Another actual Giant set, and probably among the last; a bottle-bag with card header, rather than a carded blister, the late version black and silver medievals, and a high set number, all point to the back end of the Rosenberg's Giant phase!
Seemingly the same contents as one of the
Multiple Toymaker sets by
MPC, this is one of the better sets from
Giant, despite the poor quality of the sub-HO figures. Coming with a standard fort, two catapults, a siege-engine/assault tower and the hard to find 'extra' building, a keep/barracks building, in two parts.
Clearly marked wall sections, 'MADE IN HONG KONG GIANT ⓟ' the corner towers/turrets having no mark, and I will look at all the forts in greater detail in future posts. All three sections also carry the figure '2', which is probably coincidence, there being multiple cavities, dropped into a larger holder for picking, and it just happened that the picker chose three 2's?
The same mark is found on the gate section, which has a green ramp/door.
The green carries over to the turret pennants, while the roofs are orange.
The 'Keep', comes in yellow and a reddish-brown, with the same marks.
Unusually for
Giant, there has been colour-bleed from the darker plastic to the lighter polymer, and while it might be both way traffic, it's never going to be as obvious the other way! You often find this bleeding with really 'cheap and nasty' rack toy stuff, but I don't expect it from
Giant?
The front and back catwalk/galleries of the lower story will take two or three figures, but the ends are a bit too narrow to take figures, while the upper story will take a 'last stand' of about six figures, at a push, with overlapping bases!
Copies of the Marx catapult,, and given dates, probably taken from the Miniature Masterpiece versions. The two in this set have become brittle, and most of the 'rocks' have broken off, over the years of handling, the set's been subjected to.
And for that reason, I wouldn't try to replace the perished elastic-bands, to fire it, the strains would cause the whole thing to break-up! Marked 'GIANT ⓟ MADE IN HONG KONG' along the top of a frame edge.
The two-tier assault tower, seems to be based on the
MPC one, which in 50mm-odd, is one of the ugliest things you ever saw, but reduced to small-scale, doesn't look quite so bad, or unbelievable! As
MPC carried some of the Giant stuff, there may have been a relationship between them beyond middle-man/buyer, but I suspect not, and this, like everything else copied, was done so as pure piracy.
A simpler '
GIANT ⓟ HONG KONG' on the underside is the marking here, with room for a few figures on the rear and top platforms, the middle one, it seems is just for show!
Another reason for saying the set is a late one, is that earlier sets were always careful to match horses to riders, and/or divide 'sides' equally, yet here we have a spare horse, and a dearth of silver knights or too many black ones? However, because of similar imbalance with the foot figures, it rather dictates Black are the attackers, outside the fort, Silver inside, defending!
This made sense when I was doing it, but looked very odd when I came back to it (shots taken in 2021), but it seems I was trying to do one of each pose on the left, black, then silver, with spares on the right, and silver poses for which there isn't a black one, in the centre, which I phuqed-up, by not noticing the first one (top centre), should be down the bottom left
But anyhow, you get the picture, the foot figures are pretty random, with neither side having all the poses, and Silver outnumbering black, almost two to one, so they should be the attacking force, but without the cavalry, it's easier to leave them in a position of strength, within the fort!
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But is it Giant
Absofreakinglutely! Literally a mint set, which I carefully removed the staples from, with a fine blade to open them, and which were then carefully replaced again, lining up the eight holes for each staple, after the photo-shoot.
