With another milestone for HMM coming up next year, an article has been added for the HMM Zoids 3rd Public Planning Meeting held back in 2011, or in particular, the event page that was once posted about it (but since removed from the website). This article is an interesting look into the predecessors of major events like Stand River, and featured the discussions where Kotobukiya officially decided to release the massive Gojulas for the very first time. As usual, this article relies on machine translations, so may have mistakes. If you're interested in assorted staff discussions, though, give it a read!

 

 A shocking new collaboration was announced between Bandai and Takara Tomy, which will result in a brand new Liger Zero action figure! For Takara Tomy's side, they're recreating the Mobile Suit Gundam "White Base" within the Tomica line. Meanwhile, Bandai is recreating the Liger Zero within its Chogokin line. Chogokin figures include metal alloy parts, and typically run in the higher price ranges. It's expected to be released sometime in 2023. The twitter account for Bandai Spirits posted a look at this figure, both with its final form, and with the fully-detailed armorless variety!

 An article on Hobby Watch showed off more images from the event, with the Zero in a leaping pose. Furthermore, they showed the interesting prototypes, which (from left to right) were the Initial Mechanism Trial, Appearance Trial, and Appearance / Mechanism Modification Trial, with the final result at the end. Mantan Web showed a second view of the kit.

- Dream Together

 

 TakaraTomy is collaborating with the vocational school HAL to create videos! In this project, student teams created a number of videos based on licensed series, all posted on the HAL Project page. It was interesting to see the different takes, with some students aiming for a more serious sequence of events while others enjoyed making some silly, light-hearted projects.

- Video 1

- Video 2

- Video 3

- Video 4

 

 Medabots S, a mobile game for the Medabots series, is collaborating with Takara Tomy to bring two Zoids Wild Zero inspired medabot skins to the game, Beast Liger, Genospino, Rising Liger, Fangtiger (themed after the Aldridge version), Fire Genospino, and Sniptera. The collab also includes character artwork of Medabots characters wearing Zoids Wild ZERO inspired outfits.

 

 In a rather unexpected turn of events, korean gaming company ACT Games will be launching an NFT-based Zoids Wild project. Western fans are quite adverse to anything block chain adjascent, and with the game relying heavily on cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, obviously, reviews have been less than positive. For now, we'll just cover what we know about the game itself.

 Twitter account ZoidsWild (Wait, this name was never claimed before now?) serves as the game's official account, and they have a gorgeous promo video as their top post. This is the same style of video used for the Zoids Wild Infinity Blast opening, and it's well worth a watch, even if you're not into the game concept.

 Fans were apprehensive about the game's website in its earlier iteration, which featured mostly reused assets, such as loading screens from Infinity Blast falsely rebranded as "Concept Art" (it is not concept art for this game at all) as well as reused models and assets from the switch games. This shady opening didn't do the developers any favors, but it seems things are now moving along in full swing. The site also featured profiles for some of the associated cards, with animated Zoid images and basic stats. The nice part about this is that, while it's still reused data (mostly the existing profiles), it's nice to see them in English.

 The game was shown off at Licensing Japan, a large game licensing event, where various promotions were exhibited. The Teaser Clip confirmed that further asset reuse extended to the variations from Battle Card Hunter, such as the Spideath Dusk. While this is also somewhat controversial, it'll be interesting to see some of those BCH variants without lighting effects obscuring their true colors.

 Since then, the Twitter account has been introducing various Zoids that'll star in the game, including Rising Liger, Blade Liger, Beast Liger, and Wild Liger, with an additional concept video of the Wild Liger.

 

 First, as we get back into the swing of things, there's a new update for Official Fan Book 3! It now includes the Guylos Empire Battle Machine Beast Corps, a description of several newer Zoids of the Empire, the Imperial Army Ace Pilot Directory (with translations courtesy of Falcarius!), and the Imperial Army Organization Chart. That just leaves the upcoming & custom Zoids and the product info for this book!

(You may also notice that the book section has changed to include all book series on one page! We hope that this will make it easier to find what you're looking for.)

 

 The Zoids Model Kit section has some new images at the top, to better represent model kit instructions. However, there's also a new section! For those who aren't aware, the color charts we do for the Zoids Index mostly use the images from the instruction manuals. Those PSDs have now been released for people to use for their own coloring purposes! They're a great way to build concepts of how you want your custom-painted model kits to look, and include numerous color layers to make things easier. These files are PSDs, intended for use in Photoshop.

