Baselard Animation Version

 Frame Arms Girls has been releasing redone version of their original Frame Arms Girl kit. The Gourai Kai Ver. 2 was an excellent kit far superior to the original Gourai. Stylet XF-3 from what I heard is excellent as well. I was secretly waiting for the Baselard Ver2. What I didn't expect was a collaboration with Megami Device. 

Here is Megami Device X Frame Arms Girl Baselard Animation Version. 

Quite frankly I don't know why it's called collaboration between two popular model lines from Kotobukiya, but this is an excellent version of the Baselard. 

Starting from the box art, this kit has Megami Device box art, with a Yellow line and designated letters F and 1 for the first of its line. Hopefully, we get more such as Hresvelgr and Architect. 

The kit comes with a lot of parts. Unfortunately, a lot of the parts were from old ones. 

It has 3 pre-painted face plates. As usual, they are very expressive, even for simple expression, and well sculpted. 

Also comes with a small sheet of water slide decals with 4 pairs of eyes in case you paint them. 

This kit has a new stand that I have not seen before. Unlike the previous ones which are a simple rod and ball, this one has two pivot points and is more solid. Unfortunately, it does not pivot at the bottom so it is still not a stand I would like to use. It is useable, but not a lot of functions. 

This kit has five pair of hands molded in a rubber-like material. 

Also a very small green clear piece. 

I found this light bronze-colored piece. It wasn't bad looking like the usual gold from Kotobukiya and Bandai. It was serviceable at least. 

This kit does not have a lot of skin color but they seems to be new. 

THis kit has two different shades of white based on the new part and the old part. 

Here are the pictures of the instruction manual. It is high quality with a clear picture. The instruction was well laid out and easy to follow. 

Building this kit was a standard Kotobukiya affair. Parts are small but they were easy to cut out and clean and thanks to clear instruction assembly was a breeze. I just had to watch out for small parts that flew everywhere. Despite this, it was a pleasant build.

That is until I had to build its backpack. The main body was new tooling so it was a pleasant build. Parts fit without any issues and clean-up was easy. 

However, this kit uses an old mold for her backpack and weapons which I believe are from 2016. They don't fit properly and other was a lot of mold lines. Some parts, such as her large guns, don't align properly and there are large panel gaps, so a lot of work was needed to get it looking presentable. It wasn't as bad as Pretty Armor since this kit was molded in high-quality plastic, making sanding and filing easy. Still, a new surprise ruined the fun for me as soon as I finished the main body. 

Here is the finished kit

First is the main body. The size is a lot smaller than the original Baselard and those short legs give her a child-like look making it similar to the animation. The body is slightly different, especially her shoulder which doesn't have the rotation like Megami Device's body does. Still, it does have a lot of articulation. 

The sculpting was beautiful. This is one thing that Chinese Model kit like A.T.K. Girl can't seem to get right. The curves on her body to the proportions all are visually pleasing and it doesn't look like it was molded by some little kid. That being said, the quality of A.T.K. Girl is getting better and better and if they can get this right, Kotobukiya is in danger. 

Here is her armored form. The armor, as I mentioned is from old mold which was painted to build. It is an exo-suit and it is still gorgeous. The details are excellent although that gun on her shoulder is a bit boring, and the proportion is just right. It has enough articulation to pull of some poses, despite its busy design. 

And that new stand is really solid and works well. 

Now the fun begins. 

Painting. 

This kit was painted using Mr. Color Lacquer Paint. I was careful with joints by masking them, but in the end, it still resulted in me braking one of her shoulder joints. Here are the pictures of finished kit. 

Starting with her unarmored. 

She is really cute, oozing with her childish charm

Here are the pictures of her armored version. 

This model kit shows how far Kotobukiya has gotten in about five years. There is a high difference in build experience between the new mold and the old mold which showed that Kotobukiya has really gotten far into Bandai and Tamiya level. While I do wish that Kotobukiya remade her exo-suit, The kit itself turn out to be excellent. 

Baselard has many versions and Zelfikar is regarded as the best, but to me, This one is ht best, despite its lack of weapons. I recommend this kit. If you are looking for a Baselard to build, I highly recommend this kit. 

Here is the video of the build.