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Part three of the Zero Zero Magazine scanlation, pages 36-48

This translation effort has been, on and mostly off, 18 years in the making due to time constraints, external factors, and my old ADHD tendency to bite off more than can ever be reasonably chewed. It has been largely complete for the past couple of years as a scanlation other than the parts not focused on Microman, which I had hoped after one point to also typeset once the translation was complete. If anyone would like to typeset the translated appendix pages once they go up, they are most welcome to do so.

#microman #ミクロマン #micronauts #takara sf land #zerozeromagazine

Part two of the Zero Zero Magazine scanlation, pages 18-35:

Part one here:

💬 0 🔁 1 ❤️ 6 · The first 17 pages of Zero Zero Magazine. This amazing book was masterfully created by Design Mate under the direction o

This is the second half of the history of MicroEarth civilization and its fall, and the start of "Microman Story", a summary of Microman's revival on 1970s Earth that covers and at times revises material published in the previous catalogs detailing events up to the middle of 1977.

It's a bit unsettling how the fanciful utopia society described is governed with the help of a centralized AI and how explicitly AI is shown being used by even authors, artists, tailors and so on. These magical technologies described seemed at the time so...21st century?

And now... well, draw your own conclusions.

Part three (more to follow soon...):

💬 0 🔁 0 ❤️ 0 · Post by @micromanclub · 10 images · Part three of the Zero Zero Magazine scanlation, pages 36-48 Part one: 💬 0 🔁 1 ❤️ 7

Original scans by Jack Szwergold, scanlation by Microman Club. All typeset text is human-translated. Some AI image editing tools (not generative AI) used for image editing for text replacement, removal of page creases, and other artifacts.

#microman #micronauts #takara sf land #ミクロマン #zerozeromagazine

The first 17 pages of Zero Zero Magazine. This amazing book was masterfully created by Design Mate under the direction of Yuuichi Higuchi and produced by Takara and came with a choice of Command 3 or Lady Command figure, and represents the apex in many ways of the original run. The book is divided into several parts, with this first section (and easily the best portion) being a lavish deep dive into the Kryptonesque history of MicroEarth at the height of its civilization...

Part two:

💬 0 🔁 3 ❤️ 9 · Post by @micromanclub · 10 images · Part two of the Zero Zero Magazine scanlation, pages 18-35 Part one here: 💬 0 🔁 1

Part three:

💬 0 🔁 0 ❤️ 0 · Post by @micromanclub · 10 images · Part three of the Zero Zero Magazine scanlation, pages 36-48 Part one: 💬 0 🔁 1 ❤️ 7

Part four:

💬 0 🔁 0 ❤️ 1 · This is the world of Microman! · Part Four of the Zero Zero Magazine translation, (pages 49-53, 76-78 and catalog) Part Th

#microman #micronauts #ミクロマン #takara sf land #zerozeromagazine #vintage sci fi

Part Four of the Zero Zero Magazine translation, (pages 49-53, 76-78 and catalog)

Part Three here.

Pages 54-75 are not Microman-focused and will thus be covered as a multi-part appendix series of translated original scans soon following this post for completeness and historical context and reference.

The following comic is "encoded" in "Microtext"--a very simple cypher for the Japanese alphabet. When I did the typesetting a couple years ago, I decided it would be good to maintain the "encoded" look, and debated how to handle it. Swapping out an English cypher, perhaps the sanskrit font used in the Marvel Micronauts comics seemed one possible route, but in the end I simply reversed the English text and inserted it as captions. As I was originally planning to release the entire book in one go as a full typeset scanlation, I felt it was a sufficient solution at the time, and figured I could always go back and change it later if it didn't seem the right choice in the end.

However, another translator excerpted the comic from Zero Zero Magazine for a BlueSky post a few months back and typeset their translation as a regular scanlation.

I'm a little concerned that a significant difference in translations may lead to questions about interpretation, so for transparency I am providing a full transcription of my translation with the original Japanese text decoding.

I will observe that the other translator repeatedly decoded the word enban / えんばん (円盤--a disc or saucer, often meaning "UFO" such as the 1975 die-cast ミクロ円盤 aka "MicroUFO" ) as "engine", perhaps a typo in their transcription they made before translation. In any case, I chose "saucers" over UFOs, because while they aren't precisely traditional flying saucers, they *are* identified objects and fit the mold of classic invader ships that get lumped together as "enban" in traditional Japanese SF.

In any case the dialogue is quite simple to make it easy for kids to use the cypher, so no kanji dictionary software was needed at the time I did my translation, unlike the huge amount of non-Microman related technical content in the appendices to follow, which got dry very quickly, especially in the editing pass after AI translation proved insufficient...

