Retail release Insanity, Part2

Hello and welcome to our 52nd edition of our Let’s Talk Gunpla Segment! What would you know, we release this on the same day as the Election day! To all the Malaysians, reading this now, may all of you had a good and uneventful voting day and as well I really hope that no matter what results we’ll get tonight, we pray that we will still see a better and peaceful Malaysia ahead.

This week we shall continue talking about the rest of the upcoming retail kits that we missed last week. Though this time, we would be covering mostly HG kit releases.

However all of the HG release announcement we are getting it not just limited to one series only this time around, but we are seeing a multiple series HG release announcements.

Alas, we are glad to see a huge library of HG announcements this time and we are as well were pretty happy to know that there will be many more awesome kits that are to come and that is already making us quite excited for this year’s HG releases.

So, without further ado, let’s get into our first HG release announcements, shall we?

HG 1/144 RX-0 Unicorn Gundam 03 Phenex (Destroy Mode) (Narrative Version) (HGUC)

Release Date: 2018/06

Estimated price: JPY 2,380* (MYR RM85.89* / USD $21.77*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

With the Gundam Narrative just recently announced as a new Gundam anime based from the UC timeline, it is obvious we as well get kits announced for this line, however, we are getting something that is….really familiar for Gundam Narrative first HG release and that first release we get is the release for…

The RX-0 Gundam Unicorn 03 Phenex.

Honestly, it is good that we are finally getting the Phenex as a regular HGUC release, though we have to say that it is really strange really to see something that was released before as a P-Bandai limited release to be given a second chance as a regular retail release. Somehow rather it gives us hope that one day we might see some of the previous P-Bandai releases make it as a retail release, one can only hope for that day to come. We only hope that we’d see the Pale Rider comes to us as a Retail release one day, hopefully as an MG kit.

One can definitely really hope for that.

Anyways back to talking about the kit, at the start of this you might be thinking (from its name) that this is something similar to the Unicorn MSV Phenex or all the other Phenex variants that you may have seen before, but the truth is, yes, it is still the same looking Phenex, but with one small little change.

That this Phenex variant comes with a tail….and that’s about it, really.

From what we can see, all we can say is that it doesn’t look any different then the other HG Gundam Unicorn releases that we’ve seen so far, but we have to say that this kit does make us quite curious on what does the Tail part of the Unicorn here would be used as. As well the gold parts here doesn’t look promising, though you can rectify it by painting it up, however, after looking at this we don’t think this kit would win hearts with how it looked currently in the promotional pictures.

Oh, and it doesn’t seem like this variant of the Phenex comes with unique weapons, with this variant you’d still get the normal Beam Magnum Rifle and an additional arm mounted shield unit on top the ones mounted on the backpack of this kit.

Though we aren’t really sure of the role that’d it would play in the series, and from the trailers, we don’t think this variant of the phenex comes with any weapons. However we do have to wait for the series to be out to be able to say more, but for now, all we have to say when looking a that we aren’t really excited for this one, since this is not really something new.

Honestly though, after seeing the Gundam Narrative being teased to us, that kit looks like a more interesting kit to get than this one if we may be honest. So we’d rather wait for that one to be released instead.

HG 1/144 Gundam Jian Altron (HGBD)

Release Date: 2018/07

Estimated price: JPY 1,530* (MYR RM55.45* / USD $14.03*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

We are getting quite a lot of HGBD announcements this time around, with us already covering one of the said release announcements last week on the Gundam 00 Diver Ace. This week we are going to be talking about the two other HGBD release announcements and the first one that we will be talking about is this, the Gundam Jian Altron.

At first glance, we all have to admit that this really takes a while for us to digest, well the reason being for is that we kind of love the look of some parts of this kit, however, there is parts on this kit that we kind of…don’t like the inclusion of them as much.

So let us first talk about what we don’t particularly like about this kit, shall we? The thing is there is one thing about this that really manages to annoy the living hell out of us is when we look at its lion (or Tryon’s severed headpieces) shoulder armor. Really when we all take a long hard look at the shoulder armor, we all felt like it really kills the whole vibe for the kit, where you can see some parts of this kit looks highly detail and realistic and suddenly, here comes something cartoonish attached to this awesome looking kit. It really doesn’t make sense to all of us here.

Though to be honest we haven’t watched the anime to understand why they do what they do for this kit, however, we felt even if we knew the reasons we still don’t feel its right to combine both the realistic nature of the Altron and the cartoonish nature of the Jian together. Honestly, we don’t mind them taking cues from the past entry of the series to give them some form of homage, but unlike in the Gundam build fighters TRY where we see the Tryon3 went all out in making the Tryon3 look ridiculously cartoonish-ly awesome, this, however, doesn’t seem to be all-out committed to that effort. We have to say the look for the Gundam Jian Altron looks too……half-hearted here.

Despite that, all is not bad with this kit because like we said the rest of the kit does look pretty realistically awesome. We liked how the Jian Altron’s headpiece looked like it was taken from the SD series and made to look more realistic. Not to mention too the main body unit looks pretty rad.

As well when looking at this, all of us can’t shake this feeling that we might be getting the Gundam Altron soon as a mainline HG release. Since this does look like Bandai doesn’t need to do much to change its appearance to make it look like the Altron Gundam. As well not to mention when we are looking at how detailed some parts for the Jian Altron were, we honestly won’t be surprised if we would see this getting an HG release this year.

