With a PG, head LEDs are basically a given.. It takes 2 LR41 batteries, which are included with the kit.
A clear diffuser cover and a silver reflective sticker are used to spread and reflect the light.
LED on by itself vs. with the diffuser clear part attached. Quite a difference, right?
LED lit up on the bare frame
Once the armor is on, you need to pop off the back of the head and flip the switch at the back of the neck to turn the LED on.
LED lit up with the head armor on. Light is supposed to come out in various places, but there's quite a bit of unwanted light bleed in spots it shouldn't be.
Cockpit hatch open. You can only peek in from above.
There's an opening gimmick where the chest armor spreads outward. The shape looks a bit suggestive somehow ^^;
Shoulder mount pin range of motion, up/down and forward/back. For a PG, it's nothing special but not bad either.
When bending forward, the front cover of the chest cockpit moves to give the waist a slightly wider range of motion.
The front skirt is connected with soft parts so it's pretty flexible, but..
Since the front skirt itself can rotate anyway, it probably won't get in the way of articulation much.
The rear skirt rotates too.
The beam saber storage on the rear skirt can open up slightly as well.
The C-shaped side skirt connector used on the PG Astray and others has been carried over here, so you can reposition the side skirts in various ways.
You can slide open the side skirt cover to mount weapons.
The chest ducts move up and down.
The GN Drive blah blah blah engraved on the back..
Body frame. The form prioritizes sculptural presence over fine detail.
Hologram sheet on the sides and crotch area.
The assembly process for the center of the body is really unique. It's a joining structure that makes you feel like something interesting is about to happen..
This is the basic body frame built around a circular ring.
The neck, shoulders, and waist all move in an arc along the central circular ring. It's a pretty clever idea having all the joints around the body travel along the same circumference!
The cockpit unit is inserted into the center hole as you build up the body.
Multiple linked gimmicks on the shoulder mount. They managed to fit a double-linked gimmick into that tight little space..;
The waist bends sideways as if rotating along the circumference of the torso. It's quite a unique waist articulation gimmick.
Frame articulation when the waist folds forward
The 4 cover pins that close the back cover are also articulated.
The U-shaped side skirt joint. The range of motion seems narrower compared to other kits using the same structure. Not that the side skirts get in the way much anyway..
Slightly improved hip joint mechanism. The method where the locking pins shift position diagonally up and down isn't new, but the locking pins themselves have been improved.
Since the locking pins snap snugly into the recessed area of the hip joint, there's almost no risk of the hip joint locking mechanism coming undone. Still, being a brand new PG and all, it's nice that they went ahead and fixed even these minor annoyances. :-)
Goes without saying, but both hip joints can be moved and locked independently.
The port for plugging in a display stand can also be covered with a cap.
The backpack frame
Backpack vernier nozzles.
The double GN Drive mounting section.
The frame detail looks pretty nice.
The GN Drive plugs into that large round hole there.
With the backpack armor on. The detail is pretty simple as expected..
Opening the covers on both sides exposes the connection point for the 00 Raiser.
The backpack and GN Driver mounting section. Sharp-eyed folks will notice that the left and right are swapped in the photos. =.- I'll have them on the correct sides in the main review, so please bear with me.
The GN Drive mounting section can move in plenty of different directions.
You can also slide the mounting section out a bit to extend its length further.
And one of the biggest highlights of this kit — the GN Drive special effect gimmick..
It takes a CR2032 coin battery, which is included with the kit itself, so you don't need to buy one separately.
A red cover is attached to the bottom of the GN Drive.
The switch for this special effect gimmick is the entire cone-shaped piece on top. It's a toggle switch — press once to turn it on, press again to turn it off.
When you flip the switch, the circular LED rings start spinning faster and faster with a whirring sound. It's set to stop automatically after 1 minute, but pressing the switch again will also stop it.
Seeing is believing!
Check out the video reviews from various angles to see the actual movement and hear the sound for yourself!
View from the side. You can see the circular LED rings spinning.
View looking straight down from above. You can clearly see the spinning motion.
Looking down at an angle with the lighting dimmed a bit.
The green clear parts seem thinner than those on the legs.. You can clearly see the stickers through the clear parts.
The hologram sheet exposed at the shoulder joint.
The hologram sheet at the shoulder joint isn't held in very securely. When you fiddle with it to press the clutch joint, it tends to pop off and the hologram sheet comes loose all the time.. That particular part would probably be better off glued down for your own sanity.
The range of motion is a bit reduced with the armor on compared to the bare frame.
The arm frame. It's a bit.. plain T_T Come on, couldn't they have thrown in some detail or something..
