My room update and Kumoricon news

I haven't taken pictures of room and my collection since I moved into this new house about seven months ago so I thought I'd do that today.




































This is my right wall. You can see my anime DVD collection, my Chobits wallscroll, my little Eva poster that I got from the "Death and Rebirth" DVD, a wallscroll of some naked chick, and, if you look closely, you can see my new Miyuki nendoroid standing on top of the DVD case closest to the window. You can also see my two body pillows on my bed.

This is the wall directly above my bed. You can see an Inuyasha wallscroll on the left, a little Bleach insert poster, and a Suzumiya wallscroll on the right. Also I got a Suzumiya pillowcase from the volume 3 LE DVD.





















































Here's my dvd collection. According to dvdaf.com I have 525 discs as of this writing.



















Here are my ten figures including Gekisou Yuki (review coming soon). Unfortunately I have to keep all of them on the first two shelves because my son likes to touch. I'm going to be getting a new shelf with glass doors later.



















Here's my TV and blu-ray player which you've seen before. You can also spot my SNES and my Wii.

Last order of business is Kumoricon. If you don't know Kumoricon is an annual convention held in Portland Oregon. I will be attending Kumoricon 2009 which will be on Labor day weekend (September 5-7). I'll be getting that new glass-door shelf from Ikea on the way back home from Kumoricon as well. Well that's it. Thanks for reading!

Six months of blogging already?

It's been six months today since I started my anime blog! I'm glad that after all this time I'm still sticking with it.
Got some cool stuff over the last few days but have been holding out until it was officially six months- I thought that would be neat.

Got a pretty good size box from Rightstuf. In it the the four Air TV singles + artbox, Karin complete collection boxset, the first five Welcome to the N.H.K. singles + artbox, and the first volume of DearS. Unfortunately it seems tracking down the final single of "N.H.K." will be a bit of a challenge and will likely cost a lot due to some problem with the distributor. Not expecting too much from DearS which I picked up from Rightstuf to fulfill a sale requirement, but I'll give it a shot. I've been looking forward to Karin and Air TV for some time but have always had something else to get; I'll likely be watching those first.

Also got a couple new figures from www.bigbadtoystore.com. Gekisou Yuki and a Miyuki Nendoroid. I'll be typing up a review for Yuki within the next few days and will have it posted sometime in August. On a side note I will not be doing reviews for Nendoroids because I'm not overly fond of them. Well that's it for today. Hope you enjoy the pics, and thanks for reading.

PVC Review: 1/7th scale Shana (Griffon)

I had been eying this Shana figure, the title character from Shakugan
no Shana, for a little while and recently had a chance to order it.
Like all of my recent figures it is out-of-production and can only be
found on eBay and a couple domestic figure retailers. I had purchased
the figure thinking it was 1/8th scale, but it is actually 1/7th
scale; it is still pretty short, shorter than my 1/8th scale figures.
Fans of the Shakugan no Shana anime will know that she is short in
this series and is under-developed for a high school student.

Shana is my first figure made by Griffon, and I think they did a
decent job with it. Its hair is certainly unique and is definitely
fitting for the character, a glossy hybrid of red and orange. Her top
can be removed but there is nothing amazing underneath. Shana's skin
has been painted a shade or two lighter than most figures, which is in
keeping with her character in the series. At first glance the facial
coloring seems too light in relation to the rest of the body, but this
is simply an illusion caused by the translucent hair.

The figure connects to its base by two little bumps that go into her
right foot, like Clare from Claymore I already reviewed. Unlike the
other figure, however, the Shana figure is much more sturdy because
its legs are wider apart giving more support. One thing fans of the
Shana series will note is that this figure is out-of-character for
Shana; it places her in a provocative pose not seen in the animated
series. This will, however, likely not deter figure collectors.

Paint and craftsmanship: 9
Packaging: 8
Price: 8
Likability: 8
Overall: 33/40

Upon reflection I do feel a bit let down with Shana. For as much as I paid I feel underwhelmed in its delivery. I'd recommend her to fans of the series though.

We, Wee, or Wii?

OK the title of this post is a little weird heh. Finally took the plunge and bought the Nintendo Wii like I said I was going to last time. Bought Mario Kart, the new Zelda game 'Twilight Princess,' and that's about it for the games. Those two games coupled with a second Wiimote and a Wii wheel accessory (not to mention the Wii itself) set me back $450. Ouch.... Unfortunately for me I have realized that I basically wasted the $150 I spent on the Super NES and its games because I can download all the classic NES, Super NES and N64 games directly to the Wii for cheap! Dammit!

Got my shipment in from Rightstuf today as well. (Remember last time? I said I had DVDs coming.) Actually two of the following DVDs I've had a while. Claymore vol. 6 was shipped to me a couple of weeks ago even though to this day it still has not been officially released. (July 14 is the official street date). Galaxy Angels S I picked up at Big Lots for $3. The other three sets came today. One Piece Season 2 Vol. 1- more pirate action! The Familiar of Zero and Lyrical Nanoha both look cute and were purchased for cheap. Rightstuf also sent me a hellsing bag for free (apart of their "Buy two select titles and receive a free hellsing tote bag" deal). The bag is a nice bonus I suppose- but my wife has already claimed it haha.

