[Colonol Dekker]

This is meant to be about Brand Xs render. Not another mecha plausibility thread. Split and move please. .

[Titan]

Dang, now I want to play the Macross Saga again...

[Mongoose]

For the best possible anime-spoofing experience, refer to Perfect Hair Forever.

Actually, PHF was a far better spoof of Williams Street/[adult swim] themselves than it was of anime, but that's a tale for another time.

So yeah.  Awesome model is awesome.  And I really need to see the original Macross at some point, because I rather enjoyed Macross Plus.  Itano being Itano is always win.

[Narvi]

For the best possible anime-spoofing experience, refer to Perfect Hair Forever.

Actually, PHF was a far better spoof of Williams Street/[adult swim] themselves than it was of anime, but that's a tale for another time.

So yeah.  Awesome model is awesome.  And I really need to see the original Macross at some point, because I rather enjoyed Macross Plus.  Itano being Itano is always win.

You should check out Frontier. It's new and good.

[Akalabeth Angel]

You should check out Frontier. It's new and good.

Hahahaha "new"? Yeah right.
I saw about 5 minutes of Frontier, the show practically used the storyboards from the original Macross. Can't they make a new bloody story instead of re-hasing and dumbing down the same one?????

[Narvi]

You should check out Frontier. It's new and good.

Hahahaha "new"? Yeah right.
I saw about 5 minutes of Frontier, the show practically used the storyboards from the original Macross. Can't they make a new bloody story instead of re-hasing and dumbing down the same one?????

Yeah, god forbid that the first episode of a show that premiered on the 25th anniversary of Macross includes a few callbacks to the original. 

You don't even know what the plot is about, I bet.

[NGTM-1R]

Macross is incapable of telling a good war story without getting crappy music, hackeyened love triangle, and psuedo-mystical bullcrap all over it. Frontier added new dimensions of suck with it Not Being Anyone's Fault.

On the other hand, it did have the Konig Monster.

[Narvi]

Bah, the music was good. And it's what the show is about.

Spoiler:

Anyway, I don't see any problems with a love triangle which is pretty obviously set up to end with a threesome.

Spoiler:

And what kind of pseudo-mystical bull**** does Macross peddle now? It has that weird theme of music being an outlet for love and emotion, but it isn't cheap about it like BSG is.

[NGTM-1R]

No, actually Super Dimensional Fortress Macross was originally about making fun of Gundam and some other robot animes (witness the "falling into the cockpit" parody that was its first couple episodes). Then it was about making fun of the stupidities of Space Battleship Yamato and being ridiculously awesome. The music is a multi-series plot tumor resulting from having to give Minmei a reason why she could ever be of interest in comparison to lady Hayes.

The love triangle threesome setup is, at its best, highly subjective. Sure, I can see how you got that, but most people I've talked to see a clear Sheryl win ahead of it in the probablity rankings.

The use of singing as a battle tactic and the Jammer Birds/Sound Force come to mind from 7, and it's never quite recovered from that. Frontier is gleefully unrehabilitated, a giant step backwards from Zero.

[Akalabeth Angel]

Yeah, god forbid that the first episode of a show that premiered on the 25th anniversary of Macross includes a few callbacks to the original.  

You don't even know what the plot is about, I bet.

No I can't say I do. The series hasn't been released in North America.

All I saw was some city fight with some Valkyries and some whatever aliens and I thought "oh, this is the part where Hikaru saves Minmei. He's going to fly up, his arm will get shot off and then he'll pull her into the cockpit" and then what happened? Oh exactly what I predicted. Except instead of pulling her into the cockpit he ejects from his fighter on a bungie cord, grabs her in mid air and then the cord retracts. What the hell is that crap???

And the aliens. Well, see the thing is if they're doing the same story, which, essentially it looks like they are. Then having some "creatures" instead of the Zentraedi is kinda lame because instead of having any sort of morality like "we're fighting aliens that just look like humans" they're fighting some monsters and no one cares if they get slaughtered.

So basically same story, but crappier, from what I can tell.


I'll give it a chance when it hits North America, I'll probably even buy the thing. After all I've seen every other Macross except Macross 7, and I own most of them. But the latest one I saw, Macross Zero was pretty much crap. Frontiers look very good, but it looked like what I already own so . . . if that turns out to be case in full I'll be disappointed.

[Commander Zane]

I enjoyed Frontier a lot, the capabilities of the Messiah are awesome.

[Unknown Target]

I watched thirty seconds of Frontier and gave up. Wait, I lie, I saw some Youtube AMV's...and instantly gave up. Teeny bopper super bright 18 year old somehow becomes a fighter pilot bull****, with music somehow being a magical superweapon; instead of an interesting plot device in the original show, Macross began turning into a weekly music video with robots. Screw that.

Macross Plus was the last gasp of a truly decent Macross show; Macross Zero blew (storyline was AWFUL, combat was good), 7 and Frontier are just terrible IMO.

EDIT: Also, spliting and moving.

[Flaser]

It's rather annoying that most series with "realistic" walkers always assume that they are going to replace tanks, instead of simply filling a specialized combat role.

