Courtesy of our good friends at HobbyLink Japan we’ve been sent the Robot Damashii Nu Gundam and Robot Damashii Sazabi as seen in the climactic film Char’s Counterattack. In addition, we’ve also included some game and anime footage of the mecha in action at the end of the review.

Following the success of Armored Core Reprises, the internal From Software band called FreQuency (as headed by Kota Hoshino) will be doing another Armored Core remix album. Called Sunrise, the first track to be premiered is that of “Vanishing” (as shown below). Released as a physical copy at the end of the week in Japan and then digitally next week, it’s clear that we’ll be seeing and hearing more of FreQuency in the future. There’s also an excellent fan made Armored Core tribute album called The Answer if you’re at all curious.

Following the Tamashii Nations 2012 poll where the wonderful Layzner came out on top, Bandai have been working hard to fulfill the wishes of their fans. As we already have a thoroughly excellent Soul of Chogokin Spec Layzner toy, it now looks like we’ll be getting an E-MF-LZ-00X-2 Layzner Mk2 figure too. This was the designed but never animated version of the titular upgraded and transformable Layzner that was meant to appear at the end of the second season. Due to all manner of funding issues, the series was cut short and the Mk2 never appeared. However, as is always the case in gaming, the Mk2 has graced many games over the years. From Super Robot Wars to the Another Century’s Episode games and as such the Mk2 is very much a fan favourite (so it makes sense to have a figure made of it finally). No word on release, toyline or price but Bandai have followed this announcement up with asking people to fill in an online questionnaire. It is interesting to see Layzner still endure like this though. Especially as the series is very influential when it comes to mecha gaming. If only the PS2 game had been finished, oh well.

There’s currently some interesting stuff going on at the Tamashii Nations Akiba Showroom, as we have the release of Battle Robot Damashii around the corner. Apart from showing all manner of new toys, with the lovely Robot Damashii RX-105 Xi Gundam above being notable, the really cool stuff is the AR elements of the exhibit. For this you need an iOS device and this app. Seeing Ideon pop into existence looks to be pretty cool. AmiAmi has a nice update on all this too.

Following on from our previous Revoltech Jehuty, Revoltech Jehuty (Anubis Version) and Revoltech Jehuty with Vector Cannon reviews, our good friends at HobbyLink Japan have sent us the Revoltech Naked Jehuty. This being the final and most powerful incarnation of Jehuty from the end of Anubis. In addition, we’ve also included some game footage of the mecha in action at the end of the review.

Over at Hideo Kojima’s Twitter feed he previewed a shot of a Revoltech Vic Viper from Anubis. For one it looks lovely and it will be at least affordable. Talking of other Revoltech’s, Naked Jehuty is now out too and our review will be forthcoming. If you can’t wait for the Vic Viper Revoltech they you can still buy the Kotobukiya kit, in addition a RIOBOT toy is also planned.

In a nice move of not making yet another Jehuty toy, Kaiyodo have followed up with a toy of the orbital frame Ardjet this March. As with all Revoltechs, Ardjet looks to have decent articulation and won’t cost the earth. Whilst this feels like extended marketing for the ZOE HD Collection, it’s nice to see one of the lesser orbital frames from Anubis get the toy treatment. You can pre-order Ardjet here.

The rather fascinating RahXephon is getting, what looks to be, a lovely rendition in toy form. Released this May for 12,600 yen, the price is a little on the high side. That said, the previous Variable Action Hi-Spec entries have had substantial price drops shortly after release. RahXephon was an interesting series though, conceived and directed by veteran mecha design Yutaka Izubuchi it had a wonderful aesthetic and premise. Though the latter was very much inspired by the original Raideen, which also had a similar titular mecha something that Super Robot Wars MX and Scramble Commander the 2nd emphasized with both Raideen and RahXephon bro-fisting their way to victory. Talking of games, the less said about the PS2 game the better really. Anyway, this looks to be a great toy of a really great design so on that front we’re happy at least.

When we reviewed the original Anubis back in 2003, the (Japanese) version we covered was not the same game that was released abroad. Mainly because there were multiple silent revisions across various territories, with Europe seemingly getting the more polished versions. Of all these numerous releases, the final one was something we also played to see if anything functionally noteworthy had happened.

In short, the Special Edition made lots of little changes and one pretty big one. From much welcomed boss balancing tweaks to an all new enemy squad set-up, not to mention a veritable legion of fixes to small but suitably annoying issues. All of these were undeniably positive improvements and almost made the final game something tantalisingly coherent. To the point that it made the game more of what it should have been in the first place.

Following on from our review of the 1/60 VF-19 Custom Fire Valkyrie, our good friends at HobbyLink Japan have also sent us the 1/60 Sound Booster for VF-19 Custom Fire Valkyrie from Macross 7. It’s important to clarify that the Sound Booster doesn’t come with the Fire Valkyrie, that has to be purchased separately. In addition, we’ve also included some game and animation footage at the end of the review.