Super Robot Taisen OG Saga: Endless Frontier is a unique sci-fi/fantasy RPG that takes players across a variety of worlds, ranging from an apocalyptic wasteland covered with the hulks of downed spaceships to a fantastical place of fairy tales and dark magic. Join Haken Browning: gunslinger, professional bounty hunter, and amateur ladies’ man, along with his motley crew of robots, were-beasts, secret agents, and busty princesses as they delve deep into the mysteries of how their worlds came to be and face a threat that imperils the multiverse. Available April 2009. For more information, visit: www.atlus.com
Thanks to the recent opening of Gundam statute in Shizuoka, thousands of hobbyists fans were gathered in heart of the city to experience the great galore of plastic model kits and toys. Said to be (unofficial) new home of world’s largest hobby confab in Japan. The unveiling of the statute along with its giant production plant that makes these plastic toys gave the staff of Shizuoka Hobby Museum to praise about. So says this source.
The Shizuoka Hobby Museum was set up as part of the hobby fair to showcase the half-century history of plastic model kit production in Japan.
Its exhibits are presented in 23 segments, covering various production periods. Each one shows the plastic models that best represent the period.
Among the rarer items are a replica of a 1958 model of the U.S. submarine Nautilus, the first injection-molded plastic kit produced in Japan, and a model of the I-series submarine, used by the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II.
The exhibit showcases a number of other items coveted by plastic model enthusiasts, such as the Tetsujin 28-go robot, considered a trailblazer for the numerous character models that followed, and a 1:12 scale Honda Formula One racing car, which was highly praised for its detailed perfection.
Other booths are dedicated to proud originals offered by local manufacturers.
Tamiya Inc., headquartered in Shizuoka, has put on display the Gun Blaster, which is 32 times larger than its popular Mini4WD radio-controlled car kits.
Aoshima Bunka Kyozai Co., also based in Shizuoka, is featuring its Lamborghini Countach model. The Italian sports car once fueled a wave of supercar popularity.
Hasegawa Corp., based in Yaizu, Shizuoka Prefecture, brought out the big guns with its 1:350 scale model of the Japanese battleship Nagato.
Other exhibits include the Honda Super Cub and the Subaru 360, produced by die-cast model car maker MMP Co. (EBBRO), headquartered in Shizuoka, and a replica of the five-story pagoda of the Horyuji temple produced by Woody JOE Co., a wood model maker based in Shizuoka.
Here again, the most eye-catching attractions are related to Gundam.
Using a model of a Core Fighter plane, Bandai Co., the maker of Gunpla plastic models, has reproduced the scene in the final episode of the popular “Mobile Suit Gundam” anime series where Amuro Ray, the central character, makes his escape from the falling space fortress A Baoa Qu.
The Core Fighter, as well as the giant Gundam statue that stands guard in front of Higashi-Shizuoka Station, has become a must-see for Gundam fans.
The statue, which now holds a “beam saber” in its right hand, is the full 18 meters in height as written in the series. It was built to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Bandai’s Gunpla plastic model series.
Over six weeks last summer, the behemoth attracted 4.15 million visitors to its display in Tokyo’s Odaiba district, and it wasn’t even holding the beam saber.
Moving the statue to Shizuoka, where Bandai’s factory for the Gunpla series is located, was considered a “homecoming” for Gundam.
The Shizuaka hobby fair will run till March next year. Admission is free, but not for the museum. It’s 600 yen for junior high school student and 200 for elementary school student.
All images are owned and copyrighted by the individual.
With the recent opening of the Gundam statue in Shizuoka, back in July, I’m catching up on this to see how things went with this display.
Looking at the amazing video footage of its opening over the summer, it appears everything looks so awe-inspiring and enriching to watch.
You can see several people in the streets come and go, taking long and short glimpses of the statue, leaving them in complete awe. Boy I would do anything to have this experience to see how 1/1 scale Gundam figure really stands out in large crowd of several thousands. That would certainly make my mecha fun day! ^^
Source: CNNGO, All images are owned and copyrighted by the original owner
Though it would interesting to watch this interesting footage of mechanical robots made by some wackiest, and cleverest robot scientists that were made in mankind history!
Since we now have plenty of World Wrestling Federation matches like WWF, how bout we have robot wrestling instead like this?
Have a look at this 5-minute clip video.
Note that as you watch this, you’ll notice some familiar character faces of these robot wrestlers.. One from the our early childhood days of great robot anime shows. A 4-foot tall red mechanical bot that has 2 red triangular horns pointing outwards. And if you’re from my generation, you won’t find it hard to recognize that it’s none other than Getter 1 from the Getter Robo TV series!
It’s been a few months since the new Mazinkaizer SKL OVA series was announced. And many Mazinger or old school mecha fans were surely eager to hear more of this.
