Wave Corporation interview

Of the many companies that have created Votoms products in the decades since 1983, no one has produced more models than Wave Corporation. They started out as a small garage kit manufacturer working in tandem with Lark Hobby Shop to make their first Votoms resin kits in 1985. By 1989, the two companies were united under the Wave banner. Wave now made their own products and sold them in their own store, beginning a climb that expanded their range to include injection-molded plastic models by the turn of the century. Today, their Votoms catalog is vast and deep.

The following interview was published in the 2007 book Armored Trooper Complete Report as Votoms was enjoying a periodic resurgence in popularity.

 

SCOPEDOG 1/24 SCALE KIT

Why did 1/24 survive?

Playback 1985-2006

It has been 23 years since Votoms finished broadcasting. During that long period of time, Wave injection kits were undoubtedly the ones that gave life to Votoms plamodels. How did the mixture of plastic kits and garage kits come about? Tsutomu Yamazaki, who was a member of Wave at the time and was deeply involved with Wave’s 1/24 Turbo Custom, tells the truth of the 1/24 legend that continues to this day.

Written by Hiroyuki Kawai

[Translator’s notes: the reference to “1/24” throughout this interview refers to the classic 1/24 Scopedog model originally released by Takara when Votoms was on the air. It was well ahead of its time in 1984, and has been considered a masterpiece ever since. “Injection” refers to the production process of mass-producing model parts by injecting plastic into a metal mold rather than vacu-forming, resin casting, or other methods. Big companies like Bandai can afford to create the molds and manufacture injection-molded “plamodels.” Most garage kit companies cannot.]

The early days of the garage kit that gave birth to the Turbo Custom

Interviewer: After the Votoms TV series ended and Takara withdrew from the plastic modeling business, it’s surprising that Wave was able to take over and release an injection kit.

Yamazaki: There’s a part of me that says times were good. First of all, let me explain the background of those days. Fundamentally, the standing of plamodels and garage kits was totally different from that of today. Now, they are completely different worlds. Consumers are clearly divided. Back then, there were many people who bought both, and it was a blessed time.

In such a situation, garage kits had two sources, one in the East and the other in the West. One was the Osaka school, which focused on a high level of modeling, and the other was the Tokyo school, which emphasized lineups.

Kaiyodo, for example, tried to mold Sentai heroes, monsters, and dinosaurs, and Volks was experimenting with channeling Devilman into modeling. On the other hand, Kotobukiya and Wave in Tokyo made mecha models that were not released as plamodels, and shifted in the direction of increasing variety with modification parts. There was a complete difference in the way of thinking between East and West.

Interviewer: What kind of direction did Votoms modification parts take?

Yamazaki: I think Wave started from the stance of increasing the lineup [of Takara’s 1/35 plamodels] with modified parts. We started with parts for the 1/35 Berserga DT, parts to make the Strikedog into a Rabidly Dog, and so on. After that, we started working on parts to convert the 1/35 Scopedog into a Turbo Custom. But we had to stop it after we created a new illustration and packaging.

Interviewer: Why did you stop the project when you had already made such progress?

Yamazaki: It must have been a matter of the company’s direction. At the time, Blue Knight and Five Star Stories were popular. We thought it would be better to focus on those. Votoms wasn’t coming out with anything new. So we missed the perfect time to release products along with Big Battle and The Last Red Shoulder, but when Roots of Ambition was released, there was real momentum to do a Turbo Custom.

This is where I decided to take the plamodel skills I had cultivated on other products and apply it to Votoms. It was an unprecedented turning point called “mixture,” in which a garage kit maker produced a plamodel with injection parts.

Left: Wave l/24 Scopedog Turbo Custom

The Turbo Custom is still being rereleased by Wave. The price is 4,410 yen (tax included), and the parts are of course upgraded.

Right: Takara l/24 SAK series

It all started here. This kit, which later became the base of Wave’s version, is still a legendary product. We are happy to announce that Takara-Tomy will be re-releasing this kit!

 

Interviewer: Did you plan to make injection parts for the Takara kit from the beginning?

Yamazaki: We weren’t negotiating directly, but we decided to sell the injection parts as a stand-alone product with the direction of, “Let’s make it a kit anyway.” It seems that they decided to make it a full kit after talking to Takara. It’s a good thing that it happened, but at that time Takara’s 1/24 Scopedog was about to be reissued at a price of 2,000 yen. And the price of the kit with the modification parts would be 12,800 yen. No one would buy it then. (Laughs) The form was changed to injection and the material was changed to plastic, but its position as a garage kit did not change.

