Poll: Mecha, Japanese, European, or North American?

[Soviet Heavy]

If you had to pick one, which of the three choices would you choose for Mecha designs? Japanese Mecha, European Mecha, or North American Mecha

I'm partial to the European styled Mecha. In particular the WH40K designs, like the Dreadnought or the Warhound.

Spoiler

That said, there are still other mecha designs out there. Which ones do you prefer?

EDIT. The Poll has been devoured once more.

EDIT#2. I suppose that just putting up Imperial Designs is unfair, since 40K has loads of different mecha.

Spoiler

And this needs to be made into an official Lego kit

Spoiler

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

I choose my own designs, which are a blend of Western styles... As long as they're big and stompy, I'm good. I enjoy designing steampunk mecha but then my inner artist and my inner engineer get into punch ups over 'that couldn't work' 'shut up, it looks cool'...

 

[Hero in a half shell]

Japanese mecha is pretty easy to imagine, but what is the difference between european and North American?!?

 

[Baradiel]

Interesting question. Never really thought about it, but I'd probably go with European, simply because of WH40K titans, which are awesome, and to some extent Ork Stompas, simply because theyre crazy.

 

[DeadlyYellow]

I find myself really liking the Warjacks from Warmachine, though I think those are more just big robots than a pilotable suit. I prefer mechs to have a more machine-than-man-shape look, which is why I never really like Gundam or any of those mecha anime.

 

[Volstag9]

what is it with polls recently?

Anyway i tend to enjoy the ones from Mechwarrior which are of course from the Battletech franchise. Apparently they're American so i'll go with that.

 

[SomeLameStuff]

American.


Really. Megas is THAT awesome.

 

[Cpu46]

Seeing as Gundam Wing was my first real mecha experience I will definitely say Japanese is my favorite, but I also enjoy American and European mecha as well.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

Japanese mecha is pretty easy to imagine, but what is the difference between european and North American?!?

Compare stuff like Warjack or 40K titans and they are very different from Mechwarrior of BattleTech designs, which are American.

For example, a BattleTech Madcat versus an Ork Stompa

Spoiler

 

[Raddra]

The Japanese have different mecha designs?

I thought they just cut and paste the same one over and over.

(note: joke)

 

[Soviet Heavy]

The Japanese have different mecha designs?

I thought they just cut and paste the same one over and over.

(note: joke)

That one is justified, since those are all Gundam styled mecha.

 

[Princess Rose]

Gotta go with Japanese. Love the fluidity and grace. Asuka's got my back on this one:

 

[FFHAuthor]

I wouldn't think it fair to include 40K Titans as Mecha alongside American 'future tanks' and Japanese 'giant samurai'. It's like saying that the New Orleans Saints can beat Jimmy's weekend two hand touch football game and the after school Lacrosse team. Titans aren't just a whole other league, the other league that you measure Titans against is a whole league beyond the one you'd measure Gundams and Battletechs against.

 

[Jwyrd]

ooh, tricky question.

Now, there have been hundreds of reiterations of 'Japanese mecha' in nearly every anime, sentai show, and a multitude of manga and video games. Quite frankly, they have a greater diversity and some of the options and styles, weapon systems and abilities are mind blowing.

WH40K is a great series for various forms of mecha, but I wonder if that really is the 'only' Mecha of Europe. Will get into this in a moment.

North American Mecha is interesting, but do you mean the "Mecha" that are really just work suits? Like the ones in that one ALIEN movie, or are you talking about the gun suits ala Matrix? Or is this the Gun Mechs ala the movie Avatar?

I hope none of the above, because there is a greater variety and source for 'North American and European Mechs' if you look into the source books for Palladium's RIFTS Role Playing Game. Future cataclysm, widespread destruction, and advancements of technology and space travel, mixed with dimensional monsters and altered humanity all co-mingled like an uneasy 3 bean dip of hatred and loathing and fighting.

If you are looking through the source books, I would say that Triax's New German Republic's designs for Mecha at first appear to be some of the better ones, but seeing as the Coalition States (former Domain of Man in North America) usurped many of their designs and added bigger guns to them. Canada's New Quebec had the bigger selection of "Glitter Boys" which were powered suits almost in line with the Iron Man suit, with a railgun on its shoulder and limited flight capabilities - though later models on had more advanced abilities.

Now, the only real decision I need to figure out is if Palladium's versions can count as multicultural or if the fact that it is all produced in the USA makes all said forms automatically North American Mecha...

 

[Soviet Heavy]

I wouldn't think it fair to include 40K Titans as Mecha alongside American 'future tanks' and Japanese 'giant samurai'. It's like saying that the New Orleans Saints can beat Jimmy's weekend two hand touch football game and the after school Lacrosse team. Titans aren't just a whole other league, the other league that you measure Titans against is a whole league beyond the one you'd measure Gundams and Battletechs against.

What about the Guren Lagann Mecha? They fight with universes as projectiles.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

I never really cared too much for mech stuff however the only ones I think I liked were Battletech. The Mech Warrior series and such. I also played some Armored Core.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

ooh, tricky question.

