I am a huge fan of the Gundam Wing series mainly because it was the first Gundam show I've ever watched. I watched this on YTV when I was a kid, it was the show that I stayed up on Friday nights to watch since it aired at 11pm. That's pretty late for an 11 year old me back then, sometimes I would even fall asleep during the episode because it was talking about some boring political issues in the anime since I only watched it for the Gundam fights, now those were cool!
I remember Bandai made figures for the show when it aired in North America back in the days. I think I only had a Deathscythe one, it was a pretty decent figure for its time. Several of my friends had the other cast like Wing Gundam, Heavyarms, Shenlong (no one liked Sandrock since he only had blades as weapons) and we would play battle using my friend's pool table as the battlefield. Ahhh...the good old times when our imaginations had no limits, it still amazes me how long we can play them for haha!
When Robot Damashii started doing the Gundam Wing figures, I was excited. I want to collect them all since they bring back loads of memories for me. However, they decided to make one of the main suits, Wing Gundam, as an exclusive and I refuse to pay $100 for a figure this size so to this day I still do not have that one. I've been getting all the other releases in this series, some I have yet to open. I finally opened the Sandrock and Altron figures today and they are sooo much fun to play with. I rarely play with my figures for long. I usually open them, mess around with it for 15 minutes or so, take some pictures, and in they go in the display. But these two figures, I must have played with them for at least an hour. They come with tons of fun accessories to mess with. I don't know what it is about them...maybe it's the nostalgia they bring back, but playing around with them just brings a rush of emotions in my head...good emotions...something absent in the everyday working lives of being an "adult"...
Here's another figure from Accel World, the figma Scarlet Rain. I have two other figures from Accel World: Silver Crow and Kuroyukihime.
Scarlet Rain is the current Red King which is the leader of all of the red avatars. Her avatar might look cute and harmless, but she has some impressive firepower. One of her specialties is summoning the "Enhanced Armament" which is a stationary fortress loaded with missiles and guns where she can connect to and control. Although if there were an Enhanced Armament made in the same scale as this figure, it would probably be 1m x 1m x 1m big LOL!
I received this awesome toy from Toyrsus.ca yesterday. When I first saw this from the Toy Fair pictures, I was super excited since I've had the original but lost it when we immigrated to Canada and the current prices for it is too much for me to get again. So in comes this Legacy Dino Megazord from Bandai for the 20th Anniversary of Power Rangers. Along with this Megazord, Bandai also have a slew of MMPR merchandise coming out.
When the first reviews showed up online for this toy, I was a bit disappointed because I thought there would be more diecast pieces (Yes, I am spoiled by import toys). Also once these started appearing here in Canada, I went to hunt for it one day and came back empty-handed. I asked the employees at Toysrus and they told me each store was only receiving one box of each (4 zords per box), so the likelihood of me grabbing one went even slimmer. Hence I pretty much gave up on the idea of getting one, that is until one night I was on the local forums and someone posted that the Toysrus website had them in stock for preorder. Together with excitement and impulsiveness, I got one.
Today is Good Friday here in Canada and we have the day off so I had time to open this toy and mess around with it. I have to say, this is really not as bad as I thought! Sure, the choice of diecast pieces is questionable, but all in all they add weight to the toy which makes handling it just...better! (don't ask me why, diecast just makes everything awesome-er!). The zord comes with a sticker sheet that you have to apply yourself, I enjoyed this process tremendously for some reason. The stickers were thin and needed delicate steadiness to apply on straight, but they look great once done properly. I wish all the stickers on this zord is self-applied since some of the factory stuff is pretty slanted and I risk damaging the sticker if I try to remove and reapply it.
Disassembling the bot mode into the five dinosaur bots brought a rush of nostalgia as I remember playing with the original one when I was a kid. From what I remember, the mechanism of combining is very close to the original. My favourite part is hiding the tyrannosaurus rex's head in his chest and moving the horns up to form the Megazord's head.
This is an excellent toy and I highly recommend anyone that's on the fence about it to pick one up! Ignore those elitist that boasts the original one is better and this one sucks (although if anyone is willing to sell me their complete original one for $60, I'll take it!). This is a different toy of the same character. I would grab one whether I have the original one or not. It's totally worth the $60. Now let's hope Bandai would give us a Dragonzord (yes, diecast please) that can combine with this one!
Here's Kuroyukihime from Accel World, she's the mentor of Silver Crow. However, this is her school network avatar instead of the Brain Burst game avatar. Her Brain Burst avatar is Black Lotus.
Oh ya, see that little piggy in front of her? That's Silver Crow's school avatar!
Here's the second figure in NECA's Team Fortress 2 line: Demoman. The first figure was the Pyro.
Like the Pyro, this figure has a really good sculpt. The articulation is slightly better than the Pyro figure because he has a slimmer built on his arms and legs. But again there are a lot of paint on the joints which makes the joint impossibly hard to move. I really wish this figure had ankle pivot, it would definitely improve the stability and posing of the figure. Here's hoping they add this to the rest of the line!
Received my pair of Team Fortress 2 figures yesterday and here's the first release in the series - Pyro!
