There has been a string of CORE releases in the past few months but they have not been very visible in the secondary market, what few units have surfaced usually shift into sold out status quicker than I can put together an order of my own. At my third attempt however, I was fortunate to happen on a Neue Ziel that had just been added to the Mandarake inventory and I managed to swipe it within a minute of seeing it. Being one of those CORE "marking plus" releases it was a P-Bandai release wit a price tag of ¥3700. I had to cough up ¥4000 myself so the price hasn't run amok just yet. More worrying is the lack of Neue Ziel mark twos in the marketplace. This was a regular retail release out in the end of July but I have yet to spot one for sale myself.
Anyway, supply issues aside, the Neue Ziel reissue comes in your average CORE-style box with a nice Zeonic green style which is perhaps a bit spotty on the consumer information side, but I guess anyone purchasing it would know exactly what they are in for.
The Converge Neue Ziel figure is one of those in my opinion very successful designs that hammer home the Converge aesthetics perfectly. On top of that it is an extremely easy build and sturdy figure, which you can see from the very simple instruction sheet. You build it and put it on its base and it stays there, nice and easy.
There are no option parts or build variations for the Neue Ziel so you end up using all the components and will be done in a few minutes. Large pegs and soft plastic go well together and avoid all that fiddliness you see in more complex builds like the
Gundam Sentinel designs which can be a pain to build (or even pick up without having tiny parts falling left and right all over the place).
I praised the original Neue Ziel retail figure at the time of its release and then subsequently in pretty much every EX figure review where I am moaning about material choices or figure scaling. It just does Converge perfectly and is easily one of the best mobile armor designs to have come out of the line (if not
the best). And so unsurprisingly, the reissued version improves upon it even further. You'll notice immediately that its green colour has a better Zeonic vibe to it and the metallic detail added to thrusters is really attractive
Scattered all over the design you will find the usual nonsense CORE-markings added for no other reason than for adding markings. Personally I don't think they add much value (save for that nice crest on the chest) and I always prefer unit or tactical markings myself.
The Neue Ziel figure nails the size perfectly as well. Lately we've seen a couple of EX figures that were too small for their own good (the Byg-Zam was the most recent offender) but there can be no complaints here. As for the Stardust Memory line-up itself, Converge remains rather weak and could do with an injection. I have full faith in FusionWorks revisiting the line (with updated Gundams no doubt) eventually in the same stellar way they have went to town on War in the Pocket, Gundam F91 and Victory.
Side by side with the original retail figure; EX12 which released in June 2016. While the new figure is upping the game I see no real reason to replace the old one unless you are a completionist (and I am getting really sick of buying the same figures all over again myself). Do keep in mind also that the
Option Parts Set released for the old Dendrobium and Neue Ziel contains green arm components that don't match the colours of the CORE figure.
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