S.H. Figuarts Kamen Rider Gold Drive Gallery

Buahahahahahahaha!

I've patiently waited for this bad boy to come in for a review and gallery and I'm overjoyed to have him now. One of my favorite hero designs ever redone as an irredeemably, purely evil, villain? Sweet sweet gold paint? AND it was a retail release?? You better believe I'm excited to share this gallery of S.H. Figuarts Kamen Rider Gold Drive!

Packaging
The last 7 releases from Kamen Rider Drive came out between October 2015 & July 2016, and they were all web exclusives. None featured window boxes due to their web exclusive nature. But bucking that trend after a very long stretch is Gold Drive, which is a retail release! Gold Drive employs the exact same packaging as the original Drive Type Speed.

This is a very common box design at this point, it began with Drive but has actually been carried over to Ghost as well, so no real surprises. Just new stock photos and a Banno Tablet face on the top right corner of the box. The box obviously romanizes the name as "Gord Drive" but given his color scheme and context we obviously know the proper name is Gold Drive. R's & L's are often flipped when going from Japanese to English.

Main Figure
This figure is a straight up repaint of the Drive Type Speed Mold but with a Proto-Speed Tire/Archetype Gear from Kamen Rider Proto-Drive. As such this is our 3rd outing with this mold, and a 4th is on the way with the soon to be released Zero Drive. At this point if you've handled any version of the Type Speed/Proto/Gold/Zero body, you know what to expect, excellence.

Once again I want to emphasize that the Drive Type Speed mold is one of my all time favorite S.H. Figuarts. It's a fantastic figure, so by extension Gold Drive is fantastic. He's primarily painted in a gorgeous shiny gold finish that really stands out from the glossy black parts of his undersuit. He stands out very much in any display, in a good way. The paints apps on this release are just as strong as the previous 2 iterations of the mold, aside from one minor complaint, the tire. The "Archetype Gear" as it was know on occasion has some great detailing and the gold paint makes it all really pop. But the front of the tire should have a more significant green detail on the upper right. You can see it on the figure, but its very muted. It should be bright, like almost neon green.

Unlike the other versions of the mold the Banno Driver doesn't feature many paint apps, but as a mostly black repaint that's to be expected. Physically the driver is unchanged from the other versions & like them it's removable, very fitting for recreating evil Banno moments. The face of the driver itself can be removed exposing the cylindrical part that displays Banno's facial expression & technically Tire Koukans. From the ground up this figure was designed for cross compatibility with future Shift Car/Tire sets. However the Proto/Archetype tire deviates from Type Speed at this juncture. It can't be removed without some degree of customization or the possibility of damage. So still, unlike the Type Speed's which could come apart to allow for Tire exchanges, Gold Drive's tire can't. The basic structure of his body would allow for it. But the tire has been molded as one piece. I've seen plenty of pictures where people have taken the time to pry it off. I'm just not interested in damaging my figure over it.

The Shift Brace on the left wrist is identical to a normal one but with no Shift Car present. Gold Drive doesn't have or need one to function. Likewise there is no Shift Car holster on the right hip like there was on Type Speed & Proto Drive. Since Banno doesn't use Shift Cars he doesn't need the holster either. These small removals don't add up to much tooling or parts cost, but I wish the accessory count could have gone up because of them.

Last but not least I want to talk about Gold Drive's head. Which is again, the Type Speed head done up in brilliant gold with a blood red visor. It just looks so so good. These colors just do not disappoint, a totally heroic design with these colors just looks deliciously evil. I'd gladly take this color scheme on other riders too, like maybe Decade or Hibiki. Finally I just want to remind everyone how fantastic this figure's articulation is. It's every bit the same excellence as Dirve Type Speed & Proto-Drive.

Accessories
Sadly this is where Gold Drive falls massively short:

1 - Banno face plate. Granted, Banno only ever had the 1 expressionless face when he was a tablet, and that carried over to his life as a Driver. But this feels a little slim is all. You can remove the Banno Driver and swap out the standard blank black one for this.

4- sets of additional hands. That's actually double the number of hands that Drive Type Speed & Proto-Drive came with. They had 2 sets each. Gold Drive includes recolors of the hands for the Door Gun that came with Drive Type Technic as well as the Handle Sword hands that came with Drive Type Wild. These are intended to use with the weapons that the numerous Drive Mach & Chaser figures came with.

But he sadly comes with no weapons of his own to hold. That's the biggest letdown of this figure. His special Gold Conversion ability allows him to steal the weapons of other riders that haven't been treated to resist it. Seeing as there were no shift cars or holsters included with this release I'd have been happy to pay extra to at least get like a Zenrin Shooter or Door Gun or just something with him. Gold Drive's whole thing is that he steals weapons. You can borrow them from other figures, but that's just not the same. I also wish he'd come with a split in half driver to replicate his death, or maybe a Banno tablet, but oh well.

Final Thoughts
As with any Drive release I'm really really pleased. The Type Speed mold is still the strongest of the numerous Kamen Rider Drive releases. While S.H. Figuarts Kamen Rider Gold Drive doesn't particularly build on that in any way, it still embodies the best qualities of one of my favorite figuarts. Just with a little more evil added to the mix. Definitely recommended.

Part 2
- Mold comparisons/group shots
- Weapon compatibility
- Final battle with Mach

I just want to say it actually is possible to get some Tire Koukan action going on with this guy without customization or modding. The tire section is in two parts and they're just connected by regular pegs. I don't know if it's actually supposed to be glued, but I was able to take my tire off no problem with just a bit of care.

Love the photos with Mach at the end, Den-O. They're great

It definitely is not intentional for you to take it off. Just as it wasn't meant to be done with Proto-Drive. In many cases where the tire isn't glued people have stressed or broken those pegs trying to remove the tire. It's not an advertised feature, Bandai doesn't specifically intend for it to be done. And as hard as I've tried to pry apart Gold Drives tire, it does not come apart. It just requires too much force to be intentional.

While I don't collect these (LOVE the galleries though), I still would have wanted at least a Banno tablet even if there are no weapons. That's kind of a necessity for this figure to have.

Ah I see. Maybe I sort of lucked out with mine then.


Awesome gallery as always, Den-O!

Thanks! I was really excited for this figure, I really wanted to do him justice. Or what's the opposite of justice for bad guys? Injustice? Whatever

Interesting that you couldn't remove his tire. Mine did it with ease.

To Banno, justice is whatever makes him look good, so I'd say justice works