Over at GA Graphic, they’ve previewed the upcoming 1/100 scale Hi-Metal Fire Valkyrie toy from Macross 7. The toy is interesting on several counts, firstly is that it’s rebooting the Hi-Metal line from the early 80’s and second is that the finish is especially accurate for a toy of this size. The Fire Valkyrie did already receive toys and kits around the time of Macross 7’s release but the toy was woefully proportioned and the kits required almost total disassembly for transformation. This toy, on the other hand, is remarkably accurate to the original design and isn’t overly large either (normally detailing requires larger moulds). Naturally, the Fire Valkyrie was featured in both Macross Ace Frontier and Ultimate Frontier on the PSP but the unit obviously had to play very differently as Nekki Basara doesn’t actually shoot any enemies in the series, instead choosing to sing at them whilst piloting his custom Valkyrie with a guitar. In any case, the toy is released in January 2010 and costs 7350 yen, you can buy it here.

We mentioned not that long ago about a new line of commemorative gaming releases for Gundam’s 30th Anniversary. Well, they’re now out with places like Play Asia stocking a fair few. Our personal recommendations would be Gundam MS Sensen 0079 an FPS on the Wii, pictured above, and Gundam Battle Universe a third person shooter on the PSP. Neither of these games will probably see a Western release so you’d best acquire them now whilst they’re available at their new reduced price point. We will be reviewing both games in the new future though, so also keep an eye out for that.

The final of the three Armored Core PSP ports, in the form of Last Raven, has received its first promo video and a smattering of coverage. For those unaware, Last Raven was one of the most challenging Armored Core games and ultimately aimed at its loyal fanbase, which wound up a a fair few Western journalists on its PlayStation 2 release (as they found it impossibly difficult for the most part). As a consequence, the original game was very much misunderstood and many of its features overlooked. Notably of which was its very involved branching narrative (though the English localisation was pretty woeful to be fair). The narrative received a large amount of interest, in Japan, and multiple directors were involved in creating various promotional videos for the game (with this being my personal favourite). The current PSP port has subsequently re-used a similar edit to this promo, so you should be able to compare and contrast on how accurate the port is from a graphical standpoint over the original game. This port will be released in Japan on March 4th next year at 3990 yen, along with a nice 60 page artbook containing lots of artwork and interviews.

Over at GA Graphic, they’ve reviewed the upcoming release of the DX Chogokin Macross Quarter from the recent Macross Frontier series. The Quarter is aptly named as it’s a more compact size Macross class ship, which makes it more manoeuvrable amongst other things. In the series, it acts as SMS’s base of operations within the auspices of the Frontier colony fleet. As toys go, this looks to be rather good as it uses a lot of diecast in the mould and boasts a full transformation. It’s quite expensive though, coming in at 20,790 yen.

For those that played the recent and excellent Macross Ultimate Frontier, the Quarter is also playable believe it or not. Unlocked by completing the final Extra mission, “Ultimate Bomber”. Unsurprisingly, it’s a pretty epic unit when compared to the other variable fighters. So if you had fun with that then you may want to make a pre-order for its release on the 19th December. To finish off, it seems only fair to show a little video of the Quarter kicking a large amount of Vajra behind as well as footage of the toy itself. Enjoy!

The anime adaptation of Harutoshi Fukui’s Gundam Unicorn novels will be premièred in Japan as a download via the PlayStation Store. Much like the recent anime Xam’d that saw its release via the same service, Gundam Unicorn will have its first (of six) episodes available on February 20th. There will also be HD and SD versions available, costing 1000 to 700 yen respectively (so you can also watch it on your PSP). This release is notable as it pre-dates the disc versions by almost a month and considering how hotly anticipated this new Gundam series is, this should further cement the PlayStation 3’s and Sony’s standing in the (frankly massive) Japanese anime market. The Unicorn Gundam is also a playable unit in the just released Gundam vs Gundam Next Plus.

It seems that someone at Bandai may have made a slight slip up. In a recent update to the official site for Gundam vs Gundam Next Plus, the Boss section initially contained move lists for each of the units (bar the Devil Gundam). However, these move lists were promptly removed not that long after. Now, it’s not known how the Bosses are unlocked as playable units as yet but the accidental inclusion of the move lists on the site indicates they’re in there somewhere. Still, in the meantime there are plenty of mobile suits to keep players busy.

In order to clear out some of their stock for the holiday, HobbyLink Japan are holding a sale on a bunch of items made by Yamato toys. Over the years, Yamato have made a name for themselves as a high quality collector’s toy manufacturer (rivalling the monolithic Bandai). Considering the recent release of Macross Ultimate Frontier, as well as the semi-recent Yuke’s developed VOTOMS game there’s enough in the sale to keep the discerning mecha gamer interested.

In any case, this sale features a lot of very cool items at a suitably affordable price (as Yamato’s line-up are normally pretty expesnive). So if you’ve always wanted a nice VF-1J from Macross or a Scopedog Turbo Custom from VOTOMS, then you better move quickly!

Gundam games tend to get a pretty bad reputation outside of Japan, though this is admittedly due to surreal and awful choices on the part of Western publishers really. The fact of the matter is that Gundam has quite a long and proud tradition in Japan of producing quality entries to the mecha gaming pantheon. So much so that collaborations with companies like Capcom have birthed wildly popular arcade offspring as well as further console based ports.

Considering Capcom’s solid arcade versus history, it should come as no surprise that they have been making very solid Gundam themed arcade versus games for nigh-on ten years. Normally specialising on one series and/or timeframe of the Gundam mythos, Capcom kept their approach very focused. It wasn’t until quite recently when they literally threw pretty much every Gundam into the ring within one game. Naturally, the subsequent versus depth that followed on from such a decision has pushed these games up a notch in terms of their functional prowess.

Bandai have released their MG, or Master Grade, kit of the LM312V04 Victory Gundam. This was the initial titular mobile suit of the 1993 TV Series V Gundam, though it was later replaced by the LM314V21 Victory 2 Gundam. The design also featured a lot of quite complex transformation and combination aspects in the series and the kit seems to reproduce this functionality very thoroughly, which is quite impressive. This kit was also personally supervised by its designer, Hajime Katoki (hence the “Ver Ka” suffix, as that stands for “Version Katoki”). There’s a nice unpainted review of sorts here for the kit and as always you can buy this MG at HobbyLink Japan. This particular design is also featured in the recently released Gundam vs Gundam Next Plus, which we will be reviewing shortly.

As we previously reported, the Christmas Tree adorned with various Gunpla in Akihabara has been officially lit up yesterday. With Tohru Furuya in attendance (he’s on the left in the above picture), fans who bought the recent Gundam vs Gundam Next Plus on the PSP will be able to have their picture taken with him. Naturally, we’ll be reviewing the game fairly shortly, though for those curious about it we’ve been mightily impressed with the game thus far.