Page 49

Bogey spotted on the far side of the moon! (つきのうらになにかがいるぞ)

Okay! Let's go investigate in Transfer Fortress! (よし！移動基地てていさつしよう)

Starting engines! (エンジンスタート)

Page 50

SFX (goooo)

Ah! Maybe there! (あっ！あれは)

SFX (kiiiiin)

It might be the saucer of the scoundrels! (案掠者の円盤かもしれない)

SFX (pikaaaa)

Look out! We’re going up! (あぶない！きゅうじょうしょうだ（急上昇だ))

Page 51

Fire Photon Beams! (光子ビームはっしゃ！)

SFX (vooooom)

Yes! Got them in one shot! (よし！いっぱつでしとめたぞ)

SFX (zubaaaaan)

SFX (kiiiiiin)

Oh no, there's more! (あっ、なかまがいたのか)

Blast, it's a rat nest! (ちくしょう、これじゃふくろのねずみだ)

SFX (kiiiiin)

Crap! There's too many of them! (くそ！かずがおおすぎる)

SFX (gaaaaaaah)

SFX (zuzuzuuuun)

Oh, it's the Surveyor! (あっ、サーベイヤーだ)

SFX (gogoooo)

Page 52

There must be a saucer in there, let's find it! (きっと円盤のぼかんがいるはずだそれをさがそう！)

SFX (goooo)

There's one on the far side of the moon! (月のウラがわになかがいるぞ)

Oh, there it is! (あっ、あれだ)

That's it! Don't move! (よし！ゆだんするな！)

SFX (shubaaa)

SFX (zuzuuuun)

SFX (gaaaaaa)

SFX (gwaaaaan)

Crap! We’re dead meat now! (くそ！やられたやるかたいあたりだ)

All right, now's our chance! (よし、いまがチャンスだ)

Page 53

Now, Double Strike! (ダブル攻撃だ！)

SFX (vooooom)

SFX (zu-zu-zuuuuun)

SFX (gooooo)

#microman #ミクロマン #micronauts #takara sf land #zerozeromagazine

Zero Zero Magazine Part 5, Appendix 1:

Microman Factory Tours, Part One - Mazda (pages 54-57)

Page 54

Microman Manufacturing Plant Tour

Toyo Kogyo's Hiroshima Plant is a coastal plant facing the Seto Inland Sea, covering an area of 1,545,000 square meters and stretching 5.5 km from north to west.

The assembly of automobiles is done on three lines: an engine assembly line, a body assembly line, and a suspension assembly line, which merge to form the final assembly line. Each completed car undergoes a thorough inspection and a final driving test.

The longest line is 15.3 km long, from stamping to bodywork, painting, and assembly.

The plant is an automated plant with centralized computerized control linking the headquarters and the plant. The latest computers are used to efficiently manage the complex production and quality control of many vehicle models.

The plant has a combined production capacity of more than 60,000 passenger cars and trucks per month. From here, vehicles are exported to almost 100 countries around the world, including the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

Inset image captions:

Panoramic view of Toyo Kogyo's Hiroshima Plant

Fully automated welding line with industrial robots

Transfer machine

Press line

Diagram text:

The Automotive Production Process

Casting and forging -- Machining -- Engine assembly

Pressing -- Welding -- Paint ---- --Engine assembly -- Final assembly

Casting and forging -- Machining -- Sub-assembly assembly

Page 55

Mazda

Cooperation ■TOYO KOGYO CO.

A single car uses a total of 30,000 parts of approximately 6,000 different types.

Body components are pressed by huge machines, and unmanned pouring systems are used for casting. Machining is done by transfer machines. Welding is fully automated using industrial robots. However, even the best computers are no match for the human eye and sense of touch, and experienced inspectors accurately check for distortions of a few hundredths of a millimeter, as well as invisible paint irregularities and scratches.

The development of a new car model involves a meticulous analysis of information and sketching of ideas. Once the style, performance, interior space, and other data are entered into the computer, design drawings are automatically generated. The completed prototype is then subjected to rigorous testing from every possible angle, including performance, safety, and durability, in order to create a safe car that is easy for everyone to use and has no quirks.

Inset image captions:

Automobile at the end of final inspection

Impact simulator analyzing safety data

High-speed durability test

Completed car

#microman #ミクロマン #takara sf land #zerozeromagazine #factory #1970s #vintage technology #Showa Era Japan #Mazda #automobile manufacturing

Zero Zero Magazine Part 7, Appendices 4-6

Microman SF Research Lab (pages 66-69)

Bloccar-3 Gag Comic (pages 70-73)

Microman Shopping Guide - various small sponsors (pages 74-75)

Disclaimer: all materials in this document have been translated as historical and cultural documentation, and may contain outdated science, factual inaccuracies, popular new age pseudoscience of the era, cultural and ethnic biases that come with it, and views that generally do not reflect those of this Microman Club fan journal.