Interviewer: 10,000 yen or more for a plastic model was a surprising amount at that time, wasn’t it?

Yamazaki: I honestly thought it wouldn’t sell. At that price, I thought you would only be able to buy one. There were four different Scopedog Turbo Customs in The Last Red Shoulder and since it appeared a lot in Roots of Ambition, I thought it would be useless if you couldn’t buy more than one. That’s why I pushed for the price of 8,800 yen. I said, “If you can’t do it this way, just abandon it and melt down the molds.” (Laughs)

Interviewer: How did you come up with the price of 8,800 yen?

Yamazaki: Because I wanted one!

Interviewer: You wanted one! (Laughs) So, you mean the price was about what you could afford?

Yamazaki: Yes, I thought I could buy two of them for 8,800 yen each. The point of Votoms is to see if you can buy a lot of them.

Interviewer: Basically, all ATs are mass-produced, aren’t they?

Yamazaki: So we managed to launch the product, and it sold like crazy. For example, a customer from Nagano said to me, “Excuse me, please give me ten and send me another ten.” In fact, we had to keep producing one after another to keep up with the demand. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but the enthusiasm was incredible.

Interviewer: Even today, it is a revolutionary kit, so I guess fans were eagerly waiting for it.

Yamazaki: But to be honest, it was not a very good kit due to the limitations of the molds Wave could make at that time. It was something that couldn’t be assembled in the usual plamodel sense. For the Turbo Custom, the dowel positions didn’t match at all. It was quite difficult.

Lift quote: Wave may have created the legend that l/24 scale is the standard for Votoms plamodels

 

At that time, I was also doing parts checks. I would examine the test shots to see if they could be assembled, and then make suggestions for modifications. Unfortunately, there were still many parts that could not be fixed, but I made the minimum corrections.

I was working on that during the New Year’s holiday. I received a fax from fan, who knew that I was working on it and said, “I am looking forward to the Scopedog Turbo Custom. Please do your best.” And the faxes kept coming. (Laughs) At that time, I was in a mixture of pain and happiness, and I was crying while working on it. (Laughs)

Interviewer: It seems there were a lot of passionate fans like that in the old days.

Yamazaki: People used to come to the store and say, “I want you to put this out.” I wonder how it is these days. But looking back, Votoms was the turning point for Wave. Our goal was to create parts that would be as good as those of the plamodel, so we had to think a lot about this before we started work.

I don’t know about the situation after I left Wave, but they’ve been releasing products ambitiously. For example taking on the challenge of the “landing pose” with the Red Shoulder Custom. It’s almost the same as the shin parts of Takara’s kit, but they changed the mold and altered the head.

Wave 1/24 Scopedog Turbo Custom plastic kits

The Last Red Shoulder version of Wave’s Scopedog Turbo Custom includes armament variations to reproduce Chirico, Muza, Gregor, and Baiman’s configurations. The price is 5,040 yen (tax included).

 

Building the legend of the steel-girded 1/24

Interviewer: The 1/24 continues to mix things up while undergoing such evolution.

Yamazaki: That’s right. In fact, the trend of the “steel-girded 1/24 Votoms plamodel” may have originated from there. Usually, as the popularity of a work fades, the reputation of a model kit also fades. But every time new Votoms products are released, like the Turbo Custom and the Red Shoulder Custom, Takara’s 1/24 Scopedog is used as a base, so its image is improved more and more.

What’s great about Wave is that they don’t just jump on popular titles. They’ve been releasing the Votoms series since the Turbo Custom, regardless of popularity. Even though the Turbo Custom project started when Roots of Ambition came out, the Red Shoulder Custom was released at a completely unrelated time. At one point, we put out a Dog Carrier without any reason… (Laughs) I think it’s great, always chasing after these things. On the flipside, a Scopedog can be a new product if you make a mold for even one part. It’s not impossible to rely on the Scopedog in times of trouble, is it?

Interviewer: I have the impression that there are many people who get involved in Votoms regardless of its popularity.

Yamazaki: For example, there was the l/60 Union lineup, wasn’t there? It seems that the person in charge of Union liked it so much that he kept doing it. They worked on it all the way up to the Turbo Custom. They spent so much money on development that they couldn’t put weapons on it. They couldn’t even make the packaging because they didn’t have a finished product [ready in time]. They asked me to lend them Wave’s Turbo Custom [for a photo]. For some reason, Union’s Turbo Custom packaging shows the garage kit from Max Factory and Lark (Wave’s predecessor). (Laughs)

Interviewer: It was a generous age, wasn’t it? (Laughs)

1/35 resin cast series

Unlike the 1/24 series, the Wave 1/35 “full action” garage kit series consists of resin kits. It includes ATs such as Zwerg and Fatty, which were not released by Takara. They are fully movable models with ball joints in each part.

