Archive for the “Merchandise” Category

After fighting the throng of rabid otaku my 1/8 scale Alter Hirasawa Yui has finally arrived! I reserved my copy as soon as preorders were open which was somewhere at the beginning of the fall semester for me. I’m now taking finals for the spring semester so it’s been a while. Given the various delays to Yui’s release date I was this close to canceling my order but I’m glad I didn’t.
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So today I finally got the limited edition shirt I won from Penny Arcade’s Bayonetta Contest. Basically on the release date, January 7th, Penny Arcade ran an old school ’submit-a-photo’ style contest to award the first 500 entrants to beat the game on hard difficulty an exclusive T-shirt. For extra validation contestants also had to have the ‘Umbra Elder’ achievement/trophy. After getting the game the same day a friend told me about the contest which gave me even more of a reason to play. Long story short I beat Hard on the 11th and have pretty much been waiting to see if I had won until this afternoon when I saw a Penny Arcade envelope on my porch. Now I feel like I achieved something tangible for being so obsessive about a game and all I had to do was be in the top 500 fastest lol.

While Aorii was readying the hotpot to eat last night I went outside to get something. Seeing the sparkling snow I had an idea. I went to my room and got the Cirno plushie I got the other afternoon and started putting her in the snow and taking some pictures. The way the flash reflects off the ice crystals while keeping most of the photo dark looks so nice.
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Today one of the supposedly most severe snowstorms in the state’s recent memory started. Something like 20 inches is expected to fall which considering the average for the region is quite high so a rare thing happened. UVA is kind of famous amongst us students as being very stingy in regards to holidays. We never have any days off except for the basic ones that it can’t get away with like Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday and Thanksgiving. Unexpectedly the university canceled classes today which has only happened very rarely in the past few decades.
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Yesterday I came back to school and waiting for me at the house was a package containing a copy of Dengeki G’s Festival! DELUXE Vol.5, the Key special issue, and my Cospa Hirasawa Yui shirt. Since I can only talk so much about a t-shirt I’ll focus on the magazine only. The reason I decided to get it other than the obvious fact that I’m a Key maniac was the pack-ins. In hindsight I think I felt a little shafted having missed a similar promotion last time so I didn’t want to miss it this time. Aside from the magazine the box set also comes with a Kud Dakimakura Cover, Key Playing Cards and a Kanbe Kotori Key chain. I’ll definitely use the key chain and cards but I honestly don’t know what to do with the dakimakura cover so I’ll probably just keep it in the plastic and store it somewhere.
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For the past 3 days I’ve been missing in action on the internets due to Nekocon 12. After getting tired of not ever going to conventions with my friends I decided this year that I would finally go to one. Though my wallet is aching in the end it was definitely worth the price and time I paid. Get ready for a ridiculously long write up of my Nekocon adventure.
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Apparently the TBS ishop recently started taking preorders for special guitars based on those of K-ON’s Yui and Mio. The Hirasawa Yui Model Beginner’s Electric Guitar and Akiyama Mio Model Beginner’s Bass sell for 29800 yen each and come with a set of limited edition clear stickers to make the perfect otaku guitar. The guitars are designed for girls and middle/high school students and as such are made of light materials for a lighter than standard weight.
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Last December I wrote that I got Gift’s FumoFumo Touhou Plushie Reimu and Marisa. Nearly half-a-year later I have finally gotten more Touhous to add to my collection. To be precise I received FumoFumo Alice, Patchouli, Remilia and Sakuya this afternoon. I was originally supposed to get Remilia and Sakuya in February but Toys Logic failed incredibly hard despite my early pre-order so I once again turned to Shopping Mall Japan to help me snag them at Yahoo Auctions Japan. I got Remi, Sakuya, Alice and Patchy for about 7000 yen per pair which is close to retail price and after fees and shipping about the same price I would have paid at Toys Logic so in the end it worked out. (There are a few things that Toys Logic offers that other sites don’t that I’m interested in such as the Saki Mahjong Set but I’ll be wary the next time I try to order from them).

Unfortunately I’m still missing Flandre from my collection since I ran out of money. Hopefully I’ll add Flan later. There’s also a giant version of the Reimu Plushie but I’d rather save my money for possibly more of the regular-sized ones assuming Gift continues to release more.

Right now, Gundam fans around the world are celebrating the official 30th anniversary of the appearance of the original RX-78-2 Gundam (which was today, by the way), so I figured I would do my part with a review of my recently-completed 1/100 scale Gundam Avalanche Exia Gunpla!

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Yesterday me and a bunch of friends took a trip to Washington DC to attend this year’s Sakura Matsuri. For those who do not know, Sakura Matsuri is the largest one-day exhibition of Japanese Culture in the United States and is part of the two-week National Cherry Blossom Festival sponsored by the Japan-America Society of Washington DC.
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