Azu-nyan heals the heart…

Quite a long (ok, not that long, but pretty long by my standards) time since I’ve posted anything on the blog and it has caused quite an itch on my degenerating mental state, partly because school is near and I’m basically being a lazy bum at home trying to convince myself that academic torture is about to befall on me. School matters aside, another reason for my inactivity was the stalled influx of new figure hauls, a result of my PVC plastic binge during the summer which has admittedly scalded my budget like a roasted headless chicken. With the theme of overwhelming sadness, despair, downright repulsiveness at hand, I’ve decided to bring not so good news in this post for the majority of figure collectors, though hopefully no one goes into a tirade and stir up a revolt or go streaking like a lunatic over the heartbreaking news.

Conspiracy theories anyone?

Figure Delays=Fail

So while I have not pre-ordered either of GSC’s 1/7 Saber Lily ~Distant Avalon~ or Alter’s 1/8 Yoko -Bounty Hunter Ver.- figures (or even Alter’s 1/7 Subaru Nakajima of Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS fame), the news of their release delays will piss off a lot of people who are in need of their premium June hauls, and have probably destroyed their credit accounts just to gobble them up. If you haven’t heard of the news yet, they’ve been delayed from their original June release to August, which basically dumps most of the sexiest 2009 PVC figures into that month, which is already stacked with Megahouse babes, a GSC monster in their 1/8 Black Rock Shooter and Alter’s own 1/7 Fate T. Harlaown -Shin Sonic Form-. Personally, I’m only getting one figure for that month but I’m really concerned about the financial mojo being sucked out from a lot of otaku in August, which I fear might cause them to declare figure bankruptcy like Circuit City fail. The simultaneous delay from GSC and Alter makes me wonder if they’ve decided to birth some super-corporation in August in hopes of stomping upon shitty figure makers like Taki Corp. Hey, it’s a long shot, but who knows?

Megahouse just screwed me…

Poor college student and mail-order exclusives don’t mix

When a C.C. addicted collector like me is on a mission to hunt down green-haired beauties, I usually end up winning and shouting “Awoo!!! Awoo!!!” like Gerard Butler-Leonidas without the steroid six-pack, but there comes a point where Adidas’ “Impossible is Nothing” slogan makes them look idiotic and figure collectors go rotten bananas. Recently, Hobby Japan announced that they’re releasing the CODE GEASS MODEL WORKS book with Geass-related goodies and models for people to drool over, which is going to be released in June (in fact, HLJ’s taking orders now). Fine, no problem with me. I’m not a book guy anyway. But then they announce that purchasing the book gives you a chance to get mail-order exclusives from Megahouse and Bandai. The Bandai one is a Robot Damashii version of Galahad, which I don’t give a damn about since mechs don’t appeal to me, but the Megahouse one is an Action Figure Collection C.C. which obviously made my eyes go into “must get even if I have to strangle someone” mode. If there’s two things you have to know about the AFC line of Megahouse, it’s that one, they’re aristocratically expensive (like 12000 yen, sell-my-kidney expensive) and two, they’re limited to 700 pieces (which in layman’s terms is SUCKY). Compound those problems with the fact that I’m not a guy with a constant stream of income and that the Philippines is an import tax aka corruption money, EMS-fail of a country (Extort Money from Someone) and you’ve got one mad C.C. fanatic. I get the point of having mail-order exclusives and all (production efficiency, rarity factor and marketing wellness), but clearly, the fact that my hands are tied in terms of spending makes me even more disgusted (and I’m already disgusted with this country of mine). Oh yeah, anyone notice that Japan’s been having more exclusives lately?

Pompoms can’t save Mikuru from bootlegging demons…

Fake-mas and fake-ures

I really pity for Max Factory. I really do. I thought that after the ginormous amount of bootlegged Max Fac figures on the market already (seriously, I’m sure everyone has seen that bootleg 1/8 Max Fac Haruhi already), they’d be given a break by those cheap miserly pirate bastards over at China, but I guess mercy isn’t to be expected from Mao’s domain. So while I was browsing the interwebs for figure news and haul reports (I’m a sucker for them — either to burn my irises on them or to feel some wish fulfillment of mine), I caught upon Pasu’s Blog and his unlucky experience buying a bootie Figma Mikuru Cheerleader Ver.  At first, I thought that Figmas were basically bootleg-proof, given that action figures are harder to recast and the functional nooks and crannies involved in production would be staggering, but I guess I was wrong. Looking closely at the bootleg version, I couldn’t believe my eyes that a sub-standard piece of trash could be made to look like figure gold. Apart from the dog-poop joints, the paint job was well done and the face expressions don’t look like Mikuru just crapped on herself. Disturbing stuff actually, considering that rising “quality” of booties might actually fool more people into buying less than desired merchandise. As if the bootleg nightmare wasn’t enough, I went to a local store recently that sold some PVC figures (not Wasabi Toys or GreattoysOnline) and I’ve known the owner for quite some time now. They usually get stuff earlier than those two aforementioned shops, especially in terms of Gunpla and Figmas. They have a small batch of PVC figures as well, but I was horrified (like Ozzy Ozbourne-kissed-my-dog horrified) when I saw the 1/8 Alpha x Omega C.C. in its bootleg fall from grace. As a proud owner of a legit one, I’m extremely saddened by this development and even more frustrated at the piss-poor quality the bootleg had. Crummy paint job, disfigured eyes and definitely trash-heap plastic, not to mention the elementary-level box art print all pointed to figure collecting despair. Explains why I’ve been seeing more of these evilBay failures recently.

Related posts:

1. Crazy Summer Hauls
2. May09 Figs Haul
3. May 28 is Now My Favorite Day!!! (for 2009)
4. Reason for Disappearance and August Notables…
5. Wonder Festival 2009 Summer