And sure enough, we do. :)
Here’s its Youtube promo video of the series, by Nagai’s Dynamic Planning.
Certainly looks pretty solid from its initial impressions.
Here’s further info from the posted promo link of ComicsBlog.
In the near future on an island in the eastern sea gather all those who want to fight at all costs. Suddenly appears a dark giant, armed with sword and pistols, which stands out among all. Some people called and who called Majin Kaiser …
‘S online on the official website of the spectacular trailer for the second series Mazinkaiser SKL, and thanks to friends of the fortress Mikeros we give a brief account of the conference held at Anime Fes. “Vs” by Go Nagai and some leaders of the staff on the new production.
The event was organized by Bandai Visual, the father of Grendizer showed his original concept of Mazinkaiser SKL and explained how the idea for the new OVA was born during gestation and the airing of the recent Shin Mazinger shougeki! Z-hen with the intention of creating the most violent Mazinger ever. The project was inspired by the anime series Super Robot Wars video game, using the actors completely unprecedented: that of the new Mazinkaiser is an alternative history with no connection to the original saga Mazin, Nagai states but, as already seen in previous trailers, character traits or end up inspired by other series of the author, among them, apparently, Cutie Honey Flash.
Actas produced by the OVA series to come out next winter (almost simultaneously with the action figure Bandai) is organized by Tadashi Hayakawa (Kotetsushin Jeeg), directed by Jun Kawagoe (New Getter Robot – The Last Day eps 4 and 5, New Getter Robo, Kotetsushin Jeeg), featuring Takeshi Ito (EX-Driver the Movie, Cybuster, Kaze no Yojimbo) with the mechanical design of joint Hiroshi Ogawa (Great Dangaio) and Munetaka Abe (animator in Kotetsushin Jeeg, Transformers: Armada, Mobile Suit Gundam 00). Lantis (Noein, Mazinkaiser, Mazinger Shin shougeki! Z-hen) then produces the music.
Besides anime within the multimedia project Nagai’s Dynamic Planning and also the serialization of the manga Mazinkaiser SKL Versus Mobile, already in progress on the official website of the magazine Comic Shu 2 Gekkin of Emotion (a subsidiary of Bandai Visual), and a novel, even already this year, the magazine Dengeki Hobby ASCII Media Works.
A rare super robot anime in Japan. Little info was known about the series.
This is all the info I could gather online via Wikipedia.org and MyAnimelist.net.
Trider G7, known in Japan as Invincible Robotrider G7 (無敵 ロボトライダー G7 Muteki Robotoraidā G7?), was a Japanese anime television series which aired from 1980 to 1981. There were 50 episodes. It is also referred to as “Trider G7″, “Unchallengeable Trider G7″ and “Tryder G7″, “Bird Attack Tryder G7″, “Unrivaled Robot Trider G7″.
Story
The story is about a 12-year-old young boy named Watta Takeo who was forced to leave school to run his father’s inherited space transport company. Professor Navarone would build a giant robot called Trider G7 to help the company combat space pirates and the rivals. Lord Zakuron would run the evil organization and attempt to run the company and eventually the Earth.
Concept
In the show, Trider G7 is a super robot capable of forming into a phoenix like flame which cuts enemies in half. Though the robot is capable of rearranging to 4 different vehicles “T-hawk plane”, “T-Eagle plane”, “T-cosmic plane” and “T-Beagle” ground assault unit.
Does anybody out there in the anime community know anything about this anime? Have you watched? Do you like it? What was it like? Let me know. Simply click on “Contact Us” page and leave your comments there. We look forward to hearing from you!
A first glance, you’d think he’s just an ordinary bloke who earns a normal income just like very ordinary Japanese salarymen you see in the streets of Japan’s metropolitan cities like Tokyo.
However beneath that his youthful exterior, this man leads a life with an extraordinary life activity no one would imagine he would dare to undertake.
A man whose life’s passion is collecting walls of toys in his wardrobe.
Yes. That’s right! This man is a toy collector fanatic for over 35 years!!!
Simply amazing! Here’s the small clip of the CNN interview with the greatest toy collector of his generation, Kazunori Saito.
CNNGo: This is pretty impressive. Can you give us a brief overview of what’s on display here? Kazunori Saito: In a nutshell, it’s a collection of merchandise from live-action and animated television shows that aired in Japan during the 1960s and 1970s. They’re toys of monsters and heroes that are familiar to any Japanese in their 30s and 40s.
CNNGo: When did you start collecting all this stuff? Saito: About two years after I graduated from school and started working. 25 years back.
CNNGo: So these aren’t the toys you played with as a kid.
