Gorkanaut/Morkanaut Review and Progress

The last couple of nights I've been a little busy with domestic chores and catching up on 'Game of Thrones'. However over the weekend I did managed some progress as you can see above. I also took a number of pictures of the kit part assembled which means after the break is the review of the Kit I promised on friday.
Looking at the images on the box and in white dwarf I love the final results and as a kit it's been going together very easily if a little slow since I'm also planning a number of conversions and not just the gun options.

Thing is though, I shouldn't need to make many of the changes I'm planning, on the face of it you get a big stompy walker with a big gun which aesthetically matches up perfectly with the old epic stompas and Gargants. If you glue the doors closed or aren't too fussed about the interior then beyond some weapons options your good to go, nice and easy.

For me though it's not that simple if I'm offered a detailed interiour I want it to be complete. I'm also an engineer so I want some form of worky bitz and the strange blank spaces just don't work of me.
Overall the kit has some very odd design issues that I would like to highlight today.

It's not clear from the WD or box art that behind the head is completely hollow. There have been details applied to the walls which is great but it seem a lot like an afterthought.

Looking at the top half leaves me wondering why this wasn't just boxed off  behind the head with a bulkhead as at the moment it almost gives the impression of an open topped vehicle.

The contradiction with having the detail is that the arms just seem to stop, unless the arm gubbinz are embedded in the armoured shell they have nothing inside to move them or any connection to the engine, which should be in here somewhere.

Also the ammo feed comes in the side in an ingenious way to allow the gun to move freely if you chose not to glue it but then ends abruptly where it can be seen. 

Lastly for the top half, where is the pilot? supposedly the Nauts are driven by either a nob (Gorka) or Mek(Morka) clearly they won't fit inside the head as both Nobz and Meks tend to be larger than a standard Ork and all we get is some scrawny little dude in the top hatch which leads me onto a real pet hate for interiors of vehicles. 

Where are his legs? the model finishes at the waist at the bottom of the hatch, yet the hatch is closed beneath it. So what happened to his legs? There are no cybork details to suggest he's hard wired in there, would it have been that hard to have the detail inside be the bottom of some boots standing on a bar then have the model tall enough to suggest he's all there?

This isn't the first model to have a guy poking out the top and yet you can't see any sign of him inside and that always winds me up.

The lower half of the model has similar inconsistencies, such as the mismatch with detail between the inside and outside of the back plate. 

The one that realy gets me though is the somewhat bizarre detailing for the head mount, 

We get some nice cog details and bits on the outside under the head and if you glue the head in place these will never be seen. Yet look inside though the openable doors and 

There's nothing just a crappy overly bulky ring of plastic which serves no purpose, all the body components are incredibly thick almost as solid as the cities of death terrain so it's not like it even benefits from the reinforcement.

The legs suffer in much the same way as the arms and with the joining point of the model also undetailed it's not realy a surprise that heavy metal team just used a basic metallic drybrush and the advertising in whhite Dwarf brushes to whole internal detail under the carpet with barely a mention (unlike the Taurox which had such a song and dance made about the "gorgeous detail" it probably needs it's own theme song).

 Lastly the legs, White Dwarf mentions the ability to remove the tags and the get a whole load of freedom from the models pose since. Wanting to do this (since the stock pose looks like it's squatting for a dump) I cut the tags off, it soon became apparent that to get the Naut to stand or even vaglue give the impression of walking would need a fair amount more cutting and chopping since the big chunky sections simply get in each others way, I've made a few changes and hopefully it'll work when I come to final assembly.  

Conclusion

External Details

• Plenty of detail and battle damage, little touches like the ork gunner
• 9/10

Internal Detail

• Nice when present, inconsistent with external.
• 4/10

Assembly

• I'd advise using the instructions at least a little, but thats fine for a big kit.
• Cleverly placed mold line mean few to remove
• Easy to assemble and not too fiddly.
• Solid durable Kit
• 8/10

Kustomisation

• Bulky parts will make cutting and changing core components tough.
• Core Gun components make magnetising guns tricky.
• Large front glyph difficult to change.
• Arm options for Left/Right configuration cleaver
• Nice head options and spares.
• 7/10

Overall I'm looking forward to finishing and being able to use the model on the table, I just hope taking on the modifications I want, won't end up with me never finishing. I still have a land raider that's 14 years old and waiting for me to finish fixing the dodgy interior detail and I think that experience is putting me off a little and after the Taurox release I was hoping GW had learned it's lesson, but in many ways this kit feels rushed almost as if the sculptor ran out of time before the end and that lead to the mistakes, that or trying to get it down to 3 sprues ment corners needed to be cut and changes made to squeeze it on. Though for a £65 kit they could surely have justified a fourth.

Overall 7/10

Ok but could try harder.

In comparison with other recent release it could just have been better, with the competition improving at a ridiculous rate, Games workshop have a tough job ahead if they to be able to make any "best miniatures in the world" claims in the years to come without being laughed at.