The 1/144 HG Gundam Dynames has just enough stuff to pass as a full kit, but absolutely nothing more. The missing star is in the extra stuff you’ll have to upgrade to the 1/100 kit to get.
What you do get:
-The full GN Shield, including the two smaller panels and two larger panels. All of this has swinging mounts so you can get any pose you’ve seen in the series out of the Shield. You can also easily pull off or attach the Shield in any combination, to recreate any moment from the show.
-The GN Sniper Rifle. The gun comes with detachable stabilizing legs that are pre-posed as either folded up for storage or folded out for action. In a bizarre twist, the folded out stabilizers are molded in a different plastic than the rest of the gun, requiring paint.
-Good poseability. My kit is currently posed crouching and firing the GN Sniper, and it stands by itself. The kit can obtain most of the better poses from the show. For a 1/144 kit, this suit’s poseability is above average. Or it would be, if not for all the missing equipment, detailed below.
-As always, all the parts snap together, requiring no glue. Aside from detailing and fixing the fold-out legs for the GN Sniper, no paint at all is required to make a good-looking figure. The V-fin on the head even moves to recreate the sniper mode from the show.
What you don’t get:
-No GN Beam Pistols, which were Dynames’ backup ranged weapons in the show.
-The skirt armor in the show concealed small missiles, and you don’t get any of that here. The skirt armor doesn’t even have any detail at all to suggest this feature should be there.
-No blades for the Beam Sabers. They included the hilts for two beam sabers, but not the blades. This is pretty head-scratching. If you want a beam saber pose, you’ll have to steal some blades from another kit.
-Although I didn’t really expect it, there isn’t anything to do a mockup of the damaged leg you’ll see in the show. Normally this wouldn’t be an issue, but given everything else that’s missing, this would have been nice.
-And beyond that, nothing else. In the show, Dynames had additional equipment to power up his sniping potential and shoot from the ground into space, and that’s not here. The Torpedo add-ons you can see in one of the prequel mangas are also missing. Again, I wouldn’t normally care, but these could have made up for other missing parts.
Overall, this is a great kit for what it is, but it just isn’t as much as it should be. The kit itself has superior poseability, but with all the missing equipment, there are only so many poses you can recreate. If you’re planning on getting the 1-144 line of kits, this is a great addition to the lineup and I certainly suggest it. But if you’re a Dynames fan, you’ll be disappointed by this kit- skip to the 1/100 to get all the equipment.
This was my first 00 kit. I was bracing myself for disappointment after seeing poor quality on the HG SEED kits in years past and with the exclusion of GN Pistols with this kit, I was getting quite worried. To date, the GN-002 is my favorite mecha in 00, so I was hoping I wouldn’t be disappointed with this kit. I found this kit to be remarkably good, better than I had hoped! Getting the kit to look good will take some patience with gray paint, but other than that, I was surprised and impressed with its design and build.
Head
I personally feel this is one of the kit’s drawbacks, but I have discovered simple solutions to them. The head itself has a moving part in it. They made the V Fin moveable and attached it to the scope that folds down. Though this is inaccurate to the animation, its a nice simple gimmick. Its an awfully tight fit, so it makes the scope a little smaller than I had hoped. Many people also complained about the proportion of the head and how it looked too “boxy”. This can easily be remedied by not pressing the back of the two green panels on the sides of its face all the way in. It gives the face a wider look, more accurate to the Dynames we know and love. Some minor painting is needed to make the face look good. Theres a sticker for the eyes and scope, and a bit of white and gray paint will get it right. Without the paint and with the stickers, it still looks okay.
The sculpt and design of the torso is great! Swivel action on the right and left of the torso allow the arms to have more movement. The Torso also features an awesome double joint for the neck, moveable clavicle fins, a clear part for the GN Drive, and a new sculpt system for the GN Verniae that makes it easier to paint. Speaking of paint, thats the only drawback of the torso. Unless you want to go with the gobs of stickers they provide for the torso, get your gray paint ready again. This torso is in all white and even the back side of the moveable panels on either side of it have YELLOW backs. I spent the most time simply painting this torso, but when all was said and done, it looks fantastic. I suggest getting some Gunmetal paint for the area behind the clear gem for the GN Drive ( it looked good on mine) The Skirt armor has ball joint skirt armor in front and ball jointed rear GN capacitor thingies. I was impressed with their construction. Also, the ball joints for the hips are great, and add a little “oomph” to your posing possibilities.