I used to play this game a lot, not anymore though since I have tons of other games to go through. But when I saw NECA announce these figures I knew I had to have them.
Sculpt-wise, this figure is excellent. The likeness to the in-game character is uncanny. However, the sculpting also gets in the way of the articulation. A prime example are the elbows, the joints are there, but because of the gloves getting in the way, his elbows can only bend a tiny bit, perhaps only 10 degrees or so. This prevents him from holding his flamethrower properly and really limits the poses you can do with this figure.
Another problem I am having with these figures is paint on the joints. Since I've had countless joints from NECA figures break right out of the box or after trying to move them a bit, I've developed a NECA-joint-phobia which makes me scare to move the joint if it is too tight, which is pretty much every joint on these figures.
Overall, I think this figure is okay, it looks good and all, but I wished it had more articulation.
A little something different for today...the Martian from Mars Attack by Mezco!
I've never watched the movie and don't know anything about this character apart from the fact that it's a martian. But I loved the aesthetics of this ever since I saw it so I pick this one up. Articulation-wise, there's single joints on the elbows and knees, ball joints on shoulders and hips, head/gloves/boots can swivel side to side. It's a basic figure with a good mix of articulation. Don't expect any dynamic poses, but it looks good just standing there. He also came with several guns as well.
Today we have Nyaruko from the anime, Haiyore! Nyaruko-san. Nyaruko is actually an alien in a human disguise. She was sent by the Space Defense Agency to protect the main character, Mahiro Yasaka. The story starts when Mahiro Yasaka was attacked by an alien monster and then Nyaruko came out of nowhere and defeated the monster. The plot of this anime is confusing and there doesn't seem to be any continuous story development. However, this anime was entertaining because there were a lot of references to other shows such as Kamen Rider and Dragonball Z since Nyaruko is a fan of Otaku-goods.
As a figure, she is really fun to mess with because of her character. She is one of those figures that can fit in with everything. I have seen some very creative parody pictures of her with various Kamen Riders. Accessories-wise, she only comes with a crowbar (main weapon) and a grenade that I've only seen her used once in the entire anime. She also comes with the 4 pairs of hands and an extra hand to hold the grenade, as well as, the regular figma stand.
She is a fun character to play with and I foresee many more pictures with her in the future!
Picked this figure up from Amiami on my recent order. The character is Silver Crow from the anime Accel World. The anime take place in the future and basically revolves around a bunch of high school kids and a virtual reality game called Brain Burst. Silver Crow is just the manifestation of the main character, Haruyuki Arita, in this VR world. In this VR world, avatars fight against each other to earn burst points which allows them to perform impossible feats because time slows down to a crawl when they use this function ("to accelerate"). Silver Crow was also the first avatar in the game to have wings which gave him a huge advantage in battle. It's a pretty cool anime and it's only 12 episodes or so, check it out if it sounds interesting to you!
Anyways, picked this figure up since he was on sale for really cheap (I think around $15). The quality is like the typical Figuarts, almost perfect. There is a minor paint rub on his chest, which is not a big deal. There is a figma version of this figure too, but I prefer the Figuarts version since this one has the ab-crunch that is missing from the figma version. He comes with several effect parts for his punches. Another plus is his feet are diecast which is a feature that I loved with Figuarts but was absent in most of the Kamen Rider OOO line.
I know...I've been lazy and haven't blog about toys for a while...but let's get back to them since I have a mountain of them waiting to be opened and photographed!
I just received a package from Amiami. To be honest, I sort of forgot about it since I used SAL shipping which takes quite some time. After unboxing my haul, I had the urge to get back to taking pictures of my toys again, so here's one to start off with.
This is Saber from the Fate/Zero anime, the figure is from the Chogokin line. I have been interested in this character since the start of my toy collecting several years ago. Her aesthetics are just so attractive: cute girl in a badass suit of armor, what's not to like? When I first started collecting, I got the Revoltech versions of them and thought those were really cool. Then I found out about figma, but wasn't able to get them through my local store. By the time I discovered Amiami, the figma Saber was discontinued and long gone. I think it did get re-issued once recently, but I passed on it since I had other toys to get on my list. That is until I saw the announcement of this beauty from the Chogokin line. I am a big fan of diecast parts on figures, it just makes it feel so hefty and nice to handle. So I preordered this figure the moment I saw it come up on Amiami.
Several months past and I now have the figure in my hands. I admit that I did not look at the dimensions on the product page when I preordered this since I thought figures from the Chogokin line are usually bigger in scale (thought it was around 8" ~ Play Arts Kai range). So I was surprised to see it is actually figma-size, not that it's a bad thing since the majority of my figures are in this scale so it makes them compatible with each other.
After playing around and messing with this figure, I have concluded that this is THE Saber figure to get. It is much better than the Revoltech figures (those were a pain in the ass to pose with). Aesthetically, I think it is very similar to the figma offering. But this one comes with several diecast pieces that makes it stand out from the rest. Her legs and boots are all diecast, this is a welcomed addition as it makes the figure really easy to pose because of the extra weight on the bottom. Also her skirt armor pieces and chest armor are also diecast. I believe the armor pieces on the arms are NOT diecast, it would have been nice if it was, but it's a minor downer.
