Kotobukiya Super Robot War

Rein Weiβritter

Kit Review

Straight build

The Rein Weißritter has arrived — essentially an upgraded version of the Weißritter. The overall design concept stays true to the Weißritter, but it's been upgraded to be far more flashy, colorful, and complex all around. And it's not just the design and color separation that got an upgrade over the Weißritter — the joints and detailing have clearly been improved as well.

In terms of parts breakdown, the color separation gets you 95% or more of the way to the source design, even if not quite 100%. Kotobukiya's color separation game had been getting stronger with each release, but with the Rein Weißritter, you can really feel a level of craftsmanship that makes you think "okay, this is just ridiculous." You don't even need me to explain it — just look at the photos above. It's honestly amazing how a straight build alone can deliver such a bold and intense color combination.

The joints are also a step up from older Kotobukiya kits — you can hold pretty much any pose without worrying too much about it falling apart, and as long as you apply a bit of glue to the few parts with weaker snap-fit, you won't have joints popping out on you. The Howling Launcher is huge and looks like there's no way one arm could hold it, but if you rest the tail section lightly against something, the arm strength alone is enough to keep it up.

The yellow band sections on the sides and rear legs are done in soft parts, and the molded color looks incredibly rich and natural. It could easily have ended up looking like cheap, washed-out yellow, but the color is so deep and saturated that it really works. The blue on the wings comes pre-painted, though the paint quality feels a little lacking — the edges are a bit fuzzy and there are some slight bleed-throughs here and there. That's probably the one blemish on an otherwise great kit.

Anyway, this is a design that's no easy feat to turn into plastic — but the ever-generous Kotobukiya went ahead and pulled it off in injection plastic, writing another chapter in the history of color separation. If you want a big, flashy straight build, you'd be hard-pressed to find anything that tops the Rein Weißritter. :-)

Rein Weiβritter | 2008. 11 | ¥4,800

AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.