Though theres no double joint for the elbow, I was still impressed with the arms construction. The joint built into the torso mentioned before aides the arm’s articulation. Theres solid joint construction at the shoulder, bicep, elbow, AND wrist! Its a first I’ve seen on a 1/144th kit to have wrist joints like these (non polycap based). They look promising! Also the lavender elastic-band-like cables work nice in the arms. I was wondering how they would build this, but the cable simply slides in and out of the arm as needed. Its a really nifty feature… even for arms! There are 2 clear gems for the GN thingies on the sides of the arms. Again, use Gunmetal paint underneath to get a good effect. The hands are great too! Though they’re the usual open fist hands we’re used to, they hold their weapons tight! Theres also one open palm hand nicely sculpted for the left hand to hold the rifle and do other neat open palm poses. You know the ones I mean.
Though the hardpoint for the loss of the GN Pistols is merely aesthetic, the legs themselves are great! Awesome articulation at the double jointed knee, they are capable of kneeling poses up the hizzo! I love the design of them in the animation and that is represented nicely here. Double joint at the ankle too. Their construction is solid. Some gray paint would be nice for the details on the knee and ankle armor, but theres some stickers to cover most of that.
Though the Dynames lacks the commonly seen GN Pistols, the accessories/weapons it does have are great! The Sniper rifle has an excellent sculpt and fits tight in the hand. It has 2 parts for the bipod, and for some reason, the open version of the bipod is molded in white. Oh well! I’ve yet to see Lockon use the bipod!
The Sniper Rifle can fit into the shoulder armor nice and snug. Its a solid design there. The Shield and Full Shield modes are great looking, but the Full Shield works best. The Full Shield parts almost make this unit look like it has wings when they’re open, so have fun posing with these articulate armored behemoths. The normal left shoulder shield works too, but mine falls out of the peg its supposed to go in frequently. I just use the Full Shield option whenever possible. The fold nicely and cover the Dynames well. When they fold over, the armor that was holding your Sniper rifle folds too… its a nice big motion. Simple and functional. The beam sabers… well… theres no real sabers… so I guess we’ll just call them beam saber handles… fit tight in the rear skirt armor. Theres no beams included… which is something the Dynames
and the Kyrios
have to deal with now. Perhaps they can steal Exia’s sabers!!
I love the kit itself. The articulation, the design, the sculpt, the colors, it looks great! The accessories it comes with are great too! The Sniper rifle is just awesome looking and whatever shields you choose to equip look great too! Sure it’ll take some painting to look really awesome, but to me, the end result is worth it. Besides, no paint and just stickers doesn’t look half bad either! With a little work, you’ll love the Dynames as much as I do easily! Its an overall great kit, but you’ll have to stomach the big missing parts: sabers and GN Pistols. I thought the kit would be a downer without them, but the design of the kit impressed me so much I found myself thinking “Pistols? What pistols?”. Hopefully you’ll enjoy this kit as much as I do!
Head – For a good amount of people (or only me), the head contains a make-or-break feature for the kit: The retractable v-fin. Good news: It looks awesome. Bad news: The mechanics for it is functional, but awkward. In detail, the v-fin itself is mounted on a sliding joint in the head, allowing it to be pulled up. Engineering-wise, it’s a pretty clever move to cut costs from the kit. However, the pulling and pushing for me felt a bit too simplistic in general, and doesn’t hide the camera as well as the animation.
Aside from that, it’s really a standard modern HG head construction. Chin and eyes are attached to mouthplate, two sides of the head, et cetera. Appearance-wise…well, with the v-fin pulled down it looks devastatingly awesome. With the head in a normal position, the sculpt looks somewhat awkward. It’s okay on its own merit, but it definitely has noticeable proportion differences from the animation Dynames’ head. Judge for yourself with the dalong images (it’s still a pretty good kit.)
