Japan: making the future come true, all the time.


Through constant exposure to movies and videogames, We are all able to conjure up a fairly vivid fantasy of the future: an advanced, dystopian metropolis riddled with holograms and neonlights, where amongst the populace are fully augmented humans with performance-enhancing cybernetic parts living against a backdrop of corporate warfare that unleashed both the ground and the skies countless unmanned drones, vertical take-off dropships, and towering bipedal mechas. While some of the concepts introduced by science fiction were fully realized into our world, many of the said concepts remained unrealized, and we were instead greeted by a mundane future of redundant reality shows in tandem with a social skill malaise we call Facebook against an increasingly pessimistic 21st century society. Thankfully, all hopes for a true to science fiction future weren’t lost thanks to the land of the rising sun. Japan, a country which brought virtual idols to life dropped another sci-fi staple to the real world: an actual, pilotable mecha.

Enter Kuratas, a single seater, soon to be mass-produced pilotable mecha by Suidobashi Heavy Industry. Also

known as the SDBX-01 Vaudeville, Kuratas is named after its creator, Kogoro Kurata, who had earlier worked on a 1/1 scale iron statue of a Scope Dog, the titular mecha of the Armored Trooper VOTOMS series, which I might point out as an excellent example of a sci-fi mecha anime that showcased the use of relatively cheap mass-produced mechas in warfare as realistic as it could. Unlike the towering machines seen in Mobile Suit Gundam, Kuratas stood at a mere 4 metres, weighing in at just under 5 tonnes, very much similar to the specifications of the Scope Dog mentioned earlier. Kuratas is powered by a diesel engine with a

top speed of 10 kilometres per hour through a four-wheeled propulsion, much like standard automobiles. Using a proprietary operating system called V-Sido, it helps to manipulate its hydraulic limbs via a control joystick. It also allows the Kuratas to be operated using a 3G smartphone. Kuratas also have a ‘third eye’, an unmanned helicopter drone which it could launch and send off to scout ahead first.

Gundanium Alloy construction and ALICE A.I system pre-installed it doesn’t. The Kuratas is a humble machine made by existing materials, using existing technologies not so ahead of its time. There are no technologically complex weapon systems as a beam rifle or a smart gun, rather a choice of five less lethal weaponry. Some of the available weapon choices ranged from a Pilebunker melee spike (sounds familiar, Front Mission fans?) to an ‘eco friendly’ LOHAS missile launcher, and a twin BB gatling gun being its only impressive choice of armament capable of firing at 6000 rounds per minute. The other unique feature of Kuratas is “The Smile Shot” system, where the user has to smile to unleash the gatling gun’s insane firing rate into the enemy!

The choice of less lethal arms is perhaps a great method of marketing into countries with strict laws on anything capable of firing projectiles (Kuratas can also be shipped without weapons), but maybe to tone down the war machine image synonymous with mechas and giving it a civilian appeal (as if that matters), which is its targeted customer of choice. You can also customize the Kuratas colouring scheme, one of which could potentially make you three times faster.

At a base price of 1.35 million US dollars without upgrades (the drink and iPhone holder add-ons are complete rip-offs at another 700 dollars might I add), the Kuratas is surely a toy that only the rich or the plain hot-blooded could afford, but owning a Kuratas does make one stood tall against rich, car crazed American billionaires and Saudi royals, putting to shame their luxury fleet of Lamborghinis as nothing more but uninspiring plastic Hot Wheels, and with a gatling gun accompanying a sinister smile, free target practice to boot (maybe the LOHAS Launcher could probably hit something this time).


You can build your own custom unit (click to enlarge) on their website. Simply click “BUY DREAM NOW” and start customizing from there. Yes, my custom unit’s total cost includes that ripoff drink and iPhone holder I mentioned.

There are people who in the course of opinionated discussion regarding Kuratas, stated their doubt of the mecha’s practicality in real world warfare, alongside other points of contempt: that it has a pathetic top speed of mere 10km/h, it couldn’t go off-road, none of its weapons are lethal or pinpoint accurate, that it’s a slow, vulnerable machine exposed to small arms fire, antitank weaponry, and helicopter gunships. These people are jumping the Zakus too high and missing the point that Kuratas are not built with practicality in mind. Rather it’s built strictly as a pure hobby machine, out of passion driven by that childhood dream in all of us of owning a pilotable mecha (even at a steep pricetag). I do agree however that performance could’ve been better at that price point (plus you could grab a drink and iPhone holder cheaper at Daiso), but I consider Kuratas to be the Model T of its generation; a progenitor with much open room to be improved and evolved by others in many years to come. Give it time and it may bloom into an awe-inspiring Dendrobium.

The creator himself had stated in an interview his hope that the machine would “encourage others to follow his example and create their own large-scale rideable robots”. There was no intention at all to start some sort of Wanzer-esque global arms race to get the machine proliferated into standard military usage with its own unique combat doctrine. Mechas are great as they are as fictional war machines: iconic to the respective series and universe it represents while also frequently romanticized as a deus ex machina against any opposing force in countless sci-fi works but nothing more beyond that. Those of you who are more into practical robotics should instead look into powered exoskeletons and quadpedal robots.

One final question I would like to personally ask the readers: which job pays a million dollars a year? Recommend me one.

Sources:
Anime News Network
Gunjap.net (images) – Link 1, Link 2

Entry originally from Superior Internet Content! x2