The Bandai Mobile Suit Gundam Gsight collection is a short-lived Gashapon series well known for its quirky packaging, unique mobile suit colour variations and liberal inclusion of battleground scenery. The main series consists of six basic waves released between 2002-2004 and two special sets called Spektrum I and II released in 2004. Beyond these sets there are also two special sets featuring larger figures, one of which we are examining today. The Zeonic Samson mobile suit transport trailer was released in a set of its own in 2003 and consists of four different colour variants.
The Samson trailers come in hexagon-shaped cylinders similar to the basic Gsight figures except that they are a bit taller. I assume these figures would come in the same type of display boxes as the smaller figures but I have never seen such a case myself, not even on a photo. The smaller figures come in boxes of 12, usually containing two colour variants of six different and considering the four different variants in this set I would assume a display box to contain 8 or 12 items. If you happen to know more about this, I'd be curious to know.
Inside each box the figure will be stored in plastic bags within plastic bags, that classic Gashapon feeling. The figures had an MSRP of 300 yen 20 years ago, today the prices will vary depending on where you look. If they pop up on eBay, expect them to be heavily overpriced. The best solution is - as always - the local market in Japan.
Each package comes with a trailer and its cargo consisting of some crates and a powered down Zaku II and its Heat Hawk weapon. The colour combinations are always the same, the standard colour purple trailer always comes bundled with the standard green Zaku II and so on. The three other variants are the green forest battle specification, the gray urban warfare variant and the sand-coloured desert type. Besides the colouring, there are no differences between the figures. It would have been cool if there were alternate weapons available but practical concerns such as fitting everything inside the trailer means there is no place for larger weapons like the machine gun or Zaku bazooka.
The truck and trailer are made of softer plastic with some components made of harder material so you may find a little bit of warped shapes here and there but nothing too troublesome. Being a 1/350 scale figure series you need not worry about moving wheels or anything like that, the Zaku II figure itself is also a simple statue without articulation or functioning hands. The truck can be detached from the trailer and has two gun turrets that can (at least theoretically) swivel from side to side but the soft plastic material makes it difficult to move them. The best feature is that the crew compartment can be detached from the vehicle and the hover engines can be folded 90 degrees downward to create the flying vehicle variant. No stand or peg hole is included for this feature so you will have to improvise such a display.
As you can see the four variants are all very similar so I won't be covering each figure in great detail. Instead I have placed them in some mini-dioramas with other Gsight figures in different environments.
Conclusion
All in all this is a fantastic toy set that really offers a lot of display choices. It is a pity that these figures are really hard to find these days, I for one would love it if Bandai were to bring their old Gashapon figure collections back to life. Imagine if suddenly the old SD figures would come back to the vending machines coupled with some brand new mobile suit choices. Music lovers were successfully fooled to start buying vinyls again - surely the small and uncomplicated Gashapon figures could have a renaissance of their own?
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