Left: Wave 1/24 Scopedog Round Mover + Parachute Sack (Space battle color version)

Wave’s challenge was not only the Turbo Custom but also the regular Scopedog. The Round Mover type shown in the photo has a structure not found in the original, such as polycaps in each joint. Price: 4,410 yen (tax included).

 

Connection through Votoms

Yamazaki: Well, it was such a time, and unlike now, the fans had space to understand the situation. Also, Votoms was characterized by the strange horizontal connections that existed.

For example, when I was at Wave, I borrowed LDs from Toshiba and played them at the Wonder Festival. For some reason, they asked me, “Please sell our LDs in your store next time.” I thought it would be a good idea, so I started to do it.

Whenever I thought about buying LDs myself, it was a hassle to go to the record store for them. I thought it would be better if you could buy LDs together with a plamodel. I think it was the first attempt to sell LDs in a model store at that time. Also, it was difficult to find CDs I wanted in CD shops. At that time, there were almost no Merowlink music collection CDs around. So I decided to stock them in the store myself. (Laughs) If I stocked 10 copies, about 9 more people would buy them besides myself. After that, I turned the store into a Votoms shop. I was forced to realize my dream project, called the Votoms Fair.

Lift quote: I have the impression that l/24 had already achieved MG [Master Grade level] when it was first released.

 

Interviewer: You were forced to do it? (Laughs)

Yamazaki: It was quite forced. (Laughs) They were selling limited edition garage kits and so on. What I thought was amazing was that Sunrise granted us permission for 200 units of garage kit modification parts, for example. Sunrise is a studio and a store, and they’ve been working with us for a long time. They were impressed by the fact that Wave has been pushing Votoms for so long.

I’m not trying to be funny, but I’ve always had a strong sense of duty. I’m just a garage kit maker, but they went out of their way to send me videos and let me meet the producers. In that sense, it was surprisingly easy for me to push Votoms as Wave. It was an atmosphere where the surrounding environment and the fans would respond immediately if we put something out. After all, Votoms has a lot of oddball fans. (Laughs) It’s like, “If we’re all idiots, we have to dance together or we’ll lose.”

Interviewer: Commando Vorct in Hobby Japan magazine is expanding the base of Votoms these days, isn’t it?

Yamazaki: Well, Votoms fans are pretty hardcore, so I think it’s tough. They draw a line that says, “This work is not Votoms.”

With Mobile Suit Gundam, content by the creator has always been encouraged to grow by the studio. But in the case of Votoms, it was clearly the fans who drove the growth. No, it was not so much that they were drove it, but that they were maintaining it. Since it was a work that did not have a big swell, it may be difficult for newcomers to get into the world of Votoms.

Right: Wave 1/24 Scopedog Red Shoulder Custom (Downform)

After the Turbo Custom, the evolution of the Wave kit did not stop. The Red Shoulder Custom is a Scopedog with additional armament. But even the main body of Scopedog has been upgraded in various ways.

 

Interviewer: Certainly not many young anime fans watch Votoms.

Yamazaki: Those who have been Votoms fans since the early days don’t approve of Blue Knight. On the other hand, those who are Votoms fan via Gundam think Blue Knight is 0K. It’s not about which one is better, it’s about both. In terms of encouraging growth that broadens Votoms‘ market share, a Blue Knight format is absolutely necessary.

Interviewer: If I think about it that way, I have the impression that it always delivers solid products, even if they’re not explosive.

Yamazaki: But, in contrast to Wave, other garage kit makers have not done so well in terms of numbers. When you look at the three-dimensional objects from Votoms, I feel it’s become a world of what can be done with Takara’s 1/24 as a base. I feel that Votoms has become a “plamodel” world. For example, the 1/35 lineup faded away.

The ATs were originally designed to compare the size of an AT with a human, but now they’re not. It isn’t possible for a human being to sit in them properly. Too many fundamental things were tweaked. On the other hand, the 1/24 had a solid foundation, directly inheriting the technology from Dougram, so I think it had the power to survive the times.

Interviewer: As a result, since the blood of 1/24 was inherited…I guess that’s how it all happened.