Tldr; I’m a nitpicky bitch.
Chest – This is where I start to feel impressed with Bandai. I don’t know if they’re just doing new things or are actively improving from some of Exia’s awkwardness, but there’s definitely progress here compared to the Exia. Construction-wise, compared to the Exia the shoulder/outer chest joints are now combined with the side chest armor, which absolutely helps against the HG Exia’s side chest flimsiness (as cool as it is, my playing with it often gets it rather loose.) Stability gets a plus. Also, the clavicle fins are a lot more stable now, due to a new type of clamping joints as opposed to Exia’s clavicle fins. Very tight, and very lovely. Otherwise there isn’t much else special about construction, other than the grey inner frame being left out, and it’s just a white frame where you stick things on it. Nothing wrong with that. Actually, the new construction makes the GN Drive on the back easier to paint.
Tldr; compared to Exia, stability gets a plus.
Arms – The biggest change in the arms compared to Exia is the upper arm joint which allows horizontal movement. For one thing, it’s no longer a separately detachable piece, but rather the entire arm armor is gripped around the horizontal-movement joint, which provides the same effect to the Exia, plus more stability (Exia’s lower arms were starting to slide off after increased play from me, unfortunately. I love my HG kits too much.) The lower arm also has a new joint on the wrist, allowing much freer vertical movements with the hand. A definite plus.
Other than that…there’s not much that I can note, other than the lower arm plugs being incompatible with Exia’s toys. They play little to no roles in the kit, although the sniper rifle’s plug can go in. It does limit posing a fair bunch, but it’s no big issue to me. Arm joints are still single jointed ABS, shoulders are still polycap. Interestingly enough, the chest peg that connects the shoulder polycap is on a swivel joint…it’s tight and durable, so there’s not much complaints. Until it gets loose. It shouldn’t unless you play with it a ton, but mine was already loose after a day, so here’s a tip. Lightly brush the inner swivels for the shoulder pegs with a very tiny amount of superglue and be sure to move it regularly, the superglue should NOT make your joints stuck, but instead should cover them and create an increase of surface area, which creates more friction for a tighter fit. Okay, so there was a lot more to note.
Just remember, I’m not responsible for any ruined Dynames kits!
Ass boosters/hips – Good. Mounted on a ball joint on Dynames’ ass, but they’re actually ridiculously stable and tight. Other than the victim of many jokes, there’s nothing wrong with these. Look, ma! No polycaps!
As for the hips…there’s really nothing to talk about the hips. It’s the three-balls joint from Exia’s crotch. Same thing unless you want me to talk about how cool the green front skirt is. Red codpiece, etc.
Legs - There’s a pretty big problem with Dynames’ legs in terms of articulation. The horizontal movement is lacking. It can kick up and down fine, but it has a rather limited side to side range when moving. Compared to the Ground Gundam/Blue Destiny HGUCs that can spread their legs to a 45 degree perpendicular angle, I’m not impressed with this step backwards. Other than that, it’s the same thing as Exia’s legs, although the front feet armor flaps deserve a special mention. They have a far more secure joint located inside the armor itself, as opposed to Exia’s front foot armor flaps, which are connected to a functional swivel joint, yet lacking in sturdiness.
One more important thing to note: Dynames’ legs have the hardpoints for the GN beam gun holsters, but they’re non-functional. There’s a recessed square that’s only good for black paint fodder. Speaking of accessories….
GN Shields - Looks good and swings good, but the polycap+peg connection could be a bit tighter. It won’t be loose, but it’s not tight enough for playing.
GN Full Shield - Same thing, except looks a lot cooler. Surprisingly enough, the shield joints are very tight, but the peg connecting the shoulder to the shield suffers from the same problem as above. I’m willing to forgive, as this isn’t an MSIA, but a HG kit.
GN Sniper Rifle - Grips very tightly in Dynames’ hand, a little bit more loose on the shoulder. The side grip is excellent at what it’s for. The …dipod?… has two versions, folded and unfolded. Unfolded is molded in white, folded is molded in same color as the rifle. It boggles me as to why they’re on different molds…maybe Bandai ran out of space. Either way, they’re getting painted.
