Oh ok, I didn’t know that. I have been checking back every day and got worried lol. @fradiger no rush, take your time man! Will be waiting when you return.
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Like the two tone wyverns one drop has in stock now…
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I like to beat dead horses, so we’re going to induct a yoyo into the S tier today by showering even more praise onto a throw that already has quite a cult following. The Panorama is a yoyo that I would describe as… the best kitchen yoyo ever created? For those out of the loop, a kitchen yoyo (or other …room/location themed yoyos) is the yoyo you just… permanently have stationed in your kitchen, ready to go whenever you need it. I’ll admit it took me a bit to actually get my hands on a Panorama. When it was released, I was initially put off by the low weight and high walls, however after seeing a number of throwers sing praise for the it, I grabbed one. When I first picked it up, I… didn’t fall in love, but just like any great relationship, you come clawing back… repeatedly… (ever heard the argument, “if it was sh** would I be eating it?”) Now it’s either in my hand or out and easily accessible, it’s just that good! I think it’s probably the best high walled yoyo I’ve thrown, and there’s definitely some stiff competition in this area. Some other personal standouts include the mowl High Wall, TRT Isthmus, OD/SC Sudo, OD Diorama, and I have been meaning to pick up a YYR Gopa.
To describe how it plays, I… think you should just watch Tsukasa Takatsu throw it for a minute, he’ll do it way more justice than my words:
So, who is this yoyo for? When ‘evaluating’ a yoyo, I always like to think about the motivation behind the design, and the Panorama is one of the most interesting cases of this to me. If you don’t know Tsukasa Takatsu, he has been one of my favorite yoyo players for years, and coincidentally happens to be the person responsible for the design of the Panorama, Diorama, and YYR Gopa. His philosophy on yoyo is very interesting, since Tsukasa largely focuses on more simple tricks and repeaters and bringing out the depth and beauty in them. The following is a quote from an interview he did with Doc Pop when asked about why repeaters:
Until around 2014, my string was longer, with more of a focus on longer, dense tricks( combos), but I gradually became intrigued by the actual depth of the simpler tricks. Repeater tricks in particular I have felt a similar artistic beauty like found in Japanese Haiku poetry. This really made me want to explore and pursue these types of tricks more thoroughly. I believe it is the simplicity and in a way the structural restrictions that could show the beauty within both the trick construction and the flow even more so.
You can read the whole interview here (for free!), highly recommended: https://www.patreon.com/posts/56349530
After knowing this, my perspective on the Panorama changed a little bit, rather than just being a fun and floaty yoyo, the Panorama over the years has evolved into a yoyo that rewards consistency and artistry by simply being as controllable as possible. The true genius of this throw to me is that it accomplishes all of this while actually being quite forgiving as opposed to other high wall throws. So, if you have bought into any of these ideas so far, you probably will really enjoy the Panorama! I would say the other sticking point for this throw is just the string feel, it’s very unique. You definitely get some heft on the end of the string, but sometimes you’ll forget it’s there when it’s gliding around.
To address any incoming questions from the collectors, yes the Panorama stands apart from the Parlay, the Sudo, and the Diorama. I think it’s my personal favorite out of them, though the Sudo is very close. The Panorama just has a level of float and “feel good” that’s impossible to quantify or communicate with text. Diving into some more specifics, I personally found Ultra Lights to be the only side effect I liked on the Panorama. Legos were okay, but anything heavier than that gave the Panorama a bit too much weight for my liking and tended to hurt the stability of the yoyo. I think the heaviest I could recommend is mini-spikes, you’ll find that side effects have a much more drastic effect on the Panorama than a lot of other OD throws. I really like this yoyo. I think it’s a classic, and I hope you’ll agree with me if you end up picking one up, and if you don’t… there’s always Buy / Sell / Trade .
tl;dr - a must have, easily a top 3 onedrop yoyo for me.
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Great review
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Very good. I’ve found flat caps to be perfection, but I’m willing to give ultralights another shot. I refuse to play it without a flat bearing, as a big part of the supremely controllable feel hinges on having one for me.