Now, there have been hundreds of reiterations of 'Japanese mecha' in nearly every anime, sentai show, and a multitude of manga and video games. Quite frankly, they have a greater diversity and some of the options and styles, weapon systems and abilities are mind blowing.

WH40K is a great series for various forms of mecha, but I wonder if that really is the 'only' Mecha of Europe. Will get into this in a moment.

North American Mecha is interesting, but do you mean the "Mecha" that are really just work suits? Like the ones in that one ALIEN movie, or are you talking about the gun suits ala Matrix? Or is this the Gun Mechs ala the movie Avatar?

I hope none of the above, because there is a greater variety and source for 'North American and European Mechs' if you look into the source books for Palladium's RIFTS Role Playing Game. Future cataclysm, widespread destruction, and advancements of technology and space travel, mixed with dimensional monsters and altered humanity all co-mingled like an uneasy 3 bean dip of hatred and loathing and fighting.

If you are looking through the source books, I would say that Triax's New German Republic's designs for Mecha at first appear to be some of the better ones, but seeing as the Coalition States (former Domain of Man in North America) usurped many of their designs and added bigger guns to them. Canada's New Quebec had the bigger selection of "Glitter Boys" which were powered suits almost in line with the Iron Man suit, with a railgun on its shoulder and limited flight capabilities - though later models on had more advanced abilities.

Now, the only real decision I need to figure out is if Palladium's versions can count as multicultural or if the fact that it is all produced in the USA makes all said forms automatically North American Mecha...

Well, look at it this way. When you are comparing a 40K mech to a BattleTech Mech, there is quite a difference in terms of style. Likewise, even amongst European only or NA only arguments, you get huge differences.

Can a Mechwarrior really be compared to an AT-AT? Or one of the mechs from Symbionic Titan? Is a Warjack comparable to a 40K Dreadnought?

 

[Great North]

When I clicked on this thread I was thinking, "Well lets see how dumb THIS is." But I've found this really pretty interesting. I think the idea points to a difference in Japanese vs American vs European mecha is once of philosophy.

Japanese = style, grace, technique;
European = brute force;
North American = practicality

But I'd say these so called European and North American mecha certainly blur those two concepts. Maybe I should just go with Euro/American = brute force and practicality.

But what do I prefer? There's something undeniably satisfying in my deep psyche about the more stompy mechs of the west...

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I wouldn't think it fair to include 40K Titans as Mecha alongside American 'future tanks' and Japanese 'giant samurai'. It's like saying that the New Orleans Saints can beat Jimmy's weekend two hand touch football game and the after school Lacrosse team. Titans aren't just a whole other league, the other league that you measure Titans against is a whole league beyond the one you'd measure Gundams and Battletechs against.

What about the Guren Lagann Mecha? They fight with universes as projectiles.

And then there's Ideon, which if I'm remembering correctly, is quite literally God in robot form -- as in, if you do too much damage to it (which is next to impossible to do; we're talking planets sized and larger energy blasts not even scratching the paint), it destroys the universe and starts over. Mecha from the Real Robot subgenre (like Gundam and Macross) may be weak compared to the stuff from 40K, but Super Robots tend to be at least as far ahead of 40K's robots as the 40K ones are from Gundam or Mechwarrior. I mean, Titans fight other titans. Ideon could probably go toe to toe with 40K's chaos gods themselves and win -- and if it lost, it would take the entire universe with it.

OT: I have to give it to Real Robot genre Japanese mecha. Battletech style walking tanks may make for a fun tabletop game and an awesome simulator, but for cool points, you can't beat UC era Gundam[footnote]which was a lot more grounded in reality than the various spinoff series; Yoshiyuki Tomino knows how to do a good mix of hard and soft sci-fi[/footnote], or pretty much anything from Macross.

Also, am I the only one in this thread who didn't know that Games Workshop was a European company? I thought pretty much all of the major tabletop companies were based in the US, and had been since the 70's.

Edit: Besides, none of designs are actually very practical. Even the American style walking tanks would wind up with clogged joints really quickly in any type of long term deployment. The most realistic take on giant robots that I've ever seen was the novelization/re-imagining of the original Mobile Suit Gundam. Mobile suits were never actually used on a planetary body; the closest thing was combat inside of an orbital colony, which was still zero G at the center, and were fairly low gravity even on the edges. In that novel, mobile suits basically serve as space fighters with arms that can be used to hold a variety of weapons, and legs that are mostly used to take advantage of Newtonian physics and change orientation without wasting thruster fuel (the arms can also be used for this.) It solves a lot of the logical problems you get when you have a giant robot walking around on land.

 

[ArianaUO321]

I've got to go with the Japanese... most versatile and agile. Capable of high ground speed and mobility, spaceflight, atmospheric flight, ect. Functional on all terrains, rather than flat ground. Also they are relatively ewok proof.

A lot more stable, they aren't extremely narrow and tall with weak, fragile, and easy to trip legs that leaves them vulnerable to things such as snowspeeders... or ewoks with logs.