Saito: No! I started as an adult. I loved the shows as a kid. Like a lot of kids raised in the “golden age” I was mesmerized by them. But I wasn’t really into the toys back then, more into building model kits. Years later, as an adult, I read an article about vintage toys in a magazine. That really piqued my interest. So I went to a specialty store in Shimokitazawa that sold them… And now here we are today. (Laughs)
CNNGo: What’s the charm? What do you think gives these toys their power?
Saito: Well, they come from a powerful era. The immediate postwar period was tough, and these toys represent Japan making it through that. It was an era of rapid growth, not only economically but for popular culture such as children’s shows as well. The expressiveness and technology of anime and live-action shows was growing in leaps and bounds. The toys were born of that. I think they’re powerful because they came from a powerful time.
CNNGo: What’s your single favorite piece on display?
「サイクロン号」 Saito: That would be this little motorcycle toy, the “Cyclone.” It’s the bike Kamen Rider rode in the very first series. This was the first toy I bought when I started collecting. I paid four or five thousand yen for it and decided, “I’m just going to buy all the different bikes and then I’ll be done.” But…
CNNGo: Looks like things didn’t exactly play out that way. How many toys are on display here altogether? Saito: About 2,000 of them. This is about 99 percent of my collection of Showa era (pre-1989) toys. But I have another collection of Heisei (post-1989) toys at my house.
CNNGo: What exactly is it that you do? Are you involved in the toy industry or the anime industry? Saito: No, nothing like that! I’m the senior executive director of an advertising agency. I plan commercial campaigns, make commercials, things like that. Collecting toys is an escape from all of that for me. A sort of extreme one. (Laughs)
CNNGo: So you have 2,000 toys here. Are you done? Is this it, finished, complete? Saito: No. Not yet. The problem is, the things I need to complete it are incredibly difficult to find. The rarest of the rare.
CNNGo: Even as a commercial director, it’s incredible to imagine how you afforded all of this… Saito: Even I can’t afford this stuff anymore! I purchased the vast majority back in the late 1980s and early 1990s when it was cheaper, much more so than today. I was lucky to get the bug so early on. I couldn’t have done it if I’d started today.
CNNGo: So where do you keep all of this stuff when it isn’t in a museum? Saito: In my house. I display what I can, but my house is small and a lot of it has to be stored away.
CNNGo: This is kind of a personal question, but what does your family think about your collection?
Saito: Oh, they’re used to it. (Laughs)
CNNGo: You never take any flack for it? None at all?
Saito: No, not really. But then again, keeping the collection was the only condition I insisted upon when I got married. Actually, when she agreed to it, I knew for sure I’d found “the one.” (Laughs)
One of the early robot anime pioneers made by Yoshiyuki Tomino, the great Gundam writer maker. This is one of the more familiar robot anime title series most, if not all, of us have known for a long, long time. It would be incredibly important to place this info amongst the other mech chronology pages I have on this site.
Here’s information obtained from Wikipedia.org
Mobile Suit Gundam (機動戦士ガンダム Kidō Senshi Gandamu), lit. Mobile Soldier Gundam, also known as First Gundam, Gundam 0079 or simply Gundam 79) is a televised anime series, created by Sunrise. Created and directed by Yoshiyuki Tomino, it premiered in Japan on Nagoya Broadcasting Network between April 7, 1979, and lasted until January 26, 1980, spanning 43 episodes. It was the very first Gundam series, which has subsequently been adapted into numerous sequels and spin-offs.
The series was later re-edited for theatrical release and split into three movies in 1981. The characters were designed by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko and Kunio Okawara was responsible for the mechanical designs, including the titular giant robot, the RX-78-2 Gundam. When the first movie was released on February 22, 1981, it was regarded as the new age of Anime and an event called Declaration of new age of Anime (アニメ新世紀宣言) in Shinjuku and director Tomino delivered a speech questioning the then social concept in which stereotypical Anime was portrayed as being bad and poorly made to the gathered 15,000 youngsters.
The series was the first winner of the Animage Anime Grand Prix prize, in 1979 and the first half of 1980. By the end of 2007, each episode of the original TV series averaged a sales figure of 80,928 copies, including all of the different formats it was published in (VHS, LD, DVD, etc.).[1] The first DVD box set sold over 100,000 copies in the first month of release, from December 21, 2007 to January 21, 2008.[2]
As part of the 30th Anniversary of the Gundam series, the company officially announced a project on March 11, 2009 called Real-G, a plan to build a 1/1 real size scale Gundam in Japan. It was completed in July, 2009 and taken down later.[3] However, Bandai now plans to rebuild it near their factory.
