Gundam Review: HG IBO 1/144 Gundam Barbatos Lupus

Good evening everyone!

If you've been following me in instagram or twitter, you probably expect this review coming sooner or later.

I had a fun time building this kit despite the similarities it has with my previous kit review. I love the show and characters. It's so gritty and full of raw killing atmosphere.

Then again, compared to other universes, they're kinda left behind in the technology department. Despite that, these Gundam frames are still pieces of war machinery that showcased how powerful they are in their own way.

As I said in my previous review, I was very hesitant in buying the HG IBO 1/144 line due to the gundam kits being sticker dependent and that the grunt suits had better treatment.

I can paint the details but sometimes I'm lazy hahaha! Most of the 1/144 IBO kits try too keep their prices very cheap, hence the minimal color separations.

I got his kit from my local hobby store:

http://wasabitoys.com/

Do check them out, they have good prices for gunpla kits and they deliver locally and internationally!

Let's get it on!

Box art:

Just like with every IBO kit, the Gundam is portrayed in mid battle to show off it's aesthetics and design. It's been a while since they included a pic of the pilot along with the MS. If I remember correctly, they used to do this with the Wing kits and I can't seem to think of any other series they did this style.

The usual information around the box showing its gimmicks and poseabilities. Also, they heavily promote those option sets they sell separately. We'll get into those later.

The box is also thin just like your basic HG kit.This gives you an idea on how many parts it has.

Manual:

The usual manual for an MS that has a TV series. They usually do this with non UC kits, showing a line art of the MS alongside their respective pilot and some brief info to get you familiarize with the story.

It shows again the poseabilities you can do with the color guide if you want to paint them the specific shade bandai recommends. Again, an ad for the Option set.

Runner count was surprisingly low. I really didn't expect it to have only 3 sets of runners. You can probably tell how the color separation will go for this assembly. 

I still wonder why the RX-78-2 revive, a kit that has the same price can have more parts... I really felt that they could've added some more parts without affecting the price too much.

Runners:

Whats more amazing is how it has a full inner frame. It's probably because of how the Gundams are made in this universe. Since I've built the Astaroth beforehand, this all feels too familiar. 

That's the cool thing about the IBO line, they're mainly skeletons with pieces of armor attached to them. Since they all pretty much have the same inner frame, assembly can be boring because it tends to get redundant. 

Those stickers... *sigh* I find it weird for a modern HG kit to rely heavily on stickers. Those parts can easily be molded and I don't think it would affect that price that much.

The Astaroth had more parts and it still maintained it's target price.

Assembly:

If you build a Gundam from this line, then there are no more surprises. They all have similar assemblies with minor differences in terms accessories and armor style.

Then again, it's still amazing how its possible to have an inner frame despite lacking moving parts like the RG kits.

If you wanna see the actual assembly of the frame and know my thoughts on it, check out my HG IBO 1/144 Gundam Astaroth review:

https://gunmod88.blogspot.com/2017/12/hg-ibo-1144-gundam-astaroth.html

Armor:

This is where it gets different.

Feet/Legs:

Pretty similar with the Astaroth in terms of sleekness. I love how those yellow vents are separate pieces. The legs is the section that needs a lot of detailing. 

Those toe bits can be molded plastic but left it out for painting instead.

Waist:

Simple assembly. You can separate the front skirts for added articulation. This kit sure has a lot of linings.

Side skirts:

Another similar assembly with the Astaroth. Big side skirts that are just two pieces of plastic slapped together hahaha!

This part also needs some painting to make it look accurate. There are stickers but big pieces that envelopes kinda wears off fast, might as well paint them. The extra effort will be worth it.

Torso:

It's nice that they made all those yellow pieces as separates pieces. A very simple assembly again and some lining. 

Arms:

The shoulders of the Barbatos is usually the first thing you'll notice in this kit. They stand out with its bright red color. I love how they made it look like layered armor pieces to give the emblem more depth. 

The arms sadly suffers from obvious seam lines and might bother some people. 

Head:

Another feature of the Barbatos that stands out a lot, its massive V-fin. The only other Gundam I can think off to match the size is the ZZ Gundam with its massive head piece because it's a cannon haha! He also has a massive chin, must be for muscular aesthetics.  

It has a lot of parts for a 1/144 head. Only thing missing is for the eyes to be molded separately as well. Those vents on the side of the head is my fave part. Gone are the days where you need to paint small areas haha!

The head has lot of color in it and it's all molded plastic. 

Backpack:

A very simple back pack that needs a bit of coloring to make it look accurate to its on screen counterpart.

Full assembly:

Out of the box, it looks decent. The overall appearance is acceptable if you wanna leave it that way. If you don't like putting too much effort in your kits then this kit would be good for you. Something easy to assemble and can be posed right away.

But I like completing the details and like my previous review, IBO kits look better weathered because of the shows atmosphere.

