Available From HobbyLink Japan
By Cacophanus from Mecha Damashii
Following the unboxing, here is the review for the Robot Damashii Ingram 1 from Mobile Police Patlabor. For such a compact figure, Bandai has done an excellent job here and it’s amazing to think how far the Robot Damashii toy line has progressed in just a few years.
Over the years we’ve had a few kits and even toys of Alphonse but this is an interesting addition to that. In terms of prior toys, it’s worth mentioning the massive Yamato effort from a good few years back.
That was an amazing, huge, and gimmick-ridden toy. It was also very expensive. I am not exaggerating when I say that this smaller version of Alphonse is equally as impressive.
What makes this an interesting set is that Bandai has included the Type 98 Special Command vehicle to scale with Alphonse. For me, that dinky little vehicle will always be remembered for a fantastic sequence in the first Patlabor movie (shown below).
Anyway, as toys go this is a lovely little figure and one that deserves your attention.
Like all Robot Damashii figures, the articulation is very sturdy and thorough. The Ingrams are quite agile in the anime and this figure can easily recreate many of those poses with ease.
Some of the gimmicks from the anime have also been replicated, with the retractable pistol arm being a swap out piece and the replaceable visor shield. While these aren’t inbuilt into the toy, you can still store the pistol in the right thigh compartment, just like in the anime.
The stun stick is also included and slots into the shield. The longer stick part also has to be swapped out.
The most impressive aspect to this toy is its very fine sculpt and detailing. Not only do you have a lot of fine decals across the toy but the internal sculpt parts, such as the camera “eye” in the head and the lights on the shoulders, are molded very finely.
The Type 98 Special Command Vehicle is also very nicely done and has free-rolling wheels, it is also sculpted to an equally high degree as per the main figure and also has very fine decals.
As a set then, this is truly fantastic not least because we’ve not had a proper action figure made of the Alphonse that could be easily played with until now.
While the Yamato was impressive, it was meant for display and wasn’t something you could happily play around with.
Overall, this is a great and very affordable representation of the AV-98 Ingram 1. It does the original Yutaka Izubuchi design work justice and is a nice little toy that can be happily played with. It also comes with the Type 98 Special Command Vehicle, which is just great. So if you’re a fan of Patlabor you definitely need to pick up this little beauty.
