Gundam Build Fighters

Everyone seems to be focusing on the 00 suits. I think it’s a situation where they’re so overexposed that even the slightest hint will drive people nuts.

This page showcases the upcoming Gunpla based on Build Divers, and the one that caught my eye is this one.◊ It looks to be a Combining Mecha consisting of SD versions of the RX-78-2 Gundam, Char's Zaku, the Nu Gundam, the Sazabi, and the Gundam Kyrios, with Kyrios acting as the main body while the others act as the ligaments. As an SD Gundam fan, I am loving this idea and am hoping to see it in action in the anime. I wonder if it's name has been announced yet, because if not I'm gonna call it "Brave SD-Kaiser" until it's real name is revealed.

Also, it looks like there are three other SD Gundams◊ separate from "Brave SD-Kaiser" that seem to act as armaments for 00 Diver.

And another thing, Masami Obari has been confirmed to be the Action Director.

edited 17th Feb '18 10:20:45 PM by WolfThunder

Oh, great, more SD's.

That Combining Mecha looks pretty awesome! It really reminds me of Omni/Omegamon from Digimon, with how it has the RX-78-2 and Char's Zaku as the arms.

... okay, why Kyrios?!?

I hate to bring up "weird out-of-place 00 favoritism" again but... I cannot for the life of me think of a reason that there should be a 00 unit in there, let alone the Kyrios.

And that's my problem with the use of 00 units in GBF... not that they're bad, or even over-exposed, but their exposure is just weird. The Amazing Exia is inexplicable given... literally everything about Meijin up to that point, the Exia is also the one straight-built suit in all of Battelogue, and now this combiner made of Amuro and Char's suits is built around... a second string 00 suit? It's just odd.

I'm not against 00 suits in general, mind you. I've no issue with the fact that the main suit of Divers is an 00, and the Renato Bros' GN-X use was great and made sense. And goddamn if the Reversable Gundam wasn't an amazing choice. But it's when the use of 00 suits seems to counter internal logic that messes with me.

edited 20th Feb '18 7:44:03 AM by Larkmarn

Honestly? I think it's because they thought Kyrios' V-fin would work best for the chest piece.

The Exia was a big deal for GBF 1 because of the weird way Japanese licensing works - they literally got the licence to use the Exia Repair, a Season 2 machine, just in time for the final episode. This was also why 00-inspired stuff showed up a decent amount in Try - they had all the licenses they needed now, and so they wanted to push 00 kits hard. This time around, they’re prominently featuring AGE and Reconguista suits, and there’s been a tiny IBO reference which may develop into a bigger thing later on (like the end-boss piloting a Graze Ein or something). The lack of Unicorn is kind of interesting, though, given that that moves colossal amounts of plastic crack for them, but maybe they’re trying to get less popular lines moving. It’s certainly not prohibited, at least, given that a Kshatriya straight-build showed up in Mao’s introduction.

Some more information about Gundam Build Divers has been released. The Opening theme "Diver’s High" will be performed by SKY-HI, AKA Mitsuhiro Hidaka, a member of the popular J-Pop group AAA, while the Ending theme "Ashita he" (To Tomorrow) will be performed by Iris, who recently gained notoriety for singing the Ending song for Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion: Awakening Path, "Aka Dake ga Tarinai". The anime will premier on April 3rd, and it has been stated to have a "worldwide release" this spring (Whatever that means).

April is the start of the Spring anime season, so probably (or hopefully, anyway) just means it'll be simulcast on Youtube and/or streaming sites outside Japan.

You guys think they'll do a poll for which mechs could cameo in the series, similar to Ξ Gundam for Gundam Build Fighters Try?

New commercial for Build Divers. Also huzzah Chousen Qubeley cameo!

Its entirely possible, if not probable, that they feel no need to push Unicorn in this since they’re about to reveal a new Unicorn project sometime in the next few months.

Crunchyroll will simulcast Build Divers.

