Ludens

 This is Ludens from Kojima Production made by Kotobukiya. I am assuming she is a character from Kojima Production's latest game Death Stranding. I haven't played the game yet but I heard great things about it. 

As for the kit, what a kit this is. 

Kotobukiya is leading on their mecha girl and this one just nails it. It has lots of details, it articulates well, and it looks gorgeous showing both woman's beauty and ruggedness of armor. 

Gorgeous.

The box art shows a very simple yet elegant drawing of Ludens with Kotobukiya logo on the top right corner. With the white background, it really brings out the charm of the art. 

The simple background with art continues on the instruction manual. 

And inside, it shows a few more pictures which I really love. 

In the back, it shows the color and sticker guide. The kit has a lot of details so I found that the pictures were not enough for the color guide as it hides small details here and there. I had to google more pictures online to get some parts right. 

There are the parts that came with the kit that is pre-painted. That silver spear was really nice but that clear flag is really interesting. I haven't played the game but I guess it goes with the theme of the game.

It also has 3 sets of face but they are a bit bland. Little unusual for Kotobukiya kit but I guess she is supposed to be a stoic person. 

This kit has these two-part sprues for the metal parts. It's really bad color that doesn't represent the color of the metal well. If you are straight building this kit, At least try to paint these parts. 

This kit has two color sprues for the hand. The dark gray is for armor off and the light color one is for armor on. They are soft rubber-like material so you can move it around to grip stuff, but unlike the rubber from Bandai kits, it is easy to paint. 

This kit includes a small set of water slide decals. That Kojima Production logo is a nice touch. 

 And here is what the kit looks like build straight out of the box without the stickers. 

It looks great. Her proportions are just right. The strap around her leg and arm is a nice touch and I love how they designed it.

The build was a little hard compared to the typical Megami Device kit due to lots of small parts. Unlike Bandai kits, the parts were attached to sprues in an awkward place but compare to older Frame Arms Girl or Megami Device kits, it wasn't that bad. Clean up was easy and only a few parts needed seam welding.  

Like other FAG or MD kits, this kit poses well, creating nice action poses without issues. 

This is what the kit looks like with its armor part attached. 

The center armor part locks the upper torso so articulation is limited, but it does have a nice pivot point on her thigh area, which made her leg easy to pose despite the bulky armor.

And the skull mask. Interesting addition. I like it.

I really love how the armor looks. It looks like a spacesuit, and different from the usual FAG or MD kits. 

The painting was a joy. It had a lot of small details, not to mentions some parts, like her torso, including her breast was sculpted beautifully. I just had to take my time to paint this. In fact, it took me about two months to fully build this. 

I used Lacquer paint for this build. With Gundam Origin build, I fell in love with how the Lacquer paint behaves when airbrushing. The paints I used were Mr. Color, Splash, and Alclad II. This was the first time I painted the whole kit using Lacquer paint so I made a lot of mistakes, but the end results did come out looking great. 

This is what the kit looks like after I painted it. 

I went that extra mile to shade her breast and torso just right. With a gloss clear coat, it just looks right. 

I am especially proud of how her skin tone came out. I used the bare plastic and shaded it using Mr. Hobby's Lascivus paint, and threw on some flat varnish. It's hard to see in the picture, but it has a subtle shading which made this kit looks like a well-made figurine.

Here is a close up shot of her beautifully sculpted breast armor. 

The paint does effect the kits pose-ability due to fear of scraping the paint. The parts are tight after all. 

Still, you can do some basic poses. 

This is with the armor on. I painted the armor with Splash Mecha Color white and I made it gloss. I think I made the right decision with the gloss as it made the armor stand out. 

The straps, metal parts,  hoses. These small details really separate this kit from other ones. 

I love how that strap goes over her breast armor.

Gloss white armor and flat tan armor. I love it. 

Here is the spear. I didn't paint it. The pre-painted part looks good, and it didn't really need painting. 

As I mentioned, this kit took about two months to build and I enjoyed most of them. I did have problems painting with Lacquer paint due to lack of experience and it did frustrate me, but that is not the kits' fault. 

I love the details of the kit. small details here and there, and it leads you to believe they put a lot of effort into this kit and it shows on the final product. 

I love the proportion of this kit. Her breast is not too small, not too big, it is just right. her waist and her hip are just right. 

Small parts did make this kit bit challenging to build, but it wasn't that bad. 

Whether you paint this kit or not, I recommend this kit. 

Here is the video of the build.