HGPost Disaster

ASW-G-29 Gundam Astaroth Rinascimento

A scrapyard rebuild with more knives than sense, and I mean that as a compliment.

MechaGrade Score

3.2/5

Gundam Astaroth Rinascimento · 1/144 · 2017

GradeHG

Scale1/144

Released2017

Runnersn/a

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The verdict

This kit nails the idea of a Gundam patched back together from spare parts, and that's exactly what trips it up too.

I love the asymmetry, the lopsided V-fin, the shield arm bolted on like an afterthought, it all tells a story before you've read a line of it. But the same design ambition that makes it interesting also overloads the frame, and you feel that the moment you try to pose it holding everything at once.

Best for: IBO fans who want the lore and the silhouette more than a kit that holds every pose out of the box

The full review

What it is

The Rinascimento is the second HG take on Astaroth, built around the idea that this suit got stripped for parts and then stitched back together from whatever Volco Warren could scavenge. That backstory shows up in the plastic. You get a new shield arm, an enlarged sub knuckle, reworked knee armor, beefed up calf thrusters, and the Bastard Chopper, a chunky secondary blade that actually has somewhere to store when you're not using it. The asymmetrical V-fin is a small touch that does a lot of work selling the "rebuilt, not designed" concept. Snapping it together, I kept noticing little details that only make sense once you know the suit's history, and that's the kind of kit I want on my shelf.

The catch

Here's the problem: this thing carries a genuinely absurd loadout, a rifle, two knives, a demolition knife, and the Bastard Chopper, and the shoulder polycaps just aren't built for that much weight. Try to get it holding its signature weapons in a dynamic pose and the arms sag or the shoulders pop loose. A few reviewers went straight to swapping in sturdier polycaps from other kits to fix it permanently. On top of that, the gunmetal accents on the fin thrusters are stickers rather than molded color, and builders have reported them starting to lift at the edges pretty quickly.

Who it's for

If you're building this to display fully loaded out with every weapon in hand, budget time (and maybe a spare polycap or two) for reinforcing the shoulders, because out of the box it struggles under its own gear. If you're building it for the story, the asymmetry, and a display pose that isn't wielding four weapons simultaneously, it's a satisfying, characterful build at a fair price. I'd skip it if you specifically want a kit that poses confidently with everything equipped straight from the runners.

The build story

What the build is actually like, and the engineering worth knowing about.

The build itself is straightforward HG snap-together work, nothing fiddly in the gate placement, and the new shield arm and sub knuckle pieces go together cleanly. Where it gets interesting is the sub-arm, which has enough of its own articulation to fold flush as a shield or swing forward into an active pose, and that hinge is genuinely clever for an HG-level part.

The frame gives you swiveling thighs and double-jointed knees, so the lower body holds a decent range of dynamic poses. Elbows bend to roughly 120 degrees, which is enough for most weapon-ready stances. The real weak point is upper body load-bearing: once you've clipped on the rifle, both knives, the demolition knife, and the Bastard Chopper, the shoulders are visibly straining, and that's the one place the engineering didn't keep pace with the accessory count.

Lore & trivia

01The Rinascimento is a rebuild of the original Gundam Astaroth after it was stolen and sold on the Jupiter Sphere black market, stripped of most of its original armor and equipment.
02It's piloted by Argi Mirage, who like the original Astaroth's pilot uses a neural connection through a prosthetic right arm to control the suit at faster than normal reaction speed.
03The suit appears in Mobile Suit Gundam IRON-BLOODED ORPHANS Gekko, a manga spin-off rather than the main IBO television series.
04The kit released in Japan in July 2017 at a list price of 1,944 yen as HGIBO release number 39.