New Converge feature; Revival Selection

With Gundam Converge 15 soon to be released, Bandai today unveiled the line-up for the next set in this popular little Shokugan series. See something familiar in that line-up? Yes I bet you do. Bandai have decided to go down the reissue route, and will continue to release old and out-of-print models, the first being Char's Zaku II.

Ironically, in my recent Operation Revive review, I longed for and moaned a bit about the fact that Char's Zaku II didn't make it to the finals. It remains very diffcult to find, the only figures I have found to be more rare and hopelessly difficult to stumble on are the G M and the Marasai, both of which I have never come across at all. Anyway, Bandai explains on their shokugan page that there had been many calls for a reprint of this figure (and understandably so), and they further claim that this figure will be the first in a line of reissues under the "Revival Selection" moniker.

I expect we will soon be seeing more of these old figures popping up in the new Converge volumes and that is really ticking me off. The revived figures should be handled spearately, as those of us buying complete sets will be ending up with duplicates. Bandai states that they will be using the mold of the original Zaku II, and that they haven't yet decided if they are going to make any slight detail tweak or colour change (whichever they pick, some will moan about it of course).

Have you also noticed the RX-78-2 in the set? This is a figure that is being upgraded with "more detail". So that's two slots out of six filled with old stuff we've seen before. I really do hope this is not the beginning of a watering down of the incredibly successful Converge line. It has been a great source for unusual figures and if they are now going to start recycling mobile suits instead of continuing to expand the figure line, I for sure will be disappointed.

Gundam Converge volume 16 is scheduled for release in August 2014.