Due to the Wii and manga taking up all of my free time I still haven't finished the last DVDs I bought. I still have one episode of Ikki Tousen to watch. OK, so that's not very much... but still. Normally I would have had that finished a while ago! That should do it for this post. Thanks for reading!

PS.... WHY THE HELL IS BLOGGER FLIPPING MY F****** PICTURES?

Manga and classic video games

First of all I'd like to apologize for the stupid pictures being flipped like that. Again I'd like to point out that it is NOT my camera that flips them but blogger. O.k., now that that's over on to the post.

Thanks to a friend reigniting a passion I've been buying a lot more manga lately. In fact I don't have any DVDs this purchase! Don't worry though, I've got 3 box sets on their way from Rightstuf. Actually I was thinking about waiting for those to arrive and just doing one big post but I felt like posting today. Also I've been getting back into video games after a LONG absence from the gaming scene. I had no systems whatsoever. I remembered that the Super NES was my favorite gaming system so I went down to sort of a game pawn shop and bought a Super NES and a few games. Now that I've been playing and having a blast I've decided, with some advice from a friend, to invest in a Nintendo Wii. My wife likes video games too, so she's thrilled. Mario Kart will be our first Wii game.

Went on a manga spending spree at Borders books the other day. I spent almost $150 on manga! Among them were Naruto 42, which walmart didn't have when I went there to buy volume's 42-44. It seems that I've forgotten to post pictures of Naruto volumes 43 and 44, which I bought some time back. Shoot. Well you'll just have to take my word that I bought them! Got Shugo Chara volume 6 for my wife- although she has yet to finish volume 4! Naruto 45 (more ninja bullsh*t), Haruhi Suzumiya volume 3 (which includes some stuff not shown in the anime), Lucky Star volume 1 (finally!), Rurouni Kenshin Vizbig 4-6, Ai yori Aoshi volumes 1-3 collection, and finally Mamotte Shugogetten volumes 1 & 2 again for my wife. Lots of books!

Now, the games. Zelda: A Link to the past, an undeniable classic purchased for $12. Played and beaten. Chrono Trigger (purchased for $30), another classic that the author of the Dragonball manga, Akira Toriyama, designed the characters. The main charcter, Chrono, looks like a cross between Gohan and Trunks (Future). I am currently playing this one. Finally, Final Fantasy III (Which is actually Final Fantasy VI) purchased for $40. If you think that's a lot the store was asking for $50! I haggled them down ten bucks because I was buying so much already. I'll play that one after Chrono Trigger.

Well that outta do it for this post. Thanks for reading.

PVC Review: 1/6 Scale Mai Tokiha (Max Factory)

1/6 scale is pretty big isn't it? Today I'm reviewing Mai Tokiha from the anime series Mai Hime. I bought Mai from my trusted eBay seller for fifty dollars + shipping. He has at least one more in stock and if you're interested in buying her email me at zacksawesome06@yahoo.com and I'll give you his eBay username. The typical 1/8th scale stands about 20cm tall. With her base included, Mai stands an impressive 27cm tall. This is about 6cm taller than my tallest figure, Gekisou Haruhi. I was a little worried about her being too tall and not able to fit on my shelf. Fortunately she is about one index finger short enough to fit on a lower shelf if she needs to.

Mai will be my third Max Factory figure and they did a pretty good job with just a few drawbacks. There are a couple of 'creases' down each of her legs. This was something that was not present in either of my other two Max Factory figures. A couple of my other figures have them but not as noticeable. Considering Max Factory is one of the best companies I'm pretty shocked at this. Who knows? Maybe it's just my figure. There's not really a whole lot going on with Mai. She's just standing giving the thumbs up- a pretty plain pose. I never understood why companies pick these types of figures to do larger scales with. I'd figure that they'd choose to do larger sizes when the figure is particularly complex and/or detailed. Another draw back is the base she stands upon. Not only is she fused with the base it's not very sturdy. Why just typing this review is making Mai rock back and forth.

I am, of course, just nitpicking the figure. In actuality she's quite well crafted. Her paint job is particularly excellent; especially her hair. I see about three different shades of orange on her hair alone. This shading gives her hair very realistic look. Her vest also has about three different shades of orange with the darkest right underneath her breasts making them look particularly good. (haha). This figure is a pretty accurate rendition of Mai Tokiha in both appearance and in feel. The hand on the hip and the thumbs up reflects Mai Tokiha's energetic, upbeat self.

It's too bad that there are so few Mai Hime figures out there considering how many main characters that would make great figures. I believe there are about five or six figures of Mai Tokiha and a couple figures of Natsuki whom I guess would be the second main female character. Although I guess I should be happy there aren't that many because I now I don't have to buy them all. Heh. I suppose it's time to move on to the judgment.

Paint and craftsmanship: 9
Packaging: 9
Price: 10
Likability: 9
Overall: 37/40

When browsing my sellers store there were two main things that attracted me to her. One would be the fact that she's 1/6th scale (which I have determined to be about the largest size I'd want) and the price tag of $49.99. For such a large scale figure produced by one of the top figure companies fifty dollars is a real bargain. Needless to say I'm pretty pleased with this figure and I highly recommend her. In fact the last four of my figures have come from a single eBay seller, and so I highly recommend him as well. Well that about does it for this review. I've uploaded a ton of pictures this time so be sure to take a look at them all. Thanks for reading!