Synopsis Set in a fictional universe in the Universal Century year 0079, the Principality of Zeon has declared independence from the Earth Federation, and subsequently launched a war of independence. The conflict has directly affected every continent on earth, also nearly every space colony and lunar settlement. Zeon, though smaller, has the tactical upper hand through their use of a new type of humanoid weapons called mobile suits. After half of all humanity perish in the conflict, the war settled into a bitter stalemate lasting over 8 months.
The story begins with a newly deployed Federation warship, the White Base, arriving at the secret research base located at the Side 7 colony to pick up the Federation’s newest weapon. However, they are closely followed by Zeon forces. A Zeon reconnaissance team member disobeys mission orders and attacks the colony, killing most of the Federation crew and civilian in the process. Out of desperation, citizen boy Amuro Ray accidentally finds the Federation’s new arsenal—the RX-78 Gundam, and neutralizes the situation. Scrambling everything they can, the White Base sets out with her newly formed crew of civilian recruits and refugees in her journey to survive, and unknowingly, change the course of the war.
Concept and development Tomino’s original concept for the series was considerably much more grim, with Amuro dying halfway through the series, and the crew of the White Base having to ally with Char (who is given a red Gundam), but finally having to battle him after he takes control of the Principality of Zeon. The original concept found expression in a series of novels written by Tomino soon after the show’s conclusion, and elements of the storyline weaved themselves into Zeta Gundam and Char’s Counterattack.
The episode “Kukurus Doan’s Island” was removed from the English-Language version of the series at the request of Yoshiyuki Tomino himself. He felt that the episode’s story was substandard. On the other hand, Doan appears (possibly also the pilot episode) in the game SD Gundam G Generation Advance and can be obtained along with his unit as a secret character. The player can also fight Doan in his Zaku II, in the video game Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation Vs. Zeon. Also, this episode was not withheld from the Japanese box set that was released in December 2006.[4]
The final episodes (encompassing the battles of Solomon and A Baoa Q) were originally planned to be more elaborate, with exotic Zeon mecha defending the fortresses. Budget cuts scrapped the episodes (and the designs) although at least two (the Dom-like Dowdage and Gelgoog-Like Galbaldy) do become resurrected for Zeta Gundam and Gundam ZZ.
Reception
Gundam was not popular when it first aired, and was in fact cancelled before the series was intended to end. The series was originally set to run for 52 episodes and was cut down to 39 by the show’s sponsors, which included the original toymakers for the series. However, the staff was able to negotiate a one month extension to end the series with 43 episodes.
When Bandai received the licensing to the show’s mecha, however, things changed completely. With the introduction of their line of Gundam models, the popularity of the show began to soar. The models sold very well, and the show began to do very well in reruns and even better in its theatrical compilation. Audiences were expecting another giant robot show, and instead found MS Gundam, the first work of anime in an entirely new genre, the mecha drama or the ‘real robot’ genre as opposed to the ’super robot’ genre.
Mobile Suit Gundam was also later aired by the anime satellite television network, Animax, across Japan, with the series continuing to be aired on the network currently, and later its respective networks worldwide, including Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and other regions.
Hoping to capitalize on the success of airing Gundam Wing the previous year, Bandai Entertainment released a heavily edited and English-dubbed version of the series premiering on Cartoon Network’s Toonami across the United States on Monday, July 23, 2001. However, the series did not do as well as Gundam Wing and Cartoon Network would pull the show after it had finished airing. Following the pattern of its initial airing in Japan, it was later cancelled before the entire series was shown. When the September 11th attacks occurred, the series was almost over (there were only six episodes left). Immediately following the attacks, Cartoon Network and many other stations, began pulling war-themed content and violent programming as well. Although Cowboy Bebop came back before too long, Mobile Suit Gundam did not. However, the series finale were shown as part of Toonami’s “New Year’s Eve-il” special on December 31, 2001. It is sometimes stated that MSG was cancelled “because” of the September 11, 2001 attacks. This was verified by a Toonami producer in a March 4, 2002 with Anime News Network.
On Saturday, June 8, 2002, the series was given another chance by Cartoon Network in their late-night Adult Swim block, but it was again pulled before completing its run because of low ratings.
On May 30, 2006, Bandai Entertainment re-released the English dub of the TV series in a 10 volume DVD set. There was no Japanese audio track included, apparently because Yoshiyuki Tomino felt that the original mono mix was in too poor of a condition to use. However, in 2007 the original series was released on DVD in Japan, which sold over 100 thousand copies within a month’s time from December 21, 2007 to January 21, 2008.[8]
In both American TV showings and on the American DVD release, episode 15 (Kukurus Doan’s Island) was cut out. Tomino remained silent as to why the episode was cut and it remains a mystery, the episode becoming a “lost episode” of sorts, never being dubbed. The episode remained on the Japanese DVD release. This episode also has an error in continuity at minute 19 when the Gundam’s weapon is suddenly changed.
