What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

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False Prophet
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What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

Anyone can tell that mecha designs can be categorized into the ages which they originate. But then, what aesthetic features that charactirize the uniqueness of an era? For example, in my opinion, the uses of overly-sharp angles began to occur with designs in the late 90s.
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MythSearcher
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Re: What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

Well, 70~80's have larger legs and feet, a feature carried over from super robots shows, which is also common in super robot nowadays.
Notice Katoki redesigns usually make these smaller and sharper, which I think is a feature from mid to late 90's.

The problem of doing this kind of age identification is that designs do not change suddenly, and multiple different designs may have slowly evolved into it, and if you try to trace back the style, it can well have been there for a decade or two but just never used in more popular shows so it didn't pick up the pace.
For example, Katoki was kinda made famous with the arcade/Sega Saturn game Virtual On in 1996, but his design styles was well developed in Gundam Sentinel, and the GM III original design for ZZ (which got its head changed to a rounder one and Yoshinori Sayama took most of the credit at the time since Katoki wasn't famous then) was in 1986, 10 years before that.
Another thing is that the older design style can also be kept for quite a long time and not phased out, for example, attaching wings/fins for no apparent reason(Most are not really used as radiators nor aerodynamic lifters) probably started in Macross and stabilized in Zeta and ZZ, is still being used extensively now in a lot of shows. The super slim waist style started around mid 80's by Mamoru Nagano of Five Star Story fame(Also did HyakuShiki and Qubeley and the L-Gaim series, he is also famous for his major use of high heels, super slender built and longer than height overcompensation guns and drawing in penis-shaped-hilt-sword against vigina-esque-shield) is still very obvious in current designs.
Henyo
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Re: What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

the 70s and the early 80s mechas, be they Super or real, tend to be more boxy. late 80s up to the lates 90s featured more angular designs. and also more gems/lenses/ runes or whatever they maybe in universe.
there are exceptions of course. Transformers, Brave and Eldoran series. they're still blocky while also having the orbs and runes/ whatevers.

moving into the early 2000s, i think thats were designs went a wee bit wibbly wobbly or so. the rise of CG made way for some unique designs. Candidates of Goddess, Vandread come to mind. oh and Zegapain too!

there have been constants in all of the decades in the genre though. Human faces and mouths. even some real robots have this. Macross 7's VF-19 Fire Bomber is an example.
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False Prophet
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Re: What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

Anyone here know when did slid-eyes designs (Like the Temjin in Virtual On) began to become popular?
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JEFFPIATT
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Re: What aesthetic features you expect on mecha designs of different ages?

False Prophet wrote: Sun Apr 02, 2017 8:23 am Anyone here know when did slid-eyes designs (Like the Temjin in Virtual On) began to become popular?
I believe that was a early 90's design as that's when V Gundam came out and the BESPA MS units all used the slit eye sensors.
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