The AZ-04 Shield Liger, themed after Bang's Shield Liger from Chaotic Century has been up for pre-order for a while now. It's scheduled for a June release for 11,000 yen (tax included). Like the other A-Z Zoids, it comes with an unpainted pilot figure of Bang, Fine, and Zeke. We've also got some preview videos for it!

- Product Review

- Commercial

 Zoids Official posted a custom of the AZ-01 Blade Liger, based on the Blade Destroy, which featured in Zoids Official Fan Book 2. They did an excellent job with this customization! In addition, the Blade Liger sold so well that it's already up for a rerelease, scheduled to be released again in March.

 For those who couldn't attend the physical event in Japan, the Big Zoids Expo has moved much of its merchandise online, including with restocks of plenty of merch! Their store is already linked to a proxy service, so you can order even if you're from outside of Japan. The shop even includes some new items, such as the Medal Collection. Some event-exclusive items, such as the Fubuki Fox have also showed up again.

 In an exciting turn of events the HMM Fire Fox is up for rerelease in the form of a Marking Plus kit! It'll be rereleased in March for 6,820 yen. The Fire Fox was released back in April of 2013, so its rerelease has been a decade-long wait for many members of the franchise.

 Starting on December 15th, Kotobukiya began giving away HMM Zoids Package Art Special Desk Calendars with every purchase of an HMM Zoid from their store front. This campaign is until supplies last, so I'm not sure if it's still ongoing.

 The HMM Green Horn has gotten its LABO Article, which features example sketches of early box concepts and a look at the decals. It isn't the only one, though. There's a blog for the Red Horn MPV released on January 18th. It covers the differences, such as the inclusion of the round parts from the Green Horn / Dark Horn, the inclusion of clear colorless parts, and the transition from stickers to water slide decals. This blog also gives some insight to development, such as their move away from decal guides to prevent the kit from needing to be delayed further simply to make these charts, and how they strive to make decal sizes match those of old Tomy Zoids, making them cross compatible with the old motorized kits wherever possible. Supposedly, the next blog will introduce their latest completely new item.

 Last but not least, the HMM Death Stinger is up for rerelease in May for 16,280 yen (tax included) and Pteras Bomber in June for 5,280!

 The Hunter Wolf MPD is now available on the TakaraTomy Mall for 4,950 yen, with a release date set for June. It also had a preview video made!

- Product Review

 Takara Tomy held a giveaway campaign collaboration with Bub. The campaign would give away kits, Bub products, the hot spring stickers, and stickers featuring Bub's logo for making your own Bub Zoids! They also showed off their Bub Liger on Twitter.

 Hobby Japan is releasing a 40th Anniversary Zoids Encyclopedia, which is exciting news! This book will be released on February 28th and will cover more than 600 items throughout Zoids history, including event items, game and magazine benefit items, and even concept art. This is exciting as we haven't had much supplementary book material for Zoids since Wild. Shogakukan's site listed the book at 168 pages, and it'll be released for 4,950 yen. You can pre-order yours on Amazon Japan.

 TakaraTomy is collabing with Seiko to release some high-end Zoids Watches! Be warned, though, these items will be few in number at 300 units each. The watch comes with a special box. It's scheduled to release in April for 59,400 yen.

 Kotobukiya's Art of HMM Plus, a sequel to their Art of HMM book is scheduled to be released in February for 2,970 Yen! This book will include art from about 20 kits not featured in the previous book, will include most of the instruction manual information, and more. It's listed on some sites as 168 pages. The latest post contains a video showing off a flip through this book with its incredible full color images.

 Those who order from Kotobukiya Direct will receive a special cover which features the HMM Geno Breaker Repackage boxart. Please be warned, however, that a similar promotion was run for the previous book, and Kotobukiya was shipping these covers in a ridiculously long box with the book and cover lined up side by side, and cling wrapped to a cardboard backing. This meant that shipping was way more expensive than it needed to be (6000+ yen). We are unsure if this practice is still in play.

 The Medarot twitter posted quite a bit of content for their Zoids collaboration. This included concept art for the Command Wolf Irvine, the Geno Saurer, the Shield Liger, and the Blade Liger. (Though not official, former webcomic artist Tanimeso posted their idea for a Konig Wolf version~). They also showed off the character costumes, additional Zoids, and some cut scenes from the game.

 Zoids Official posted several more videos from HAL, a 3D & animation school. Each one featured Zoiko, a mascot who originally came out around the time of the MPZ Kits, and has returned for the 40th anniversary promo videos! You can view them here: Link Link Link

 TakaraTomy's Youtube Channel has posted a video report of the Big Zoids Expo! Though the event is now over, it was a heck of an event. It's nice that the company has chosen to archive it in video form.

- Report Video

 In an exciting change of events, Zoids Official has announced a Machine Beast New Century Zoids Core Box! Machine Beast New Century was a term used later in the NJR era model kits, and what this box could contain is anyone's guess. The former Zoid Core Box contained the Zoids Mammoth model kit, a set of the Zoids Battle Story (OJR era books), Avenge of Proitzen book (mostly the story of OFB4 with different stats files), a set of metal pins featuring the Helic, Guylos, and Zenebas insignias, and a series of large print cards called the Zoids Bible, which featured the core lore of the franchise that many people still refer to today. It was quite a collection, and a holy grail of mine for many years (obtained a while back, actually!) Planning for this product has begun.

 The Big Zoids Expo is still going strong! Kotobukiya posted their own review of the event up 'til now, covering many of the exhibits. We're just about to round the corner toward the second phase of this event, with exhibits scheduled to swap out today. We've already seen teasers of the new model exhibit and the new concept art exhibit so it'll be interesting to see what new content is revealed for this event~

 As for status updates, the Murasame Liger Letter Opener increased from 4950 yen to 6600, but at a glance, that's the only price change we've been able to find. Some items have been noted out of stick, including the black logo T-shirts, purchase bonus stickers for the first half of the event (Republic), Blind Character/Zoid Badges, OJR Logo Shirt, Blind Box Art Acrylic Blocks, Blade Liger Face Shirts (below XXL), and Anniversary Shirts (besides M and XXL), Geno Saurer Raven Shirt (Large), 40th Anniversary Shirt (Medium), Zoid Core Pies, and Entry Bonus Cards. There have also been delays on the Tattoo Stickers, Character Stickers, and Blind Character Cards. (Huge thanks to Falc for tracking this!)

 When Hunter Wolf MPD was exhibited at the Big Zoids Expo, it was in front of a screen featuring a promotional video. This has now been posted online, along with a look at the weathered model kit by SigemikanZ and a dedicated Collaboration Page containing lore content!

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 The AZ Shield Liger received its own promotional video, this time animated from the perspective of Raven analyzing the Zoid from his Saber Tiger. This was a fun take on the existing promo video style, and it's nice to see the Tiger running around.

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 Zoids Official posted a nice look at the Wild Liger Kokuoh, which now has a dedicated product page.

 As many of you already know, the HMM Green Horn is set to release at the end of the month, and one of Koto's stores has posted some new images of what the kit looks like out of the box! The look of the attack boosters fanned out looks quite dynamic, even for a Red Horn variant.

 Zoids Official has posted a new video featuring Zoiko, the mascot of the MPZ Zoids. Along with this they've announced that they'll be sharing the highest nominated student videos on their channel soon. For those of you who aren't familiar with HAL, it's a university that focuses on 3D modeling. You might remember some of their videos being shared a while back.

 Medarots posted a video featuring some interactions with their new Zoids collab characters. They also posted this neat graphic for the Geno Saurer.