Hologram sheets scattered across the shoulders and arms. Except for the shoulders, they're hidden behind the outer armor and can't be seen. The hologram sheets are really just part of the frame.
Just like the knees, the arms also use double joints to achieve a full bend.
On top of the round rotating section, there's an additional bend point inside the upper forearm.
The elbow joint framework.
How the additional elbow joint below the clutch joint works Just like the knee area on the legs, a dual gimmick causes the inner elbow structure to extend in sync.
When you move this joint below the elbow, the internal gimmick gets exposed quite a bit. But maybe because it's not shaped like a piston cylinder... it doesn't really look that cool T_T
Since the elbow is a double joint, some pretty weird poses are possible.
While the legs only had one clutch joint, the arms use no fewer than three — at the shoulder, elbow, and wrist.
The structure and principle of the clutch joints are identical to those on the legs. They just differ in size depending on the location.
Two clutch plates mesh together via spring tension, and you release the clutch by pressing the spring with your finger before moving the joint.
The clutch sections of the arm's clutch joints. They mesh together like gear teeth.
The elbow gets the large one, while the shoulder and wrist get the smaller ones.
There's also a dedicated assembly tool included to brace against while turning the screws, though honestly you can manage just fine without it.
The wrist and shoulder clutch joints are inserted from the inner side of the arm.
The elbow clutch joint, on the other hand, goes in from the outside.
The hologram sheet slides up and down in sync with the wrist movement... but again, once it's all assembled, it's another area where you can barely tell T_T
To move the shoulder, you have to lift the shoulder armor up, press the clutch joint firmly, and then move it. When installing the shoulder clutch joint, make sure to follow the manual and seat it correctly. Unlike other joints, if it's not seated properly it tends not to work right, and compared to the other joints you really need to press down hard with your fingers to get it moving. A light press barely does anything;
The elbow joint moves easily with just a light press. In fact, pressing it too hard can sometimes cause it not to spring back out properly. There's plenty of spring tension, so I'd recommend just a light, gentle press before moving it.
The wrist clutch joint also seems to have a narrow spring gap... you need to press it down fairly firmly to get it to move.
The range of motion on the wrist joint that requires pressing the clutch. It moves reasonably well in frame-only state, but once the armor is on, it's limited to about two knuckles' worth of movement, which is a bit disappointing.. ; Makes you wonder if a clutch joint was really necessary given how limited the range is.. ?
The shoulder armor and inner frame. Again, it's a plain frame with almost no detail.
Somewhat un-PG-like... you actually assemble the fingers yourself. That said, the method is designed with ease of assembly in mind. As shown, you remove the middle knuckle of each finger and slot it between the first and third knuckles above it.
In other words, you detach only the second knuckle and fit it — still on the runner — between the first and third knuckles, then remove the whole thing from the runner together.
Doing this for every finger — just popping out the middle knuckle and slotting it in — does make assembly noticeably easier. Above all, rather than cleaning up gate marks on each individual finger piece, It's much easier to trim things with all three joints fitted together like this.
The hands are also designed so you can fit them while still on the runner, then remove them afterward.
There's an extra fold in the middle knuckle between the palm and fingers, which makes the hand articulation feel a lot more natural.
The finished hand. It's definitely, very, quite, extremely, considerably more solid than the typical one-piece molded PG hands. At least you won't have to worry about the finger joints popping out.
Closed fist
The articulation is smooth, the joints aren't loose, and it doesn't fall apart easily. To be honest, it's clearly an upgrade over the old one-piece molded fingers.. Though the ABS material is pretty hard, so the gate marks show up quite noticeably. -.-
Detailed leg shots. As you can see, the external detail is kept very simple.
The GN Drive glow sections on the sides of the knees use a pretty deep green clear color, so you can't really see inside all that well. They did put some nice-looking stickers in there, but.. hmm.
Foot section.
Now, the first thing anyone's curious about with a PG is the inner frame..
Full shot of the leg inner frame. It leans more toward overall form and sculpt, rather than fine surface detail.
Just like the MG Exia, you need to pay attention to the orientation of the hologram sheet when assembling. For those who have trouble reading Japanese, here's the deal: between the smooth side and the rough side, you need to insert it with the rough side (right photo) facing outward — that's what gives you the rainbow shimmer depending on the angle of light. Alternatively, as shown in the upper left photo, the side where you can read the English letters is the outer face, so keep that in mind.
Hologram sheets attached at various spots on the thighs and legs. Unlike the Exia, they're only visible on the inner frame — once you put the armor on, they're almost completely hidden. So on the 00, you'd have to think of the hologram sheets as just part of the inner frame.
