31 July 2009

Akihabara 2009 Day Trip


Possibly one of the most anticipated part of going to Japan? (laughs)

Day 4: Spending the whole afternoon in Akihabara.

Note - Again no pictures of shops' interiors as there's an emphasis on the rule that no photography is allowed.


Breakfast: Onigiri. Onigiri's are usually packaged this way so that the seaweed is not in contact with the rice in order to keep dry and fresh


There are a few but simple steps on preparing it. First off tear the middle part around the onigiri.


Pull one side of the package - this automatically gets the seaweed to wrap around the rice.


Pull the other side as well...


Done! Now the onigiri is ready to be eaten~


Lunch - Tonkatsu in Sunshine City.

It's worth mentioning that me and mother noticed a rice dispenser in the kitchen. With a press of a button rice falls out like grains into the rice bowl, always in equal amounts. This saves the time and effort of having to scoop out rice into the bowl and keeping consistency. o_o


Fried shrimps for mother.


A crisper look at the tonkatsu


Anyway, enough with the food. After the tonkatsu lunch, I went to Akihabara by myself while the rest continued shopping in Ikebukuro.


Akihabara JR Station Electric Town Entrance - remember to take this exit when you got there - the Chuo Avenue (中央通り), which is literally the high street of Akihabara.


Getting out of Akihabara JR Station and the first noticeable building is usually the Radio Kaikan.

There are 6 floors to it as follows (source from the guide book I use, excluding small shops):
  • 7/F - Yellow Submariine (Game Shop / Scale Shop), VOLKS (Rental Showcase)
  • 6/F - VOLKS (Akihabara branch)
  • 4/F - Kaiyodo, Yellow Submarine (G-Shop)
  • 3/F - K-BOOKS (whole floor)
  • 2/F - Kotobukiya


1/1 Kenshiro statue outside Kaiyodo shop
You are already sold out.


Eva Unit 04s on display.


Uchusen (宇宙船, i.e. spaceship). The "Animate" shops in Hong Kong are related to this, and not the ones of the same name in Japan. Confusing, isn't it?


Volks Akihabara branch. Finally got to see the Dollfies myself, and


VOLKS Rental Showcase - basically a store with many labelled shelves so you pick what stuff you like and grab them all at the end.


Example right here - say I want this particular black plane (which is seen in my loot post last month), then I grab a form and write down the shelf number it belongs to as well as the item's number. Write down how number of items wanted and hand it to the cashier at the end. A member of staff will lead me to each shelf I've requested and unlock them so I can grab them. Once everything's ok I pay the money and it's done.

Such shops are great for hunting smaller toys such as gashapons, shokugans, and other harder-to-get items that may be gone in many places already.


Kotobukiya store on ground floor. There's also one on the 2nd floor but I will show that on the next trip post.


GAMERS.


PSP game Project DIVA, not yet released at the time of visit.


Nendo Miku as well as a Miku Itansha on display there


AsoBitCity - hobby chain stores. These stores tend to focus more on models and such, so it's not so much of a hit for figure collectors.


Setsuna's dream of becoming a Gundam has finally come true XD


Animate store in Akihabara. Not as big as the one in Ikebukuro, but definitely more crowded.

Generally Animate always sells things at retail price, so if you are looking for cheap stuff, this may not be the place to go for in the first place as other stores tend to sell the same items for a discount.


Liberty - another hobby chain store. They are pretty varied so you have to look and see what each particular branch focuses on (e.g. models, figures, games etc)


A huge poster of Prime Minister Aso Taro


Figure Hobby Kan - I surprisingly took a long time loitering around there - many second hand or resold items can be found there. T'is one of these places where you can look for hard-to-find items such as exclusive figures etc.


Notice how many buildings in Tokyo are thin and tall. Hong Kong has many highrises but are usually not as squeezed as Tokyo's.


SofMap is another


Nightlife in Akihabara


GiGO - various arcade games can be played there, and each floor are sorted by game categories. Ikebukuro has one too which I've forgotten to mention last time.


LaOX Hobby - another hobby chain store similar to AsoBitCity (i.e. mostly models and such), so another one that figure collectors may like to skip.


Mini 4WD courses spotted in LaOX Hobby store. When I was little there was a hype of mini 4WDs in Hong Kong (obviously brought by Japan's hype wave), and many kids had their own mini 4WD. It's nostalgic seeing this popping up again.


