NBC-256 is the latest entry from Kawada in the Wild Animals Series. It is a small set, with approximately 100 pieces and taking 15 – 20 minutes to assemble and with an RRP of approx. $13AUD.

As an animal lover, I’m always extremely excited to see Kawada continue to iterate on this series – as an Australian, even more-so when it’s one of our countries unique and beautiful animals.

What is a Wombat?

Wombat’s are a species of marsupial that are native (and unique!) to Australia. Never heard of a marsupial before? That’s not too surprising! They’re a group of mammals, mostly found in Australia, who raise their young in a pouch. Other famous marsupial’s include the Kangaroo and Koala.

Some fun facts about Wombats:

• Like rabbits, they dig extensive networks of burrows under the ground
• They have the worlds only backwards pouch. This way, no dirt gets in their pouch while they dig!
• Their teeth grow forever, like a rodents. They use rough vegetation to wear them down
• They are the only species in the world to leave cube shaped poos

There are a few different species of Wombat in Australia, including the Common Wombat and Hairy Nosed Wombat. My best guess is that this kit is based on the Hairy Nosed Wombat.

Specs

NBC-256 is advertised as a level 2 difficulty set with 100+ pcs

The build itself has 102 total pieces, but as with all Nanoblock sets comes with a generous number of additional pieces.

The final build is 5cm x 2cm x 4cm and took me 17 minutes to build.

Appearance

In my opinion, NBC-256 does a great job capturing the appearance of a Wombat. I particularly appreciate the prominence of the nose (a big feature on all Wombats, but particularly the Hairy Nose Wombat!). While I really like the use of a 1 unit cylinder to represent the eyes, I do wish there was a little more contrast between the color of the Wombat’s eyes and body.

Speaking of which – this is one of the most monocrhome builds currently available, consisting of only three shades – brown, black and gray. Over 95% of the build (99 out of 104 blocks) are brown, which, while faithful to the coloring of a Wombat, isn’t going to make this model ‘pop’ on the shelf.

Difficulty

Kawada rate this as a level 2 build, but I’m inclined to disagree. The Wombat had one of trickier starting layers in my recent memory, with the first two layers doing their best to fall apart all the way through the build.

My spacial reasoning isn’t the greatest, but I’m also convinced there’s an error in Step 2 of the instructions, with the previous layer being drawn incorrectly.

I don’t think anybody would struggle to complete this build, but if you’re new to Nanoblocks, then this would be a fairly frustrating introduction.

Where to buy?

I was very lucky to purchase my copy of this set from the Moonlit Wildlife Sanctuary after seeing a real Wombat up close. If you aren’t lucky enough to live in Melbourne, then you have a few great online options.

$12.99AUD at Nanoblock Australia

$12.99AUD at Metro Hobbies

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find a stockist in the US – let me know if you know of one!