Monday 11 May 2015

Super Dimension Century Orguss 超時空世紀オーガス : 1/40 scale Orgroid - Takatoku






















If i'm not wrong, there were two version of Orguss Orgroid released by Takatoku back then in 1983, there were the green and brown visor. I'm happened to be the brown visor version. As you can see, the visor on the head and cockpit cover were tainted brown.

The packaging of this 1/40 scale Orguss shared a lot of resemblances to the 1/55 chunky monkey valkyries made also by Takatoku in the 1980s. This 1/40 scale Takatoku Orguss Orgroid toy is as old as the 1/55 scale Takatoku Macross toy and both the toys are about the same physical size. Just that Orguss was made boarder as a toy with an addition mode which is the 'tank' mode.  1/40 scale Orguss did come with a miniature figure of the pilot, Kei Katsuragi of the Freedom Space Corps.

This is definitely the very first perfect transformation of Orguss achieved by Takatoku and it kind of sad to learn that Takatoku no longer existed but left a legacy of making creativity toys in our hearts. The transformation was very direct as I didn't need to refer to instruction manual changing it to different mode. Unfortunately, mine had some yellowing on the chest and left elbow was pretty loose.  

'Super Dimensional Century Orguss' came from the creator of 'Super Dimensional Fortress Macross' and was introduced shortly after Macross' popularity. Despite the awesome mecha design that comes in four interchangeable modes (fighter, gerwalk, tank, battroid), Orguss anime wasn't very successful. Maybe it's because of the slow and unappealing plot that really turn me off after I had watched only the first few episodes.

4 comments:

chrismandesign said...

watching the original opening, i can see the great quality of the animation for Orguss !!!... after the success of Macross, you can hardly expect something better, even from the same creator (albeit, sometimes it actually happens)... the mecha design, on the other hand, is quite innovative, as you pointed, instead of 3 modes (which is daring), they offer 4 modes !!!...

Takatoku is a brand i have heard about, but unfortunately, i have nothing made by them in my collection... this toy, despite the longevity, the yellowing and the loose articulation, still looks in very good condition... moreover, it has for me, the same level of quality you could expect from CM’s and that’s a very high standard, in my opinion !!!... =D

deSMOnd said...

Its neck seems a bit short :)

Dennis aka Katsuden said...

>> Chrismandesign
The opening of Orguss has this Gundam OYW feel. It also seems like Orguss was produced before Macross although Orguss to my knowledge was of a later production after Macross' success. It was not as big of a bang compared to Macross or Gundam and definitely far from Transformers. Still the mech has a place in some of our hearts. I grew up playing Takatoku Macross valkyrie. Memories are priceless.

Dennis aka Katsuden said...

>> Desmond
Actually, the head looks kind of small too. Vintage toy didn't have much of proportionality given the technology those days.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...