What makes a good mech?? You gotta have style as well as power, me thinks.
I’d like to say Gundams… But then Orbital Frames are more powerful…
What makes a good mech?? You gotta have style as well as power, me thinks.
Not really, I mean Mechs are weapons of war, not customizable toys. THAT said, I have to admit that the absolutely most beautiful/I-could-never-come-up-with-one-myself designs are from Anime Mechs, ESPECIALLY the Power Ranger-like shows. Mazinger Z was the series that REALLY turned me into an Otaku, because (among other things) you could NEVER guess what the next Evil Robot of The Week was going to look like!! o_o
roflcoptors:
THAT being said…
I’ll vote Armored Core mecha over anything on the market. With the exception of maybe the MechWarrior stuff. Mechwarrior’s designs seem more… believable.
Armored Core goodness…
http://www.gamecritics.com/feature/artgallery/armoredcore2/art02.jpg
I makes the threads dissapear!
OMGWTFLOLBBQ!!!
For looks, the Armored Cores, as they managed to look cool yet have so much variety (well, IMO at least). However, I’ll take the battletech mechs any day, I’m often the person to take believability before coolness, and the battletech mechs are IMO the most believable.
Mazinger Z of course. My second favorite is the ID-Weltall.
Do Gears, A.G.W.S, E.S and ATACs count? If so, I like the Toreadore ATAC from Vanguard Bandits the most. It’s basically a mecha shaped like a noble centaur with a mighty spear.
I prefer Armored Core units and Clan Omnimechs. ACs have a vast diversity of roles they can fill (the 2 most recent incarnations have over 500 parts to build from) while Clan tech represents the best of a universe of large, powerful and highly realistic mecha <3 Classic Battletech.
And I can’t leave this without giving honorable mention to Goliaths and Dragoons from Starcraft. Though by far some of the most expendable mecha in existance, they still rock.
Whats up with this Mazinger Z series? I really must know. What, besides corny designs, is so special about the show?
You mean besides the fact that it started the whole big-robot fad back in the 80’s, it was created by Go-Nagai (Otherwise known as God) and that it is revered as the saint patron of all big mechas? Yeah, the series were pretty cool and Mazinger had more than one single attack (Making it instantly better than it’s contemporary bastard children). Of course if you look at it now it’s crap, but when I saw it when I was 6 it was the greatest motherfucking thing ever. You can’t understand the sheer glory of Mazinger by comparing it to what we have now, because Mazinger is the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and that goddamned posture he did in every damn episode will forever shine like a beacon for… Okay, I’m getting a little exited here.
As an extra fact, there is a little town in my country that has a twelve meter tall glass-fiber made statue of Mazinger Z in it’s park. It looks awesome.
Where the hell is Goemon Impact? And the awesome pig mechs from Rocket Knight Adventures? Not to mention Xenogears from… Xenogears.
It’s just that Xenogears, while being freaking awesome, looks too bulky for my taste. It fits perfectly with the “divine” theme but by looking at the pictures in Perfect Works, it doesn’t look like it could even turn 180 degrees without slamming it’s wings on anyone besides it.
Now ID-Weltall, that one is fast AND powerful. Can’t hold a candle to Xeno in matter of power, but the look is cooler.
I guess it has that classic thing going for it. And I respect what it set the stage for… But were living in the now, and “now” Mazinger Z looks like crap.
But I can certainly understand how you feel, I mean, this is like those of us who herald FFVI as the best, while others think FFVII (with its “superior” 3d engine) is teh leet roxxors.
I guess this time the rolls are reversed and I want to enjoy the designs of today.
Things that make MAZINGER cool:
*It was one of the first (if not THE first) Giant Robots to be PILOTED FROM THE INSIDE. Without it, there would have been no Gundams, Evangelions, etc.
*Being a Go Nagai series, it was full of designs from the cool (Like Maz itself) to totally bizarre ones (Like Baron Ashura, a Villain that was male on the right side of his body… and female on the left!! (Spoke with BOTH a male and female voice, too!) And that’s NOTHING compared to some of the later vlllains!! And as I mentioned above, you could never tell what the Villain Robots would look like… sometimes they looked like logical things, like Dragons… and sometimes they looked absurd, like accordions and such!! NO, I’m not making that up! 
*It also stablished the basic Robot Anime archetypes (Angry young hero, wise scientist, angry wouldbe girlfriend, dumb comedy relief friend, etc.) which have been done so many times as to be cliches today. AND it made them likeable, too, unlike many of the later imitations.
*Speaking of the Comedy Relief Character (A fat dumb thug called Boss) he started as the hero’s rival, then befriended him, then actually gained his own Mech… BOSSBOT, one of the few COMEDY RELIEF Mechas ever!!:hahaha; It just kept falling apart, even in battle! (But that doesn’t deny the fact that at least he TRIED to help… and actually SAVED the day once!! GO, BOSSUBOTTO!! 
*And there’s the fact that Maz was an INTERNATIONAL hit, being particularly popular in latinoamerica (Yes, Seraph, I saw it as a kid too- in the 70’s!) LONG before Anime was “cool” in America. (Thought it WAS part of the Shogun Warriors toy collection, and a (severely edited) version, for some reason called TRANZOR Z, did have limited exposure in the US.)
*And as mentioned above, they kept coming up with all sort of COOL and ORIGINAL weapons for it, like the Drill Missiles it could fire from its elbows!! What did later mechas use? Missiles, swords and lasers? Yawn
So, OK, modern Anime series have BETTER stories, I’ll grant you that, but I have seen few that match Maz for sheer creativity.
I find that Gundam mechs are the best, but, I do love playing Armored core.
Mazin-fucking-Kaizer. That’s right, the third robot in the Mazinger series.
BEST OAV EVER. 7 episodes of pure happy fun time goodness.
I was talking about comparing it to other new series. Mazinkaiser has both old and new elements that make it THA BOMB.
I really need to check this thing out. I hope to god that its as glorious as you all claim.