Best. Figure. Ever.

View the rest of the photos here.

The figure retails for ï¿¥10,000 but online stores like Ami-Ami are selling it for around ï¿¥8000. (HobbyLink Japan has it at retail price.) I got mine for 108 SGD, which is about ï¿¥8100 or 70 USD.

Yet another one of my life goals has been achieved. :)

Money is the root of all evil. Therefore we should spend all our money. Besides Mahoro and Haruhi, here are some nice pieces of polymers that I am probably going to cough up blood for in the near future…

First we have Kaiyodo’s Mikuru. Standing at 23cm in her waitress uniform, Mikuru’s angelic smile can kill a fanboy in less than 4.32 seconds assuming you have not already been vaporized by the heat rays located in her innocent eyes. Forget nuclear weapons, Mikuru is a one-girl weapon of mass moé-fication.
Pro: Mi-Mi-Mikuru Beam!!!
Con: May result in accidental death.

Cost: ï¿¥4,725
Release: Dec 2006

Navel Characters Collection. Six chibi-fied girls from Shuffle!, Tick! Tack! and Soul Link. SAGE-CHAN FTW!!!
Pro: Has SAGE-CHAN!!!
Con: Has Kaede and Sayaka. No Nerine. Not enough SAGE-CHAN!!!

Cost: ï¿¥3,800 for 10 random
Release: Feb 2007

To Heart 2‘s 1/8 Ma-aryan-senpai (Drill Ma-ryan Kick Ver.) from Kotobukiya. I can’t stress enough just how cool and awesome this figure is. If you played TH2 on PC, then you would know what I mean. Seriously, you can’t miss this and still call yourself a TH2 fan. Moeyo has a pre-release review of it here.
Pro: Best. Pose. Ever.
Con: PVC may possibly bend out of shape more easily due to the pose.

Cost: ï¿¥4,410
Release: Feb 2007

Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu Figumate from Konami. More chibi-fied cuteness. Take a look at the Negima Figumates to get an idea on how they will look like.
Pro: HARUHI! WITCH YUKI! RYOKO! TSURUYA! MIKURU! (everything)
Con: Witch Yuki and Waitress Mikuru are “rare”, which means I’m probably never getting them.

Cost: ï¿¥4,200 for 10 random (your first born for a rare)
Release: March 2007

Also, I need to seriously start to consider how to pay for the DVDs I preordered on Amazon JP. The temptation to preorder things is so great when you are not required to pay up until they are released…

Oh well.

Say NO to lolicon!
Help light a candle today!

The innocent victims of Internet child abuse cannot speak for themselves.

But you can.

With your help, we can eradicate this evil trade.

We do not need your money.

We need you to light a candle of support.

We’re aiming to light at least One Million Candles by December 31, 2006.

This petition will be used to encourage governments, politicians, financial institutions, payment organisations, Internet service providers, technology companies and law enforcement agencies to eradicate the commercial viability of online child abuse.

They have the power to work together. You have the power to get them to take action.

Please light your candle at lightamillioncandles.com or send an email of support to light [at] lightamillioncandles dot com.

Together, we can destroy the commercial viability of Internet child abuse sites that are destroying the lives of innocent children.

Kindly forward this email to your friends, relatives and work colleagues so that they can light a candle too.

Fully endorsed by Mahoro!

Anyway, I have a story to tell today. It’s a story of love, passion and courage. Okay, so there isn’t really any courage involved and the love is somewhat superficial, but screw it! The title is cool. ねぇ？

Long before the current incarnation of this blog, when I was still a young and impressionable (lol) otakuling, I woke up one day and suddenly felt the urge to splurge all my money on little plastic anime figurines. It was a sudden enlightenment not unlike achieving nirvana or playing eroge for the first time.

Okay, so that didn’t happen. The real version of the story goes like this: I was just surfing the net as usual when a few unfortunate series of clicks brought me to HobbyLink Japan, a blood-sucking store built on the soulless corpses of gullible foreign otaku that exports cool and useless stuff out of Japan because no one in Japan is actually stupid enough to pay for those crap any more.

One of the first things I saw on HLJ was this 1/12 Mahoro & Sports Motorcycle resin kit from Mahoromatic, a show by the lunatics geniuses at Gainax about a flat-chested combat robot maid. Now the combat robot maid part would have been totally cool by itself, but she’s also riding on a cool-looking bike! And holding a huge gun to boot! It boggles the mind as to why she’s doing that in her maid costume, but dammit, I think words cannot describe how awesome this figurine looks.

I knew I wanted it bad. But reality rose its nine ugly heads (wait, maybe I’m thinking about something else here) and my short-lived dream was shattered. It’s 19,800 god-damn yen and I had (and still have) no fucking idea how to assemble and paint a resin kit. There was a completed PVC version of it selling for less, but that was sold out. Shit. I swore to myself that I would one day buy the kit and build it. One day.

The next time I saw the figurine was at a local store that had a completed version on display. To this day, I remind myself of the promise every time I walk pass that store. But alas, “one day” has yet to arrive.

Recently however, Kotobukiya suddenly decided to re-release the PVC version of this totally awesome figurine for a retail price of about 10,000 yen (86 USD) with a pre-order special price of ~8000 yen (~70 USD). You can imagine how delighted I was. I placed an order for it today from my usual source for an estimated price of 138 SGD (88 USD), which is not bad taking into account shipping. Hell, the store hadn’t even added it to their pre-order catalogue until I pestered them about it.

So in another three months or so, I’ll finally have my very own 1/12 Mahoro to admire. No doubt I will hug it to sleep every night and cherish every moment of my life with it, at least until the times come when I grow bored of it (which takes about TWO whole days) and leave it to collect dust like every other figurine before it.

*sniff* Wasn’t that a nice story? I love happy endings.

Okay, so I technically still have yet to fulfil my promise to one day build and colour the resin kit myself, so it’s really just a cheap substitute for the true happy ending. But you know those gal game like AIR where you have to beat all the “normal” happy endings before you get to the “true” happy ending? It’s the same thing.

Now I just need someone to teach me how to assemble and paint resin models so that I can unlock the true end to this story. Any suggestions?

P.S. The title had nothing to do with the story after all… but hey, it still sounds cool.