If you are a fan of Saber and do not have the figma version, I recommend picking this one up. But if you have the figma one already, then I'd pass on this since they look very alike. The Revoltech can go back in the box and be stashed away now LOL
I finally had time to start uploading pictures from my India trip, so I am going to start writing about my experiences in India. Hope you guys will enjoy it as much as I did!
To start off, the primary reason I went to India is for my friend, Harsil's wedding. I went with a friend of mine and his cousin who just graduated from uni and wanted a break from the academics. We decided to stay there for 2 weeks so we will have time to check out some places around the location of the wedding as well.
The plane ride was long and tedious. Since we went for the cheapest tickets, we had to go from Toronto to New York, then get a cab to CHANGE airports in New York, take a 16 hour flight to Doha (in Qatar), and then finally the last flight to Ahmedabad (in Gujarat, India). We got there at around 2am in the morning. Thankfully Harsil's sister arrived there several weeks before so she picked us up and we went straight to the hotel for some sleep. Harsil actually left on the same day as we did, but he was on a different flight and was going to be arriving at around 5am.
The journey starts on the next day. We woke up pretty early since once the sun comes out, all we heard was constant honking from the vehicles outside. It was pretty chaotic since we came from the quiet suburbs back home. After getting dressed, we went outside to wait for our friends. Little did we know, we forgot to factor in IST (Indian Standard Time). So basically we were told to wait outside at 8:30am, and we did, but waited outside until 10am before we saw our friends arrive in the little auto ricksaws. We thought this was an isolated incident, but as we found out later, IST is applicable all the time LOL!
Oh and the ricksaws...our first ride on them scared the crap out of us! There are basically no traffic rules, we saw oncoming vehicles constantly and vehicles going in ALL directions. The lights at the intersection are constantly flashing yellow, so there's no need to stop anytime. However, even with all this chaotic-ness, everything just works together fine. Here's a video I took while we were on the ricksaw.
I didn't take many pictures during the day because we were constantly on the move and whipping out the large DSLR is too cumbersome. This trip made me realized how much use I would get out of a simple point & shoot camera. We spent the majority of the afternoon in a custom clothing store preparing and getting our clothes made for the wedding. The store did not allow photography inside so there's no pictures from that. Although it was really fun and embarrassing at the same time because we were the only non-Indians in the whole store so whenever we put on some clothes and go in front of the mirror, everyone in the store will stop what they were doing and just stare at us. I guess it's not everyday they see several Chinese guys shopping there LOL!
After getting our measurements done at this store, we went to another store in downtown to get shirts and suits made. We did A LOT of tasks today in what seems to be a short 5-6 hours. Anyways fast forward to around 10pm at night after dinner. We headed out to a night market in downtown.
So in the morning, this place is a collection of jewelery stores. Then at night, the stalls, carts, chairs, and tables come in and form the night market. The surprising fact, for me, is that the night market opens every night of the week. It was especially packed tonight since there is a Kite Festival tomorrow which is a national holiday in India.
One of the aspects of India that was quite different for us are the dogs and cows that are everywhere on the streets. Being a dog-owner myself, it is heart-breaking to see these malnourished dogs living by the scraps. The cows are sort of scary too because they walk everywhere on the streets and we have seen them charge at people several times on this trip as well.
There were soooo many people there that it took a while to find seats for all of us, not to mention we were the center of attention in the market as well LOL!
Can you find who stands out in this picture?
After finding seats and settling down all our stuff, we went around to check out the food. One of the snacks that I wanted to try are the dosai's here. I had them back home at Indian take-out places, but I just had to try the freshly made ones here.
Mmmmm...looking at this picture is making me salivate...
The dosai's here are soooo much better than the ones back home. The thing is the ones I had back home had a nice crust, but the stuffing were cold and they just didn't mix together. These ones that are freshly prepare right in front of my eyes were delicious. They came with several types of chutney (dipping sauces) as well.
This dish here is Hakka Chinese fried rice with meatballs...this was sooo goood as well but was extremely spicy.
Here's what pizza looks like in India, the cheese here is 50% fat, it literally melts in your mouth!
We had many other dishes as well that I didn't take pictures of. Reason being, we had to eat with our hands! A regular practice in India, but several of us were hesitating. In the end we did and it was fine. That's why I put my camera away and didn't take it back out since my hands were busy the whole time.
We finished off with some road-side ice-cream which was amazingly delicious!
We left around 2am and passed out when we got back to the hotel. Even though we've only been here for 24 hours, we did so much on the first day that it felt like we were here for a week!
![[Accel World] Scarlet Rain](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8111/8604386123_5c997e4880_b.jpg)
![[Accel World] Scarlet Rain](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8112/8605488962_7773c3fae5_b.jpg)
![[Accel World] Scarlet Rain](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8539/8605488562_96d2c6be99_b.jpg)
![[Accel World] SHFiguarts Silver Crow](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8111/8546336277_ffca1f29f7_b.jpg)
