Being a dedicated fan of a specific franchise or series can be challenging, especially for those who follow globally renowned Japanese franchises like Bandai’s Gundam series.
This series spans various animated adaptations, movies, games, and a vast array of commercialized memorabilia, making it a prolific and demanding fandom to keep up with.
Typically, franchises that spawn anime adaptations and merchandise usually limit their offerings to trinkets or figurines. However, large-scale franchises like Warhammer 40K or Mobile Suit Gundam, which have been around for decades, go far beyond that.
Gundam, in particular essentially pioneered the “mecha” genre and features an almost infinite array of iconic characters and robots that even those who aren’t familiar with the franchise unbeknownst to themselves can recognize.
Consequently, the series is flooded with merchandise, including scale model kits that often retail for hundreds of dollars each.
This is precisely why being a devoted fan of such franchises is so challenging. The astronomical costs associated with purchasing the vast array of merchandise and scale models make it difficult.
Collecting, building, and personally embracing these items can be prohibitively expensive, both in terms of money but they also require a vast amount of time.
Their hustle is quite commendable really because It’s not uncommon to see mega-fans of Warhammer or Gundam having spent thousands, if not tens of thousands of dollars to acquire their vast collections.
So, what can you do if you cannot afford to purchase figures or scale models from your favorite franchise?
The most ingenious fans might choose to create their own scale models using programs such as Blender and opt to leverage 3D printing to produce models / figures of their favorites.
However, one Japanese individual, known as ToT, has taken an even more audacious approach to this problem, leaving me truly astonished. Their solution?
If you can’t afford to spend hundreds of dollars on scale models, why not leverage the intricate character creation system inside Koikatsu instead?
I shit you not. A Gundam fan who seemingly couldn’t afford to buy actual models decided to make his own by using the Koikatsu character creator. Koikatsu being an eroge game developed by Illusion, a highly regarded developer of high-quality pornographic games in Japan who sadly closed down last year.
The game is a top-tier eroge game set in a high school, combining dating simulation with extensive customization. You have the freedom to create and customize characters as you please, as well as produce high-quality carbon copies of your favorite characters from any franchise.
The only limit is your imagination.
You’re able to customize their appearance, clothing and personality, placing them in the school environment where you can then interacting with them in the limited 3D open world, establish a relationship, take them on dates or simply just fuck them.
The most remarkable aspect here, however, is the minimal use of mods that ToT claims to have employed. While they’ve adjusted Koikatsu to eliminate its accessories limit and made slight tweaks to the model’s bones, ToT asserts that “the parts themselves are all authentic Koikatsu products along with additional packs.”
The whole concept of flipping Koikatsu upside its head is hilarious to me, ToT has taken the game’s customization to a whole new level by transforming the default brunette character into the GFAS-X1 Destroy Gundam, a transformable heavy assault mobile suit introduced in the “Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny” anime.
He shared screenshots of the Gundam in action, firing beams in various environments. All these scenes were set up and captured entirely using Koikatsu’s in-game photo mode, which mind you can also be customized and modified with custom designed scenarios.
There are numerous upsides and downsides to this approach. Unlike actual plastic model kits, the ones ToT has produced inside Koikatsu can be mass-produced. ToT has already created several, including GN-005 Gundam Virtue and GN-004 Gundam Nadleeh, although they haven’t yet shared screenshots of these particular units in-game.
ToT’s creations have the ability to transform into various states instantly, saving money compared to purchasing different Gundam models.
This inventive approach is a testament to their ingenuity and dedication towards Bandai’s franchise. However, given the nature of the game, building relationships with female characters in a high school setting and eventually fucking them, it’s hard to imagine doing this with a mecha.
Nonetheless, it highlights the dedication of fans to Bandai’s Gundam franchise and the extensive customization available in eroge titles like Koikatsu, or any other game made by Illusion.
