ARX-8 - Ever since seeing its debut in a Japanese Convention , the mechahead in me is almost filled with shame.
"What is this Trombe of a mech, it's cool?" Slowly translating the katakana, "Libertine" still doesn't hit me and I thought it was from Muv Luv. Nope, I definitely have seen the anime before, it's from "Full Metal Panic!". My geekness was threatened, dethroned!!
In my defense, however, there has only been so many art of ARX-8, it is only appeared in a novel so far. The Aussenseiter-like ponytail was not portrayed in those colored lineart except for this huge large face-up of its head. Supposedly out in May 2008, it got delayed to August 2008. The wait was excruciatingly long, I've been wanting some kinda FMP! product for a long time.
Sculpt: Good, clean, nice detail all around in the head area and nice panels. Really like how the lower back legs has a joints for a stabler (I don't know what to call it) when it's firing the big guns.
Paint: I've always found the orange color on this Arm Slave pretty much took away the consistency of the relatively realistic look on most Arm Slave. Orange is such an odd color (even more odd that I do prefer it for my car). The orange used is quite tamed, bordering more on the red side and not as flamboyant as I had feared. Some slight bleed but nothing too serious. The heads, however, I have some complaint. The mouth piece has a little too strong on the panel lines. It creates a goofy "Why So Serious" grin, and it's triangular. I found it bad and repaint white over it with grey panel lines instead.
Articulation : There are the "now-all-too-familiar-by-now" Revoltech ball joints on its knees, hips, ankles, shoulders, and the chest piece. Smaller ball joints on the kneecaps, lower back legs, and the elbows. Cut joints for the hands. Three sets of double joints for the support arms, one double ball joints for the demolition gun, and lastly one more for the "standard" stand. I gotta say, the Revoltech joints were relatively sturdy for past Revoltechs I've gotten. This ARX-8 one.... something wonky and fragile about it. Didn't break, but it slips into pieces very easily it seems. I am not so sure about the attachment of the hip joints to the back skirt armor instead of the conventional middle of the crotch piece..... This causes the legs to almost do a split under it's own weight, but not nearly that severely.
Accessories: The category that this figure really really really shines. Basically the part where you pay 500 yens extra. There are a pair of fists, a pair of hands for holding the guns, a pair of hands for holding the knives, and one spread out open left hand. The usual stand which pretty much comes in every Revoltech pretty much.
You can snap on extra armor for the full armor mode. It replace the more Arbalest-like shoulder armor with the another armor piece along with what is called the Lambda Driver Canceller. The head is replaced with the "cheesy" ponytail. (You know.... I wonder if it is a self-reference of that creepy pony~~~~ guy from Fumofu?) Lastly, the kneecap armor is replaced with a bigger piece..... as explained later. And then there are the superb choices of weapons.
Firstly is the Royal Ordanance M1108 Anti-Tank Daggers.
And then there's the Geotron Electronics GRAW-4 Monomolecular Cutters. The previously mentioned special knee cap armors from before. The folded up dagger are separate pieces, they unfortunately don't actually fold out.
The 76mm Shot Cannon, Boxer 2. Because shotgun is Sousuke's favorite weapon it seems, just like his pump action rubber bullet gun he casually carries to school.
2 Alliant Techsystems M1097 Anti-AS Grenade,
as seen here gripped by the specially designed mechanical arms around its lower chest. The lower chest pieces come off and can be replaced by these mechanical claws. These arms give Al, the robot's AI, direct control and facilitate weapon switching and other assistance for Sousuke.
The new shoulder armors both have 2 pegs each to attach weapons.
Specifically, the Seward・arsenal 165mm Multi-purpose Demolition Gun. The double joints allow the gun to be pulled down from the shoulder, making it look like the VSBR for Gundam F91. Since the gun is a confined grip, the lower arm rest part of the handle separates. The trigger itself can be rotated to fit with the way the hands are angled. Pretty thoughtful.
The Howitzer long barrel substitution, which switches out the shorter barrel. Normally stored also on the shoulder via a handclaw similar to the ones on the chest.
Overall, I think this is one of the cooler Revoltechs. Tons of accessories, tons of fun. Reading its wikipedia entry, there seems to be one more weapon for it. I am not complaining too much. Hopefully, they will make more Arm Slaves from FMP!, such as Arbalest and the Halberd.
