09.30.07

Yamato 1/48 Grenade Box Protection (GBP City Urban Camo)

Posted in 1/48, Macross/Robotech TMS, VF-1, VT, VE Valkyrie, Yamato at 9:21 pm by micronian

Observations & Gallery: Was there an urban area on the ARMDs?

One of the strengths of this Urban GBP is that, like the anime version GBP, it is intended for Valks with white hands so it isn’t nearly as pigeon-holed aesthetically as ‘Wood Land color’ GBP. All canon valks have white hands meaning that this GBP will go great with all canon valks. The LV1 has light gray hands but it’s close enough and I didn’t find it very distracting. Yes, the LV1 goes very well with this Urban GBP but c’mon, who wants to hide the weathered LV1 underneath all this armor?

The grenades were much tighter on my Urban GBP than they were on the ‘Wood Land color’ version which I was mighty grateful for. I could pose valks tossing grenades or move my valks around with the GBP on and not have to anticipate the sound of a grenade, or part of a grenade, plopping off. As with previous releases, this valk comes with the alternate cod piece that will appeal more to some than others.

I only have a couple slight criticisms. On a universal GBP note, the neck collar used to help support the backpack doesn’t always seem to fit just right. Anything having to do with the backpack is kind of scary too (the backpack hinge on 1/48 VF-1 toys is a known weak link). The second criticism is specific to this version of the GBP. The original custom that inspired this toy looked like this picture below (taken from Japan’s Dengeki Hobby Magazine):

The final version, with decals applied, looks like this picture below (taken from this http://ga.sbcr.jp/g-toys/miyazawa/09/index.html website):

Note the conflicting origin points now caused by the decal change. I don’t apply decals, it doesn’t really bother me, but the GBP no longer knows whether or not it came from the Prometheus (more logical as it could be deployed from the carrier into cities) or from an ARMD (uh, cities in space? Maybe for the Moon and Mars bases?).

I really enjoyed this version of the GBP. It’s got some color and a bit of life to it and I think it’s a definite improvement over Yamato’s second effort. The green hints weren’t nearly as gaudy as I expected them to be and the silver on the boosters was a really clean touch. Overall, I highly recommend this piece to any one who is not a stickler for canonicity.