I rather like how MGS4 did it. Walkers only around twice the height of a man, deployed mainly within combat areas, and they serve the specific role of anti-insurgent warfare. Mind you, they were absurdly maneuverable.

You're confusing the "real robot" genre with "realistic robot". Real robot shows merely handled mecha as another weapon platform, but at heart (mainly due editor/producer interference and fanwank) were still initially "kidshows" and later on retained a lot of these aspects because producers needed the gimmicks to sell the show.

However there are a couple of "realistic" robot shows out there: Gasaraki is a prime example and the GITS mechas are the ur-example.

[QuantumDelta]

Macross is the best mecha anime period.
And if you actually watched the series Unknown you'd know that the main character doesn't "suddenly somehow become a fighter pilot" -> he's been learning to be a pilot for ages, and is a natural at it, fighter pilot however - he learns during the series, his skills develop subtly as the series go, where you see the veterans use the variable forms of the crafts they use regularly at the start he barely does, HE gets drafted in cuz he's determined, and it's less of a security risk since he's seen stuff he's not supposed to have, also vaguely because he saved the squadron leaders little sister.
It's really only by the last episode that he's 'one of the elite', there is an episode where he dukes it out with the best pilot in the squadron and they just about draw (the main character loses).

The songs absolutely rock and the grand finale of the series is one of those "all things topping" moments.
Sure, it's not the same series as SDF, and Song/Fold wave 'power' is mostly developed in Macross 7, but god damn, in it's own little universe it fits, and it rocks.

[NGTM-1R]

The ur-example of realistic robots is VOTOMS. (They aren't even really designed to move that much, if you look at the Scopedog's design; it's totally dependant on the wheels in its feet for any real kind of movement.) The ultrarealistic approach is Patlabor.

Macross is the best mecha anime period.
And if you actually watched the series Unknown you'd know that the main character doesn't "suddenly somehow become a fighter pilot" -> he's been learning to be a pilot for ages, and is a natural at it, fighter pilot however - he learns during the series, his skills develop subtly as the series go, where you see the veterans use the variable forms of the crafts they use regularly at the start he barely does, HE gets drafted in cuz he's determined, and it's less of a security risk since he's seen stuff he's not supposed to have, also vaguely because he saved the squadron leaders little sister.
It's really only by the last episode that he's 'one of the elite', there is an episode where he dukes it out with the best pilot in the squadron and they just about draw (the main character loses).

Granted I'll be the first one to attribute credit to the machine rather than man, I got started early with Amuro's Gundam and low-rent Char's Zechs' Tallgeese, but let's face it. Rick/Hikaru's first foray into flying a Veritech is basically the most realistic portrayal of what would happen transitioning from civilian craft or even military trainers direct to a frontline fighter, much less one as new and capable as the VF-25.

Staying in one form is frankly the mark of a better pilot than you seem to realize. Simply because you have the capablity doesn't mean you should be using it. As I noted earlier the first VFs were developed specifically as a counterforce to a feared orbit-to-surface invasion of Zentradi infantry. They stayed in service because they offered a variety of unique but, except for orbit-to-surface attack and defense, niche roles on a platform that was also a solid aerospace fighter. Max made his name in B form because he knew how to utilize that particular one for every tiny bit of manuverablity that could squeezed out of the VF-1. Rick/Hikaru made his name in F because that was the form most suited to the battles he fought (it's a further mark of Max's crazy awesome that he managed to do so well fighting in what's really the wrong mode).

The series doesn't present us situations in which rapidly cycling through available modes offers a serious advantage (except for the Konig Monster, because it's flight form apparently can't shoot and really looks dumb, but it's the only way to move), it just does it and tells us it's an advantage. That's bull****. It's also the only detectable change in skill level.

[Woolie Wool]

I watched thirty seconds of Frontier and gave up. Wait, I lie, I saw some Youtube AMV's...and instantly gave up. Teeny bopper super bright 18 year old somehow becomes a fighter pilot bull****, with music somehow being a magical superweapon; instead of an interesting plot device in the original show, Macross began turning into a weekly music video with robots. Screw that.

Macross Plus was the last gasp of a truly decent Macross show; Macross Zero blew (storyline was AWFUL, combat was good), 7 and Frontier are just terrible IMO.

EDIT: Also, spliting and moving.

If you want to set giant robot battles to music, I'd think a lot of these shows would be better off using heavy metal than J-Pop. Especially power metal, and especially power metal that sounds like Iron Maiden. Because music like this this just seems born to be set to giant battles full of things blowing up.

In the later Macross series, did they at least have non-hero units be depicted as actually killing anyone? The brown redshirt Valkyries in the original Macross never did anything but get blown up over and over and over.

[NGTM-1R]

In the later Macross series, did they at least have non-hero units be depicted as actually killing anyone? The brown redshirt Valkyries in the original Macross never did anything but get blown up over and over and over.

I actually counted once. The redshirt Valkyries got about fifty kills in the series, nearly all in the missile spam phase of the engagement. The real shocker was that several of them got kills engaging the Quadronos and their power armor, which is pretty much the only episode where they scored cannonfire kills. (Though most of them didn't survive it.)

