Kimi The Builder

Part 1?

HELLO! We are back!

In today’s 623rd edition of our Let’s Talk Gunpla segment, we’ll continue our retail release discussions. There is a lot to cover since Bandai dropped a lot of new kit announcements last week. Unfortunately, we don’t have much time to spare today, so we decided to cover two of them first, and then we will try to cover as much as we can in the next post.

Although admittedly, we have seen most of them back when Bandai revealed them during the Shizuoka Hobby Show event. So, most of you probably have already seen most of them. However, since we have received more details about these upcoming releases, we feel like revisiting some of these kits and discussing the new things that we learn about them.

So, without further ado. Let us get into it, shall we?

MG 1/100 ASW-G-08 Gundam Barbatos Lupus (MG)

Release Date: November 2025

Estimated price: JPY 7,150 (MYR 209.67* / USD 49.36* / EUR 42.95*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

Finally, Bandai dropped some more new information on this release. Although admittedly, there isn’t much to learn about since we already know from the start that we are getting something that is practically just a more roided-up version of the MG Barbatos.

But what we find interesting is that despite retaining some of the same parts from the MG Barbatos, Bandai also made some changes to the inner frame part, more specifically at the chest area, which will enable it to have more extreme articulation on its chest unit.

We don’t know why there is a need to improve the MG Barbatos chest unit joints since the original version already had a decent chest articulation, but we admit, it is a nice addition.  But to be honest? We don’t think all of that matters when you have all the armor installed on the MG Barbatos Lupus’s inner frame, because there is a possibility that the new thick armor will be the one to limit the inner frame’s articulation.

Also, Bandai made it a point to tell us that this version will come with a lot of weapons. Not that we are surprised about it, since we already know the Barbatos Lupus is an up-gunned and up-armored version of the bog standard Barbatos. But even with that said, it’s not like we have nothing to be excited about here, because for this version, we are getting the two-arm-mounted 200mm Gun.   

Why are we interested in this, you ask? Do you remember the huge smoothbore cannon that the Barbatos got?

Because those were a joy to build, and not to mention, quite an interesting weapon design that we’ve seen on a Gunpla to date. So, we are interested to see what they do here with the 200mm Gun since it is a scaled-down version of the Smoothbore cannon.

All in all, we are very excited about this one, and we are looking forward to buying it this November.  

HG 1/144 MS-06 Zaku (HGGQX)

Release Date: November 2025

Estimated price: JPY 2,420 (MYR 71.08* / USD 16.72* / EUR 14.54*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation

Admittedly, we had a bit of a dilemma with this one; we were wondering if we should combine this and the Char version into one discussion, since they are the same kit, just with different colors. Or should we separate the discussion?

But since we are going to keep most of our discussion short and sweet for this post, we decided to go with the latter. Despite being the same thing, there are enough differences for us to justify separating the two from each other.

So, you might be wondering what is new with this version.

Well, unlike the HGGQX Military Police Zaku, with this version, you get the iconic 30mm Bazooka, new shoulder armor, the iconic Zaku II color scheme, and a decal sticker set. Well, just like the HGGQX Char’s Zaku.

But if you are familiar with the HGGQX Military Police Zaku, we imagine the experience working on the HGGQX Zaku wouldn’t be that big of a difference. Although we have a feeling looking at some of the HGGQX Zaku’s decal designs here, we reckon that the Sticker decals are going to be much easier to deal with compared to the HGGQX Military Police Zaku’s.

But even with that said? We are still interested in getting this since we did have a lot of fun working on the HGGQX Military Police Zaku, so we wouldn’t mind getting this one. Plus, we are starting to like how this Zaku looks now.

This concludes the 623rd edition of the Let’s Talk Gunpla segment. We know the latest post is a bit short and sweet. Not to mention that by the time we release this isn’t all that new anymore, but we still wanna get our thoughts on them out there, so we can move on to other kit discussions.

Anyway, we will be back soon with a new blog post! So we do look forward to seeing you guys then!

Also, you might have noticed a slight change to our posts, which is because we recently added a donation tab to our posts to help keep this site running and to fund our future projects. However, we want to clarify that we will not be placing any of our content behind a paywall. All of our content will remain free for everyone to access.

The reason why we decided to add the donation tab is that after managing this blog with our funds for so long, we’ve found that even with ads, it hasn’t been enough to maintain the site without putting ourselves in debt. We have tried our best not to resort to this, since we are doing this blog for fun, and we really didn’t plan to earn money from doing this.

However, since the start of the year, we have been struggling financially to keep this site running, and we refuse to give up on it after putting so much work into it.

So that is why, for the first time after running this site for so long, we are finally asking for help from you, our readers.

If you appreciate what we do and want us to continue providing this content, we would greatly appreciate any support through donations to help keep us afloat.

If you can’t or don’t want to contribute, that’s perfectly fine! You’re still supporting us by sharing, commenting, and reading everything we post here. We truly appreciate all the likes on our posts and your feedback!

As always, we welcome both positive and negative feedback, so feel free to share your thoughts.

Even on this donation tab.

We are incredibly grateful for your support, and we hope to see you again in the next post!

Once again, thank you.