One thing I can say about this kit is that it's very sharp... Literally. There's a lot of pointy bits so be careful not to hurt yourself or break some pieces when moving them around.

I dunno why but in the show, this guy looks more bulky and thick. The kit however makes him look slender and sleek.

Weathering:

So... Aside from weathering, I pretty much painted all the parts that intends to be stickers and did some panel lining as well.

The usual dry brushing with paint chippings. I'm still working on my paint chipping style haha! It's quite a tedious process but if done right, it would look more realistic. I tried making it gritty and rough.

Since they mostly fight in deserts or dry dusty places, I also applied some sand and soot stains to make it more worn out.

The parts that needed painting because they don't give you stickers for them are:

• The feet spikes
• The gray section in the side skirts
• The neck piece
• The yellow trims on the shoulders
• The hands

They first 3 mentioned pretty much uses the same shade of grey so you can that in one go. For the hands, you need to paint the finger tips white. You don't have to but that's one of the Lupus' striking features. 

The yellow trim isn't even that obvious but I painted it anyways to follow the line art.

Articulation:

The shoulders have ball joints that can make them rotate with ease since nothing really impedes in its way. The arms can move in and out no problem. Side skirts are on a peg that rotate and get out of the way when posing the legs. 

The legs reminds me of the Exia because it can do the full splits with ease. The thighs can also rotate and the feet can do those amazing bends since they don't have much restrictions when moving them.

The feet can be annoying sometimes because of its big hollow design, the leg armor tends to get in the way when moving in certain directions.

Arms have more than a 90 deg bend and the biceps can also rotate with ease. The legs can move backwards a lot and forward a bit. The toes can bend as well. Hands can rotate no problem.

Elbow joints and arm pegs have a slight stiff fitting when bending/rotating them which is good to hold poses but bad at the same time because It tends to pop the shoulder off at times when you rotate it. 

Shoulders armor can move up and the red piece can open a bit for added poseability. Those sharp bits on the sides of the torso can sometimes get caught inside the hollow part of the shoulders when moving them around so be careful since those are rather thin pieces.

Those sharp bits also tends to get in the way when moving the shoulders outwards making it pop off. I find the shoulder connection to be shallow since it gets popped of easily when moving abruptly.

Head can look up and down with ease since it has a double ball joint. It can go a full 360 but move it slowly since there's a lot of pointy bits.

You can't do a generic kneeling pose because the knee bends are quite short and the armor design is rather bulky for him to even do it.

You can do his usual pose when he's waiting in the hangar.

Slight ab crunch but it's not that evident.

Accessories:

That's pretty much it. Alternate slightly bent hands and the sword mace. The swords mace is basically two pieces of plastic slapped together. Unlike the Astaroths demolition knife, the sword mace doesn't fit exactly into the hands.

It can rotate in place but it's loose so it tends to slide up and down at times unless you hold it an angle to maintain its position.

Again, the hands needs white paint. 

You can clip the sword mace on his back, it's a solid connection but it's hard to position it to maintain the Lupus' stature without him bending forward to accommodate the lack of space.

*I forgot this part... I did a quick shoot for this hahaha*

They also include these extension parts for the backpack so they can hand out spare weapons to the Lupus. It can rotate in its base and can bend. It's not much but it's hand at times.

They also give you an adaptor when using the action base. I'm lazy to get mine but it fits with the Tamashii Stage act as well. 

If you're using the stage act, this adaptor isn't really needed since the stands peg connects well with the kit but it's nice that they give you one of these.

Posing:

His default standby pose. 

I love how the sword mace looks heavy for a plastic piece.

Is it obvious that I'm using the alternate hands?

Dual wielding because why not.

Again, is the alternate hand obvious? 

Box art pose

Astaroth finally met his "enemy" Seeing these to duke it out looks epic. The weathering really adds the realistic vibe to them. Follow me on instagram to see my edits!

https://www.instagram.com/x88x/

With the number of accessories, you don't really have much posing options. Stay tuned for my next review because I got the option set 5 :D

Comparison:

Side by side, these two look awesome. They really have that demonic vibe to them. I have yet to get an Astaroth origin since this Astaroth is the one with scrapped parts but still it looks awesome and can easily match the Barbatos' visual appeal.

The Astaroth may be asymmetrical but it still stands out quite well compared to Barbatos' more ferocious silhouette.  

See more of Astaroth here:

https://gunmod88.blogspot.com/2017/12/hg-ibo-1144-gundam-astaroth.html

Next to Gramps, his grandson towers over him. I wonder how they fare in a match. You can really tell the difference in terms of style between these two MS.

Gramps has a move simplistic old school mecha appearance while the Barbatos' fashions a more feral and wild demeanor.

These kits have the same price and the RX-78 has most of its parts molded in color and more accessories... I wonder why they held back on the IBO kits.

