to 00 designs.

Mon Jun 13, 2011 8:56 am

Ugh...

At least Unicorn has some episodes left.

The transcript from the Bandai Q&A at Shizuoka was interesting. Less MG's as they focus on kits costing around 2000 yen. MG Kshatriya prototype that required a metal frame and was deemed too costly to mass produce. PG Unicorn deemed too costly to produce. 2.0 Hyaku Shiki is comming soon.

News Credits: 2 · Mon Jun 13, 2011 1:33 pm

Hm, I'm not liking the new Suit designs, except for the new Gundam. But then I didn't care for the designs for 00 at first either, so I can't exactly write Age off because of that.