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Japan is finally about to reach their goal of a domestically designed and produced stealth fighter:



http://www.military.com/daily-news/2016/01/29/japan-unveils-1st-stealth-fighter-maiden-flight-next-month.html



From the photos I've seen on the tubes, it's a nice looking bird. And knowing the Japanese, the final product should be top-notch.

They forgot to paint it black, it's clearly visible.

It's so... curvy! Neat looking.

Hopefully this will swing the fight against the Kaiju.

 Ouze wrote:

Hopefully this will swing the fight against the Kaiju.

They'll never see it coming.

It appears that it does not transform into a giant robot.

Keep working at it Japan, you'll get there soon.

It is just a guy standing in front of an empty hangar.

 Ahtman wrote:
It is just a guy standing in front of an empty hangar.

That guy must be a badass if he's the only one guarding their first stealth fighter.

There are loads of stealth guards.

When does the model kit come out? You know they have to do merchandising on this thing!

Is 294 million to develop a stealth-fighter fairly cheap? It sounds like it to me- that's only a bit above what it costs these days to make and market a blockbuster.

Maybe it was a typo - maybe they meant $294 billion? If they spend a mere 100 billion more, and make it so that it sometimes catches on fire for no reason, then it would line up pretty well with how we develop stuff.

But....can it transform?

It doesn’t transform all on it’s own. They are still working on the tank, helicopter, car, and motorcycle it needs to combine with to form a giant robot.

 Nevelon wrote:
It doesn’t transform all on it’s own. They are still working on the tank, helicopter, car, and motorcycle it needs to combine with to form a giant robot.

But then they would need color coded teens to pilot them, and only after the monster grows big

Demonstrator is a pretty stupid name for a stealth plane when you think about it.

Perhaps something to do with the translation?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Demonstrator is a pretty stupid name for a stealth plane when you think about it.

"Demonstrator" as in "technology demonstrator".


Japan hasn't been one for giving their modern, domestic warplanes official emotive names. The F-1 (retired in 2006) and F-2 don't have emotive names. Only the combat aircraft of American origin have proper names.

When the Japanese do give an emotive name to something they usually manage to pick a name that makes no sense at all.

E.g. FM Towns, the home computer operating system of the late 1980s. Nothing to do with FM and nothing to do with Towns.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FM_Towns

I think it's a typo.
In the battle against the kaiju comes a new challenger, The Demonsterer.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
When the Japanese do give an emotive name to something they usually manage to pick a name that makes no sense at all.

E.g. FM Towns, the home computer operating system of the late 1980s. Nothing to do with FM and nothing to do with Towns.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FM_Towns

Err, did you actually read your own link? FM was the company's initials, Towns was the development name (much like modern operating systems have their code names). The name makes as much sense as any other product names.

The "FM" part of the name means "Fujitsu Micro" like their earlier products, while the "Towns" part is derived from the code name the system was assigned while in development, "Townes". This refers to Charles Townes, one of the winners of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics, following a custom of Fujitsu at the time to code name PC products after Nobel Prize winners. The e in "Townes" was dropped when the system went into production to make it clearer that the term was to be pronounced like the word "towns" rather than the potential "tow-nes"

 oldravenman3025 wrote:

And knowing the Japanese, the final product should be top-notch.

Ehhhhhhh.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Is 294 million to develop a stealth-fighter fairly cheap? It sounds like it to me- that's only a bit above what it costs these days to make and market a blockbuster.

That would be insanely cheap, though it's not outside the realm of possibility we gave them everything we had on VLO for next to nothing.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
When the Japanese do give an emotive name to something they usually manage to pick a name that makes no sense at all.

E.g. FM Towns, the home computer operating system of the late 1980s. Nothing to do with FM and nothing to do with Towns.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FM_Towns

Err, did you actually read your own link? FM was the company's initials, Towns was the development name (much like modern operating systems have their code names). The name makes as much sense as any other product names.

The "FM" part of the name means "Fujitsu Micro" like their earlier products, while the "Towns" part is derived from the code name the system was assigned while in development, "Townes". This refers to Charles Townes, one of the winners of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics, following a custom of Fujitsu at the time to code name PC products after Nobel Prize winners. The e in "Townes" was dropped when the system went into production to make it clearer that the term was to be pronounced like the word "towns" rather than the potential "tow-nes"

Yes, I did read the link thank you very much.

The name FM Towns is completely stupid, even though it uses the manufacturer initials and so on.