SD Gundam Force is a 2003 early full 3D anime that's a lot of fun and has a lot going for it in it's own right, but I also waned to use it to talk about SD Gundam content as a whole as it's not very well known among English speaking Gundam and mecha fans, mostly due to limited availability outside Japan. Strap in, because it'll take a which to get back to the Gundam Force.
SD Gundam Memorial Book cover, characters starting with the top left are the Ryubi Gundam (Liu Bei), Hyper Captain Gundam, Musha Gundam, Command Gundam, Knight Gundam, and SD RX-78-2
Bandai first got the idea for SD Gundam from an illustration submitted by a kid named Koji Yokoi to a plastic model news magazine they ran in the 80s, and they thought that the proportions and weird style would make for good gashapon toys. They were right, as the cute 2 head tall gundams were a hit with Japanese kids. These started with gundam-shaped erasers, but quickly moved into gunpla kits, cards, games, and anime. Notably among these was the Mobile Suit SD Gundam shorts that released direct to video or in theaters. At first these focused on SD versions of existing mecha and chibi versions of existing characters, but SD Gundam as a franchise then split off into 3 original settings, although still filled with references and versions of existing material. These were; Musha Gundam, a samurai themed feudal Japan themed setting in a land called Ark based on the Sengoku (warring states) period, Knight Gundam, a Medieval, swords and magic setting centered around the kingdom of Lacroa based on European fairy tales and folklore, and Command Chronicles, a futuristic military setting. They each got a variety of content, but from what I can find some notable highlights are that Musha had a lot of manga, Command had a lot of gameboy games in the G-Arms series, and Knight got a multimedia project called SD Gundam Gaiden Sieg Zeon Hen which included trading cards, a manga, and an excellent 4 episode OVA in 1990 which by the way is fully english subbed.
All Three settings came back together first in Mobile Suit Gundam the Movie: Musha Knight Command: SD Gundam Scramble in 1991, and then again in a 2003 anime which finally brings us back to our main topic. Superior Defending Gundam Force is based not just on all of the SD Gundam content I just mentioned, but also the rest of Gundam as a franchise at the time of it's creation. Specifically all the Musha Gundams are based on Mobile Fighter G Gundam with the blazing samurai Bakunetsumaru designed from the Shining Gundam, all of the Knight Gundam characters are based on Gundam Wing with the winged knight Zero designed from the eponymous Wing Gundam, and the Gundams of the bulk of the SDG of neotopia as well as all the mecha of the main Dark Axis forces being taking inspiration from both Command Chronicles and the Universal Century timeline like Gun Eagle who's designed after the Nu Gundam. Zapper Zaku of the Dark Axis isn't actually based on Char's Zaku II (as there's a clearer reference to that later on) but more heavily on Bloody Zaku of Command Chronicles. Deserving special mention is our main character Captain Gundam who, while clearly taking inspiration from the RX-78-2 and other main UC gundams as well as the original Captain Gundam from Command Chronicles, is his own very unique design which I find extremely cool.
If you happened to catch the show in english on Cartoon Network's Toonami as a kid, you should definitely look it up because only half the series aired on North American television. The remaining 26 episodes were dubbed in english and are available on DVD, or maybe you could watch them some other way. For everyone else, while it's a very early fully 3D anime, and has all of the expected downsides in quality, of that which might already be a deal breaker to some, I do want to make a strong appeal that it's worth watching. The series is fun and I enjoyed a lot of the comedy. It also features a lot of great action, much of which I would argue still holds up today. If you're a gundam fan the new and SD versions of a lot of classic mobile suits are really cool to see and are an amazing novelty in their own right. The story and character, while clearly intended for a younger audience, are very compelling and I felt a lot of emotional connection to the show not just for having watched it as a kid but also from following a likable cast through a great set of adventures and a dimension hopping adventures. Also if you watch the fight at the end of Gundam Build Fighters Try very closely there's a bunch of easter eggs paying homage to the main characters.
To get back to SD Gundam more generally, two quick special mentions is the infamous Doozy Bots which was a dropped north American SD Gundam cartoon, and 2 Gundlander board games in their own setting which is separate from the other 3 SD Gundam series and is a more fantasy and pre-history inspired setting. As well as some more recent works including 3 anime; SD Gundam Sangokuden Brave Battle Warriors from 2010 and a, SD Gundam World Sangoku Soketsuden from 2019 which are both based loosely on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms legend and historical period of China, and SD Gundam World Heroes which is a sequel to Sangoku Soketsuden but is also itself based loosely on the famous Journey to the West story. and On top of that it also brings in a hodgepodge of characters and settings based on RoboCop, Robin Hood, the gentleman thief Lupin, Arthurian Legends, historical real world figures like pirates, Egyptians, and the ten heroes ninja group that served Sanada Yukimura during the warring states period, as well as guest appearances from characters from the 3 original SD Gundam settings we talked about earlier.
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