Some of them are only faintly visible from the inside when you bend the knee.
On both sides of the thighs, there's a detail where clear parts are sandwiched in the middle.
Taking a closer look at just the feet..
Front and rear foot frames. Barely any detail to speak of.
The same anti-slip rubber stickers for the soles that were used on the PG Astray are included here too. They give the feet amazing grip on surfaces, but.. since most people will probably display it on a stand anyway, I'm not sure how necessary they really are. ;;
There's a gimmick where the side brackets on both legs open up and the cover behind the knee opens as well.
This is to allow the clutch gimmick to be inserted and removed.
The most defining gimmick of the PG 00 — the advanced clutch joint mechanism. It's more complex than you'd expect.
So I heard it was a clutch joint and took a closer look.. It really is the exact same mechanism as a manual transmission clutch in a car. The toothed friction surfaces that lock together firmly face each other, and the play between them allows for a complete lock/release.
So, as shown in the photo above, when the spring is under tension and holding everything in place, the clutch teeth on the left side mesh together, making rotation impossible.
But when you press the round part, the spring compresses and the meshed gear clutches separate, allowing rotation.
The clutch gimmick is divided and locked by a two-stage pin located inside the round part of the knee. In other words, unless you release the clutch, the upper and lower locking pins stay meshed together and locked, so nothing moves..
Simply put, you have to press that round part firmly with your finger to rotate the lower leg. The lock is so tight that you need quite a bit of force to get it to rotate.. If you don't press it, it absolutely will not turn.
However, the 00's knee joint is a system that bends at two points — upper and lower — but the clutch gimmick is only applied to the lower pivot. The upper pivot uses a ratchet gimmick instead of the clutch.
If you look closely at the upper knee pivot, it's shaped like a gear, and there's a separate gear friction pin on top of it to keep it from rotating too easily.
So when you rotate the upper knee, click-click-click.. it makes that sound and the joint bends in small incremental steps. This part is pretty stiff.. it doesn't bend easily.. but it's a design that makes me a little worried about the long-term durability of the friction surfaces.
Anyway, the knee joint locks up incredibly solid at both the upper and lower points, while still achieving a near-full bend.
Note that there's almost no difference in articulation before and after adding the armor!
The knee armor splits and folds in two stages depending on the bending angle.
The internal movement gimmicks as seen with one half of the inner frame removed. There are quite a lot of articulation points.
First, when you bend the upper knee pivot, the front structure slides down in two stages, and inside that, even a small hologram panel slides along in sync. At the same time, the cover at the back of the knee folds up and down in a linked motion — it's an in~cred~ibly clever and complex design.
The lower knee pivot also has the front structure split into two stages and move in sync. This is exactly what you'd expect from a PG.. ^_^
The front of the foot folds in two stages.
If you look closely, when you fold the front of the foot, the top-of-foot armor slides slightly forward. It's a slide gimmick worthy of a PG, with attention paid even to the smallest details.
The armor on top of the foot is thoughtfully designed to slide upward so the ankle can bend forward more easily.
The 00's unique ankle rotation gimmick rotates in two stages.
The ankle bend range isn't as large as you might expect. The HG 00's ankle joint that bent 90 degrees was a bit odd.. but even so, you can't help feeling a little let down — even though the side-to-side ankle rotation range here is actually really good.
Seeing them in person, the beam parts are no joke in terms of size..
GN Sword II
True to PG standards, the blade parts are finished with plated parts. This kit only uses plating in this one spot, which feels a bit stingy for a PG.
On the other hand, seeing how even the tiniest little areas are broken up into separate parts, I guess it really is a PG after all. ^^;
Center section detail.
The fixing pin used to attach it to the side. The pin can rotate and its length can be adjusted to some extent.
Transformed into rifle mode.
The handle transformation is on the same level as the HG/MG. The difference is that the back-of-hand cover parts are broken up into separate pieces all the way to the inside.
There's a hidden connection gimmick at the end of the handle — pull it out and you can connect two GN Sword IIs symmetrically like a spear, as shown above.
With the extra beam parts attached. Slap those on and it gets almost uncomfortably large..
GN Shield
The detail on the inside of the blade looks pretty decent.
Feels like there should be all sorts of PG-worthy gimmicks hiding in there..
Both the white blade section and the blue shield section slide independently.
For the blade, there are tiny tab structures on the inside to lock it in place.
The shield mounting section on the inside also slides independently.
The fixing pin used to attach it to the 00 Raiser or arm section can be retracted and extended.
