Has anyone ever heard of Gundam?

This franchise has an unbelievable amount of games in it. Just look at the Wikipedia page, there have been Gundam games on every console from the obscure Fujitsu consoles to the well known Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo ones. The first one came out before Donkey Kong, which came out in '81.

Um yeah? There has been Gundam games on pretty much every platform I have had (every gen to be precise, I can name platforms that have never had a gundam game, but They come across every gen, pretty much teh same with the Macross games.

It always did strike me as odd that they would rarely if ever come out in the west, given how popular they are even in the west. Luckily I think we are finally going to get a port on the Vita for one of the latest Gundam games?

Well maybe the hit or miss quality of said games might have something to do with it. I remember some of the older games to be jank, or just quick cash grabs. The good ones however do tend to be rather good.

Yes. Growing up I was obsessed with Gundam. However, as good as the shows are, the games ain't very appealing. I recommend Armored Core or Zone of the Enders for that flexible mech vibe.

Ever heard of Gundam? Hell yeah. I'm a huge Mobile Suit Gundam fan for over a decades and I played just about every Gundam games there is. Ask me anything about Gundam, what do you wish to know?

I loved gundam as a child. Very good series. The games rarely delivered. They tried to make it into some dynasty warriors other silly crap that just could not fit well

The one game that I remember that was good was for PS1, called Gundam Battle Assault 1.

Since then, only Zone Of Enders took the throne. Especially Zone of Enders 2 the second runner

Considering that Gundam has spanned over a dozen different TV series over the last 35 years, four movies, over a dozen more OVAs and another dozen manga series, the answer to your question is "yes", I'd say that a few people have probably heard of it.

-Byshop

All right, cool. I was just wondering because no one really talks about Gundam a whole lot. I'm glad that someone has heard of Macross too. How many of you guys have heard of Genesis Climber Mospeada though, huh?

Dude you really need to play Gundam Battle Assault 2. It's by far the best of the Battle Assault series to date. But I always felt like BA2 was ahead of it's time, hell, its the only non-SD game to have the Hydra Gundam among others, and it did introduce G-Gundam fighters during G-Gundam came to the west at the time. If you can, go find Gundam Battle Assault 2.

As for Zone of the Enders, yeah it was basically Gundam in many ways it could possibly can be and I enjoy those games on PS2 and I also own the HD version.

Maybe more have "seen" it than heard of it. Way back in the 80s, a company named Harmony Gold got the US distribution rights for several anime series. Macross was aired in the US under the name "Robotech" with some significant editing and story changes in the translation, and then they took Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross and aired it in the US as the "second generation" of Robotech, again with translation changes to tie the stories together. While not a ton of people outside of Japan have heard of Genesis Climber Mospeada, that show was aired by Harmony Gold as the third season of Robotech so even if people don't know it by name they probably remember "that cartoon from the 80s with the bikes that turned into power armor".

-Byshop

Who hasn't heard of Oppan Gundam Style?

Yeah, Gundam is one of the most famous mech animes ever, and was one of the biggest series that aired on Toonami back in the day. Game wise, I love Gundam Side Story 0079: Rise from the Ashes and Gundam Battle Assault 2.

@Byshop: Yes, Byshop, I know. I've seen every episode of Robotech, and the original serialized animes (Which are almost the same thing). I've also read a good portion of the Robotech comics/novels. Genesis Climber was its own show before it was combined with the other two shows though. It was pretty strange, and I mainly mentioned it to see if anyone had heard of it. There is also this weird Japan-exclusive OVA that virtually no one has seen, and it's based off Genesis Climber, and it's made of combined new and old footage, which is a bit better.

I've got all "four" shows. The entire Robotech series, plus the macross series that made up season one, Southern Cross and Genesis Climber. I haven't worked my way through all of them, though. I've got too much newer stuff stacked up ahead of it.

-Byshop

@Byshop: Cool. Macross is by far the best one. Try to see if you can watch the remastered version, too. Also, watch out for the strange "bath scenes" in Southern Cross. (There is also one in Macross I think.) Hell, DBZ was worse though.

I think the thing is that anime seems to have hit is height of popularity outside of Japan, at least around here in America. A lot of people still like and regularly watch anime and read manga, don't get me wrong, but I think now that most of the really notable series' are available for people to watch anywhere, we're past that introduction point where it was all still new to us.

I think Mobile Suit Gundam, G-Gundam and Gundam Wing will always be the ones I remember best, because that's what aired when I was really into anime. And I don't think I've ever seen any Gundam series all the way through, now that I think about it. I wouldn't mind going back and re-watching them - I probably would if it were as easy as turning on Netflix and loading up an episode.

I remember some people who were way more into Gundam than me in middle school, thought the PS2 game Journey to Jaburo was decent. I have no idea if it was or not, but at the time they liked it.

You know, it always seemed to me like they could make a really amazing game out of a property like Gundam. Have you customize your Gundam and fix it up after harsh battles, equip it with different weapons, and then have it be like some arcade-style third-person battlefield on land, in the sky and up in space.

I loved Gundam Senki Battlefield Record UC 0081, for me that has been the best gundam game so far, too bad crossfire was shitty optimized because that game had great dismemberment, something which senki lacked.

Dragon Ball series is what got the whole Anime thing going for in the west back in the 90's-2000. Dragon Ball Z open the doors to the west when it became a smashing hit. Gundam also help out when Gundam Wing first air on Toonami during the early 2000. I still own Mobile suit Gundam: Journey to Jaburo and Zionic Front on PS2, but Battle Assault 2 is still the best Gundam game out there. Last month, I just started and finishing watching Gundam Unicorn, it's okay but once you get to episode 4, it went downhill really fast and I had to drag myself to finish that series but lucky, there's only 7 episodes so not too bad. Gundam has lost it's popular in the west and I wish Japan would make another Gundam game for current-gen. Funny thing is, when I play Titanfall, it's really what a Gundam game should be like.