See more of RX-78-2 Revive here:

https://gunmod88.blogspot.com/2017/11/gundam-review-hguc-1144-rx-78-2-revive.html 

Conclusion:

Details 10/10:

It's relative close to its on screen counterpart but as I said, it looks more bulky in the show for some reason. Armor pieces are loaded with panel lines. 

Same with the Astaroth, some parts of the inner frame is exposed and I love those pseudo cables and pistons making them more realistic. It nice that the pieces that needs stickers have raised/deep details so you can paint over them easily as opposed to a completely flat surface.

The emblem on the shoulder was nicely thought of and didn't end up being a sticker which would be another nuisance.

The head has a lot of interesting parts. The massive V-fin, the color separation and that massive chin all stand out giving him a very unique appearance. 

Articulation 8/10:

It's good for the most part but some parts tend to collide with one another making it annoying when changing poses but once you're in a desired pose, it holds well. Sometimes having too much moving parts can be a bad thing.

The ball joints in the shoulder will not age well. Over time that will get loose and because of it's shallow connection, popping it off will happen a lot and it will test your patience.

The arms has a lot of solid connections but with the shoulder popping of easily, it will really get into your nerves.

It's a shame since Barbatos is known to hold heavy weapons and if the kit can't hold up to that, his one and only accessory tends to be useless. You need to push in The shoulder and hand joints to hold poses when he's holding the sword mace in front of him or if its raised higher than his torso.

Like this pose, it tends to drag down at times unless you place it in  that certain sweet spot to hold it.

It can do a lot of dynamic ground poses thanks to those legs and feet. Thankfully the side skirts don't get in the way and can be moved easily to avoid limiting the range of poseability. 

It's all minor setbacks that can be easily remedied if you give it a chance. 

Accessories 7/10:

My score is based on his first appearance. In the show, Barbatos Lupus appeared with the arm cannons already attached so it made me wonder why they sold that as an "option" part if he already has it to begin with.

I'll understand if they didn't include the weapons he doesn't use a lot and the weapons he uses only on certain episodes but to separate a piece that can easily be included is just weird.

It wouldn't even take too much space and I don't think the price would be that different. Also, the box art and manual shows the Barbatos Lupus with open hands why couldn't they include at least one open hand?

He uses his hands a lot in the show as weapons too and again, something small could easily be included in the runners. They give you two angled hands instead which is weird. Why couldn't it be one angled hand and one open hand? 

Oh right, marketing strategy... Also, in the show, Tekkadan tends to scavenge parts to be later added to their Mobile suits.

So, in a similar concept, option sets are pieces you need to "scavenge" to upgrade your kits. If you think it that way it kinda makes sense but seriously.. Is it that hard to include those things in the kit? 

Parts 8/10:

It's amazing how generous they are with the yellow parts but they ignored the other big pieces to stickers. I'd understand if small details are left for stickers but giant pieces using stickers is kinda torture. 

Some sections could've been made with plastic but then again I don't know how Bandai is deciding which part gets molded or not. 

I know more parts means higher price but like the RX-78-2 Revive with a relatively close price to the Barbatos Lupus, has most of it parts molded separately except for the really tiny ones like the head vulcans and the V on the crotch which is understandable due to its size. 

Also, the forearms suffer from a very visible seam line, you can cover that up if you have the tools and time but it can be overlooked if you're not sensitive about it.

Verdict 8/10:

It's nice kit and fun to build because it has an inner frame but it the lack of accessories kinda bummed me because it limits the posing options you have.

Most of the parts have a solid connection, only the shoulders tend to be a let down, depends how you deal with it. The legs are the strong point of this kit. It can pose very well on the ground and dynamic poses can be achieved easily.

Out of the box, you will get a decent kit even if you just line it. Painting is always optional but I recommend it to get the more accurate look of the MS. It looks rather toyish is you leave it as so invest on some tools and practice detailing you kits.

It's one of those kits that would have a better impact if you completed the details.

Accessory wise, it's a big let down, it doesn't have much so posing can get redundant. If you have the extra cash, I really suggest getting the option set 5 because most of parts included is for Barbatos Lupus and you won't regret it.

Personally, I got this kit because I collect lead Gundams. I didn't get the 1/100 Full Mechanics because that's basically an up sized High grade with better color and parts separation. Deal with it.

If you can nicely detail the HG 1/144 counterpart, you don't need to buy the FM 1/100 and just wait for the MG instead, if it ever does get made. But yeah, it's just a bigger kit with the same gimmicks and slightly more panel lining. Some people just like it big. LOL. I say they're lazy in painting.

Moving on, this kit is cheap and good for beginners who are new into the hobby. Only downside is, if they get used to modern kits like this, they tend to shy away from other lines because it has different assembly. 

Anyway, those are all opinions and solely based on my experience with the kit. Buy the kit and experience it yourself!

As usual, follow me on Twitter for my random ramblings:

https://twitter.com/GunMod88

and

Instgram for my BTS shot and Toy photos :

https://instagram.com/x88x

Stay tuned for more reviews and updates!

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