Zero had the Destroids (the ****in' Destroids man!) give an enemy ace a run for his money, but not much else. Frontier's redshirts pulled the Standard Redshirt Manuver though. No kills that I remember. Plus didn't even have any redshirts that stick in my memory. I refuse to discuss 7.

[QuantumDelta]

The transformations in Frontier (and in 7 and plus to lesser extents, haven't seen SDF/DYRL/etc for ages) are used to kill the pilots drastically alter the trajectory and speed of the craft, they also improve cannon/missile FoVs and shifts between forms by the better pilots tend to be done on a few second basis to avoid/shoot down missiles, to emergency stop, to get the upper hand on an opponent in a dogfight rather than trying to simply out manoeuvre him "the old fashioned way".

The suit the character is wearing is actually a military design originally, it's a stunt-flight pilot suit adapted for those purposes which is why it 'works' with the VF-25, would surprise that it actually worked cuz you'd expect it to be encoded but hey, suspension of disbelief.
And on top of that really the first flight is more frantic/hectic and although it ends well is hardly anything other than an amateur screaming at the controls with some natural talent getting lucky.

Whilst I realise 'it's not gonna be easy' you have to realise there's a large time gap between that epic first time out in a veritech and Alto's flight - veritech aren't new, they're the staple of the defence force and that means everyone who wants to know about them /knows a lot/ about them.
It's in their films and stuff, so he's going to be vaguely familiar with how it works before even seeing it for real, let alone getting into it, his first couple comments elude to that.

The somewhat out-of-universe unrealistic thing about that first flight for Alto was it was in one of the ace's craft which meant it had one of the special packs on it which he would have had no idea how to handle more than likely.
If it's any consolation I didn't much enjoy Minmei in SDF/DYRL, It was Plus, Zero and 7 that allowed me to enjoy Frontier for what it is, music is embedded in that shows reality, and the song 'power' thing seems to be related to fold waves.
.......Which makes sense considering it relates us to the Proto-culture AND the Zentradi AND the Vajra AND the Proto-Devilin (or whatever they were called, I tried not to pay TOO much attention to 7 and just sort of ran with it it's definitely the worst of the macross franchise), meaning all life is to some small degree fold-wave sensitive (though it's obviously not the original intent in SDF, in the slightest).
Song is just an ultra-cool (well, imo) way of doing it.
WH40K has Psykers, Star Trek has lots of random ways of tying you to the universe(including a Galactic Progenitor race?)/opponents you'll meet, even Freespace has hints at a commonality between all of the mentioned species and organisation so far


Frontier doesn't really 'show' any enemy kills by non-heros but you know that it happens because of the scale of the battles, most of the flashy stuff is on screen by the NUNS/SMS though.

Macross Frontier really topped the franchise even if most of it is fanwank, if you watched the rest of the franchise and can enjoy it for it's own sake rather than what you want it to be then Frontier is an amazing offering, and the fans did eat it up.
Nevermind the fact that Mei Nakabayashi is one of the best female singers I've ever listened to which just adds to it moreso than Plus or 7 did.

[NGTM-1R]

Whilst I realise 'it's not gonna be easy' you have to realise there's a large time gap between that epic first time out in a veritech and Alto's flight - veritech aren't new, they're the staple of the defence force and that means everyone who wants to know about them /knows a lot/ about them.
It's in their films and stuff, so he's going to be vaguely familiar with how it works before even seeing it for real, let alone getting into it, his first couple comments elude to that.

That's like saying you should know how to fly a modern jet by watching movies.

It's complete bull****.

I'm willing to give Alto the benefit of the doubt and say he has experience on military trainers even, but a straight transition to a military-grade variable fighter as smoothly as he pulls is flat impossible. Rick/Hikaru would have had it easier; a first-generation VF would have been more like a jet aircraft than later models simply because it's closer in lineage (and performance). Alto doesn't even have that to fall back on.

[QuantumDelta]

Not know how, but you can get a fair idea of how you can expect a Harrier to work from some air time it's had, and arguably it's one of the hardest craft to fly even today.
Whilst systems and internals are perhaps completely unclear -> Alto has a background in it, so is again more likely to be familiar with it too.
Whilst never having been in one it's not that much of a jump when you consider everything else you see from him in the series.
...And being honest, I'd argue that whilst it might get more complicated, I'd imagine that variable fighters would become more intuitive over time, not less.
I think i'll re-watch the first ep again and pay attention to his commentary as he climbs in.

He doubts himself until he gets in.
When he gets in his suit auto-integrates with the fighter.
He never changes out of the half-transformed state, and he never fights back, spends most of his time skitting around.
The most disbelievable thing he does before(other than) the final moment of the chase is pick Ranka up with the fighter's arm, which would have to take a phenomenal amount of skill (he is shown to be concentrating on it a lot).
Seems the crap he flies at the academy and the VF-25 are based on the same tech, he is the top of his class in 'pilot school' though.
The second chance, he asks to go out in another VF-25 and gets decked by the squadron leader and thrown out