Nightlife in Akihabara 2


Angel Beats! is getting animated soon. Anyone know anything about it?


Dream Club; I somehow almost mistakened it as IDOLM@STER


On my way back in Ikebukuro there's really heavy rain going on there. Even with a raincoat and an umbrella my lower half has gone completely soaked.


But t'is good that my mother and sister have ordered me a large curry rice dish in advance for my dinner, which was a good way to end the day.


I couldn't finish going through Akihabara in one day, mainly because I got stuck in some shops and loitered around too much. As a result I ended up only visiting one side of Chuo Ave, and had to revisit it again on the next day. Since my sister was still on her shopping spree with her friend, that didn't cause interference to my compromised plan.

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26 July 2009

ACGHK 2009 Coming soon

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July is coming to an end, and the annual ACGHK (Animation-Comic-Game Hong Kong) will be coming up soon - a convention focusing on animations, comics, and games in Hong Kong.

Date: 31st July - 4th August 2009
Time: 10am - 9pm daily ; closes at 8pm on 4th August
Venue: Hall 1, Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre
Area: 126000 sq ft


Like last year, there will be a lot of stuff going on for the event, and it's not just limited to Japanese stuff - there are manga, games, and other media from various places including Hong Kong and China. I will only mention a few interesting points below:

  • Entries for the Hong Kong Dengeki modelling tournament will be up. Without a doubt I will do a coverage on it like last year.

  • Microsoft will host a large area for people to play varioous XBOX 360 games.

  • Autograph signing will be available from many authors and artists. Those from Japan will include Isuna Hasekura (支倉凍砂, author of Spice and Wolf), Mikuni Shimokawa (下川みくに, singer–songwriter), Shoko Nakagawa (中川翔子, idol singer).

  • Mikuni Shimokawa and Shoko Nakagawa will make guest apperance and perform at 19:30 on 31st July and 1st August respectively.

  • Competitions will include cosplays, image girl (don't really know what that's about), online games, and singing.

  • Doujin stuff will be available


    As mentioned by Wikipedia, the name of this fair has been changed several times as categories of products and services in ACGHK have been extending in the recent years. When it was first started in 1999 it was originally called Hong Kong Comics Festival (香港漫畫節). In 2004 the convention was sponsored by Animax, and subsequently it was renamed 2004 Animax Summer FUNtasy for that particular year. In 2006 and 2007, the convention named Ani-Com Hong Kong (香港動漫節), and was held together with the Hong Kong Games Fair (香港電玩展). Since 2008 they have merged together to become what we call today.

    I will attend the convention sometime during the weekend. Will try to take as many photos as possible like last year but don't expect me to come back with lots and lots of things.

    It's only less than one week before it starts~

    Official Site (Chinese):
    http://www.ani-com.hk/front.htm

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  • 23 July 2009

    Whole Day in Ikebukuro

    Or strictly speaking, a whole afternoon only... -_-;;

    We were a bit too tired after not sleeping on a proper bed for the first 2 days of the trip, and we've pretty much the third day's morning just to sleep.


    To start of the day, we have some Hokkaido milk bought from a supermarket near our hotel - in fact we've always bought our breakfast from convenience stores and supermarkets.

    Well, let's get going on this short day in Ikebukuro.


    Tuna rice with half boiled egg for lunch inside Sunshine City.


    Animate - this one is actually bigger than the one in Akihabara, and less crowded too ^^

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    Animate is literally just opposite Sunshine City Prince Hotel, so it's not hard to spot. Address as followed in case one's interested:
    東京都豊島区東池袋3丁目

    I can only do such location spots for the shops in Ikebukuro (I doubt I can do this for Akihabara I afraid), as there are fewer and most were found via the guide book I've used as well as Google Maps.


    K-BOOKS are stores which will have anime lated merchandise that Animate (which is just a few blocks away) will not provide.


    K-Books for ladies, selling various things oriented for girls including cosplay stuff.


    A map showing other branches of K-BOOKS in Ikebukuro - there's an Anime store, Premium store, doujin store, and a comics store.


    Zaku II J version 2.0 and RX-78-2 version 1.5 Kawaguchi version as spotted in Animate - not easy to get outside Japan (at all)

    Btw there won't be much photos inside shops in my posts, mainly due to the fact that there are "no photos" sign here and there in most shops I've encountered.