Wnat, no youtube streaming this time?

Gundam.info will stream the first episode of Build Divers at 7:00 p.m. JST/6:00 a.m. EDT today.

Calling it now, the mysterious girl is Aila and Reji's kid, in cyberspace somehow because Arista are bullshit!

Way too obvious. I figure her looking exactly like a baby Aila has to be a red herring. That said, is it a sequel to GBF or a separate continuity? I assumed sequel, but our page treats it as its own continuity. From what I can tell, it could be either.

So yeah. Watched it. Combat was good. So there's that. The Gunpla aspect just felt... kinda forced. Like, GBF was already pretty far off from Gundam fare, but it was about Gunpla, so it's still very much tied to the experience of being a Gundam fan.

With the switch to VR, the narrative feels much more like a standard Deep-Immersion Gaming series. I know, the first ten minutes of the episode are a straight up Gunpla tutorial, but it felt shoved in to say "see, still Gunpla." And I cannot envision this becoming any less the case.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:20:30 AM by Larkmarn

So am I the only one who sees Mikazuki and atra in the main boy's designs?

To be honest, the main character's design (along with, so far, everything else about him) is so generic that even after watching the episode two hours ago, I genuinely cannot form a mental picture of him.

From the first episode, I only liked the Camp Gay guide and the girl who ran the shop that didn't actually care about Gunpla. The two leads, the Mysterious Waif, and the bandit ogre left zero impression on me.

edited 3rd Apr '18 12:23:06 PM by Larkmarn

Opinion's a solid "decent" for now. Will see where it goes.

That was a slick powerslide the 00 Diver pulled there - especially since as pointed out, the protag looks vaguely like Mika, who pulled the exact same move versus Hashmal. I was kinda expecting him to respond to the declaration that he's got no weapons left by either pulling out another throwing knife or Trans-Am. Speaking of which, I'm slightly miffed that although it's explicitly stated that a Gunpla's performance depends on its equipment, the 00 Diver was completely unaffected by losing a GN drive even though its base model is explicitly unable to operate without the Twin Drive up and running.

The Mystery Waif isn't Reiji and Aila's kid, since she already appeared in the Try OVA and this girl doesn't look like her.

As an MMO player, watching this Gundam VRMMO is going to be an exercise in half my attention being spent going "ooh, pretty colors and neat mechanics" and the other half going "that is not how people behave in an MMO". Like what kind of stupid-ass PVP system rewards you a higher amount of points for beating on level 1 players?

So far I'm not particularly impressed. I mean, I don't dislike it, but it's a definite step down from IBO, which grabbed me from the start.

• I don't like the opening song and the opening itself feels a bit too cluttered. Maybe it'll be helpful later on for remembering who the Loads And Loads Of Characters are.
• My main gripe is that Magee is the only character I find remotely interesting. Riku in particular is very one-note for a main protagonist.
• So I like GBN as a setting, but why are players made naked when entering it?
• The big fight at the end was nice, but nothing special.

Edit: Almost forgot, anyone else notice that the Immortal Collasaur plays GBN?

edited 3rd Apr '18 5:00:50 PM by lrrose

That actually shows up in a bunch of games, particularly if they’re running slow - clothes are layered over base character models, and can pop in a second after the ‘inner frame’, so to speak, when you enter a new instance.

A system that takes into account relative level difference but not the direction of the difference? That is, beating a level 1 as level 10 nets the same amount as the opposite in order to encourage PVP by giving the lower-level player a high-risk-high-reward incentive to avert Complacent Gaming Syndrome of only taking on battles you know for sure you can win? I mean, just think back to GBF's last episode: Reiji explicitly spelled out that gunpla battle is not fun if you're not willing to take risks.

That and being seal-clubbed serves as additional incentive to git gud so that you can wipe the smile off the fuckers' faces with your gunpla's foot.

edited 3rd Apr '18 5:09:41 PM by amitakartok