Let’s build a fun Premium Bandai release - the GM Night Ranger Night Seeker II:
(Seriously, you have no idea how many times I mentally referred to this thing as Night Ranger)
About the Mobile Suit
Here is what the Gundam Wiki has to say about the Night Seeker II:
The RGM-79V GM Night Seeker was developed based on the RGM-79 GM, but many of the special operations forces that had deployed the RGM-79V requested the deployment of a Night Seeker with improved mobility.
The original GM Night Seeker
For this reason, during the third production run of the GM Night Seeker, the Earth Federation Forces manufactured several units based on the RGM-79L GM Light Armor, which has superior maneuverability to the regular GM. Based on the RGM-79L, this machine was named the RGM-79LV GM Night Seeker II.
The GM Night Seeker II
The RGM-79V and RGM-79LV were deployed to the front lines in the latter half of the One Year War, and achieved great success in suppressing the bases of the Principality of Zeon's Earth Attack Force, thanks in part to the skills of the pilots of the elite "033 Special Mission MS Squadron".
The Night Seekers are the Earth Federation’s equivalent of ODST’s from Halo. Their mission was to drop down into Zeon bases from high altitude, under the cover of night, and take out the main defenses as quickly and efficiently as possible, so that regular GM forces could then march in and take control of the installation.
Whether the Night Seekers had a higher rate of survival than ODST’s isn’t clear, but some of the text on the wiki implies that maybe they did. For example, it seems the reason why the Night Seeker II was created was because pilots gave feedback on how to improve on the original design - and that’s something you can only do if you come back in one piece!
Weapons and Equipment
The Night Seekers were equipped with a variety of different weapons depending on the mission, including:
Beam sabers
The standard Beam Spray Gun used by regular GMs
A custom beam rifle originally used by the GM Light Armor. It is said to be more effective than the Beam Spray Gun at long range; combined with the Night Seeker’s extra sensor packages, I imagine it worked as a makeshift sniper rifle
The 100mm machine gun used by all sorts of Federation mobile suits
And then there is the matter of its thrusters. The Night Seeker has special thrusters on its backpack, as well as additional thrusters on its chest. These allow it to safely (and quickly) descend on its target, without the need of a parachute (which I guess would make it easier to be spotted, not only because of the size of the parachute, but also due to the slow speed of descent)
On the Night Seeker II, these thrusters can be expelled after landing, so as to make it even lighter and faster during operations. Though any unit that leaves them on will benefit from increased jumping ability, as the thrusters allow it to reach a jumping height of 400 meters.
If we look at both the Gundam Wiki and MAHQ, we find that they both list an Origin-ified version of the GM Night Seeker I:
The GM Night Seeker I as it appears in Mobile Suit Discovery, using the updated/modern art style of The Origin OVA
Yet neither website lists the Night Seeker II as being part of the design series. So why does it say MSD on the box? My guess is that, since both units are so similar in nature, Bandai’s model kit division just lumped them together for the purposes of packaging and branding.
MSV-R Backstory
Normally a given design series simply features a bunch of mobile suit variations that were concocted for a given TV series or film, but MSV-R actually has an in-universe story. Ten years after the One Year War, the Earth Federation Survey Service was tasked with investigating and documenting a number of unverified mobile suits that may or may not have been used during the war. MSV-R is the result of their findings.
I interpret this as meaning that these are the mobile suits that were doing highly classified, black ops shit that was on a super strict need to know basis.
Appearances in Media
The Night Seekers have actually shown up in a couple places outside of their design series. They show up briefly in the 0083 Rebellion manga (though from the description it doesn’t sound like they fared all that well):
On the video game front, it looks as if both models appear in Gundam Battle Operation 2:
About the Model Kit
This is like the Platonic Ideal of a Premium Bandai kit; an obscure mobile suit variation that most people don’t know or care about, with lots of accessories and markings and whatnot.
All in all, it looks like a pretty standard GM build. My only complaint about it is that, sadly, all of its markings are stickers, rather than waterslides. That’s a shame, especially considering there are P-Bandai High Grades that come with waterslides. They really ought to have done the same thing here.
High Grade Night Seeker I?
In case you’re curious - yes, they also made a P-Bandai release of the original Night Seeker:
It looks like it may come with one less gun, but other than that they’re pretty much the same thing with different color schemes. Well, that, and the fact that the original Night Seeker was last printed in 2020, and there’s no telling whether or not they’ll ever do another one.