    コミックとらのあな (COMIC toranoana) - a shop selling seiyuu CDs, DVDs, visual novels, as well as various doujin stuff. There's quite a lot of explicit stuff for doujin in case you're interested ^^;

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    The location is around here:
    東京都豊島区東池袋1丁目13番4号


    VOLKS store in Ikebukuro. Other than stuff specifically from VOLKS (e.g. Dollfies, figures, and some plamos) there are other stuff available too such as gunpla and figmas etc.

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    It's right here in case you're interested:
    東京都豊島区東池袋3丁目12−5KATONo.1


    Walking down Ikebukuro


    Promotional stuff for Gurren Lagann the Movie: Lagann (i.e. the 2nd movie) found outside a cinema. It looks like that they've left it untouched for nearly 2 months.


    Guys playing Gundam VS Gundam NEXT - couldn't leave the spot for quite a while ^^;


    Tekken 6 arcades


    Melty Blood - a well known fighting game based on Tsukihime.

    Was going to mention this but forgot about it until LEon asked me in the comments below: Arcade games in Japan tend to be a bit more expensive than those in Hong Kong (many which are imported from Japan); Japanese ones tend to cost around 100 - 300 Yen, depending on what you play, but Hong Kong ones usually only cost up to 6HKD, which is still less than 100 Yen!


    USB Missile Launcher for those who wants to launch these foam projectiles at your enemies in your office XD


    There's an okonomiyaki restaurant inside Sunshine City where you can do one yourself~

    Accidently called this yakisoba earlier as this one does contain some. Thanks to Blowfish for correcting me on this.


    First of all, you mix the content/batter together...


    Put the mixture on the teppan (metal plate) which is in the middle of the table and let it fry.


    Make sure you make a circle shape so it can fit inside a cover...


    ... Like so. Let it cook inside for a few minutes and flip it to let it cook on the other side. There's a tiny hourglass for you to use so you can time it well when making your own okonomiyaki.


    Add some okonomiyaki sauce on top of the okonomiyaki after it's been fried on both sides.


    Add some katsuobushi as a finishing touch, and tadah - it's done. Time to enjoy the okonomiyaki now~


    Yep, that pretty much sums things up for the 3rd day. Not much happened to be honest, as my sister and her friend spent the whole day shopping just inside Sunshine City and I walked around those places mentioned above pretty much by myself for most of the time.

    When I've found out that they're planning to shop in Ikebukuro for the next day too, I've decided to go to Akihabara that day ^^;

    Actually, I didn't manage to visit Akihabara within one whole day on the next day, which was mostly got to do with pondering around for too long in in a few shops, so I made a short return on the day after that (after visiting Nakano Broadway beforehand). Have been wondering whether I should do both Akihabara + Nakano Broadway visits in one single post, or keep them separate as though I'm doing them day by day like I'm doing so right now.

    Hope you like this post on Ikebukuro and find the addresses above useful. Do ask me if you need a bit more info on something (can't guarantee answers but will try my best)!

    Read more!

    18 July 2009

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum preview

    Update: Review available here!

    It looks like that I may fall for another little action figurine next month -_-;;

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Meet Reycal Orichalcum, from a relatively new manga series of the same name.

    She will be released by Kaiyodo Revoltech on 15th August so these pictures are from a preview by Hobby Stock.

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Reycal will be released under Kaiyodo Revoltech's Yamaguchi line (not Fräulein or Queen's Blade line). Standing at about 13cm, she will be around the same size as figmas, which is good news for me ^^

    As for the manga, here's a sypnosis from Baka-Updates Manga:
    Sakugi Mitsuaki is a poor college student who gets hooked on figure modeling. In return for helping his class he receives some special putty -- but the figure he builds with it suddenly comes to life. The figure is a life force called Orichalcum ("Oriharukon") that fulfills the wish of its creator. Their strange life together begins


    I'm sure that an inanimate girl coming into life is not the first time for a manga/anime series already, but I hope this will be a good series should I decide to continue it after the first chapter.

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Number of accessories (optional hands, faces, armour parts for Knight Reycal mode, and stand) looks fairly good. The Knight Eagle is not included here.

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Hair has joints so you can fan them out for more dynamic poses, but I personally prefer the ones in figma Shana, which are a bit more subtle.

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Hole-in-the-back like figmas. Judging from the fact that the Revoltech joints are pretty universal and my experience with Revoltech Airi, Reycal should also be compatible with the figma stands.

