MSiA ZGMF-X10A Freedom

Height: 10.7cm to top of head.

Articulation: 38 points total, plus 4: 6 points in each arm - double jointed shoulder, pre-elbow swivel, double jointed elbow, ball joint wrist; Ball joint head; 10 points in backpakc - various hinges and swivel joints for the Deca Wings; ball joint waist; 6 points in each leg - ball joint hip, triple jointed knee, double jointed ankle; Plus 4 points of articulation in each hip-mounted railgun.

Accessories: Beam rifle; beam sabres x2 with removeable blades; double beam sabre grip; shield; extra hands x4.

Colors: Molded white, black, blue, grey, clear pink; Painted black, red, blue, yellow, grey.

Release Data: Released January 20th in Japan at a price of ¥1500. This item is still in production as of this review (February 16th, 2005).

Gallery: 18 images.

Author: ExVee

The Figure

Like it or hate it, Freedom may well be one of the most popular Gundam designs in the last 26 years. I may have problems with it conceptually, especially the animated portrayal edging toward the wrong side of Super Robot, but I also associate it with some of the better episodes of my second favorite AU Gundam series. Plus, the design itself is fairly sound.

I remember reading once that when SEED was still be made, the instructions for the upgrade from Strike were, among other things, to include elements of each Striker Pack. Although Sword made the least influence on the final Freedom design, I feel that the balance that was struck to be more than adequate, and serves to offer the idea of a reasonably (enough) functional design at the same time it has a distinct, stylish appearance.

For the most part, the only Freedom merchandise has been model kits. And there's not necessarily anything wrong with that. But for those of us not really so inclined, there was only one figure available - the AMIA. Sadly, the wide opinion of that figure is low, and the toy fan was still basically out of luck. But now, two years later, something new has arrived on the scene.

It's not surprising the proper MSiA version of Freedom has been highly anticipated since it was first announced, as the SEED MSiA series has been of a consistantly high quality. Even so, this figure is not without its flaws. Are they minor enough to be worth your buck? Read on!

The Head

Y'know, Freedom has a pretty nice looking head design in the lineart. Sadly, it's not reproduced very well here. The various facial elements are present, but the proportions aren't right. It's really a shame, since it's clear that Bandai is capable of sculpting the MSiA faces that match, or are at least much more closely in line with the animation models, so it's disappointing when this happens. Aside from that, the articulation is okay. Up and down works pretty well, but it's a bit of a trick to turn the head very far to the side without catching the bottom of the "helmet" on the collar, which will actually result in deforming the soft plastic of the "helmet".

The Arms

The articulation is essentially standard. On the other hand, it is one of the few figures that can raise its arms out nearly level. The shoulder armor actually limits the articulation of the clavicle joint significantly. The arms can swing forward almost far enough with the shoulder armor off to reach the beam sabre hilts on the opposite side skirt armor. In fact, with a slight turn of the waist joint, it actually *can* do that. With the shoulder armor attached, you barely even get a hint of that kind of range. I really think it's sad when a joint is given such range, but nobody takes the time to consider engineering the part that fits over the joint so that it won't interfere with the excellent range of motion.

The upper arm swivel joint is a bit tight, and is difficult to turn without moving the shoulder ball joint instead. An odd thing too, is that the upper arm isn't even. I mean, normally the upper arm is a straight line when the swivel is in the default position. But in this case, the arm below the swivel is set slightly more inward than the shoulder half. I'm not sure if it's a design compromise, or if it's supposed to be that way, but it looks wrong.

Aside from that, all normal. The shape of the forearm limits the elbow and prevents it folding up flush with the shoulder, but that's actually a little more natural looking, and there's no problem with the articulation apart from that, so it's fine.

The Torso

Ah, Gimmick Land! Between the railguns and backpack (the Deca Wings), this probably has more going on in the torso than any non-transforming MSiA, and at the same time carried perhaps the most concerns about the figure.

The Deca Wings were a point of particular concern, especially in how strong they'd be. With such a complex structure, it was natural to fear that it may have turned out either fragile, or lacking strength to support itself ...or both. Fortunately, this wasn't really the case. The wings are made out of softer plastic, and have the potential to be warped straight out of the package. I think a somewhat sturdier plastic may have been useable here without risk to the survival of the wings, and would eliminate the warping issue.

There's also that the hinges are just the tiniest bit on the weak side. Not to the point that they'll sag under their own weight, but it's particularly easy to accidentally push them out of place. They do hold position a bit better in Hi-MAT (High Mobility Aerial Tactics) Mode, but this has problems of its own.

You may be aware that Freedom's wings house a pair of M100 "Balaena" plasma beam cannons. Now, remember I said the wing hinges were a little weak? The hinges for the plasma cannons are a little stronger. This naturally means that when you try to move the cannons, you'll change the positions of the wings whether you want to or not. This isn't all of it, either. Freedom can do what's called "Burst Mode", which is an attach using both the plasma cannons and the railguns. It can also do this in Hi-MAT mode. Now, the engineering of that trick isn't shown at all in the animation, and in order to portray this function, the Master Grade kit basically invented an extra hinge in the cannons to make it possible. On the other hand, the MSiA lacks the ability entirely.

Considering some of the feats of micro-engineering MSiAs have pulled off in the past, I find it a major shortcoming that this feature was left out here. While it may be possible without too much fuss to modify the cannons to work for this, the point is that it shouldn't have to be a consumer remodelling job when it's well within established capabilities to make the figure like that in the first place.

As for the railguns, these are actually handled pretty well. The hinges here are all good and strong, and there's no risk of them drooping when fully extended. Each segment uses a slot and tab to secure together when folded for storage mode, and so they won't come apart on their own either. As you may have noted in other reviews, I tend to call for some kind of method for securing pieces together in similar applications, so the presence of them here pleases me.