The fixing pin needed to mount it under the 00 Gundam's GN Drive is also movable.
The fixing pins used to join the GN Shields together.
Combined GN Shield
The detail on the beam saber handle is pretty clean.
GN Sword III in rifle mode.
The blade being made of soft green clear parts is great, but since even the 1/100 and HG came with the same treatment, it doesn't really feel all that impressive..
Handle and muzzle detail. The muzzle end is definitely nicely detailed, as you'd expect from a PG.
Movement of the locking gimmick
There's a mysterious-looking movable gimmick in there.. It's actually a locking part for securing it to the underside of the 00 Raiser.
Rotate the blade 180 degrees to use it as a sword.
GN Sword III in sword mode.
The beam parts for the GN Sword III are absolutely massive. Seeing them in person.. they're almost laughably huge. -.-
GN Sword III with the clear parts attached
It measures up to 40cm in length. PG weapons really do overwhelm you with sheer size..
You can see the blade showing through the inside of the clear parts.
Since it needs to be locked in from 4 directions when attaching to the GN Sword III, you have to carefully align the frame before pushing it in.
These are the additional weapon parts that mount onto the 00 Raiser.
Triple-barrel hand missile unit. Similar to the one Kyrios was equipped with. You'd think there'd be actual missiles inside, but.. it's just a hollow shell. Feels a bit lacking for a PG..
Particle disruption missile. A weapon that disrupts GN particles within a certain area.
GN Condenser. Used to replenish GN particles, the energy source for the Gundams.
GN missiles. A total of 8 are included, in 2 pairs each.
The 2-way stand included as a first-run limited bonus.
What's unique about this stand is.. the main support and the secondary support can be separated and used as individual stands on their own.
It's called a 2-way stand because you can place the 00 Raiser on the lower section and the 00 on the upper section, just like this — that's why it's called a 2-way stand.
Shape of the fixing section on the lower 00 Raiser support stand.
Shape of the fixing section on the upper 00 Gundam support stand.
An additional adapter can be attached to the upper fixing section to mount the 00 Raiser as well.
The large U-shaped adapter is for the 00 Raiser — it's the adapter used to connect to the stand when the GN Sword III is attached to the underside.
Top and bottom views of the straight built 00 Raiser.
Orange clear parts.
The cockpit hatch in the center of the body can also be opened, and there's a Haro to the front-right of the cockpit. ^^
Another hatch-open gimmick in the center section.
The movable section attached to the rear-center of the body serves as a locking hook when docking with the 00 Gundam later.
Parts layout of the nose section.
Neatly packed detail on the underside of the body.
The linked gimmick on the tail section. Pull the center piece and the four structures on both sides open automatically. Closing them works the same way via the linkage.
Internal structure of the tail linkage gimmick.
It's a pretty fun gimmick that's worthy of the PG line.
The underside of the body also features a landing gear gimmick.
The landing gear fully extended. A bit short though..
The landing gear is so short that it's not much different from just setting it flat on the ground. ^^;
The side binder movement gimmick works the same as the existing HG and 1/100 versions.
The missile hatch open gimmick on the side binder. Pull the black structure on the inside outward and the blue cover on the outside lifts up.
Looking at the internal structure, it's a simple lever principle.
Then the missile hatch opening that was subtly hidden opens up like you see on the right.
If you look closely, there are missile launch holes behind the opening, but they're small so they're hard to see..
Clear parts are embedded inside the side binders.
Wings that are thick and voluminous, as befitting the large scale.
The side binder connection point used when docking with the 00 Raiser main body.
Rotate this connection point and spread the two rod gimmicks out into a circular shape to complete the docking gimmick with the 00 Gundam. Unlike the HG and 1/100, it locks by wrapping around the GN Drive.
The hinge gimmick on the 00 Raiser main body for docking with the 00 Gundam.
Part of the main body also has an internal frame.
Top/bottom internal frame of the nose section.
The frame around the cockpit.
Top/bottom frame of the tail section.
The side binders don't really have much of an internal frame to speak of, but..
There is a frame structure in part of the front with clear parts embedded inside.
The GN Sword III comes with one odd-looking part...
It's an adapter for attaching the GN Sword III to the underside of the 00 Raiser.
Pull out the locking mechanism from the bottom of the GN Sword III and plug it into the adapter.
To connect to the stand with the GN Sword III attached, you need to fit in the U-shaped connector piece.
Attaching the 00 Raiser's exclusive add-on weapons. Just one side binder alone carries a total of 5 different weapons.
With the GN Sword III and all the add-on weapons mounted.
