Seeing double

Recently an acquaintance of mine inquired about the differences between the P-Bandai MG Banshee and MG Banshee Final Battle Ver. When my answer of  "nothing" failed to suffice I promised a picture show to validate my somber confession. If you number amongst the curious click the break and dive into a bit of deja vu!

Eye Spy the 1st

Eye Spy peers at... Master Grade Sengoku Astray.

Cheers for:

• Awesome Red Frame mod
• Cool swords
• Even cooler shield 
• Great pose-ability

Jeers for:

• Parts that fly off
• Boring default colors
• Few accessories
• Wimpy joints/joint connections

Click the jump for more the full review.

Purple Dabbed Death Dealer

Purple is among my favorite colors - yellow, orange and salmon are the others - so naturally my eye was drawn to this custom version of the granddaddy of all Gundams.

Find more eye candy at Gundam Guy and Sabotenkun's blog. 

A box cometh!

I got a package today, rather a box and this box was chocked full of mobile suits and dirt.

First up are two HG kits, the Hi-Mock (which will probably be built by one of my sons) and the Space Jahannam (which will probably be on standby indefinitely).

Next up are two 1/100 scale kits, the RE/100 Gundam Mk-III, which I'm eager to build and the MG Hi-Zack.

Following those two are the rarest of all parcels, sealed Gunpla! Might be hard to see but hiding beneath that shrink wrapping are MG Exia and Deathsythe, the latter absolutely has to be painted.

Finally, a kit I feel I've been waiting an eternity for has finally arrived... The MG Sinaju Stein ver. Ka.

And that concludes the very first installment of "A Box Cometh!" Got your own box full of Gunpla joy you like to share? Well shoot us an email and we'll give your box it's moment in the sun!

Till next time. 

MG MSZ-006 Zeta Gundam

I'm sooo conflicted I feel like i shouldn't like this all black MG Zeta Gundam but I simply love what modeler Toya has done here.

Nifty Diorama Tutorial For Beginners

Found this nifty little tutorial on Gundam Info for creating your first diorama. Don't know that I'll be trying this anytime soon with all that I have going on at present, but I'd love to hear from anyone who does.

You can check out the shebang here.

Uhh...

I don't usually comment on Gunpla box art, I typically admire the more beautiful boxes and grant the others a fleeting glance. This box art for the forthcoming MG Exia Dark Matter is uninspiring to be kind. Rather than the focus being mobile suit, my eyes are constantly drawn to the floating rocks which seem to be CG rather than illustrations and much worse for the choice. When my eyes do stray they are drawn to the ice sword which looks like it's misting and nothing like it's emanating deadly frost. Where are the ice particles to convey it's purpose? Another problem I have is with the pink text on the box, yuck. I have not seen many cases where the HG box art was superior to the MG box art but this is one of those cases.

It's a slight win but a win all the same.

If I'm going to be honest this mobile suit design never really spoke to me, not even in the anime. I liked the concept of the Amazing Exia, as that suit seemed perfect for the concept of build fighters. When Dark Matter appeared if felt like Bandai/Sunrise were mailing it in on the design. With all that said I do intend to grab this kit eventually but there is no chance it maintains it's original colors. What do you guys think of the box art, leave your feedback in the comments below. You can also see further images here and here.

Zero System Online

Atmospheric re-entry like birth is hard work that leaves a genuine impression on all involved, this Wing Gundam Proto Zero EW captures that impression (re-entry not birth, silly reader) perfectly.

The scorch marks and general wear and tear details transform Paul Velando's gunpla from a just a simple model kit into something more, something unarguably awe-inspiring.

MG FA-78-1 Full Armor Gundam - Custom

Ah the Full-Armor Gundam, perhaps no Gunpla benefits more greatly from a bit of love (paint) and care (sanding) than this kit. Every single time I've ever seen this kit fresh out the box I immediately wonder, "Why do I want this thing?!" Then I see it painted and suddenly words are replaced with Oohs and Ahhs,

The color scheme on this kit is very underrated, it applies universally to every Gundam out there - don't believe me check out the video below. You can see more images of this kit modeled by courogi83 here and here (translation required).