If you have made it this far through the whole book, congratulations, this is in fact the final installment (some possible minor formatting edits and such later notwithstanding)! Thank you very much for perusing this project, one I have dreamed myself of seeing since I first encountered this remarkable work in the late 1990s.

I'm sorry it has taken decades to get here, but it's a huge relief to finally have the *entire* document translated and public at long last. I have worried for a long time that something would happen and all this would be lost. Even as I put these last appendices up, I still found myself making corrections and filling in some gaps like the catalog text (which is pretty interesting as a pricing guide).

As for what's coming next? Well, there's a lot to choose from, but my main focus will likely be split between the other vintage "Microman Bible" text of Microman Book, the 2005 Microman Theology manga, and the "Lost Adventures" (as I call it) Bouken Oh manga, of which I have, with the help of others, collected well over half of the roughly five dozen or so chapters, a significant leap from the handful I had when I first posted about it here.

I also have a number of other interesting esoterica I hope to explore. I am hoping to accelerate the frequency of updates as I will be prioritizing translation over scanlation and typesetting, which just currently is not manageable or sustainable as a side project. As such, all materials published here will be open for anyone to clean and typeset, preferably with attribution and similarly shareable. But as a side project, there's no set schedule, and it's entirely possible this could even be the last post, too, though I certainly hope not!

Anyway, enough of my yapping...enjoy!

Page 66

Microman SF Intelligence Agency

It is said that among the 500 billion planets in the Milky Way galaxy, 1 billion have life, and among those, several million have intelligent life. Therefore, it cannot be denied that there is a possibility of highly evolved beings from beyond the galaxy visiting Earth in UFOs.

■ 6 Major UFO Characteristics

The basic shapes are circular, spherical, and cylindrical, with all saucer shapes divided into these 3 types.

They can hover motionless and fly tilted forward.

In daytime they appear metallic silver or gray, at night they emit mysterious lights.

Silent flight except when taking off.

Make sudden turns, sudden stops, zig-zag at ultra-high speeds with anti-gravity maneuvers.

Emit powerful electromagnetic waves, impacting surrounding lifeforms and objects.

[Inset diagram captions:

● Inside an Adamski-type saucer

Upper view lens

Magnetic pillar

Saucer body

Power coils

Control seat

Charts and graphs

3 condenser coils

Maintenance room door

External flange

Entrance door

Spherical landing gear (also a condenser)

Underside view lens

Floor view lens]

[Inset diagram captions:

● Inside a cigar-type saucer

Pilot cabin

Ship hatch

Storage deck

Airlock

Boarding platform

Rest area

Central control room

Airlock

Saucer travel rail

Ship hatch]

[Inset image captions:

While UFOs come in various forms, these are 11 representative patterns based on reliable eyewitness accounts!

Hemispherical type

Oval type

Rugby ball type

Conical type

Saturn type

Cross type

Cigar type

Perfectly spherical type

Blood cell type

Triangular type

Domed type]

#microman #ミクロマン #takara sf land #zerozeromagazine #1970s #Showa Era Japan #1970s UFOlogy #1970s pseudoscience #1970s Japanese novelty goods

Zero Zero Magazine Part 6, Appendices 2-3:

Microman Factory Tours

Victor (pages 58-61)

Nikon (pages 62-65)

Page 58

Microman Manufacturing Plant Tour

This is Victor Company of Japan's Hinode Plant in Yokohama. About 2,000 cassette recorders and black and white televisions are produced here per day.

Cassette recorder production starts with the manufacturing of the radio, TV and amplifier circuit boards. Wiring is printed onto the boards, then 70-130 resistors, bus wires and other components are inserted and soldered. The insertion machines contain computers which automatically insert the 70-130 small parts. If done manually, this would be extremely tedious work. The TV boards are processed accurately at a rate of 20 boards per hour, while the radio boards are done at 40 boards per hour.

[Inset image captions:

Panoramic view of Victor Company's Hinode Plant

Computerized insertion machine

Insertion machine]

Next, parts like resistors and transistors that cannot be machine-inserted are added by hand. On average, a person can insert 18 points (parts per board) in just 2.5 seconds per point.

The backsides are then wave soldered by passing through solder around 250°C. If the solder temperature is too low, poor connections result, but too high damages the parts.

The boards pass through a high-speed automatic trimmer, cutting within 3mm on the backside. After passing through the solder once more, corrections are made and checking is done. This completes the heart of the mechanisms - the circuit boards.