rico soul: Before people get too excited on this, the announcement was only for the Progenitor Effect Overlord manga debut on this Overlord suit. There is still no timeline or schedule for making this into an actual figure yet.

Still, I'm definitely onboard the hype train since this design tics so many boxes for me. I love heavily armored mobile suits with big ballistic weaponry and this design combines elements from two of my favorite wing gundams, the heavyarms custom and the armadillo unit sandrock.

Love the giant shoulder shields, love the almost front missions or armored core style shoulder missile pods, and of course love the dual gatlings. I will be keeping an eye out to see if Moshow has any product updates. For now, we already know the next two Progenitor Effect figures to be the Wei GouGong and the God's Whip. So it may be a while before we see this one get made.

I'll attach some images from the manga for this. I don't know if there's any translation anywhere.

rico soul: This is the next model kit designed by NoneZero Studios in collaboration with Hemoxian.

A bit of history here, NoneZero's first kit was the Knight of Dark Sky which while was designed well and showed promise, it had a lot of molding and fitting issues likely due to inexperience on their part.

Their second model kit was the Thor in collaboration with Hemoxian. That is arguably one of the best kits of 2023 and was both fantastically designed and under Hemoxian, the build quality improved drastically.

This is their next project, the Tastier kit, which was announced originally with the mecha dog and the storage base all sold separately. Well as expected, they are offering a package with everything bundled together, priced at a very competitive 188RMB.

The surprise here is that it's revealed to be a 1/10 scale figure rather than a 1/100 scale like the Thor, meaning that this original design is more of a cyborg/humanoid than a mecha. Doesn't really matter cause it's still looks awesome but it does make the more humanoid proportions make sense. Pretty excited for this one. If it can live up to the quality set by the previous Thor kit, this may be a contender for one of the best kits of 2024.

Lets just hope the Gundamit international price doesn't get inflated due to the previous success of the Thor (like the Thor kit has)

rico soul: Strange Work is the same brand as Nillson, which made a bunch of 1/60 scale Astray gundams. They also made the 1/60 scale Frosty Cat model kit which was essentially a Byakko Ryujinmaru.

This 1/60 scale model kit is called Monument, but obviously it's the Tallgeese from Gundam Wing.

Height: 30cm
Materials: ABS
Includes display base

If you look at the design, it definitely resembles they previous Frosty Cat kit aesthetically. However, the frame is fully redesigned from the ground up, with a focus on joint strength and articulation. They specifically wanted to design the kit for stability and so the backpack and shoulder equipment are redesigned to be better balanced. In other words, they made them slightly smaller so the kit would be less top and back heavy.

Aesthetically, I kind of prefer the original Bandai MG/RG Tallgeese designs with the big mechanical Dober Gun and the giant thrusters, but this still definitely has some of that goose charm, even if it does feel a bit too streamlined.

The physical photos are from an initial test print and are only for reference. The colors are not fully finalized yet. The TV Tallgeese colors looks good to me so far.

Currently, preorder price for this is in China 385 RMB without shipping, 435 RMB shipping included in China.
That should put it around 100 USD here, maybe 120 if the box is large. To give you an idea, it's pretty much the same price as the IN ERA+ Aurora but 1:60 scale with no metal frame.

More official news should come after Chinse new years but currently, people are estimating it to be available around May 2025

rico soul: This is kind of the kit that started it all for the current boom in Chinese metal frame not-gundam model kits. This reprint brings this legendary kit back while increasing value with painted gold runners and an extra metal polearm handle, while keeping the msrp price the same. Actually for us internationally, this price is actually better because it's not as affected by the market craze of the original release.

The one thing to note though is that the action base connector appears to still be the same plastic. So for anyone who buys this kit, realize the action base will likely snap because the built kit is fairly heavy and the action base connection is just too thin and brittle.

There are some loose parts that can be resolved with glue. The painted runners means those parts can be a bit tighter fitting than originally designed. As for being top heavy, that's kind of a given with the massive backpack, but with the weight of the metal frame, it is possible to stand on his own but it takes some balancing.

Other than that, the kit itself is excellent with excellent molding and design.

rico soul: The main topic of discussion since the BaiQi reveal has been a bit of disappointment in how they removed the dragon transformation of the old metal build. I'll attach the photos of the metal build here so you can compare.

With these model kit adaptations, MotorNuclear has been updating but still mostly keeping the key elements from the previous metal build like AoBing with the dragon and CaoRen with the phoenix transformation.

With this BaiQi, they removed the twin swords and the dragon transformation and instead replaced it with the strike freedom style dragoons on the wings. On the one hand, I like the change for making the suit more unique but I think everyone is a bit burned out by dragoons and funnels at this point with almost every third party kit doing them. Also, the lack of the dragon transformation makes the claws on the arms and legs just kind of unnecessary decoration.

