Indie developer 17bit is very much hitting the nostalgia buttons with their upcoming game 2D sidescrolling shoot-em-up, Galak-Z: The Dimensional. Coming to the PS4 and PC in 2014, the Macross/Gundam/Space Battleship Yamato-inspired game has the player controlling a lone spaceship (which reminds me a bit of Hikaru Ichijo’s FanJet) against a horde of enemies, including some large mecha and aliens, through asteroid riddled areas. While it doesn’t seem as if you can transform into a mecha and vice versa, your missile attacks are very reminiscent of the well loved “Itano Circus,” on top of performing rather appealing dodging maneuvers hearkening stylistic anime action. Check out the recently released PAX 2013 trailer and Kotaku developer interview below!

After losing the mobile contest against the Crossbone X-3, the next suit to be added to the Gundam Extreme Versus Full Boost roster on August 27 will be the Gerbera Tetra, piloted by Cima Garahau. Completing the Stardust Memory mobile suit crew, the Gerbera Tetra is a 2000 cost mobile suit that looks to be rather nimble.

If you didn’t get a chance to see it live, watch some great North American Gundam Extreme Versus action at the EVO 2013 Championship Tournament held in Las Vegas. Courtesy of TheBrett and the NorCal Dogfight crew, this video displays the Top 8 of the tournament with some of the best North America has to offer. Using an impressive streaming setup, you can watch all four combatants during each of the matches. Congratulations to the winners of the 2013 tournament and hopefully we will see some Full Boost action at next year’s EVO. So stop waiting and check out the action below!

On July 23, the XM-X3 Crossbone Gundam X-3 will join the Gundam Versus Extreme Full Boost roster after winning the mobile event against the Gerbera Tetra just recently. The final Crossbone Gundam unit in the original Crossbone trio, the Crossbone Gundam X-3 is a 2500 cost suit and is very melee oriented as expected. Equipped with its Muramasa Blaster, as seen with the Crossbone Full Cloth, the X-3 has very quick striking melee that can be powered up with its safety release. Other attacks include a nice little whirlwind throw with the EMS-VSX1 Quarvarze, burning tree logs, and the lovely nuke found with the Crossbone Gundam X-1 Kai. To make up for not being equipped with the iconic ABC mantle, the X-3 also has a very quick approach move with the I-Field, blocking all beam like projectiles for a certain period of time. My only gripe with the suit so far is the fact that while it can throw burning logs, it does not have the infamous monkey controlled mobile suit as an assist. Regardless, it’s still very exciting to see it added to the roster! Cecily Fairchild will also be added as an operator as well. Check out the little gameplay teaser for the X-3 below!

With Pacific Rim ramping up to release on July 12th in the west, Hideo Kojima recently tweeted a collaboration with Guillermo Del Toro and famed artist Yoji Shinkawa on the Japanese Pacific Rim movie poster. The titular mecha Gipsy Danger is given the Shinkawa makeover, with slick lines and a slim profile with its blades protracted over what looks like a defeated Knifehead kaiju. Hopefully this will be a collaboration that will spark more mecha-themed games from Kojima such as the long awaited Zone of the Enders 3 as he has been giving Pacific Rim nothing but high praises. Until then, check out the latest Pacific Rim trailer below!

Looks like a couple big updates will be on the way for Gundam Extreme Versus Full Boost in the upcoming weeks. The first update is a major unit readjustment that affects around 32 current units, ranging from increased main ammo for Cherudim to several new cancels for many units . This update is included in the June 25th update that introduces the Kapools as playable units. The next update is the Character Battle between the X-3 Crossbone Gundam and the Gerbera Tetra. Like previous Character Battles, they will be voted on through the mobile site and whoever wins will be added in the next game update, which is July 15th. The loser will move onto the next Character Battle and await the results of that round. Until then, check out the video below and see some of the new unit updates in action!

On June 25, the Kapool and Corin’s Kapool will be added to the Gundam Extreme Versus Full Boost roster. Teased in the game’s intro since it was released over a year ago, the AMX–109 Kapool and Corin’s Kapool seem to be one of the most unique units out there. Acting as one selected unit, the player will be able to switch between the two units during the match. Corin’s Kapool appears to be more melee focused, whereas the Kapool, piloted by Sochie Heim, is more ranged. Each unit has its own health, but beware as one unit death means both Kapools go down. Regardless, we are definitely looking forward to playing the Kapools sometime soon. Other additions in the next update include Lunamaria Hawke from Gundam Seed Destiny as an operator and A Bao A Qu as a new playable stage. Check out the video below to see Team Kapool in action!

At the recent Nintendo E3 Direct, a new trailer was shown for the new Wii U RPG by Monolithsoft, currently dubbed “X”. This new trailer focuses on the mecha featured in the game, called Dolls, and showcased more of their functionality in the game, from different forms of traversal and mecha types. As a spiritual successor to Xenoblade, the scope and scale of this game looks amazing from the large vistas to the giant enemies, both organic and mechanical. As a huge fan of the Xeno-series RPGs and Xenoblade, I can’t wait to see what this game has in store for us in the future. The game will be released in 2014, but until then make sure to check out the trailer below!

Looks like Gundam Seed Astray is getting a little more love in the form of the Robot Damashii ZGMF-X12A+AQM/E-X05 Divine Testament Gundam. From the Gundam Seed Destiny Astray manga, the Testament Gundam with its Divine Striker armaments is a fearsome antagonist mecha that is eventually repurposed for Kaite Madigan’s usage, one of the leads in Destiny Astray manga. In the manga, it also is able to attach other Striker packs such as the Sword and Aile packs designed for the GAT-X105 Strike Gundam, so it would be interesting to see if that applied to the Robot Damashii version. As for speculation time, could this be another hint into upcoming roster additions to Gundam Extreme Versus Full Boost? The Divine Testament Gundam is scheduled for release in September of this year.

It’s that time of the year again where the top players from all over Japan come together to see who’s the best Gundam Extreme Versus Full Boost player in the country! The Premium Dogfight 2013 tournament will take place on May 25th and be held at the Differ Ariake Arena in Tokyo. Last year, we saw a team of Tallgeese III/00 Qan[T] barely eek out a victory against a Zaku II FZ/Hildolfr team in the finals. It will be interesting to see what kind of matchups will be in store for this year’s tournament. Perhaps we might get some news about a possible home version of the game or even an upcoming sequel! Just because you may not be able to see the event in Japan, does not mean you cannot watch it live. Streaming info can be found on the Full Boost website here. Until then, watch some of the 2013 Tokyo qualifiers in the video below!