Yamazaki: Yes, the blood of 1/24 is very strong. (Laughs)

Wave 1/24 Votoms series

The 1/24 Wave Votoms series is still being released. In addition to the Turbo Custom, the Scopedog series and other series are being developed. The most notable product is the Dog Carrier (sold separately).

 

The passionate blood that has been passed down from generation to generation

Interviewer: The 1/24 model is also quite different from the drawing, but what are the differences compared to the 1/35 model?

Yamazaki: I think it is the skill of arranging [details]. The 1/24 model looks more realistic than the 1/35 model, even though it is completely different from the original design.

And then there are the rivets, of course. In addition to Mr. Okawara’s design, the addition of rivets makes the arrangement even more effective. I think this is also respected in Bandai’s 1/20 in the form of bolts. I have the impression that 1/24 had already achieved MG [Master Grade level] since it was first released. It was natural for it to survive.

Interviewer: But then, 1/24 has completely deviated from a hobby for children, hasn’t it?

Yamazaki: Considering the fact that Votoms was aimed at adults from the first episode, which had a naked woman with a bald head, I’m impressed that the people who thought up the 1/24 Scopedog were in their right minds. They knew what they were doing from the beginning. Of course, Kunio Okawara must have known that what he was looking for was completely different from what had come before. As a side note, mecha with riveted steel plates comes from Yatterman rather than Gundam. It has the image of being side by side with a human.

Interviewer: Was the 1/24 highly evaluated even at that time?

Yamazaki: Yes, it was. But unfortunately, the design from the upper body to the waist was always the same. There was a dilemma that it was difficult to build every time. But after the broadcast, the Votoms design was recognized again, and the reissues sold like hotcakes. Clearly, the kit had an aspect of being born too soon.

Interviewer: I have the impression that the power of the 1/24 scale has led the series to this point.

Yamazaki: That’s right. Takara was the driving force when the series was on TV, and Wave was the driving force during the OVA period after that. I guess you could say that is the legend of the steel-girded 1/24. During the 8 years after the OVA, we released garage kits and tried our hand at injection. For those 8 years, Wave was leading the way.

Interviewer: And now, Bandai’s 1/20 is about to make its debut. I feel like you will finally be liberated from the isolation you’ve been in all this time.

Yamazaki: The cannons have arrived. (Laughs) The military balance will change. It will be interesting to see how this affects the situation. The development side of Bandai has been imprinted with the legend of the steel-girded 1/24 for a long time. (Laughs) I wonder if we can overcome this situation. It will be interesting to see if they can take over the 1/24 mantle.


Visit Wave’s website here.

Read another interview involving Mr. Yamazaki here.

The gallery below contains Wave’s vintage Votoms garage kits, up to the year 2000.
See a gallery of Wave’s modern garage kits here and their plamodels here.

 


1/24 Scopedog Red Shoulder Custom parts (for Takara’s 1/24 Scopedog)

 


1/24 Scopedog Liman Custom parts (for Takara’s 1/24 Scopedog)

 


1/35 Scopedog downform conversion parts (for Takara’s 1/35 Scopedog)

 


1/35 Scopedog “Best Proportion” parts (for Takara’s 1/35 Scopedog)

 


1/35 Scopedog Special Weapon Set (for Takara’s 1/35 Scopedog)

 


1/35 Scopedog Turbo Custom conversion parts (for Takara’s 1/35 Scopedog)

 


1/35 Rabidlydog conversion kit (for Takara’s 1/35 Strikedog)

 

 


1/24 Scopedog Turbo Custom upgrade parts (for Takara’s 1/24 Scopedog)

 


1991 Zwerg resin kit, scale unknown

 


1/35 ED (“Exceed Demand”) Scopedog

 

 


1/35 Full Action Scopedog Turbo Custom

 

 


1/35 Full Action Scopedog Light Custom

 


1/35 Full Action Burglary Dog

 


1/35 Full Action Berserga

 


1/35 Full Action Snapping Turtle

 


1/35 Full Action Strikedog

 

 

 


1/35 Full Action Rabidlydog, 7800yen type

 

 

 


1/35 Full Action Rabidlydog, 14800yen type

 


1/35 Full Action Zwerg

 

 


1/24 Bloodsucker limited edition

 


1/35 Full Action Bloodsucker

 

 

 


1/35 Full Action Ecrevisse

 

 


1/35 Full Action Fatty




1/35 Full Action Fatty ground type

 

 


Support goods (upgrade and conversion parts)

 

 


1/60 Scopedog Turbo Custom Sunsa set

 


1/1 Armor Magnum

 

 

 

 

 


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