Model Kits

Gunpla Build - High Grade Zaku High Mobility Type (Build) 2026-02-25

I jumped into this build so quickly that I forgot to take photos of the runners and the boxart. Of course it was easy enough to go back and fix the latter, but not so much the former, so you’ll have to settle with the layout as seen in the instructions:

My takeaway here is that the special parts for the legs and the backpack are scattered across the different runners, which makes me wonder whether or not this based on an existing HG Zaku, or if this is a brand new mold.

The Gunpla Wiki doesn’t say anything about this being a parts variant of an existing kit, and they’re usually pretty good about documenting that kind of stuff, so it probably is a new mold. And I think that might actually make financial sense. Between this, the Shin Matsunaga version, and the Johnny Ridden version, they made three retail kits out of this single design, which is probably enough to justify the cost of new molds.

But I’m rambling now. The much more interesting thing about this model is its coloring. We’ve got a lot to talk about there.

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Double X (Photos) 2026-02-20

First I had a bad photoshoot with Airmaster. Then the Double X build ended with me being unable to recommend it. Suffice to say that these last two builds have been downers, and so I come into this photoshoot with even less motivation than ever.

But what’s this? I also fallen out of love with the design of the Double X? That makes things even worse!

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Double X (Build) 2026-02-15

Let’s cut to the chase here - this model requires quite a lot of elbow grease, mainly in the form of color correction:

If there’s a silver lining to this, it would be that, by my rough guess, about 75% of it can be done with a single tone of dark grey paint. But the other 25% involves using colors that are either tricky (like yellow and gold), or somewhat nonstandard (like the dark blue seen on the Beam Rifle).

And that’s to say nothing of the stickers:

Actually, if you ignore the really big ones at the top, I suppose the sticker sheet isn’t too large. And most of them are quite useful (though there is one that is supremely annoying - read on if you want to know which!)

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Double X 2026-02-12

I know I haven’t yet taken photos of Airmaster, but let’s keep the Year of Gundam X going anyway:

Poor Double X. This kit is probably one of the oldest ones on my backlog. Based on the timestamp of this photo, I bought it back in March 2021, so it has been sitting there for almost five years! And now it’s time to give it its due.

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Airmaster (Build) 2026-02-12

This kit is now twelve years old, but as we are going to see, it still features a lot of the hallmarks of modern High Grades. That mostly checks out, I think. There’s no exact date upon which High Grades entered what I’d consider their modern era, but in my mind it started sometime around 2012, and really kicked off in 2015, the year they released the Revive Gundam.

Of course, that means that if this kit were a few years older, it probably wouldn’t have any of its niceties, so I guess we lucked out.

Looking at these runners, they look underwhelming, but that’s probably because I just finished building a massive Ver. Ka:

I went back and compared them to the parts layout for similar High Grades (like the Gundam X itself), and it turns out that this is actually pretty comparable.

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Airmaster 2026-02-05

I’m going to start the Year of Gundam X - and celebrate the announcement of the High Grade Gundam Leopard - by building its best mate, the Airmaster:

There aren’t that many regular retail Gundam X kits, and most of them are either the GX, Double X, or the X Divider. Prior to the announcement of the Leopard, this was the lone exception. And as far as I can tell it’s been pretty rare, with not a ton of reprintings since it’s initial release in 2014.

Naturally that meant I jumped at the chance to grab it when it was reprinted last year, and now I’m ready to finally build it.