My online existence practically lives in two circles, football and Warhammer, and never the twain shall meet. Except in Blood Bowl, but that’s a different kind of football. I follow people who paint nice miniatures, hand sculpt the most messed-up beasties you’ve ever seen, and people who post things like “Salah should have buried that,” “Nine points clear,” and “football without Origi is nothing”.
But recently, one of those circles has expanded. Or another circle has joined. Or the circle has morphed into an oval or egg shape or something. Because everyone in my carefully curated Warhammer feed is talking about Gundam. What the mech is going on?
Expanding The Warhammer Community
As far as I can tell, this surge in Gundam obsession has been spearheaded by Louise Sugden, the ex-Games Workshop staff member who left to create Rogue Hobbies, an excellent YouTube channel with its own range of goblin miniatures. Check out her channel, buy a goblin, have a happy time.
It’s been interesting to watch ex-employees’ growth after they’ve left the behemoth that is Warhammer, because so many of them branch out to try different systems. Chris ‘Peachy’ Peach, who I interviewed earlier this year, enjoys Star Wars Shatterpoint, historical games from companies like Warlord (especially Napoleonics), and has found a brilliant niche in Silver Bayonet, a fantasy-Napoleonic game system where he substitutes in Sean Bean for some fantastical Sharpe adventures.
Sugden has a similar approach. While both clearly hold Warhammer and its miniature ranges dear to their hearts, she explores the weirder side of the Workshop. However, she also isn’t afraid to go further afield in her search for the cutest fantasy goblins (cloth goblins are the clear winners here), to try painting in different mediums (including VR), or look at other game systems.
Enter Gundam. Sugden has been singing the praises of Gundam for a few weeks now, and I think she alone has caused a spike in popularity for the models. She and select other influencers were invited to try the kits by Bandai, which seems to be engaging a focused marketing push in the UK at the moment. The marketing push is working.
What Is Gundam?
If you’ve made it this far without knowing what a Gundam is, congratulations. Gundam is a series of mechs that feature in myriad anime. It’s like if Armored Core was kawaii or if the T’au committed war crimes. Okay, if the T’au committed more war crimes.
So why has everyone suddenly grown obsessed with this relatively niche brand of miniature kits? The influencers are a starting point, but there are a couple of other key factors, too.
We’ll start with the price. An entry-grade Gundam costs about the same as a single Space Marine miniature. For that price of around £25, you get a fully posable 6” mech suit. Far cooler than another Primaris Lieutenant, right?
Then you’ve got the kits themselves. Impressive feats of engineering, the sprues are multicoloured, meaning you don’t have to paint anything after assembly. Most people add details or panel lining, but it’s not a necessity. It boggles my brain when I try to understand how Bandai can inject multiple colours of plastic onto the same piece of sprue, so I won’t try.
More than that, the kits come with fully posable hands that are pre-built on the sprue. More complicated kits have fingers that can move and lock into place with no added complexity for the builder, and some even come with LEDs pre-installed so that the eyes or swords can glow in different colours. These are things that Warhammer players spend hours drilling and soldering to achieve, but achievable straight out of the box. It’s all very impressive, and it’s no wonder the kits are spiking in popularity.
I’ve been eyeing up a Gundam myself, something I never thought would happen. I have never seen a Gundam show, and I’ve never taken an interest in the miniatures before, but the feats of engineering in the high-grade kits compels me to crack one open for myself.
I think I’m interested because there’s no game attached, I don’t have to buy Codices and rulebooks to get the most out of each kit. The focus is on the building, the part of the hobby I enjoy the most. And I do love myself a big robot. Maybe it’s just marketing at work, maybe I’m being capital-I Influenced, but Gundams are cool now, and I want to see what all the fuss is about.
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