GN Beamsaber - Bandai is mocking me, and I don’t appreciate it. For what it’s worth, the hilts fit tightly on Dynames’ ass boosters, and inversely fit loosely on Dynames’ hands.
Conclusion: It’s a good kit. It’s a very cool kit. It can crouch, go prone, and whatnot. You can do anything Lockon did with Dynames minus doing a legsplit, swinging a beamsaber or shooting the beam guns. For eight bucks from Rainbowten, that’s a good deal in my book. Too bad about the head sculpt, but the sniper mode more than makes up for it.
EDIT - F***, I forgot the score. 4.25/5. Flawed legs and missing accessories, but the sheer improvements from Exia’s engineering gives it a bigger score than Mr. Seven Blades.
As a newcomer to Gundam model construction, I found this kit to be an excellent set. The pieces are sturdy with solid connections, and even at the 1/144 scale it’s highly detailed - almost like a build-your-own action figure. Even left unpainted, the model still looks great. The instructions are in Japanese, but the figures are well-labeled and very easy to follow (even for a rookie like me).
However, it’s not as great as it could be. The kit includes the GN sniper rifle and hilts for the sabers (which click into their holders on the model’s posterior), interchangeable stands for the rifle (folded and extended) and interchangeable left hands (closed fist or open), but that’s about it. Full-length sabers would have been a nice touch, or at least the GN pistols frequently seen in the series. The lack of those pistols was my greatest disappointment. Also, while the joints are easy to move for poses, some of them move a little too freely, especially the ball joints at the head and hips - making posing a little tricky.
Overall, a very good kit. I was not disappointed with the Gundam, only the lack of accessories.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:00 am
The 1/144 HG Gundam Dynames has just enough stuff to pass as a full kit, but absolutely nothing more. The missing star is in the extra stuff you’ll have to upgrade to the 1/100 kit to get.
What you do get:
-The full GN Shield, including the two smaller panels and two larger panels. All of this has swinging mounts so you can get any pose you’ve seen in the series out of the Shield. You can also easily pull off or attach the Shield in any combination, to recreate any moment from the show.
-The GN Sniper Rifle. The gun comes with detachable stabilizing legs that are pre-posed as either folded up for storage or folded out for action. In a bizarre twist, the folded out stabilizers are molded in a different plastic than the rest of the gun, requiring paint.
-Good poseability. My kit is currently posed crouching and firing the GN Sniper, and it stands by itself. The kit can obtain most of the better poses from the show. For a 1/144 kit, this suit’s poseability is above average. Or it would be, if not for all the missing equipment, detailed below.
-As always, all the parts snap together, requiring no glue. Aside from detailing and fixing the fold-out legs for the GN Sniper, no paint at all is required to make a good-looking figure. The V-fin on the head even moves to recreate the sniper mode from the show.
What you don’t get:
-No GN Beam Pistols, which were Dynames’ backup ranged weapons in the show.
-The skirt armor in the show concealed small missiles, and you don’t get any of that here. The skirt armor doesn’t even have any detail at all to suggest this feature should be there.
-No blades for the Beam Sabers. They included the hilts for two beam sabers, but not the blades. This is pretty head-scratching. If you want a beam saber pose, you’ll have to steal some blades from another kit.
-Although I didn’t really expect it, there isn’t anything to do a mockup of the damaged leg you’ll see in the show. Normally this wouldn’t be an issue, but given everything else that’s missing, this would have been nice.
-And beyond that, nothing else. In the show, Dynames had additional equipment to power up his sniping potential and shoot from the ground into space, and that’s not here. The Torpedo add-ons you can see in one of the prequel mangas are also missing. Again, I wouldn’t normally care, but these could have made up for other missing parts.
Overall, this is a great kit for what it is, but it just isn’t as much as it should be. The kit itself has superior poseability, but with all the missing equipment, there are only so many poses you can recreate. If you’re planning on getting the 1-144 line of kits, this is a great addition to the lineup and I certainly suggest it. But if you’re a Dynames fan, you’ll be disappointed by this kit- skip to the 1/100 to get all the equipment.