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Reycal's bird-shaped armour Knight Eagle. Haven't come across this yet as I've only read the first chapter. Gotta say that the head doesn't look like that of a bird's though ^^;

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Knight Eagle can combine with Reycal to form "Knight Reycal"

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    Action pose as Knight Reycal. Hope the stand can hold the figure just as well when the real product comes out.

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    Reycal holding an art knife...

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    ... Which is to simulate this particular scene.
    Manga extract from AnimeA

    Revoltech Reycal Orichalcum
    デレデレ ("dere dere", i.e. lovestruck)

    Retail price for this will be 2400 Yen, which is just 100 yen cheaper than regular figmas. Both Hobby Search and HLJ has her up on pre-order.

    First noticed this from Ngee Khiong, which is a little ironic as he mainly focuses on Gundams and mechas ^^; What's interesting though is that it's not mentioned much in many other places. Being roughly at the same size and price with figma, I'd say that it looks promising and a fair deal, but let's hope the real thing is as good as I hope.

    Anyone planning on getting this? It could be just me, but she somehow looks a little broad at some angles, and some people even complained about her "thunder thighs", but nevertheless I think I might get this when it comes within a month's time :o

    All images are from Hobby Stock




    As for what I've got with the same price recently, here it is:

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    3 HGUC 1/144 GM Commands (800 Yen each)

    "3? Have you gone nuts buying 3 of the same models?" Well, I tend to like grunt machines a bit more, so I've wanted to build at least 1 team of them (3 units) to get to match with the Zakus from Ground War Set, which I've got 2 of them sometime back in April. But hey, 3 cheap gunpla for the price of a figma isn't bad though (well at least for me ^^;)

    Have been building the 4 tanks from the Ground War Set at the moment, and they are surprisingly detailed and a pain to panel line; perhaps reaching that of a MG gunpla XD This would surely require quite a bit of patience to get them all done, and I still have quite a backlog of other gunpla to do ^^;

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    13 July 2009

    Yokohama and Ramen Museum


    Back to the Japan trip last month:

    After spending the first night eating and staying overnight in Manyo Club, we spent the second day looking around department stores as well as the Ramen Museum in Yokohama.


    A lot of people waiting on the final minute before the department store opens.


    Gundam pens, along with Ultramen pens on the left XD


    For Gundam-related pens I see Zaku, Hyaku Shiki, Quebeley, and RX-78-2. However, they are too expensive (around 5000 Yen each) so I didn't consider getting one.


    Kinokuniya book store, which took up a large portion of one of the department store's floor. T'is here where I got the Element Girls periodic table book for a friend of mine.


    Banana case so you can safely put your precious banana in your bag without having to worry getting it crushed.

    Seriously, Japan has all sorts of stuff there ^^;


    We took a JR line and got off at Shin-Yokohama station, which is actually underneath a Bic Camera department store.


    Heading out for the Ramen Museum.


    Here it is, the Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum (新横浜ラーメン博物館). It's perhaps worth noting that the English name there intentionally spells ramen as "raumen".


    Went into the lower section of the museum, which takes you back in time and appreciate how Tokyo looks like in the late 50s.


    Map showing the old Tokyo / lower section of the Ramen Museum


    A blackboard notice with Astro Boy drawing saying that the smoking area is nearby


    The central area of the old Tokyo. Other than ramen shops out there, there are also game stalls for little kids to play, as well as decorational shops and people dressed in that time to bring that nostalgic atmosphere.





    Ice lollies of various flavours.


    There are at least 9 famous ramen shops you can try out yourself in the museum. For those who want to fully appreciate different ramens from different regions, please do come in with a very, very hungry stomach ^^;


    Different flavours of ramune are available, but what's with the odd ones such as curry flavour, kimchi flavour, and wasabi flavour on the bottom right?! XD


    Ramen croquette - tried one in miso flavour, and it sort of has some taste of ramen, but sort of not ^^;


    On the upper floor (which is the ground floor), there are displays and educational information all about ramen. Here is part of the history of ramen.


    A touchscreen interaction shows that the Japanese up north eats a larger amount of ramen than those in the south.


    Diagram showing various flavours of ramen used in Japan. The brown colour shows that shouyu (soy sauce) is the most common one of all.


    There are displays of different kinds of ramen bowls in terms of shapes and artwork


    History and development of instant noodles.


    Instant noodles all over the world. Recognise any that appears in your region?


    Babystar ramen - we have these in Hong Kong too, where they are known as 童星點心麵


    Older packages of the said snack noodles. I did see them briefly back in the old days before getting replaced with the one above.


