Can this be built strait from the box? I know about the back deck, but what about the rest?

The kit can use some tweaks, sure. But what kit doesn't? Two things that you can easily correct are 1) the placement of the pulpit MG barrel clamp should be directly in front. The directions are misleading. 2) the set of rods (actually part of the tarp set up) is not necessarily where the directions tell you to place them. Check photos for options.

Read this review
http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/reviews/vehicles/academy/acd13210.html

Thanks Roy, but it was my understanding that this review may have also been a little misleading?? But I may be way wrong on that. I plan to cover the back with stowage and not worry about fixing the back deck. I'll just build er' up and see what happens.

I also purchased this kit, the Dragon 105 howitzer to replace the Academy gun, and the Verlinden gun crew. Now Dragon has announced the release of the same vehicle in a couple of months. I'm shelving the Academy kit in favor of the Dragon. Now that I'm finishing detailing the Academy M10 Dragon will no doubt announce theirs soon too!

Shelving mine too. Dam Dragon....

I need some building practice so I am putting mine together now and doing it in British rather than US markings. I need to get some building under my belt so once learned of the DML version I ripped the Academy one out of the closet.

I'm not an uber-accuracy freak and I don't really care if another company comes out with a newer, better version of something in my stash. I'll still happily build it. I picked up the Academy kit on sale for about $20 and to me that's good value for money. I imagine the Dragon kit will retail for around $50 and quite frankly while I imagine it will be better than the Academy for my purposes (personal amusement) I don't think it will be $70 better to justify buying one and ignoring the perfectly adequate kit I already have.

Build the damn thing and have fun.