Even with all that said, we aren’t really that excited to get this one tbh, but we are excited for that HG Gundam Altron if it is coming this year.

HG 1/144 Galbaldy Rebake (HGBD)

Release Date: 2018/07

Estimated price: JPY 1,870* (MYR RM67.77* / USD $17.15*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

The Galbaldy Rebake is another kit that is from the Gundam Build Divers series, however, this unlike the Gundam Jian Altron is to us is a lot more an interesting kit to look at. With the Galbaldy Rebake we could honestly say that this is one of the most interesting original ideas for a custom kit we have ever seen that has come out from all of the Gundam Build series. Not to mention here, when we take a look at this we can’t help to feel like it has a lot of original parts made for it.

However all its not new here, there are a few parts that we can see taken from other existing gunpla, like the backpack, it is obvious from the design that it was taken from the GP02 and some parts of the leg and arm section of the Galbaldy rebake does look like it was taken from the upcoming Galbaldy β or since the Galbaldy β is not officially released and this two is announced at the same time, it could be that Galbaldy β is the one based from this? Who knows? You may be thinking no, it looks like this kit may take some parts from the Gusion Rebake here and there.

Yes, they did but only on the joints part and some parts here and there, maybe. But honestly, after we take a long hard look at this, we can really say that most of the parts that we can see are only using inspirations taken from the Gusion Rebake design (and most of the IBO MS design, tbh) to create something that is truly amazing here. I think by far the Galbaldy Rebake is one the most original MS design yet to have come out from the Gundam Build Diver series.

Compared this to the Gundam Jian Altron, we have to say we are mostly leaning towards the Galbaldy Rebake. Though we admit that it might not be as handsome, but hey, at least it’s the one that looked the part more than the Jian Altron.

There might be hope for the upcoming releases yet. We hope they would keep giving us awesome looking HG kits soon.

HG 1/144 RGM-79HC GM Guard Custom (Gundam The Origins MSD HG)

Release Date: 2018/07

Estimated price: JPY 1,530* (MYR RM55.45* / USD $14.03*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

This GM Guard Custom.

This probably one announcement that we never have imagined to eventually see the light of day as an HG release, why you may ask? We all thought after the release of the quite recently released MG GM Sniper Custom recently, we were expecting to see this being made as an MG first before we see it this as an HG.

Regardless we are still glad to see more GM variant to be made. We really feel that the GM’s not getting as much love from Bandai.

However, after reading through the finer detail of this announcements, we realize that this not a release for the Mainline HGUC line of release but instead the GM Guard Custom is a release made for the Gundam the Origins MSD line of release and knowing that made us more excited for this line of HG kit.

Really how wouldn’t you’d be? The Origins HG line has had a reputation of releasing some pretty awesome and fun HG kits to date. Seeing the GM Guard Custom the origins variant from the release details and promotional materials on the web, can’t help to make us feel like this is as well going to be one HG kit that is going to be making waves in the gunpla community.

Not to mention, this GM Variant is one badass looking MS.

From we have seen, this does seem to be taking some cues from the past HG Origins releases. There are parts which we can see here and there that looks taken from other previous releases but at the same time, it does seem like the kit gets a lot of new molds for its parts. The blue and white color scheme that we see here for this GM looks awesome as hell, though honestly, the really awesome bits for this kit is really when you take a look at that awesome Guard Shield unit. Though it might not look as impressive as the GP02’s shield, but we are still pretty impressed by what we see here and we are hoping to see more of it soon.

This is definitely one of the kits that we are most excited to see more of, and hopefully, we would be able to have it here in out Homebase when it reaches our shores in this coming July.

We are aware that we are as well getting the HG GM Sniper Custom too but we aren’t sure if we will be getting it this year or if we are even getting it for retail (knowing Bandai they might want to have it as a P-Bandai). However, just knowing that we will be getting more GM variants does make us pretty excited for the coming months.

We really hope that the official announcement of it would come to us soon.

With that ends our 52nd episode of our Let’s Talk Gunpla segment. Finally to be able to talk about all of the main kit releases does make us feel quite happy, really there is just so many kits that Bandai announced set for release for all of us in the coming months and we really feel that this isn’t really the tip of the iceberg yet. We are always looking forward to more awesome things that Bandai might have in store for all of us here. Anyways do let us know here of what from these announcements that you are looking forward to getting or seeing more of? As ever, we always look forward to reading and responding to your comments and thoughts of the kits and as well to this post!

We will be back with more Let’s Talk Gunpla Segment on the next coming Wednesday and we will be back as well this Sunday with a new Review on the 1/100 No grade De’nan Zon, Kimi does seem to be having some issues with the kit and with his health being quite crappy in this past few days, he does have some trouble building the kit. So we do hope that you all be patient with us as we may see some delays to the review. However, we are still hopeful that we might still see him completing the kit and giving his final thoughts on the kit. So do look forward to it!

As ever please do leave us a like if you enjoyed this article, as well do give us some feedback and comment if you think we would be able to improve further in making sure that we can give you better content in the future! As well, we want you to know that your likes and shares would be highly appreciated in supporting and helping us grow further, honestly your love and support means the world to all of us here in Kimi the Builder Blog editorial team.

We hope by sharing our love and passion for gunplas here, it’ll inspire you to pick up the hobby or reignite your love for gunpla!

Anyways, we shall see all of you again next week, and we hope that you all have an awesome week and weekend ahead! Have an awesome Gunpla building time there as well and until next time!

Ciao!