With the holiday season coming up and the figure companies showing off their newest offerings for next year, now is definitely the time to put down money on preorders - but as excited as I am about all the great new releases, a part of me is in a panic! Although I live above the otaku poverty line, getting my hands on the new figures that I just can’t live without will surely demolish my entire savings. I won’t have any regrets, but I’m going to have to learn to live with the consequences. 

Take a look at what I’m ordering this season.

First up is Kotobukiya’s “Kousaka Tamaki Temptation,” which is probably the best name for a figure ever. The much-anticipated Tamaki is due out in March, and looking so good in her recent feature on Sankaku Complex.

I’d say she deserves the hype. The details look great and seem faithful to the original art, as expected of Kotobukiya, and the pose is a knockout that seals the deal for me. Better yet, at 1/6 scale, Tamaki is going to stand out no matter where you put her - in fact, this figure will be the largest-scale one in my collection.

Honestly, I want this figure so bad that I’m placing my pre-order even though I haven’t actually seen To Heart 2 yet or played the visual novel. But I have a few months in between now and March to take care of that, and with Tamaki being the legendary tsundere that she is, I’m sure I’ll fall in love with her in no time.

Next would be Griffon Enterprises’ “Asahina Mikuru Gothic Lolita Version,” in 1/7 scale and also due in March.

I’m looking for Mikuru to match with Griffon’s Gothic Lolita Haruhi, which I picked up at Nekocon not too long ago. Haruhi has become the highlight of my collection, but I expect even more from Mikuru - I’ve always thought that Mikuru was the cutest among the lovely ladies of the SOS-Dan, and I like her Gothic Lolita costume even more than Haruhi’s. I know the kind of quality I can expect from this figure, and there’s no question that this is the one I most want to add to my collection in the next few months.

Also, as a fan of Max Factory’s Figma series, I’m interested in the upcoming “Yagami Hayate Knight Armor Version” that’s due this January. Hayate isn’t really my favorite character from the Nanoha series, but she does have a very cool costume and should come with tons of accessories, which translates into a fun Figma.

 Hayate spends so much time working hard at her desk job in StrikerS that I’m sure she’ll make for an inspirational desktop ornament. Maybe that’s not the best reason to go about buying a figure, but Figmas are cheap so I don’t care.

Putting this all together, it’s inevitable that I’ll be spending $200 at least, and probably more including the shipping. And that’s not all…

Let’s say, hypothetically, that between now and March, Ranka Lee and Sheryl Nome of Macross Frontier finally get the figure releases that they deserve and that I’ve been waiting for since the end of the series.

Since Macross Frontier is one of my favorite anime of all time, I will have to buy these figures immediately - both of them, since I can’t imagine having Ranka without Sheryl, or vice-versa. And while Ranka and Sheryl will look good together wherever I display them, they’ll set me back another $100 at least, bringing my total spending over $300…

In the absence of Ranka and Sheryl, I still might end up spending the money on Good Smile Company’s 1/8 figure of Muv-Luv heroine Sumika Kagami, arriving in January, although I’d be more motivated by the mystique of Muv-Luv Alternative itself rather than any sort of connection to the character…

That doesn’t change the fact that this is a fine figure from one of the best companies in the business.

And in the middle of all this, I wouldn’t mind adding another Shana figure to my collection, either, if I happened upon a good deal on eBay. Shana always makes for a good Christmas present!

Anyway, to make a long story short, I’m guaranteed to spend at least $200 this season, and possibly as much as $400 in a wild shopping panic depending on what happens. I’m sure I won’t regret it either way, but did all the good figures really have to come out all at once like this?

This week I did a friend’s request and drew Tomo and Yomi from Azumanga Daioh though I didn’t really have time to do any shading. Original down below:

Oh god I need to reinstall Windows on my tablet badly during Thanksgiving Break since it is currently dying of something other than VistAids.

I’ve been waiting forever but today I was finally able to login to Aisp@ce and create my online avatar. I haven’t done too much so far but I think I will grow to like it and actually gives me even more of a reason to memorize kanji.

So far I haven’t done too much. I made my avatar an average height girl with the default purple eyes and medium-length blonde hair and named myself 本屋 of course. After finishing the survey of which I can’t remember exactly what was asked, I started running around Akiba. After playing around with the controls and menus to get a feel for them I wandered around since I couldn’t recognize half the kanji and didn’t realize I had to go somewhere.

Long story short I finished some quest so I finally got to pick which “world” my room would be in. I chose the CLANNAD area but before leaving the attendant asked what type of character doll I had a taste for. I picked the “silent, wait-and-see” option over the energetic one. After boarding the train I arrived at the CLANNAD Area. Before I could do any serious exploring or to even meet my partner though, something happened causing the game to stop working. I restarted but have yet been able to go back on so it looks like I will have to wait a little longer. I’ll write more once this maintenance (I think) is done.

