Hasegawa 1/20 Großer Hund 'Altair' Kit First Look

By Michael Benolkin

First Look

Maschinen Krieger (Ma.K.) is a science fiction genre that was started in the early 1980s under the banner of SF3D by Japanese artist Kow Yokoyama and was published for a few years in the Japanese hobby magazine Hobby Japan. While many of the science fiction and fantasy kits that are produced in Japan are based on one or more anime (Japanese animation) television and movie series, or at least as a manga (Japanese comics), SF3D was created out of a series of scratch-built futuristic combat vehicles and armored suits. At the time, Nitto produced a series of kits based upon Kow's designs. When a copyright dispute arose in 1985, Hobby Japan dropped the series out of their magazines and Nitto discontinued the kits. Since that time, companies like Modelkasten, Wave, and Brick Works stepped in and continued the genre under a new banner - Maschinen Krieger (Machine Wars). You'll note that while Ma.K. is supposed to take place roughly 900 years into our future, the vehicles, uniforms, and even names/designations are inspired by World War II Germany.

In this release, we have a special unmanned attack interceptor that has been updated with a rocket pack for operations in space. The kit is molded in light gray styrene and presented 11 parts trees plus one tree of dark gray styrene and one tree of vinyl parts.

Among the features and options in this kit:

• Head is movable/poseable
• Arms are movable/poseable
• Legs are movable/poseable
• Stabilizers are positionable
• Detailed aft avionics bay
• Nice rocket pack with positionable maintenance access panel

Whether you're a follower of the MaK series or are simply wanting an unusual subject to build, this kit will provide you with a variety of possibilities for fun or placed into a diorama or vignette. Have some fun and give one of these beauties a try!

For a look at this kit built-up, look here.

My sincere thanks to Hasegawa USA for this review sample!