 

 So we have a ton of new entries for the Zoids Index, mostly focusing on those obscure Zoid variations everybody knows from the Saga Games and Battle Story. Many of them even include additional images you might not have seen before, from magazines like CoroCoro.

 The following Zoid entries have their basic information, what available weapons info could be filled in between magazines and source parts, and their military history (if featured in the later OFBs.)

 - Boost Liger
 - Blitzer Wolf
 - Gator Radome
 - Geno Scissors
 - Geno Trooper
 - Hel Digunner DT
 - Proto Breaker
 - Redler Interceptor
 - Shield Liger DCS
 - Shield Liger DCS-J
 - Shield Liger Holotech
 - Shield Liger LMA
 - Shield Liger LMB
 - Shield Liger MK-II
 - Slayer Liger
 - Sniper Liger

 Blitzer Wolf also contains discussion about its origin as a custom contest Zoid.

 The following Zoids have color charts as well!

 - Geno Trooper
 - Proto Breaker
 - Shield Liger DCS
 - Shield Liger DCS-J
 - Shield Liger LMA
 - Shield Liger LMB
 - Shield Liger MK-II

 The Blade Liger AB has also received an update covering its Combat History, and the following Zoids have received sections for their primary Media Appearances: Blade Liger, Blade Liger AB, Command Wolf, Geno Saurer, Geno Breaker, and Death Saurer. They're missing a few but they'll be added in steadily. Finally, the Command Wolf, König Wolf, and Liger Zero X have all had their Index images replaced with the stock model kit images to better represent the core Zoid. In Zero X's case, the colors have been digitally altered to account for how washed out the original photos were.

 

 Summaries have been added for Episode 7 through 10 of Zoids Wild ZERO! This includes a ton of screencaps, automatic translations of the text in the Zoid profiles at the end, notable facts from the episodes, and best-guess translations of screen glyphs that appeared during them.

 In addition, the Zoids section for this series has been expanded. The icon gallery now properly links to the Zoids' profile pages, which covers their website profiles (where applicable), all variations, weapons info, history within the anime series, and screenshot examples for almost everything up until Episode 10. Organizing the many variations can be a little tricky, so my apologies if the pages are cluttered!

 

 The Zoids Wild Biographies section has been updated with a page for the Hunter Wolf Victor Spiegel Special! This includes an automatic translation of the Wolf's story, and official product photos posted by the company.

 

 A new model kit review has been uploaded to the NJR Section for the RZ-075 Rayse Tiger! This is quite an interesting kit, with some new gimmicks and unusual build conventions. That's not just counting the glow in the dark or LED-tube based features, either. A highly recommended kit, and cheap to pick up on Yahoo Japan.

 

 In the continued effort to expand the model kit info on the site, a new section has been added dedicated to the OJR (Original Japanese Release), a fan-coined term for the 80s kits. For now this includes a (not 100% complete) thumbnail list, but in the future will be expanded to include the box lore from these Zoids as well.

 

 Well, its been a hot minute since we looked at this series. The Smack Zoids articles have received a section for The World of Super-Large Zoids, which includes coverage on the huge transporter Zoids seen in the March 2002 issue. This includes translations of their text blurbs courtesy of Falcarius.

 

 With the prototype reveal for the HMM König Wolf and Redler, there's a lot of hype going around! To celebrate, a page has been created over in Books for the Art of HMM. At this time, it doesn't include the bulk of the book. It does, however, contain a cleaned up machine translation for the interview featured at the back of the book! This roundtable discussion goes over the history of the HMM series, how it began, how each of the major team members got involved, and what to expect in the future. It also discusses the highest-ranking fan requests from recent years, including the Ultra Saurus and Death Saurer!

 

 Kotobukiya recently posted a look at the prototype for the HMM König Wolf, as well as the Redlers. The articulation on this kit looks superb, especially regarding cheek armor that now folds out to prevent obstructing neck movement and rotating ears.

 A recent LABO Article went into greater detail about these prototypes, and discussed some of their core features. In the mean time, the wolves, their associated CPs, and the Redler products have been on display in Japan for visitors to come and check them out. Details include:
 - Movable Ears
 - Rubber belts are used for the head and chest belts
 - The tail is articulated at the base as well as in the middle
 - The Dual Sniper Rifle has telescoping barrels
 - The Dual Sniper Rifle comes with several adapters, allowing it to be equipped to 3mm joints, and even to the old Tomy version.
 - The 5-Shot Missile Pods also include multiple port sizes, so they can be connected to standard 3mm hard points.
 - For the Heavy Arms, you must choose which had you want to build with it, since the belts run through the parts and it will be difficult to swap later.
 - The blog teases for us to look forward to other Zoids that have ranked high in the questionnaires!

