80s anime inspired by big mecha anime Macross and Mospeada series, Megazone 23 tells the story of motorcycle enthusiast Shogo Yahagi, who mistakenly comes into possession of a top secret government prototype bike/mecha, the Garland at top speed 320km/hr as well as the mysteries it holds.
I always wanted this toy but back then, had to put my budget on other Yamato's stuffs like Macross. Finally made up my mind on getting it during recent Tokyo otaku trip. 1/15 scale Garland Full Action Model is huge and the packaging box occupied much of my luggage space. I also managed to get a loose Garland and could now display both in different modes.
I practically had little idea of this mecha anime before owning the toy and only started watching the OVA movies on YouTube after I returned from my trip. Honestly, I like the concept of transformable motorcycle aka Maneuver-Craft mode to robot aka Maneuver-Slave Mode with ultra cool blue visor head. Kind of reminded me of the Mospeada's charm.
Not many accessories apart for the rifle and rider. The whole toy looks extra cool with the rider, Shogo Yahagi, especially in bike mode and rider also fit well in the cockpit in robot mode after transformation. My loose piece came with an extra female pillion, Yui Takanaka, manned as a bonus figure for the military type version.
Drawing upon original mecha designs by Shinji Aramaki (Wolf's Rain, Bubblegum Crisis), Yamato's 1/15 Garland stretches over 10" long in bike form and 9.5" high in mecha form with over 10 points of articulation and scaled Shogo Yahagi figure. Even more, as a testament to late Yamato's engineering genius. I made a video of my toy... Do check it out...
6 comments:
Hmm didn't know Yamato did make some Megazone toys, while the figure looks kinda derpy the garland itself just looks awesome though i am biased to Proto Garland.
Megazone by itself is great OVA but the greatest thing that the series left behind is the concept of dystopian futuristic setting that inspired series like armored core. For such an awesome concept, Motorcycle power armor are still underused in mecha series.
>> Yami
Yamato and CMS were companies I admired a lot as they brought a lot of cool old school mecha from anime to toys. The OVA has great Ideas and concepts and now that u mentioned, it struck my senses that armored core has the bike robot similar to Garland.
I do admire CMS as well since they make some awesome toys lineup for series like Mospeada and Yuusha which is rather unfortunate that they went bankrupt few years ago.
The Nineball AC from Armored core is definitely carbon copy of Garlamd
Dennis, the front design of the bike looks exactly like the one called Akina.
>> Yami
Really unfortunate these companies went bankrupt. Lost is definitely to the fans.
I will surely check out on Nineball AC. Thanx!
>> Desmond
I also think the cover resembles a bit of Akira... Not as popular as Akira but credit given for the transformable Garland ^_^
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