Soul of Chogokin - GX-14 Evangelion 01 Test Type

Series	Soul of Chogokin
Title	GX-14 Evangelion 01 Test Type
Release Date	June 2003
Manufacturer	Bandai
Suggested Price (JPY)	5,500
Scale	Non-Scale
Height (cm)	15.8 cm (approx. head height)
No. of Parts	1 figure + 30 parts + 1 color manual (9-pages)
My Rating	Excellent

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Comment
The first release of Evangelion mechs in Bandai's ever-popular 'Soul of Chogokin' series, it is solid and has quite a heft to it. What makes this chogokin piece so special is its incredible posability. Cunningly designed to overcome limitations of die-cast, this is truly an 'action' figures, with joints just about everywhere, allowing you to put your EVA into just about any pose you might think of. Even its feet are jointed so that you can bend them for a realistic crouch.

This item is first release in June 2003 and it immediately sold out upon release. I manage to collect “EVA 00” and “EVA 02” and regrettably, I missed this item. I waited for a year and finally Bandai announce EVA-01 will re-release on September 2004. Without a second thought, I pre-ordered this one from HLJ. Now, my collection of the three main EVA mechs is complete.

Packaging
Packaged in a purpled colored box where the figure nicely tucked on the left Styrofoam tray and its accessories placed on the right and segregated into 3-tiers. A 9-pages color manual is included with photos in color and instruction in Japanese language.
The plastic tray on first tier includes a plastic ring (for holding bazooka on its display base), a nameplate, 2x long head spike, handgun, bazooka, progressive knife, a 'Magoroku' Katana (long sword) and a Counter sword (short sword), 2x sword sheath and a runner with 2 plastic piece (for holding and mounting both sword to the figure).

Plastic tray on second tier consists of 2x extra hand (open grip while the figure comes with 2x close grip), 1 runner with 3 entry plugs, a pallet rifle, a weapon crate (for storing the pallet rifle and attachable to shoulder armor) and 4x shoulder armor (2x thin and 2x thick shoulder armor for weapon mounting). Bandai provides 2 sets of shoulder armor attach to the figure via magnet. The thinner set gave an anime feel while the thicker set comes with additional gimmicks. The thicker right shoulder armor comes with hidden needle gun and the left has a hidden compartment for progressive knife. Weapons are mountable on the both thicker shoulder armor.

The display base came unassembled and hidden under the lowest tier along with an umbilical power cord.

Figure
The figure is hefty as it is almost entirely made of die-cast and painted in metallic purple distinguish by a bluish silver chest plate and adorned with black, metallic-green and bright yellow-orange at various spot. I have received comments that the re-issue has a slight difference to the original. This has less metal in composition and its paint has less metallic gleam comparing to first-release. I could not confirm this though there is not a first-release figure for me to make comparison.

The head sculpt of EVA 01 Test Type is different comparing to EVA-00 and EVA-01. EVA-01 is flat and has a diabolical look to it while the later are shaped in oval. It comes with extra spike and inserted via a slot to its forehead. The jaw is moveable showing EVA-01 in an animal like roaring fashion and it is a bit too loose for frequent posing. The head is ball-jointed to the torso and its upper chest is moveable giving the head section a great degree of movement.

EVA-01 has a fancier chest design comparing to EVA-00 and EVA-02, distinguished by a gleaming bluish-silver chest plate and the extra protective armors on both shoulders. The waist segmented into 3 sections and comes with 2 points of articulations. The upper segment rotates about 245 degrees and the lower segment, slightly limited in movement, rotates at about 30 – 45 degrees. Both segments move up and down.

This comes with 3 ‘entry plugs’ and is inserted into the back of the figure’s neck. There is a piece of armor moveable to reveal the hole. Just bellow comes with a switch, which eject an inserted ‘entry plug’ via a spring mechanism. The socket for the power plug is located further down.

The hand made of soft PVC and swappable with the extras provided. It is double-ball jointed while the elbow is single-ball jointed. Although its shoulders are ball-jointed, its movement are somewhat limited by its large shoulder armor.
Each leg is connected to the hip via a large ball-joint and could move freely. Although, the knee is using a double hinge, it does have a good degree of movement. The ankle is ball-jointed with an articulated toe.

Base
Each EVA mech comes with a display base and EVA-01 is of no exception. The base is design to look like the launch elevator used in the story, complete with working upper body restraints and a hole for placing the power umbilical cord. An emboss nameplate displayed in front identifying the mech and placeholders are provided to hold EVA-01’s wide range of arsenal. Some simple construction is required to setup the base and it is not explain clearly in the instruction manual.