CAMS-02 Catsith – A Review
After my little Test of Buyee and Finally getting my grubby little paws on not one but Two(!) HG Catsith kits - essentially a double dose of personal Unobtainium - you know I had to build one eventually.
Well… this one left me with more than a few questions when I was done.
So sit back, relax and join me as I enjoy my rare recent win. Here’s my review of 2015’s G-Reco grunt suit from the Capitol Army, the HG CAMS-2 Catsith.
So… what can I say about a kit that, at the time of writing/building, is almost a decade old?
Well, the Catsith has all the earmarks of a classic Grunt Suit. The back has the now fairly standard two-peg system for the High Grade backpacks. It also has a little long square hole above those that looks to be another type of mounting point (not the blocky one of some of the old SEED kits but possibly another locking point?). Aside from the big ‘ol flight pack that it almost always had in the show, it comes with that very basic load out of a shield, a gun and swords - a staple of a number of Gunpla but the hallmark of a basic grunt unit.
Before I get too deep into that rabbit hole, let me talk up the build a bit.
The build went really smoothly. It’s a 2015 kit so it relies on polycaps for stuff that’d be better served with a plastic-on-plastic connection but it’s still an amazing solid kit. It's even disturbingly well balanced. The Catsith even has one of my fave gimmicks – leg based beam sabers! I mean, I love the when a mobile suit has beam weaponry in places that isn’t just the backpack. I Really love when it’s someplace that can be used defensively – a hole in the palms, a spot on the forearms, etc.
The Catsith one-ups other suits by hiding them in a moving flap on the front of the shins. The toes move down, the handle of the saber flips out from behind the moving flap and it lays in a groove along the front of the foot. It’s absolutely a neat gimmick and I love it.
So here’s my final thought on the kit before I get back into the rambling from the beginning…
The Pros:
It’s a simple kit. Not super complicated to stick together. Not a lot of stickers that you couldn't just paint in or ignore.
You have options for the optics. You can place them over the clear lens or use the smaller one on the head directly and have it behind the “glass".
It can balance like nobody’s business. I didn't have to do much to get my goofy pics. It’s a tad back heavy with the full flight pack installed but it's Super stable.
The Cons:
There’s flexibility just left on the table. This tends to be a thing with certain G-Reco kits. The designs are unique and I love them but they’re a pain in plastics. The knees could bend more with a few tweaks and the arms could have a better range in the elbow. Same with the waist.
It’s an HG so it suffers from a lack of hands. I love that it comes with three hands (and hand backs) for stuff but it lacks a basic holding hand. It’s two open hands and a trigger finger. I get that the leg-mounted sabers are Technically a part of the suit but they’re still beam sabers. They’re even used in the hand in the show. A bummer not to have a set as they are molded in a very nice pink color. Hard to just grab a Hand kit and replace them without work.
Overall, this is a fun kit. There’s just one issue that confuses me about it… why is it not one of those kits that gets reprints and alternate versions?
This thing has all he trappings of a GM style suit. It’s simple but not so much that a builder couldn't do something with it. It's got a gimmick, sure, but it’s an easy enough fix if you didn’t want to deal with the flip out sabers. It even has a bunch of artwork for alternate versions and You Know how Bandai likes to take a kit, mold it in a new set of colors and drop it on P-Bandai. The Catsith doesn’t even get that.
The G-Self is the Hero suit of G-Reco. It makes sense that it’s going to hang around a bit despite the series not being that popular. But it’s not the only one to get a different version. The Grimoire – the Zaku to the Catsith’s GM in this universe – got a nice modded version in the third Build series, Gundam Build Divers. It makes no sense.
Instead of going off too much on stuff that no one can use, how about I wrap this up.
Overall, the Catsith is a fun little build. It’s a solid kit that has a good range of motion in the hips and neck. A nice little base kit to mod into the mech of your dreams…
If you can find one.