Observations & Critique: Make your 171 toys look angry
These Tamashii exclusive armored parts come in the standard brown shipping box with a two-tone interior box (36 x 23 x 3.5 cm). Inside the box you get the following:
1) Armored Parts
2) Replacement wings with hard points
3) 2x set of 3 short-range missiles
4) 2x Individual larger long range missile for wing
5) 2x other weapons for wing (gun pod?)
6) Instructions
The glaring flaw of the VF-171 toy is the removable wings. Pegs pop out, get lost or break, diminishing the enjoyment of the toy. The hardpoints on the wings included with the armor releases are relatively sleek; it’s hard to imagine that anyone would be offended by them and insist on having the set without hardpoints. Bandai just HAD to include the vehicle-colored hardpoint wings with the add-on packs so they would be specific to each release. Shame on you Bandai. It probably hurt sales of both the 171 and the armor parts accessory.
The Nightmare Plus armor accessory also comes in the Tamashii exclusive brown shipper with a two-tone retail box within. While the dimensions of the box are unchanged, Bandai found a way to squeeze a second tray with more goodness in there. The extra 700 yen in price nets you everything from the original Alto release as well as:
7) 2x Reaction missiles
8) 2x MDE Missiles
In theory, the missiles included with the Nightmare Plus armor fit any toy with corresponding hard points. That means they’ll work on any VF-171 toy (assuming you have the hardpoint wings), the YF-30, the VF-31 and 31AX, and you can even pinch them on DX VF-1 toys though it barely works and probably isn’t good for the missile. The DX VF-1 has rotating wings so it has circular hard points so the connection was tenuous. This also means you can sometimes use VF-1 araments on these same toys but my results were mixed at best.
Armor parts could also be acquired by purchasing the Armored VF-171EX Maruyama Custom gift-set. This toy includes all the standard elements of a VF-171EX toy:
1) 2x Fist covers for fighter mode
2) 6x fixed-posed fists
3) Optional ABS replacement antennas/guns (less bendy then the installed PVC ones)
4) Gun with swing out latch and handle
5) Pilot figure (same figure that was included with renewal VF-25F for Alto)
The plastic tray includes:
6) Display stand (consisting of base and arm)
7) 3 x display stand adapters (fighter, GERWALK, Battroid)
and a separate baggy contains:
8) Instructions
As well as all the items that came with the Alto Armored Parts.
The armored parts were also included in Bandai’s “Revival” version Armored VF-171EX Alto custom. There are three trays included which house all the same goods that were included with Maruyama with one huge exception… there is no second set of wings! The toy comes with hardpoint wings installed and the wings without hardpoints have been unceremoniously discarded. It’s not often that removing an accessory is a huge plus but it is here.
Bandai announced the Tamashii exclusive armored parts for Alto’s EX toy in June 2012 (see promotional pictures and announcement above) and shipped them on December 25th, 2012 for 5,040 Yen. Like other Tamashii exclusive products, the parts quickly became scarce and demanded a premium on the secondary market. The 171 was never as popular as other Frontier toys so the premium for out of print toys and accessories was never as unreasonable as it was for some other products (at one point, the super parts for Alto’s YF-29 were more expensive in the secondary market than the YF-29 toy). The armored parts for the Nightmare Plus toy were announced in April 2013 and released in September 2013. The Nightmare Plus armor includes massive bombs that were not available through any other accessory which keeps them in demand. Bandai later issued a Tamashii limited Maruyama gift-set, which appears to have been produced in smaller quantities making it an intriguing collector’s item. Finally, Bandai revisited Frontier in 2024 with a regular retail gift-set release of Alto’s 171EX and his armored parts. This release has a matte finish and permanently attached wings with hardpoints and is a great place to start if you missed the first wave of Frontier toys.
Bandai’s hot streak for getting extremely close to the line art continues with this offering. The toy looks good in every mode. There’s nice attention to detail in the varying shades of blue/black used and some molded on detail that’s easy to miss given the drab colors. Flip the parts over and there’s detail on the side that you’ll only see when installing the parts. It’s a gratuitous but expected at this price point. There’s no internal mechanical detail to expose here and the detail work on the landing gear is as little as the landing gear itself. So, the set looks good but lacks the truly premium touches we’ve seen in some other toys and accessories.
Though the Nightmare Plus accessory includes two monstrously large additional armaments, the armor parts themselves are identical to the previous Alto release. Other than the regretable detachable wings, there are no paint details that differentiate the armor from Alto’s. Unfortunately, the Nightmare Plus DX toys (not this accessory) suffered from a bad batch of plastic so my ability to photograph the crumbling toy was limited.
