Monthly Archives: March 2012

Dakimakura Review – Fate T. Harlaown from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS (NSFW)

Fate T. Harlaown Dakimakura Review

I’ve been looking for a good dakimakura cover of Fate Testarossa for a while now, and it’s been surprisingly difficult to find one despite the popularity of the Nanoha franchise’s number two lady. For one, many of her pillowcases depict her in her younger form, and while I don’t dislike her original appearance, I prefer her as an adult. Also, being that I’m fond of the character, I was going to be more discriminating than I might have been if I were unfamiliar with Fate.

One of my favorite dakimakura covers is Vivio, and I knew the artist had done one of Fate earlier. I had skipped it then, but being that I liked his work with the Vivio pillowcase, I decided that passing on it had been a mistake. When I heard that this Fate pillowcase showed up on Mandarake, I went ahead and picked it up. While I like the illustrations better than I did at first, this dakimakura cover came with an unexpected and quite unwelcome surprise.
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Dakimakura Review – Rin Tohsaka from Fate/stay night (NSFW)

Rin Tohsaka Dakimakura Review

It’s time for dakimakura cover show and tell, and today’s pillowcase features a character that needs no introduction at all.
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ER Nurse Miyuu from the Daydream Collection (NSFW)

Nurse Miyuu from the Daydream Collection Figure Review

Like school swimwear, bunnysuits, and catgirls, nurses are a well-loved staple of anime art and anime character design. Not by me, though – school swimwear, bunnysuits, catgirls, and nurse uniforms don’t do a whole lot for me by themselves, not like, say, bodysuits or sportswear or revealing body armor. However, I ordered Miyuu less for her clothing and more for how she looks sans clothing. How does she look and how detailed is she?
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Tamaki Kousaka from To Heart 2 (Gift Swimsuit Version)

Tamaki Kousaka Figure Review

If you’re a figure collector and a fan of Tamaki Kousaka, you are probably a happy person. Characters come and go with respect to their popularity amongst figure makers – Iroha was a favorite character for some time, as was Ignis, and the Ikkitousen and Sengoku Rance girls had their heyday … but Tamaki – her popularity is as high as it’s ever been, at least among figure manufacturers. This particular figure puts her in a swimsuit, which isn’t particularly noteworthy. What is special about this figure is its size – she’s got many, many figures, but few of them offer a solid fifteen inches of Tamaki.
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Preorder Outlook XVII

The pace of figure releases was rather languid at the start of this year, but now that we’re past Wonder Festival the preorder announcements have been popping up with the quickness. There’s lots of new faces from recent series and a lot of old staples, like Miku, Saber, Sonico, and Fate. No Tamaki Kousaka, curiously – though I’ll be photographing another Tamaki figure soon. As if the world really needs another Tamaki figure review; regardless, it’s coming later this week. But for now, let’s look at some stuff that I’m thinking about buying.
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Naoe Kanetsugu from Hyakka Ryouran Samurai Girls

Naoe Kanetsugu from Hyakka Ryouran Samurai Girls

Alter is one of the most well-respected figure makers in the hobby, and they have a diverse product portfolio that encompasses a huge variety of properties. There are a few franchises that they seem to particularly prize – in particular, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Strike Witches, and Hyakka Ryouran Samurai Girls. One could make a good argument that Samurai Girls doesn’t deserve figures of this quality but although the show is quite terrible, the character designs are, at least, fairly pleasing to the eye. They’ve trickled out over the last few years, and though Alter seems committed to making figures of all of the show’s characters, they’ve shown little of the alacrity that they evince with chucking out Strike Witches figures, who seem to get a new one every few months. Nonetheless, the newest one is Naoe Kanetsugu, an evidently happy young girl who carries a very big stick.
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