BB Senshi 299 Gundam Astray Gold Frame

The Gundam Astray Gold Frame appears in Mobile Suit Gundam SEED ASTRAY. It is the machine flown by Rondo Gina Sahaku of the Orb Union, and as the name suggests, its single biggest trait is that it is clad in gold.

The Astray line also includes machines such as the Red Frame and the Blue Frame, but the Gold Frame is the one whose color itself is its identity. That makes “how do you express the gold?” the key question whenever the design is turned into a model.

This kit renders that machine as a BB Senshi released in September 2007, with shortened SD proportions. The price is an approachable 1,100 yen (tax included), and yet gold-plated parts are used in the key areas. A palm-sized model with a metallic sheen makes for a slightly luxurious configuration by BB Senshi standards.

BB Senshi is a line I built a lot as a kid. I remembered that it included gold-plated parts, and I wanted to see how the same thing would look to my eyes today, so I went looking for one and picked it up.

Product name

BB Senshi 299 Gundam Astray Gold Frame

Scale

Non-scale (SD proportions)

Series

BB Senshi

Release date

September 2007

Price

1,100 yen (tax included)

Age rating

8 and up

Distribution

General retail release

Contents

Full set of molded-color runners + gold-plated parts + stickers to supplement color separation + instruction manual

Source material

Mobile Suit Gundam SEED ASTRAY

BB Senshi has released a large number of machines from the SEED family, including set products that bundle several units together. Since the per-unit price is kept low, it’s a line that suits collecting and lining them up.

The box is classic BB Senshi, with illustrated art showing the machine in action. It has a different flavor from today’s kits — a design that feels very much of its time.

Open it up and, inside a compact space, you’ll find the molded-color runners, the gold-plated parts, and stickers to supplement the color separation. The gold-plated parts catch your eye clearly even while still on the runner.

The part count is kept modest, as you’d expect from an SD kit. As a result, there are areas where the molded colors alone don’t reach the设定 colors, and stickers are provided to fill those gaps. That trade-off is what ends up deciding your finishing plan later on.

My build time this time was about 45 minutes for the plain snap-fit build, and difficulty is ★★☆☆☆ out of five. That figure applies to the snap build only, though — once you factor in painting and panel lining, treating the overall effort as merely average is closer to the truth.

There’s nothing in the assembly process itself that trips you up. What you need to think about is the policy question of how far you take the finishing work after it’s built.

The first thing I felt once it was finished is how good the gold-plated parts look. Despite the small SD size, the gold sheen placed at the key points really does its job. The way it photographs once you set a pose is far better than the price would suggest. This is the kit’s biggest highlight.

Articulation is within the standard BB Senshi range. It doesn’t move as far as the latest kits, but it looks good when you lock in a signature pose, and it has more than enough capability for standing on a shelf.

On the other hand, here’s what honestly bothered me. Left as a plain snap build, the fine color separation isn’t sufficient. The stickers and gold plating do reproduce the main areas, but getting it to look like the设定 really calls for partial painting. For that reason this kit gives you more satisfaction if you treat panel lining and partial painting as part of one single job. If your intention is to “just build it and stop there,” I’ll be honest and say a sense of something missing will remain.

There’s one more thing to be careful about that’s specific to gold plating. The plated surface picks up fingerprints easily, and anywhere you touch during assembly or when rearranging the display shows up clearly under light. Since the gloss is the selling point of this kit, after finishing it I naturally became conscious of where I was gripping it.

With this kit, a little finishing effort translates directly into results. In fact, whether or not you do this work is what changes your verdict on it.

1. The price is 1,100 yen (tax included). That’s an easy range to reach for.
2. Left as a plain snap build, the color separation leaves something to be desired. I’d recommend buying it on the assumption you’ll do partial painting and panel lining.
3. Conversely, if you can’t find the time to work on it, this is a kit that’s hard to feel satisfied with. That’s the one thing to judge for yourself in advance.
4. This is a 2007 product. Since a number of years have passed since release, it’s realistic to assume availability depends on timing.
5. Gold-plated parts are a material where gate marks show easily. Allowing for a sharp nipper and the extra effort of a two-stage cut will put you at ease.
6. Being SD size, it doesn’t take up space. Angling it on a stand or similar improves how it looks.

【Good】

1. Despite being SD size, it uses gold-plated parts, so it looks good once a pose is locked in.
2. It has the easy-going nature unique to BB Senshi, coming together at a good tempo in about 45 minutes.
3. For a price of 1,100 yen (tax included), it has room to look completely different depending on your finishing work.
4. As a subject for practicing panel lining and partial painting, the size and surface area are just right.

【More (points of concern)】

1. As a plain snap build it doesn’t reach the设定 color separation, and supplementing with the stickers alone still leaves something missing.
2. The plated surface picks up fingerprints easily, and anywhere you’ve touched shows under light. After it’s finished, you need to pay attention to where you hold it.

In a wordThe assembly itself is very easy in true SD fashion, but as a plain snap build the color separation leaves something to be desired, and once you include the effort of panel lining and partial painting the difficulty lands at about average. Even so, the visual appeal of the gold-plated parts and the way it photographs once a pose is locked in are genuinely there.

BB Senshi 299 Gundam Astray Gold Frame is a kit whose impression changes dramatically once you put in a bit of painting and panel lining. Stop at the plain snap build and a sense of something missing remains, but put the other way round, it’s a kit that gives you clear results for a small amount of work. It was a model packed with the gloss of gold plating and the flavor of BB Senshi from that era. It suits anyone who likes the Mobile Suit Gundam SEED ASTRAY series, or who wants to finish an SD kit quickly with partial painting and panel lining. If you’re displaying it, I’d recommend tightening it up with finishing work first, then hunting for the angle where the gold-plated parts catch the light as you set the pose.