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The panorama is definitely a standout flat bearing performer, the interactions with the walls make it actually quite fun. I just don’t like the flat bearings when all there is is a small response bump (like the most recent wizard for example).
Honestly heavier SE with the panorama could also just be a skill issue on my end, maybe it tilts too easily because I’m bad and not because it’s unstable 
ANOTHER UPDATE LETS GOOOOO!!!
I’m ashamed to admit I haven’t kept up with OD in a couple years and didn’t even know this had come out. I’m absolutely going to try to snag one of these on the BST now. Thanks for the review. Sounds like a phenomenal yoyo and the colors are beautiful
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I was using ULs, but then wanted to try them in my Kamaraiju. Swapped flats into the Pano, and both throws were markedly better. I now have domes in the Pano which look great with the organic design and are a sort of halfway measure.
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Here lies my favorite post. Rest in peace
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Sooon… I have to stop working on these in parallel I have a doc with like 4 half done…
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God the DANG1 is a confusing yoyo. Originally sold as “like a Project with big rims and Side Effects,” the DANG1 was a pretty popular release at the time, even hitting JP storefronts with names like gear of spin and winding of re. Before I even talk about how this yoyo plays, I have to talk about how beautiful of a yoyo the DANG1 is. I absolutely love the p/d engraving on the DANG1, it’s very iconic at this point and basically the hallmark of the DANG1. I love it. You can clearly see the influence of the Project on this yoyo, from the flat rims and cup to the projection grooves in the profile. Now, if you’ve ever had the pleasure of throwing an original Project, you might know that it lacks in a certain area, stability. The DANG1 by description aims to sort-of address this by adding bigger rims, but unfortunately the DANG1 also has some stability issues. They aren’t as pronounced as the Project, but definitely there. If you’re Paul Dang this probably isn’t as much of a concern, as he grew up learning on even less stable yoyos, but by modern standards the DANG1 is unstable.
For playfeel, the DANG1 is quite light, clocking in at 63.2g with ultralight side effects, and I think this is the main weakness of the yoyo, and honestly many side effect yoyos. Putting heavier side effects in a yoyo that already is unstable due to a (relative) lack of rimweight only makes the stability problems worse. I tried using legos and flat caps and liked those as well, but going heavier than that starts to really work against the purpose of this yoyo. The DANG1 was built to be nimble, and if you yoyo’d in the era when the DANG1 came out, you probably know the playfeel that this yoyo was targeting, lots of rail combos, fast hops and bounces, and getting in and out of chopsticks. This “zippy-ness” comes at a costs though, as when you begin to push the DANG1 faster it starts to become difficult to control.
That all being said, ultimately the performance of this yoyo just didn’t hold up to the competition level. Paul Dang quickly ditching it in favor of other yoyos to compete with (I believe he mostly stopped using it in 2013, but this is based on analyzing like 480p Youtube videos). The fatal flaw is just a lack of spintime, which, if you want some anecdotal evidence, Paul Dang threw the DANG1 11 times in one of the 2 minute freestyles I watched (I think one was due to a mistake), which is an insane amount of times to need to re-throw your yoyo in a world where players now are doing 2 minute freestyles in one throw. I would label the spintime as “acceptable” by modern standards.
I feel like onedrop slightly missed the mark here, and this is one of the many onedrop “performance-oriented” throws that suffers from a lack of spintime. I struggled with putting this between C and D tier, and eventually opted for D tier for “DANG this yoyo doesn’t spin very long.“ Even at the time period, I feel like there were other more competitive offerings that I would rather have. The two I’ll point out here are the ILYY Sakura and onedrop CODE1. Here’s a shot of the three profiles (DANG1 → CODE1 → Sakura):
As you can see, all three definitely share some shape characteristics, but both the CODE1 and Sakura hold up better in 2023 due to just better weight distribution, so I would recommend hunting down one of those unless the lightness of the DANG1 is really speaking to you. Also worth taking a look at the DANG1’s much better successor, the DANG2.
more reviews in the pipeline, lots of life to live 
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tried to make the beer, was disappointed
would not recommend
(for those curious a real review will come, gonna lump the FT and FT 20/20 into one and talk about them both in a more… cerebral post)
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I guess another valid question is…“Will it blend?!?”