Both railguns have handgrips that can fold out, but these are not at all necessary to hold up the railguns, so their use is truly optional, depending on your preferences. Though I must say that it does look pretty nice with Freedom using the grips. There is a little trouble, since the skirt panels with the railguns are attached to the waist by ball joints which could be just a slight bit tighter. They have an unfortunate tendancy to easily nudge out of alignment the way they are. This isn't just a problem when using the railguns, as the folded railguns and beam sabre grips atop the side panels make it very obvious when on side isn;t lined up with the other.

The front skirt armor is pretty well flexible, but the standard soft-plastic-warping caution applies: Don't leave in pose for extended periods as it will deform the armor. The waist joint itself is similar to that of Saber, with pretty much the same range, but lacking the convenient push-down function that helps stabilize Saber's torso. Plus, the torso can rotate all the way around, provided you move the arms and wings out of the way of the beam sabres and railguns.

The Legs

Since the skirt armor is pretty flexible, there's not much interference for the hips. Though the side skirt armor doesn't have alot of give, it's away from the body just enough to be outside the natural range of motion of the hips. The knees are good, with lots of room to move, though the ball joint at the base of the knee seems a bit restricted, and doesn't seem good for much but straight back and forth, which does limit the leg poseability a bit more than most figures using this type of knee joint.

The ankles seem only rivaled by figures with no ankle armor at all, but still have a fantastic range of motion. Really more than the figure can even actually use. Even with the slightly limited third joint in the knee, you can still do all kinds of poses, kneeling, semi-crouching, etc.

Paint And Decoration

Not really anything to complain about with the paint work. It's all applied smooth and even, with clean edges. The panel lines aren't inked here. Normally I'd not be bothered except from a "cheap-out" position, except this plastic seems a little different than what they've been using before, and it's really hard to see the panel lines even in person from a short distance. Basically, this is a case where the figure really, really *needed* inking, and it doesn't have it.

As I did with Gaia, I have to break down the rating here more than normal.

Sculpt and Articulation: 8/10

Engineering: 6/10

Paint and Deco: 6/10

The Accessories

-MA-M20 "Lupus" Beam Rifle

I never realized before I got the MSiA how similar this rifle is to the one used by Strike, both in size and general shape. Basically, Strike's rifle could probably pass as this one if you were to add the armor covering on the top of it like this has. Anyway, it's a simple enough accessory. The barrel is glued on, as opposed to being a contiguous piece with the rest of the rifle. This seems to have the result in my case of a slightly angled barrel which isn't the result of warping. This may not be a consistent problem, but it's something to consider if you have to buy the figure sight-unseen.

The rifle has the typical hinged forward grip, and also a large peg on one side to let it mount on Freedom's rear skirt plate. The hold is quite secure, but it does have to be removed if you're using the railguns, since the rear third can't unfold with the rifle connected. I don't think it can really be blamed on the figure, just a problem of the design itself.

-MA-M01 "Lacerta" Beam Sabres

Technically, this is two accessories. I don't mean that it's two beam sabres, I mean what you get is two separated grips, and then a separate combined grip. Another of Freedom's gimmicks is that it can connect its beam sabres together to have a double beam sabre, and rather than make the regular grips where they can combine, you're instead given the combined grip as an extra piece.

While the separate grips can store on the hip armor, there's no place for the extra to store. Additionally, since the combined grip is soft plastic, thin, and has a bit of length to it, it seems to be prone to warping. I suspect it'll be especially so when posing with the blades attached.

The blades themselves are the more solid type used in Destiny, and are easy to put in and out of either type of grip, but won't come out on their own. And while they're not as dark colored as Gaia's sabre blades, they're a bright shade of pink, instead of the pale, washed out pink Impulse and others have.

-Shield

Unusually, this shield uses a fixed ball joint to attach the shield to the arm. I say it's unusual because just about every shield has had the mounting hardpoint as a removeable piece, which isn't the case here. Plus, the handgrip, while removeable, is fixed in one position when attached, despite being made to appear moveable like Strike's shield.

While I like the overall design of Freedom's shield, it didn't translate well for the MSiA. Between the size and shape of the shield, shoulder armor, and wings, the shield is very difficult to pose with, especially if you have the handgrip attached. Even without the handgrip, the shield is essentially useless in a straight-armed pose, since the shoulder armor prevents it from resting correctly. You can counter this slightly by turning the arm so the shield faces forward a bit, but I realy think the shield could have been handled differently.

-Extra Hands

Freedom comes with the standard extras, a set of open hands and a set of trigger finger hands. Either set will work fine with the railgun grips. The hands all switch easily, and have a good range of movement when attached. The trigger finger hands could be better, as they're styled like the Japanese GP01's hands, where the grip of the rifle is held forward of the palm. It makes it slightly awkward to use the rifle, and may well lead to deformation of the hand over time.

Accessories: 7/10

Closing Remarks

At this point, it's not really looking good, is it? As Freedom uses the Destiny articulation model, it's a basically nice figure. But the fact is, there are certain things one would expect from this figure. And that some or all of these things are not present is certainly a failure.

But really, how much of a failure is it? That's something you'll need to decide on your own. As for me, being a mechanically good figure helps to outweigh the shortcomings, at least some, and so improve the final rating of the figure. I'm well enough satisfied with my purchase, and not only would I do it over again, I intend to buy another specifically for modifying to fix some of my problems with the figure.

For up to $17, I think you'll be happy with your purchase. In my opinion, Freedom is Very Good.

-ExVeeBrawn, 02/16/2005