 

 First, let's get to older news. As mentioned in an earlier post, Kotobukiya has had the HMM König Wolf and Redler on display recently, along with their associated Customize Parts. An article by Hobby Watch gives a good view of this display. An older couple of twitter posts also showed off a look of the out-of-the-box Shield Liger Marking Plus Ver., which comes in a box closer to Liger Zero size than the classic Shield Liger box.

 Other recent rereleases included the Command Wolf Repackage (February 2022), the Iguan Marking Plus (March 2022), the Gun Sniper Wild Weasel Spec. (April 2022), the Dark Horn (June 2022), the Berserk Furher Repackage Ver. (July 2022), Great Sabre Marking Plus Ver (July 2022), and the Pteras Bomber Marking Plus Ver. (July 2022).

 The HMM Liger Zero Marking Plus Ver. is scheduled to be rereleased in October, for 6,930 (tax included).

 The HMM Gojulas the Ogre is scheduled to be rereleased in November, for 32,780 Yen (tax included).

 The HMM Iron Kong Marking Plus Ver. is scheduled to be released in December, for 15,400 Yen (tax included).

 The HMM Geno Breaker Repackage Ver. is scheduled to be rereleased in Jan of 2023 for 11,220 Yen (tax incl).

 There was also a long-overdue LABO article introducing the Death Stinger ZS. This is such an interesting kit, color wise, and I highly recommend it. If you're concerned about the degree of green, it may help to know that this kit includes multiple colors for some of the sprues, allowing you to choose between green and red!

 Soon after, a second LABO Article was posted for the HMM Rev Raptor, which also included early concept sketches for the box art. The other concept shown featured the Empire's landing on Ergyle Beach, shortly after the Rev Raptors had taken care of the defense forces and, ultimately, their Gojulas.

 

 February saw pre-orders open for the Xenorex Storm XA, the final installment thus far in the Zoids Wild Biographies line. It also included the end of the Zoids Wild Senki storyline, which after the last episode, was transitioned into a web-story format and published on TakaraTomy's website. The kit was first teased in January, with a clear nod towards the Storm Sworder from Tomy's old Zoids line. Afterwards, the kit was posted to the TakaraTomy Mall for 4,400 yen (tax included), with a release date of July 2022. The story was published on its site page.

 Some tweets also showed off various combinations of the Storm parts with other Zoids. one showed a combo between the Storm XA, Scissors XA, and Buster XA. The wings can also evidently be used on the Burning Liger.

- Xenorex Storm XA Promotional Video

 

 Earlier in the year a collaboration was announced between Zoids Wild and Duel Masters! Duel Masters was releasing a Duel Masters Super Complete Works 20th Perfect Box. While this box contained mostly Duel Masters goods (3 a4 size books containing card catalogs and illustration collections, limited cards, autographed illustrations, a poster, and assorted gifts) the box also contained the Bolmeteus White Dragon model kit, which was a variation of the Xenorex with completely new (and limited) parts! The box was released on July 29th, for 28,600 yen.

 A dedicated page showed off most of the box contents as well as the gorgeous limited edition art for the Bolmeteus White Dragon. Zoids Official also showed off the special promotional page featured in CoroCoro.

- Bolmeteus White Dragon Promo Video

 

 Official Fan Book 3 has been updated with profiles for the Helic Republic Zoids, pilots, and hierarchy! OFB3 introduces the use of charts to measure Zoid abilities for speed, fire power, maneuverability, etc. It also introduces some of our favorite Zoids, such as the Liger Zero!

 

 A new custom has been added to the bottom of the model kits page, the König Wolf Silver Fang! This is a page I've been excited about adding for a long time. Though this kit was finished in 2020, 2021 was such a chaotic year for me that it took forever to finish the photo taking and page setup. Silver Fang is a 3D printed conversion kit for the Tomy (motorized) König Wolf, developed, 3D modeled, and printed by the amazing Torrigan, who put countless hours into making sure that every single detail was perfect. Before starting work on this project, I never imagined I'd get my hands on a Silver Fang, and I'm eternally grateful!

 As this has been such a long-standing holy grail for me (over a decade!) I've made the files available for visitors of the website, so you can download and print your own version! The custom page goes into more detail about what you need to watch out for. My only request is that the files not be used for commercial purposes, either directly or indirectly. I'd love for this conversion kit to remain free above the cost of materials, so that everyone can enjoy it~