December 2nd, 2008 at 12:00 am
Introduction
This was my first 00 kit. I was bracing myself for disappointment after seeing poor quality on the HG SEED kits in years past and with the exclusion of GN Pistols with this kit, I was getting quite worried. To date, the GN-002 is my favorite mecha in 00, so I was hoping I wouldn’t be disappointed with this kit. I found this kit to be remarkably good, better than I had hoped! Getting the kit to look good will take some patience with gray paint, but other than that, I was surprised and impressed with its design and build.
Head
I personally feel this is one of the kit’s drawbacks, but I have discovered simple solutions to them. The head itself has a moving part in it. They made the V Fin moveable and attached it to the scope that folds down. Though this is inaccurate to the animation, its a nice simple gimmick. Its an awfully tight fit, so it makes the scope a little smaller than I had hoped. Many people also complained about the proportion of the head and how it looked too “boxy”. This can easily be remedied by not pressing the back of the two green panels on the sides of its face all the way in. It gives the face a wider look, more accurate to the Dynames we know and love. Some minor painting is needed to make the face look good. Theres a sticker for the eyes and scope, and a bit of white and gray paint will get it right. Without the paint and with the stickers, it still looks okay.
Head Normal
Scope
Torso/Skirt armor
The sculpt and design of the torso is great! Swivel action on the right and left of the torso allow the arms to have more movement. The Torso also features an awesome double joint for the neck, moveable clavicle fins, a clear part for the GN Drive, and a new sculpt system for the GN Verniae that makes it easier to paint. Speaking of paint, thats the only drawback of the torso. Unless you want to go with the gobs of stickers they provide for the torso, get your gray paint ready again. This torso is in all white and even the back side of the moveable panels on either side of it have YELLOW backs. I spent the most time simply painting this torso, but when all was said and done, it looks fantastic. I suggest getting some Gunmetal paint for the area behind the clear gem for the GN Drive ( it looked good on mine) The Skirt armor has ball joint skirt armor in front and ball jointed rear GN capacitor thingies. I was impressed with their construction. Also, the ball joints for the hips are great, and add a little “oomph” to your posing possibilities.
Torso Front
Torso Back
Skirt Armor Front
GN Capacitors
Arms/hands
Though theres no double joint for the elbow, I was still impressed with the arms construction. The joint built into the torso mentioned before aides the arm’s articulation. Theres solid joint construction at the shoulder, bicep, elbow, AND wrist! Its a first I’ve seen on a 1/144th kit to have wrist joints like these (non polycap based). They look promising! Also the lavender elastic-band-like cables work nice in the arms. I was wondering how they would build this, but the cable simply slides in and out of the arm as needed. Its a really nifty feature… even for arms! There are 2 clear gems for the GN thingies on the sides of the arms. Again, use Gunmetal paint underneath to get a good effect. The hands are great too! Though they’re the usual open fist hands we’re used to, they hold their weapons tight! Theres also one open palm hand nicely sculpted for the left hand to hold the rifle and do other neat open palm poses. You know the ones I mean.
Arms
Hands
Legs
Though the hardpoint for the loss of the GN Pistols is merely aesthetic, the legs themselves are great! Awesome articulation at the double jointed knee, they are capable of kneeling poses up the hizzo! I love the design of them in the animation and that is represented nicely here. Double joint at the ankle too. Their construction is solid. Some gray paint would be nice for the details on the knee and ankle armor, but theres some stickers to cover most of that.
Legs
Accessories/Weapons
Though the Dynames lacks the commonly seen GN Pistols, the accessories/weapons it does have are great! The Sniper rifle has an excellent sculpt and fits tight in the hand. It has 2 parts for the bipod, and for some reason, the open version of the bipod is molded in white. Oh well! I’ve yet to see Lockon use the bipod!