By the way if you want to come play with me, I will most likely be on channel 4. Let’s make this the Gaijin Channel lol!!

The front page has links to the forums and dev blog of course but the coolest thing is the rotating quotes that come up which link to all the different characters. For example “Can you see what I see?” links to Lilly’s section of the character page.

Speaking of Lilly, she was my favorite character along with Emi when I first heard about what would become Katawa Shoujo but that may change once the final game is out. I like how the character page has birthdays, measurements and even blood types for all the main characters. As for the minor characters, I laughed when I saw the best friend character and the nurse. Kenji looks a little Harry Potter there and I couldn’t help but think of Nurse-kun when I read that the nurse is a young male.

The sample page includes a few screen shots not released on the dev blog as well as the theme songs for the main girls. I after listening to them I can say that they are not bad. Not sure if I can call them memorable or not but my opinion may change after the full release.

On the downloads page, you can find 2 wallpapers of Emi and Misha at 1600×1200 and 2560×1600. However you can’t get the so-called “preview” that was leaked a while back. There is a section for a new preview though so I wonder when that will be released.

The Staff page lists all the current staff of course and has a short description of how they project came to be. I’m glad to know that they included the original Katawa Shoujo sticky thread that I gave them. Of course I’m not actually listed since I haven’t really done anything for them since the beginning of 2007. If I had the time and weren’t busy with my current game dev project, I would have tried to join the team a year ago. Anyways have this bit of fanart instead. Enjoy.

I will try to write a post about my impressions of Umineko soon depending on how schoolwork goes. As unlikely as it may be, I hope the Witch Hunt finishes translating Banquet of the Golden Witch before Episode 4 comes out.

According to my blog statistics, 5 of the top 10 queries that lead readers to my blog is either some combination of “Rosario” and “Vampire” or Mizore, one of the main characters of Rosario to Vampire. I’m not quite sure why it is so prominent since I have not blogged about it much compared to a lot of other things. Although I often make fun of it, I finally admit it—I FUCKING LOVE ROSARIO TO VAMPIRE!! I’m not even sure why I like it so much.

Anyways, just so that potential readers can find the pictures they originally googled for, here are 40 high-resolution Rosario to Vampire pictures. Enjoy!

Today I finally received my Snow Strawberry Fraulein Revoltech Hoshii Miki AND 1/8 Max Factory Hoshii Miki Awakening Version. Two Miki’s in one day equals Bliss. I pretty much spent the afternoon playing with my new figures as well as some older ones (which I will be posting about later). Anyways on to the photos.

“Go My Way!!” without tablet background

“Go My Way!!” Drill Version

Max Factory Miki

Let’s try with drill first

Getting Ready to Pierce the Heavens

How about some non-drill pictures?

I have absolutely no complaints about Max Factory’s job on Miki; this has to be one of my favorite figures I own. The pose is absolutely gorgeous and Miki’s face looks exactly like it does in the games which is something I am very particular about. The paint job is fabulous especially with its dazzling glitter and hints of shading. The one thing that would have been nice is to have a spare head of regular Miki to swap out. Doesn’t really matter to me since I’ve become quite attached to natural-hair Miki. Besides Miki is quite…shapely…

Nothing more to say about this Fraulein since I already covered this previously in my Fraulein iDOLM@STER post; Miki’s overall quality is on par with the others. I only wish I had Haruka and the Futami twins with me so I could pose all four of them together.

Now I just need to wait for Kaiyodo to announce more Fraulein iDOLM@STERs and for Max Factory or Good Smile to make a matching Haruka and Yayoi. (Not sure about Mega House’s versions). Oh God Just Like Iori, I Need Yayoi SO BAD!!

A reminder from your friends at Lyrical Spark! Brought to you by Barack Obama, Gundam 00, and OVER 9000 hours in MS Paint.

With this year’s SaiMoe tournament at an end, it looks as if Kagami is the superior Hiiragi twin. Although I am happy that Kagami beat Tsukasa I am a little bit disappointed with this year’s event as a whole. For one the top eight consisted of characters from only a total of 4 series; CLANNAD (3), Lucky Star (2), Bamboo Blade (2), and Hayate no Gotoku. Don’t get me wrong as I like all these series but some variety would have been nice like in 2006 when there were 8 series represented.

Out of the Round 4 characters that didn’t make it, I would have liked to see some combination of Hanyuu, Miyako, Shana, Hayate, and Akari. Furthermore I am still shocked that none of the winners from the last three years even made it to the quarterfinals. Suiseiseki only made to the fourth round and neither Nanoha nor Rika even made it to that.

Speaking of Rika, SaiMoe 2007 has to be one of my favorites. Rika came out of nowhere to win a very tough fight with Nagi. Rika has to be one of my favorite Higurashi characters so I was glad that she got revenge for Rena’s loss against Nagi.

Overall it was an alright tournament. Hopefully next year will have a better character lineup and larger turnout. Anyways Figma Kagami Photo shot soon maybe.