    Neko Rahmen merchandise. According to Wikipedia, Neko Rahmen is a Japanese flash anime series based on a yonkoma, which revolves around a cat and his encounters running a ramen shop.


    Yummy pudding we've bought in a pudding stand on the first floor of SOGO. The pyrex glasses can be used as measuring cups as it has markings on them. My sister got a limited
    Yokohama 150th anniversary version :o


    We went back to Ikebukuro by nightfall, which is where we stayed for the hotel. Here is a small dish of chicken which is cooked with charcoal. Can't remember the name but in Chinese it's known as 炭燒雞.



    Different kinds of yakitori, great to go with alcoholic drinks


    親子飯 (oyakodon), rice bowl with egg and chicken


    Sashimi rice bowl of some kind, forgot what it's called

    Sorry if it seems a little rushed, but will get the food captions sorted by Wednesday night as my sister knows them better than I do.

    Lots of food again here and there. Got any you like there? I really wished that I could eat a few more bowls of ramen before leaving the ramen museum. By the time we finished our dinner and got into our hotel rooms in Ikebukuro we pretty much crashed out; we didn't sleep on a proper bed for 2 nights with a fair amount of trekking here and there in Yokohama.

    That's it for now. Will get this post sorted out a bit more tomorrow night!

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    8 July 2009

    One Year of Daybreak

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    Sometime this day last year, a new blog was born, just like any other daybreak one would see in a typical morning.

    To the new visitors, I welcome you and thank you for stopping by.

    To the returning readers, I thank you for coming back to my humble blog.

    Not surprisingly, this is one of those "anniversary" post thats you may have seen on some other blogs already. Personally, I am not into the milestone or statistics, so rather than going into the numbers why not just sit back and know how all this got started?


    Like many fellow bloggers with similar interests, I have started blogging in the summer last year. Due to the fact that I do have an interest towards a variety of things, I have decided to narrow my blog's focus to Gundam, figures, Hong Kong (where I live), Japan, and the otaku subculture in general. It may still seem a little varied for some, but for me I am happy with what I am blogging about already.

    Originally there was a blog before this with the same URL known as Q's Random Journal, which I had around for about 4 years but I didn't do much blogging on it, and the stuff I did blog about were woefully varied, as if there's no sense of focus or direction at all.

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    How my blog used to look like

    When it came to July last year, I gave some more serious thought about blogging after following a few blogs that offered me some inspirations, namely Ngee Khiong and Danny Choo. At the end I have decided to delete the old blog but start a new one under the same URL. However it took me a while to come up with a new blog name.

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    Although hardly ever mentioned in my blog, the band L'arc~en~Ciel was where I got the blog's name from

    Those who know what Daybreak's Bell is would know that it is an opening theme song from a J-Rock band called L'arc~en~Ciel for the anime series Gundam 00. Other than listening to Japanese songs from various anime series, they're the only artists whose songs that I would actually focus and listen to. Having the oppurtunity to attend their only concert performance in Hong Kong, I ended up naming my blog Daybreak's Bell. For me the title (not the song itself) was symbolising a new start, as if with light shimmering from utter darkness it gives me a new direction to head out for, unlike what I have done with my old blog which was like poking around in a state of astray.


    Getting back into blogging is quite interesting. Over this timespan of one year I have met a lot of fellow bloggers, exchanged links with some, as well as maintaining contact with them. I have met blogs that specialise on the Gundam franchise, those who solely focus on PVC figures, some who share a bit of both or even be blogging a lot about various Japanese things. There's been quite a lot of colours I have witnessed in the blogosphere, and it is overall a positive experience.


    Kotobukiya's Candy Bikini Shana was my first ever PVC figure

    As for how the blog is heading now, I will still focus on what I am blogging on at the moment, but with one more thing: to get people to understand and appreciate Hong Kong more than they used to so they don't find it more foreign than, say Japan, which is where a lot of my hobby and interests are influenced from.

    I am not looking for "hits" or "popularity" particularly, but just sharing my common interest with others (anime, figures, Gundams), perhaps showing them in a different perspective or opinion, is what I want to do. However, each comment that you have given me has mean so much to me, and I want to thank you for your support all this time!