Maruyama’s wings have a gray stripe instead of the red stripe included with Alto. Otherwise, the armored parts are unchanged from either the Alto or Nightmare Plus releases.
The matte finish on the revival armored parts is so subtle I had to hold the toys under bright lights and rotate them to notice any change at all. The more obvious change is a slightly lighter hue to the non-black parts. On the original releases, these parts are rendered in a navy blue but the revival parts have these as more of a dark blue-gray. There are also very minor paint details added to some of the armored parts. All of these changes are subtle and didn’t make the revival parts materially better in my estimation.
Starting with the negative, the device on the left arm is supposed to house four reaction missiles. It would have been a nice touch if the doors on the device opened up revealing some big missiles. Similarly, the chest has two missile compartments that can’t be opened to reveal micro-missiles. The lack of both these functions greatly reduces the fun you could have posing this toy.
A critical component of judging accessories is how well they stay attached to the toy. The 171EX Armored Parts perform very well with the thigh armor being a notable exception. The thigh armors clip well enough into place in battroid mode but pop off easily during moderate handling. It didn’t help that the hips are my go-to spot for picking the toy up. In GERWALK mode, things were even worse as the hips now moved up against the GERWALK joint in such a way as to increase the probability the hip armors would pop off. he hardpoints under the wing do an exceptional job. Even during rather rough handling and transformation, the wing weapons stayed securely in place.Â
The armored parts will fit on any VF-171 DX toy. You’ll need the color-matched wings with hardpoints for the early releases to use the wing-mounted weapons but all of the other parts can mount to any toy, even Luca’s RVF-171EX.
It was nice to have a battroid toy that could have missiles on the wings. This won’t be the case if you’re using the MDE or Reaction missiles included with the Nightmare Plus toy. Those weapons are too long, they bump into each other with the wing closed and run into the vehicle’s legs. The MDE bomb/missile also has spikes that come off it far enough where the spikes may be on the ground with the landing gears deployed depending on how tight the wings are on your toy. If yours are dragging, first try pressing the wing pegs in. If that doesn’t resolve the issue, it’s easy to ignore since the bombs aren’t tall enough to prop the toy up.
The landing gear housed inside the lower leg armor (near the ankles) are tiny but feature well concealed doors. The rear wheel has a twist mechanism that works adequately to reduce its profile when not in use.
While the display stand included with the VF-171 is basic, I was pleased that the armor parts don’t impact the display stand connections of the VF-171, so there’s no need for separate adapters.
There’s only one durability issue I’ve determined from handling these toys that you should be cautious with. For my Nightmare Plus toy, when removing the factory installed wings one of the small pegs the wing uses to pivot had the head shear off of it leaving it useless. This is more an issue with the underlying toy than the armored parts themselves. Many 171 owners have broken these pegs from the action of opening and closing their wings so they are something you should be very cautious with. On my 171EX toy these pegs pop out when under pressure which would theoretically stop them from ever being broken (but make them prone to being lost). On my Alto 171EX toy, the new wings stayed in place better than my original wings although I’ve seen other people complain of the opposite being true so you should know that you’re trusting your luck.
As these toys are handled more frequently, the shoulder and elbow joints may get loose and their metal construction can make them tough to tighten back up. If you’re having a tough time pointing the heavy arm gun in the direction you want, you may be able to wedge the shoulder housing against the wings to limit motion. All standard VF-171 durability warnings still apply here, especially the one about not touching the teal Nightmare plus because it was made with faulty plastic. The pegs for swapping the wings problematic. The smaller pegs might fall off and get lost or have their tops sheered off when opening and closing the wings. The flaps that come down to the chest can also be popped free and lost while handling the toy. Also, be careful as you add/remove parts as the paint is delicate and can be scraped off easily by an errant movement that gets a sharp edge close to a painted detail.
If you own a 171 toy, and you like the look of the toy with armor on, then you should grab this accessory as soon as you can. It looks imposing and I LOVE the 171 in battroid mode decked out with this armor. It just looks like it’s waiting to pin-point barrier punch a bug in its teeth. Don’t expect this accessory to do anything more than look cool though; you won’t get pivoting boosters or hidden missile bays like we’ve seen on other recent Bandai DX accessories. It’s such a shame we don’t get the opening missile bays; those extra poses would have put this accessory over-the-top! The wing armaments included here also fit the YF-30 hardpoints which may impact demand.
Original Post: March 19, 2013
Updated September 16, 2014, included information pertaining to the Nightmare Plus armored parts.