Astranagant
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The Astranagant(アストラナガン) is a fictional robot in the Super Robot Wars series. It has appeared as an enemy in Super Robot Wars Alpha, but can be made recruitable and had cameos in Super Robot Wars Alpha Gaiden and Super Robot Wars Alpha 3. It has also appeared in the opening sequence of the animated Super Robot Wars Original Generation: Divine Wars.
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[edit] Appearance
Astranagant is jet-black in color, with red highlights on its head, arms, legs, and chest. Its body is slender and insectoid. Its wedge-shaped head is mostly featureless apart from a pair of blood-red eyes with dull metallic highlights around them. Astranagant sports segmented, telescoping projections on its back that emit greenish psychic energy to form ghostly, feathered "wings." Its weapons are mostly self-contained -- its only handheld weapon is the Z.O.(Zol Orihalconium) Sword.
[edit] Technical And Historical
Codenamed "Black Angel" by the Earth Federation, the Astranagant was created by the Aerogators, alien invaders from the planet Balmar. While the Astranagant was far from being their most powerful mecha, it was designed using a combination of Earth-based technology (gleaned from the various mecha anime series featured in the game), Masoukishin (魔装機神) alchemy from the subterranean world of La Gias, and Balmarian materials--- making it a formidable foe. The Astranagant was designed to be piloted by a telekinetic Psychodriver, harnessing psychic energy both as a weapon and a defensive system; its T-Link System could amplify the pilot's telekinetic power into a protective psychokinetic (念動/Nendou）field. Astranagant is made of Zfylud crystal, an elemental material found only on the Balmarian homeworld. Zfylud crystals reproduce themselves, emit harnessable energy and gain sentience in large quantities, behaving much like nanomachines. These crystals constantly maintain Astranagant's condition, repairing it on their own when the unit is damaged.
The Astranagant was designed and piloted by Major Ingram Plissken, an Aerogator double agent who, after infiltrating the Earth Federation's ranks, becomes the leader of the SRX team---the very team chosen by the Federation High Command to combat the alien invaders. Plissken later betrays the SRX team by sabotaging the R-series' SRX combination sequence, almost killing Captain Aya Kobayashi in the process. After Plissken returns to the Aerogators, he makes several appearances as a hostile unit. In one of the missions Ingram appears in, he nearly kills Ensign Ryusei Date, the SRX team's most promising Psychodriver. However, Ingram and his Astranagant can be convinced to side with the player in the last mission of the game.
In SRW Alpha Gaiden, the Astranagant appears in the future as part of the Ancestors' Aurgelmir. The Astranagant bursts out of the Aurgelmir's belly when the latter uses its most powerful attack, Dogma Blaster.
In SRW Alpha 3, the Astranagant appears in the first mission of Cobray Gordon's route. Although badly damaged, it seems to come alive and assimilates Cobray's robot, transforming it into the strange-looking Werkbau and erasing the pilot's memory in the process. As the game progresses, the Astranagant completely takes over the unit and becomes "Dis Astranagant,"---a re-designed version of the original Astranagant whose weapons and systems are mostly references to the Kabbalah.
[edit] Specifications
Height: 40.7 meters
Weight: 187.9 tons
Main Power Source: DEENLEV
Armor Material: Zfylud Crystal
Defensive System: Psychokinetic Field
Weapon Systems:
- Photon Vulcan
Mounted in the unit's head, this weapon is similar to the vulcan guns found in Gundam heads, except that it fires a stream of photons.
- Z.O. Sword
A handheld, single-edged sword, charged with psychokinetic energy when in use.
- Attracter Shower
A mass gravity projectile bombardment weapon, fired from an unknown location on the unit's body
- T-Link Feathers
Psychokinetic projectiles fired from the wings
- Gun Familiar
Remote weapons similar to Gundam's funnels, the Gun Familiars are released from an unknown location on the unit's body. When in use, they surround the target and rapidly bombard it with energy beams.
- Axion Cannon
Mounted on Astranagant's hand, this weapon launches a black hole-like anomaly at the target
- Infinity Cylinder
Fired from Astranagant's chest, this weapon releases the full power of the mecha---subjecting its target to an anomaly in the space-time continuum that simply causes it to cease to exist. Ingram is known to say "Time flows backwards...you return to nothing." when he uses this weapon.
[edit] Trivia
- Several Banpresto Originals are named after real life firearms. The name Astranagant is a combination of Astra and Nagant, which are Spanish and Belgian gun companies, respectively. The final "t" in the name is silent.
- The Infinity Cylinder's name is possibly derived from the Tipler cylinder, a theoretical time machine.
- The Astranagant's theme song is entitled "Kokuu Kara no Shisha" (虚空からの使者), which may be translated as "The Messenger from the Void."
- In Super Robot Wars Original Generation: Divine Wars, Astranagant combines with SRX during the battle against Septugaint to form DiSRX.
- Astranagun is a mistransliteration of Astranagant. The name first appeared in Astranagant's debut game, Super Robot Wars Alpha, but was never officially spelled in romaji until recently. The pronunciation of the Japanese katakana name (アストラナガン) led to the popular mistransliterations Astranagun, Astronagun, and Astranagan.