P.s. Love your reviews. 
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Been a bit pressed for time as of late, but had some time to write one of these up!
So, lots of people (including myself) were skeptical about the new Format:C Gen 2 when it was first announced because… well, they read the specs. I believe there was a forum thread around here somewhere where the collective reaction was:
And now here I am! To tell you that this yoyo, is indeed too light. Shocker. Now, the problem isn’t that the Format:C Gen 2 (“the yoyo”) is bad, or unusable, it’s the opposite actually! The lighter weight makes it glide on the string, and the weight distribution is rim-weighted enough so that you get a pretty solid experience all around. I think my major issue with this yoyo is the fact that it’s right on the cusp of being so light that it’s just downright uncontrollable (ever taken the rims off a Shutter EVO and tried to throw it before?). Maybe I play with too many heavy yoyos, but every once in a while when I go to maneuver the yoyo it will fly off with a mind of it’s own. I think an extra gram on the rims would’ve gone a looong way with this one.
Also as an aside, if you own an original Format:C, the Gen 2 has these changes that I noticed:
- The Gen 2 is noticably more stable, I attribute this to better weight distribution and also the bump near the response that helps prevent string rubbing.
- Gen 2 still has the zippy qualities that the gen 1 sort of has, but turned up to like 11 by comparison. The feeling on the string is much more refined as well, and I feel like the gen 2 is a better yoyo overall.
The closest existing yoyo I could compare it to is the Blur Autoscopy that recently dropped from yoyorecreation. I have both of these, and I heavily prefer the Blur Autoscopy (“BA”) simply because of the extra rimweight on it. The BA has the string presence that the Format:C Gen 2 lacks, and is something that I really look for in yoyos, especially when they get lighter. When you swing the BA around in and out of mounts, you can feel it at every point on the string even when the weight is quite low (61.7g), but the Format:C Gen 2 has points where it zips so fast that you blink and miss it, and don’t feel it either.
Who would enjoy this yoyo? Well, if the weight doesn’t scare you right away, it might be you! I think the people who would really enjoy this yoyo are people who like their yoyos maneuverable, light, and fast. Sports car energy almost, but… I don’t think the performance is quite there to push it there for me. Maybe like a gutted & suped up golf cart or something.
Finally here’s a trick with it:
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The Cerakotes weigh one gram more usually.
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Yeah but they got rid of the machined line on the cerakote version 
, I still might have to track one down.
Format:C is SUUPER underrated in the aesthetics category, I think they’re both beautiful yoyos.
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It does play crazy fast. I wonder if in a competition the speed could equal more tricks and thus more points?
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Maybe, the Format:C Gen 2 definitely isn’t suited to handle more dense tricks and definitely wouldn’t be ideal for horizontal and most of the elements used in the less-dense speed combos don’t click super high (or at all) anymore. I had to go down to thinner string to get enough wraps on the bearing to do some of my more dense tech tricks which would make your slacks suffer if you’re used to fatter string. I think the real issue is just the Format:C Gen 2 really struggles to get past like a minute of tricks in one throw, which is what competitors are really after.
If I were going to compete tomorrow with a onedrop yoyo it would probably be either the Citizen, Kuntosh 5kQV, VTWO, or maybe the Seven Summit. Rally is great as well but way too fragile to compete with (would probably get DQed on stage when one explodes and embeds shrapnel in the judges)
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I would choose the Virtuoso. It was used to place 2nd in a national competition I believe.
I don’t think, usually fast players use quite heavy weight yoyos cause they allow much much more control, very light yoyos sometimes “want to go everywhere” and not stay stuck on the string, you can check one of the latest YYR or the Radiance are quite heavy yoyos for fast players.
This format C seemed very interesting sad that this little bit about the weight “ruined” it, I am waiting so much for a VWTO, seems so cool by the shape and people talk really well about it, hope they will bring it back!
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