    Last but not least, I want to thank those who helped inspired me to resume blogging, as well as those who have continued to support me throughout this year (in no particular order):


    Ngee Khiong
    , Apt-1B, GunStray, zenical, Lightning Sabre, gordon, Otaku Dan, Blowfish, konadora, Roy, Saku, valho, Willie, Optic, seven6398, Jacques, James, meronpan, RyoBase, Danny Choo, T.I.P., radiant, Snark, persocom, vixion, blood on the mirror, Z, gndynames, AstrayP03, suki, and many more


    Great apologies if I have miss anyone out there, but you can inform me should I have carelessly forgotten you so I can add it on the credits.


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    To finish off, and let's celebrate with a birthday cake, the 08th MS Team's way!

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    6 July 2009

    Revoltech Airi

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    Got this from a shop last Friday, but didn't have the time to open it until last night. Anyway, let's have a look how Revoltech's Queen's Blade acion figure Airi fare, and whether it is worth me spending 195HKD on it.

    (Note: This is NOT a full review due to the erotic nature of the figure, as well as the lack of time recently)

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    Revoltech's Airi is the second figure in the Queen's Blade line, which is just released on 1st July. Perhaps not surprisingly, she is much more popular than Reina (released last month), as she's sold out in many shops already. Hongkongers surely are quick and ruthless on these things o_o;;;

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    Standing side-by-side next to figma Shana and Haruhi. Unlike the Fräulein line, the similarity in height between the 2 different lines make them more playable with each other. Definitely a good thing there ^^

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    The ghostly flame parts can be attached to her ponytails. Took me some time to push it in though. The hole for attaching the flame part can be seen on the left.

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    Each ponytail has a revoltech joint just like the rest of the joints. You can actually take the ponytail off so you can attach or remove the flame parts easier. Additionally you can twist the ponytails so the unsightly hole can be twisted out of sight when not using the flame parts.

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    Changing the faces is pretty simple. Lift the front piece of the hair and change the face pieces. Due to the fact that the front piece is not a removable but moves like a flap, some people don't like the T-shaped seamlines on top of the head.

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    The hands for holding the scythe seem rather natural-looking (unlike figma's hole-in-the-hands), so you have to somehow push the scythe into the hands and hope it won't fall off.

    Airi's legs seem a little loose (apparently it is the case for others who bought her too), but she can still stand straight alright.

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    The stand requires assembly, but it is pretty easy to set up and it uses the same joints as the figure itself.

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    Airi with all the flame parts (including the alternate scythe blade) attached.

    The arm can hold the figure alright, though I somehow find it not as sturdy as the figma counterpart as it can sway left and right a bit.

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    Revoltech action figures revolves around revoltech joints. Which means most many joints use common parts (e.g. all leg joints, waist, and neck joints etc. are all the same; ponytail and wrists joints use smaller ones). The joints can be pulled out easily (well nearly all of them for me), supposedly for easy swapping should one get damaged or worn out, but according to Ngee Khiong, who has a Revoltech SFO Chun-Li, revoltech joints are pretty durable even if you play with one for a lot.

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    The two different chest piece (each has 4 pegs) for the maid's top. You can have neither piece on Airi so you try to appreciate her exposed chest in full glory, but at the same time you will have to cope with the 4 unsightly holes around it.

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    Here is the M mode (負け Mode / Defeat mode?) with the burst chest piece visually covered by the hand

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    Tried to exchange the damaged kneesock leg parts too for the M mode, but couldn't remove the joint on the thigh from the original leg, and I didn't want to force it so I gave up -_-

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    All Revoltech action figures now come with a little box for storing small parts. Even the leg can fit inside there, but there's no home for the alternate scythe blade to reside -_-

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    Funny enough, figma stands are compatible with Revoltech Airi - definitely a good thing there~ ^^


    The exposable chest aside, the other thing I have not mentioned (confirmed on forums) is that the lower undergarment can be removed, and in addition to that the details beneath it are there too... I have seen some cast-offables figures before, but having the lower part of the body being exposable too is one of the firsts for me, much to my surprise. Without a doubt this is one erotic figure to have, should you decide to go all hell on it. o_o;;


    Overall, good articulations, good proportions and look as well as the fair price (retail price is only slightly more expensive than regular figmas), Revoltech's Airi is a good buy for me. The new size makes it playable with the figmas too. It looks like that Revoltech is slowly competing in the bishoujo action figure market. The upcoming Reycal Orichalcum (not from Queen's Blade) looks quite attractive too, even though I know nothing about the character or the manga.

    Might add a few more pictures later but that will do for now :o

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