There is actually some updates to the inner frame as well for some more connected armor sliding movements

rico soul: This is a pretty classic Supernova move. They're releasing this soul blue version recolor of the Hunt and Kill kit as a color change reprint. There will be three new runners added that will be duplicate runners in different colors to achieve the correct new color scheme. That also means there's going to be a bit of color customization built into the kit. From the looks of it, I'd say it seems like the main armor dark teal runners of the original will come in both white and purple for the reprint so you can have a more purple color scheme if you choose to build it that way.

I'll post some side by sides of the new color and the original release promo photos. Personally, I like this alternate color a lot more. I passed on the original release but will probably pick up this reprint. Really like the blue effect parts over the original purple.

Just remember the plastic is ABS on this so you'd have to be careful when panel lining with Tamiya or flow type markers

rico soul: We finally have the long awaited official information update on this beast in the form of a 26 minute video:
video.weibo.com/show?fid=1034:5007129258688539

repost from someone on youtube: youtu.be/1O6OKvYTPoY

The video is in Chinese of course but really goes into detail on the design and assembly of the model.
I'll just put some of the main specs here.

msrp: 399 RMB
preorder bonus: metal parts
box weight: 4.7kg
box size: 41cm x 24cm x 63cm
total parts count: 1108

total model height: 34cm
model weight (without bonus metal parts): 717g
model wing span: 50cm
instruction manual: 150 pages

materials: POM, ABS/PS
includes photo etch detail parts

Note, the bonus metal parts are very minimal and are likely more for detail and specifical durability parts than for a metal frame. The video spends a fair amount of time marketing how they tried to balance POM and ABS/PS usage in the design of this kit

Overall, this is definitely marketed as an Advanced model build, but YJL is also taking steps to make the build process more accessible to everyone. The manual appears to be laid out well and they are going to be releasing tutorial videos as well.

The msrp is comparable to IN ERA+ Aurora or Ruling which is pretty appropriate considering the design and style of the Sky Defender and the lack of a metal inner frame. Now the question comes for international prices. That box is PG size so the shipping upcharge is going to be substantial. Personally, I'm looking for a fair price of around $120 on this but I wouldn't be surprised if it'll get pushed much higher since there is a lot of anticipation behind this one.

I'll put some screenshots from the video here but there's way too much to see so you have to watch the video

rico soul: I don't know why gundamit put up this weird desaturated photo. I'll post a picture of the kit I grabbed from weibo.

This is just a 1:1 bootleg of the Bandai MGEX strike freedom. The molding quality of this bootleg appears to be much much better than anything from Daban and is pretty close to Bandai's detail sharpness. However, the build is still very much a bootleg feel with inconsistent fits and parts being either too tight or too loose.

by the way, just to be clear, this is NOT made by Daban, unlike what some random rumors claim.

Interestingly enough, reliable Chinese influencers have stated that another bootleg company (again not daban) is also working on a copy of the MGEX strike freedom. So some people are saying to wait and see how that one turns out.

Personally, with direct copies of model kits, I would generally just buy the Bandai original if it's available since the build experience will be vastly superior. In this case though, the Bandai kit is almost 2x the price of this bootleg and aesthetically, this copy is as good as the original, so I guess that's still a decent chunk of money to consider for people.

rico soul: New updated pictures from Starfield Toys as of 03/23. It's a 3D printed prototype for display purposes. The final product will of course not have the surface print imperfections and this is mostly for demonstration.

- Height: 22cm
- Complete inner frame
- Frame is reinforced with alloy parts where needed (with POM parts where needed)
- Gold parts will be pre-painted runners
- Fully color separated by part separation

Additional information including weapons and accessories details to be released later.


I have to say, I still really like this. It's like a fancier Hazel or MK-II. Loving what I'm seeing so far. Even though it's not from a known manufacturer, this design is looking very promising. It feels like just the right amount of surface detail without going overboard.

It's nice to see a third party kit from China that feels more traditional UC rather than SEED. Those front skirts even look like they may have some sub arms. Getting more excited now that we see this actually get some progress and updates.

rico soul: Man I don't know what's going on with the image compression on Gundamit here but that low res on an already dark image just makes it harder to make out whats going on here.

I'll attach a higher res image.

This was only announced a couple days ago so not much more info yet.

This is apparently the grey model prototype, not a CG render. I believe Jiang Wei is the girl, and the horse is named Ying Zhao, and they can be combined into the centaur form. Seems pretty similar in both concept and execution as the Nuke Matrix Yefuna Malkina, but you get an actual horse instead of a transforming motorcycle. These two companies are really both stepping up the mech girl model kit game.