Ahhh... ZOIDS! Raise your hands, those of you who sometime in your youth (or even adult days), have at least assembled ONE of these fantastic spring-powered or battery operated semi-kits. I can still remember the awe when I flipped the switch on my RED HORN and watched it come to life :)

However, times change and kids, well..., kids grow up. At a certain age, I started losing interest in things that moved on their own, seeking out instead toys that involved my participation in the playing. ZOIDS fell out of favor in my collection and were relegated to a dinky little box in a corner. All was forgotten until an article in Dengeki Hobby caught my eye - poseable ZOIDS without motors? Sacrilege! Wait-a-minute... DIECAST armor?! Where can I get one?

In my case, it was HLJ that came through with the goods. Before long I had my spanking new King of Flexible Mobile KZ-01 Liger Zero all laid out and ready to go.

The mid-sized package comes with a very well made basic Liger body, onto which you attach various armor pieces. The amount of diecast is decent and well thought-out - the face plates and all four shoulders are metal. But the star is definitely the superb base figure. Featuring detented joints in the knees, tight ball joints in the hips, multi-jointed neck and torso, plus spring-tensioned ball joints for the ankles, you can achieve some pretty impressive, life-like poses that no traditional ZOID could hold a candle to... even on just TWO legs!

Once you put on the armor, the majesty of the design shines through. Sleek, wild and aggressive, it is the embodiment of a true mecha-beast. I swear the eyes seemed to glow on their own sometimes!

And the armor, for the most part does not interfere at all with its poseability. Perhaps the only quibble I have is with the two small flip-down stabilizer wings on its flanks. They tend to get in the way of the legs... so I usually leave them folded up on the sides and focus on what the main toy can do instead. And MAN, can it do some amazing things!

To start the battle here's Liger Zero facing off its nemesis... the lilac terror Berserk Fuhrer!

--Drifand