The Sniper Rifle can fit into the shoulder armor nice and snug. Its a solid design there. The Shield and Full Shield modes are great looking, but the Full Shield works best. The Full Shield parts almost make this unit look like it has wings when they’re open, so have fun posing with these articulate armored behemoths. The normal left shoulder shield works too, but mine falls out of the peg its supposed to go in frequently. I just use the Full Shield option whenever possible. The fold nicely and cover the Dynames well. When they fold over, the armor that was holding your Sniper rifle folds too… its a nice big motion. Simple and functional. The beam sabers… well… theres no real sabers… so I guess we’ll just call them beam saber handles… fit tight in the rear skirt armor. Theres no beams included… which is something the
Dynames
and the
Kyrios
have to deal with now. Perhaps they can steal Exia’s sabers!!
Full Shield
I love the kit itself. The articulation, the design, the sculpt, the colors, it looks great! The accessories it comes with are great too! The Sniper rifle is just awesome looking and whatever shields you choose to equip look great too! Sure it’ll take some painting to look really awesome, but to me, the end result is worth it. Besides, no paint and just stickers doesn’t look half bad either! With a little work, you’ll love the Dynames as much as I do easily! Its an overall great kit, but you’ll have to stomach the big missing parts: sabers and GN Pistols. I thought the kit would be a downer without them, but the design of the kit impressed me so much I found myself thinking “Pistols? What pistols?”. Hopefully you’ll enjoy this kit as much as I do!
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:52 pm
Head – For a good amount of people (or only me), the head contains a make-or-break feature for the kit: The retractable v-fin. Good news: It looks awesome. Bad news: The mechanics for it is functional, but awkward. In detail, the v-fin itself is mounted on a sliding joint in the head, allowing it to be pulled up. Engineering-wise, it’s a pretty clever move to cut costs from the kit. However, the pulling and pushing for me felt a bit too simplistic in general, and doesn’t hide the camera as well as the animation.
Aside from that, it’s really a standard modern HG head construction. Chin and eyes are attached to mouthplate, two sides of the head, et cetera. Appearance-wise…well, with the v-fin pulled down it looks devastatingly awesome. With the head in a normal position, the sculpt looks somewhat awkward. It’s okay on its own merit, but it definitely has noticeable proportion differences from the animation Dynames’ head. Judge for yourself with the dalong images (it’s still a pretty good kit.)
Tldr; I’m a nitpicky bitch.
Chest – This is where I start to feel impressed with Bandai. I don’t know if they’re just doing new things or are actively improving from some of Exia’s awkwardness, but there’s definitely progress here compared to the Exia. Construction-wise, compared to the Exia the shoulder/outer chest joints are now combined with the side chest armor, which absolutely helps against the HG Exia’s side chest flimsiness (as cool as it is, my playing with it often gets it rather loose.) Stability gets a plus. Also, the clavicle fins are a lot more stable now, due to a new type of clamping joints as opposed to Exia’s clavicle fins. Very tight, and very lovely. Otherwise there isn’t much else special about construction, other than the grey inner frame being left out, and it’s just a white frame where you stick things on it. Nothing wrong with that. Actually, the new construction makes the GN Drive on the back easier to paint.
Tldr; compared to Exia, stability gets a plus.
Arms – The biggest change in the arms compared to Exia is the upper arm joint which allows horizontal movement. For one thing, it’s no longer a separately detachable piece, but rather the entire arm armor is gripped around the horizontal-movement joint, which provides the same effect to the Exia, plus more stability (Exia’s lower arms were starting to slide off after increased play from me, unfortunately. I love my HG kits too much.) The lower arm also has a new joint on the wrist, allowing much freer vertical movements with the hand. A definite plus.
Other than that…there’s not much that I can note, other than the lower arm plugs being incompatible with Exia’s toys. They play little to no roles in the kit, although the sniper rifle’s plug can go in. It does limit posing a fair bunch, but it’s no big issue to me. Arm joints are still single jointed ABS, shoulders are still polycap. Interestingly enough, the chest peg that connects the shoulder polycap is on a swivel joint…it’s tight and durable, so there’s not much complaints. Until it gets loose. It shouldn’t unless you play with it a ton, but mine was already loose after a day, so here’s a tip. Lightly brush the inner swivels for the shoulder pegs with a very tiny amount of superglue and be sure to move it regularly, the superglue should NOT make your joints stuck, but instead should cover them and create an increase of surface area, which creates more friction for a tighter fit. Okay, so there was a lot more to note.
