Kit Review: HGBB 1/144 – Perfect Strike Freedom
Since we’re currently giving away the HG Perfect Strike Freedom, why not review the kit itself so you can see what it’s all about? Debut in the Gundam Breaker Battlogue OVA and piloted by Sana Miyama – a girl that seems to love the color pink, it comes as a surprise that her unit in the OVA is a recolored Strike Freedom to match the color scheme of the Perfect Strike Gundam.
– Design: The Mobile Suit’s main body is literally the same as the Strike Freedom, minus the chest beam cannon and the side-skirt railgun. The kit also incorporates the Perfect Strike feature with the shoulder armor with the gatling gun and grappling hook from the Sword and Launcher pack. The beamshield armguard is also colored light blue and green to reflect the Perfect Strike color.
The biggest deviation of the PSF from both the PS and SF is the backpack for sure. The Ailt Strike fused with the DRAGOONs to create an extremely bulky backpack. The railguns that used to be on the hips are now on the backpack instead – replacing the Aile’s beam saber slot. It’s quite innovative to turn the Aile’s four wing binders into DRAGOON rack. This give the kit incredible wing span however, but might be a bit difficult to balance. The weapon design is also quite nice. They went the 00 Sky route and shrink both the Schwert Gewehr and the Agni and added extra gimmick to it, which we’ll cover later.
The biggest deviation of the PSF from both the PS and SF is the backpack for sure. The Ailt Strike fused with the DRAGOONs to create an extremely bulky backpack. The railguns that used to be on the hips are now on the backpack instead – replacing the Aile’s beam saber slot. It’s quite innovative to turn the Aile’s four wing binders into DRAGOON rack. This give the kit incredible wing span however, but might be a bit difficult to balance. The weapon design is also quite nice. They went the 00 Sky route and shrink both the Schwert Gewehr and the Agni and added extra gimmick to it, which we’ll cover later.
– Build quality: Not much to criticize with Bandai’s near-perfect engineering. However, for this kit, I recommend not sanding the joint parts too much and only remove nubs thoroughly in places that are very visible. Since the kit is carrying a huge payload at the back, not fully sanding out the nubs on the joints will help the kit hold together better, same with the wings’ connectors – the DRAGOON is quite hefty once all of them are on the backpack, so extra friction between the connectors is good. The weapons’ nub marks is also quite large so need to be careful cleaning it up.
– Articulation: The PSF use the standard Strike/Strike Freedom frame. Articulation is very flexible. The range of the limbs is very nice. The front/side/back skirts also can be moved out of the way to allow the legs extra room to pose, so there’s a lot of poses the kit can pull off. However, the armguard and backpack is quite bulky and might interfere with some poses. And of course, the kit is extremely back heavy, so getting him on a stand is a must! You don’t want to knees to give out after 10 plays or so. Otherwise, this guy is a posing beast!
The backpack also has very nice articulation. The railgun on the backpack is on a ball-joint so you can pretty much swivel it anyway you’d like. My preference for them is different from the manual since I love shoulder cannons, and I think the way it originally has the cannon pointing away from the front is kinda weird. The wing binders at the bottom are on ball-joints also, and it can go low enough to support the whole kit to stand.
The backpack also has very nice articulation. The railgun on the backpack is on a ball-joint so you can pretty much swivel it anyway you’d like. My preference for them is different from the manual since I love shoulder cannons, and I think the way it originally has the cannon pointing away from the front is kinda weird. The wing binders at the bottom are on ball-joints also, and it can go low enough to support the whole kit to stand.
– Gimmicks: Of course, with the name “Perfect Strike Freedom”, it better have as many tricks up its sleeves as the number of times Kira cheated death. The shoulder anchor can be detached with a wire like the Sword Pack’s Panzer Eisen. The beam shield can be attached to the arm guard just like the SF. And, of course, the DRAGOONs are basically SF’s one so if you have the full-burst stand, you can attach them on as well. Another reason I like the Perfect Strike Freedom is that it can store all of the weapon on the kit, although a bit silly. There’s a slot to attach both the gun and sword to the backpack’s binder, which adds even more weight to the backpack, but hey at that point it basically has 4 legs.
The final – and probably best – gimmick is the ability to combine the two weapons. Just like the Strike Freedom’s Beam Rifle, but this time using the not-Agni and not-Schwert-Gewehr together. The new weapon can either be a giant cannon or a giant sword. The kit comes with beam effect parts to attach on the weapon’s edge as well. Ngl this makes the kit looks much more badass.
The final – and probably best – gimmick is the ability to combine the two weapons. Just like the Strike Freedom’s Beam Rifle, but this time using the not-Agni and not-Schwert-Gewehr together. The new weapon can either be a giant cannon or a giant sword. The kit comes with beam effect parts to attach on the weapon’s edge as well. Ngl this makes the kit looks much more badass.
– Accessories: The HG PSF is quite a valuable kit. It comes with:
x1 “Schwert Gewehr” Anti-Ship Laser Sword
x1 “Agni” Hyper Impulse Cannon
x1 Beam Shield
x1 “Licht Fang” Beam Blade – can be attached to the armguard
x1 “Panzer Eisen” Rocket Anchor
x8 Super DRAGOON
x2 Beam effect parts
x2 pair of interchangeable hand parts
There’s also quite a bit of spare parts. You also get 2 Beam Saber handles (but no beam sable). But it shouldn’t be that hard to source a beam saber effect parts.
x1 “Schwert Gewehr” Anti-Ship Laser Sword
x1 “Agni” Hyper Impulse Cannon
x1 Beam Shield
x1 “Licht Fang” Beam Blade – can be attached to the armguard
x1 “Panzer Eisen” Rocket Anchor
x8 Super DRAGOON
x2 Beam effect parts
x2 pair of interchangeable hand parts
There’s also quite a bit of spare parts. You also get 2 Beam Saber handles (but no beam sable). But it shouldn’t be that hard to source a beam saber effect parts.
Overall: The Perfect Strike Freedom is a very good kit. The original design has some points that I don’t really like, but it’s very easy to change it up a bit and tune it to your liking. The PSF combines the good points of both the SF and the PS – taking the weapon combining gimmick of the SF and apply it to the PS weapons, and incorporating the Aile, Launcher and Sword Pack design principles to the SF. It is quite a different beast than the Amazing Strike Freedom of the Meijin. This mobile suit may not suit Sana’s personality to a T, but it surely is one badass Gundam!
Gallery:
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