09.15.08

Mega House 1/15 Ride Armor (Yellow’s VR-41)

Posted in 1/15, Cyclone/Ride Armor, MOSPEADA/RT New Gen, Mega House at 12:47 pm by micronian

 

Observation & Critique: Finally a Proper VR-41 Toy

It looks like Mega House did the wise thing by avoiding placing this toy’s nickname all over the box.  For those of you who don’t know, the VR-41 is often labeled as a Blow Superior in many Japanese texts.  This obviously humorous name comes mostly from how the Japanese handle ‘L’s and ‘R’s.  This model’s name was supposed to be an homage of sort to English motorcycle manufacturer (defunct) Brough Superior.  That nonsense aside, Mega House did manage to put a bit of Engrish on the packaging regardless with the back of the box and it’s reference to “ARMER”.  Now that I’m through with nitpicking the trivial, you do get a Gallant weapon and a nice-looking helmetless head in this release, missiles that look like they’re preparing for launch on sprue, and all the standard fists, kickstand,display stand, instructions, and lack of decals you would expect from previous Mega House releases.

 

You may find yourself thinking that this is the first VR-41 available in mass release but you’d be wrong.  Way back in the day Gakken put out their (admittedly horrible) transformable 1/20 scale of this toy.  This toy is so much better in every respect that it’s a given that most collectors will now quickly shun the original Gakken to pick up this one instead.  Early indications show that this toy is selling quite briskly but as of the time of this post Overdrive did still have some available. 

 

There’s probably more re-molding going on for this toy than most casual fans realize.  Obviously the chest is different but so too is the entire rear end of the bike.  Yellow also has a different helmet from Ray and Stig and while Mega House treated their helmet the same as the old Imai models (no center section beneath the jaw) some art shows a sleek chin protector that logically seems like it should be there.  There still isn’t a ton of tampo-printed detail but there’s enough to suffice.  The figure that rides the bike still suffers from moderately inhuman proportions. Yellow’s helmeted head is pretty terrible looking but the normal head looks good and fits down lower on the neck to hide the wonky neck length.

 

Unfortunately I can see a couple spots that could have used some improvement in this toy’s design.  First, the gauntlets aren’t positioned correctly and would have prevented Yellow from being effectively able to use his hands for much in Armor mode.  Second, the chest pieces don’t sit low enough down on Yellow’s chest which does make for a pretty beefy look in armor mode and helps diminish the figure’s giraffe neck but it’s just not quite right.  Having opening missile compartments on the chest was awesome and there’s still a scope that can be attached when the missile doors are open.  One huge improvement I would have liked to have seen would be the ability to draw and conceal the blades without taking the gauntlets off (I guess you could cheat at this by simply not concealing them all the way and then just pulling the tips of the blades out when you want to use them like the CMs does).  I wasn’t sure where to discuss this but Mega House also revisited the wheels/tires and made them larger.  This looks great in bike mode but it causes a bit of an issue in armor mode.  The wheels are now so big they hit up against the toy’s shoulders.  This isn’t a huge issue, it’s very similar to how the handles are so close to their covers that the hands don’t fit on the handles without jostling.

 

I don’t know if it was sheer luck or if Mega House is improving their production quality but this toy is put together much better than my Ray and Stig bikes.  I had a real hard time transforming either of those toys without parts flying everywhere and, while there’s still ample opportunity for that, Yellow was much easier to keep together.  This toy is still a long ways from being super well-built and sturdy but it seems less fidgety now which makes it that much more enjoyable to own.  The new arm design is prone to a bit of looseness though although mine are both still very capable of holding poses.

 

You’ll probably have a lot of fun posing this toy, as you should.  There are still plenty of balance issues remaining and you’ll probably end up relying on the stand for most really interesting poses.  The overwhelming need for the stand is a shame but if you make a cool enough pose you’ll almost forget that stand is there.  One thing to be aware of, the helmetless head doesn’t allow for any head mobility so helmeted head only in armor mode and other poses will also be limited.

 

This toy is probably the most fun Mega House Ride Armor toy I’ve owned yet.  Sure, there’s lots of room for improvement but it does seem like Mega House is heading in the right direction.  I’ll be sure to pit this toy against CMs upcoming release once that becomes available.  In the meantime we’re only a few months away from Beagle’s launch of their 1/10 Ride Armor figure which looks to be a significant improvement over both MH and CMs so you may still want to keep saving.  George Sohn indicated that Beagle would be making all four variants to be released in the US as Masterpiece Cyclones so the best yet VR-41 may be only a year or so away.

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