Just remember, I’m not responsible for any ruined Dynames kits!
Ass boosters/hips – Good. Mounted on a ball joint on Dynames’ ass, but they’re actually ridiculously stable and tight. Other than the victim of many jokes, there’s nothing wrong with these. Look, ma! No polycaps!
As for the hips…there’s really nothing to talk about the hips. It’s the three-balls joint from Exia’s crotch. Same thing unless you want me to talk about how cool the green front skirt is. Red codpiece, etc.
Legs - There’s a pretty big problem with Dynames’ legs in terms of articulation. The horizontal movement is lacking. It can kick up and down fine, but it has a rather limited side to side range when moving. Compared to the Ground Gundam/Blue Destiny HGUCs that can spread their legs to a 45 degree perpendicular angle, I’m not impressed with this step backwards. Other than that, it’s the same thing as Exia’s legs, although the front feet armor flaps deserve a special mention. They have a far more secure joint located inside the armor itself, as opposed to Exia’s front foot armor flaps, which are connected to a functional swivel joint, yet lacking in sturdiness.
One more important thing to note: Dynames’ legs have the hardpoints for the GN beam gun holsters, but they’re non-functional. There’s a recessed square that’s only good for black paint fodder. Speaking of accessories….
GN Shields - Looks good and swings good, but the polycap+peg connection could be a bit tighter. It won’t be loose, but it’s not tight enough for playing.
GN Full Shield - Same thing, except looks a lot cooler. Surprisingly enough, the shield joints are very tight, but the peg connecting the shoulder to the shield suffers from the same problem as above. I’m willing to forgive, as this isn’t an MSIA, but a HG kit.
GN Sniper Rifle - Grips very tightly in Dynames’ hand, a little bit more loose on the shoulder. The side grip is excellent at what it’s for. The …dipod?… has two versions, folded and unfolded. Unfolded is molded in white, folded is molded in same color as the rifle. It boggles me as to why they’re on different molds…maybe Bandai ran out of space. Either way, they’re getting painted.
GN Beamsaber - Bandai is mocking me, and I don’t appreciate it. For what it’s worth, the hilts fit tightly on Dynames’ ass boosters, and inversely fit loosely on Dynames’ hands.
Conclusion: It’s a good kit. It’s a very cool kit. It can crouch, go prone, and whatnot. You can do anything Lockon did with Dynames minus doing a legsplit, swinging a beamsaber or shooting the beam guns. For eight bucks from Rainbowten, that’s a good deal in my book. Too bad about the head sculpt, but the sniper mode more than makes up for it.
EDIT - F***, I forgot the score. 4.25/5. Flawed legs and missing accessories, but the sheer improvements from Exia’s engineering gives it a bigger score than Mr. Seven Blades.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:00 am
As a newcomer to Gundam model construction, I found this kit to be an excellent set. The pieces are sturdy with solid connections, and even at the 1/144 scale it’s highly detailed - almost like a build-your-own action figure. Even left unpainted, the model still looks great. The instructions are in Japanese, but the figures are well-labeled and very easy to follow (even for a rookie like me).
However, it’s not as great as it could be. The kit includes the GN sniper rifle and hilts for the sabers (which click into their holders on the model’s posterior), interchangeable stands for the rifle (folded and extended) and interchangeable left hands (closed fist or open), but that’s about it. Full-length sabers would have been a nice touch, or at least the GN pistols frequently seen in the series. The lack of those pistols was my greatest disappointment. Also, while the joints are easy to move for poses, some of them move a little too freely, especially the ball joints at the head and hips - making posing a little tricky.
Overall, a very good kit. I was not disappointed with the Gundam, only the lack of accessories.
Pros:
- Sturdy construction, high poseability
- Full shield
- General good replication of series’ details
- Requires no glue or paint
- Easy-to-follow instructions
Cons:
- Sabers, but no blades
- Rifle, but no pistols
- Joints can get a little loose