What would you like to see in next Gundam Series? - Winners Announced!

What would you like to see in next Gundam Series? - Contest Winners

Thank you everyone's participation in this contest.  It was a joy for us to read all your fun and creative ideas for a great Gundam series.  We especially thank those who had put a lot of effort in writing out your ideas.  There were definitely a lot of great stuff among the 700+ comments we received.  GG, PatrickGrade & Hon were the judges in selecting the top 3 ideas which captured our attention.  Now these ideas are in no way superior to some of the other great ideas posted for this contest, but they were ones which we thought..."Now that would be a making of a great Gundam series!!!"

For the 3 winners, we only ask that you send us an email to admin@gginfinite.com to inquire how you can receive your prizes. 

1ST WINNER: Some Other Anon

PRIZE: MG 1/100 Tallgeese EW

TEAM GG: "An interesting story about power struggles, involving a Gundam with a special AI system.  The emotional ties between the Gundam and the lead character sounds very interesting.  This could be an interesting take for a new Gundam series!"

In an alternate century, mankind as settled on Mars and is getting ready to explore the rest of the Cosmos. To this end, the Mars Builders Association begins building a new Super Space Station, that will serve as the launching ramp for this exploration. It is a joint venture between Earth and Mars, and to ensure this, a new machine is created on Earth that allows control of the Space Station. This machine is called Gundam. But unknown to earth, the leader of the MBA is plotting to take over the Space Station so he can use it to claim the independence of Mars, because he feel that Earth treats Mars like nothing more than a work force, with bad working conditions, an no say on Earth's politics. He comes up with a plan to highjack the Gundam on a supposed routine testing of the Space Station. This doesn't turn out well, and the Gundam's pilot ends up getting killed. Unknown to the MBA leader, though, is the fact that the Gundam pilot had a love relationship with his daughter. When she finds out about this operation, she tries, in vain, to stop her father, but she's too late, and she ends up seeing the pilot die in front of her. Full of rage against her father, she gets in the Gundam and tries to escape to earth, so she can return it. She then finds out about this Gundam's new AI system. It appears the Gundam has a learning AI, that picks up personality traits from it's pilot, so the AI is all that she has left from her lover. While on her way to earth, she gets contacted by an Earth rebellious group, that informs her that Earth's plan was to use the Space Station to destroy the MBA all along, because they felt the MBA was getting too rebellious themselves. This rebellious group is led by an Earth Official that feels opposes this decision, so he decides to go on his own to get, and ultimately keep the Gundam out of Earth's and Mars' reach. Our heroin decides to join them, and now she must protect the Gundam from the opposing factions that want it so they can control the Space Station, torn between the feelings she has for her father and for her lost love, forever present in the form of the learning AI...

2ND WINNER: Lei

PRIZE: RG 1/144 Zeta Gundam

TEAM GG: "A well thought out grand scale Gundam space opera in the making!"

This is my idea for a gundam series where the Gundam would be an integral part of the story, and not just a vehicle for the main character to ride in, and the main female is both original and, imo, is better for expressing the kind of darker feelings and tone this series would present

I've always been interested exploring expansion into the rest of the solar system. In my concept, the solar system would be connected by space gates. These gates would be expensive, energy intensive, difficult to build, and have a limited tunneling range. Furthermore, travelling through these gates would require special equipment. 

The Solar System would be under a unified government (the Federation of Sol?) centered around the Earth sphere, but many of the planets would be de facto autonomous. The farthest full settlement would be Jupiter. Saturn and beyond would have exploratory settlements. Colonies in the outer solar system would mostly depend on giant fusion reactors for power to generate the light needed for habitation and food. A terraformed and prosperous Mars would get the extra sunlight through giant solar reflectors placed in orbit. A terraformed Venus would similarly have solar dimmers. In addition to colonies around the planets, there would also be autonomous colonies around the Lagrangian points between the planets and the sun (in UC the Lagrangian points are between the Earth and the Moon). The Asteroid belt would be populated and controlled by mega-corporation industrial settlements. 

The series would start in the middle of a conflict between Mars and Jupiter 500 years after the establishment of said unified government, during its state of decline. Jupiter is making a power grab to control the inner planets for their land (better agriculture and standard of living), and out of an ideology that asserts a superior Jovian race should inherit the Earth. The Earth sphere has turned a blind eye to the conflict, believing that Jupiter intends only to take Mars. Earth is willing to sacrifice Mars to sate Jupiter's appetite. While Earth does not recognize the conflict, Venus, the Moon and the colonies of the inner planets have declared neutrality, but with many sympathizers in its government and businesses providing assistance to Mars in secret. The Asteroid belt settlements would also be officially neutral, with sympathizing factions to both Mars and Jupiter. 

Most mobile suits at the start of the series would resemble each other, as mobile suit development is based on centralized prototype designs distributed by the unified government, though heavily modified by the planetary governments. However, competitive 2nd or 3rd generation designs indigenous to each planet have begun emerging by the start of the series, with Jupiter leading in development. The main mobile suit of the series would be a new generation prototype Gundam that Jupiter has been secretly developing with the ability to open its own space gate. The technology is imperfect, unreliable, and has limited range. Jupiter's intention is to perfect this technology so that it can perform a surprise attack on the rest of the solar system. 

The series would follow a Martian spec ops unit forward deployed into Jovian space. Their mission is to sabotage Jupiter’s supply chain, strategic asset, and un-deployed fleets to reduce the number of forces able to reach Mars’s defence perimeter. During one of these missions, the protagonist discovers the prototype Gundam and steals it. The rest of the series follows the spec ops unit as 1) they try to make it back to Martian space so that Mars can reverse engineer and perfect the Gundam’s superior technology, 2) they reintegrate into the main fleet as Mars tries to rally more support from the other planets, 3) the other planets and Earth itself slowly gets pulled into the conflict as the Jovian threat grows imminent. 

In addition to all the usual tropes and themes from real robot military shows (of which a number should be obvious) such as how ideology and interests motivate wars, some of the themes that would be explored in the series are whether man is doomed to division, what is humanity under extreme conditions, and what happens to the concept of “home” as man increasingly drifts away from their place of origin.

3RD WINNER: Jason Reynolds

PRIZE: HGUC 1/144 Delta Gundam Kai

TEAM GG: "A great story with great characters... sound simple, but is often overlooked these days."

Most Gundam series are variations of the same story with many of the same situations but with new mecha designs and new characters. The story is almost an afterthought. Instead the question is who is the new Char, the new Ranba Ral, etc. of this series? 

The only truly original Gundam series, other than the original MSG, are G Gundam and Turn A Gundam. While they are great series in their own rights most "hard-core" Gundam fans don't like them as much as the OYW retreads. 

With all of this in mind it is pointless to try and create yet another variation of the MSG formula. I think it is time to shift the focus back to telling a great story with great characters. 0080 is a perfect example of what this should be. It tells a story about a boy who idealizes war as a game who comes to realize how tragic and horrible it really is.

CONGRATZ TO THE ABOVE WINNERS!!!

Other Comments which we thought were interesting and wanted to share with you:

- A world where Gundam is referred as a God

- Awesome Gundam name: Gundam Valkyrie

- Awesome Gundam title: Gundam: Guardian of Space Drifters

- Female as the lead protagonist

- Steampunk Gundams

- Prequel to the One Year War

- Gundam vs. an alien race

- Side stories / Continuation of Gundam UC, 08th MS Team, Gundam X, Turn A Gundam..etc.

- After the Gundam AGE series, a bunch of Gundam fans attack Bandai Headquarter.

ONCE AGAIN, WE THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION!!!

Images above via goodfon.com & Windforcelan