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Winter Wonfes 2020 Personal Highlights



Well it's been a while since my last post but I'm still here and still excited about figures. Things have just been very busy between holidays and lots of travel and work, but I'm hoping to get back to figure reviews soon. Until then, I'm sure if you're on this site you're aware that Winter Wonder Festival has just happened in Japan and tons of new figures have been previewed! So many, in fact, that it would jsut be way too much work to go through all the ones I'm excited about here. To keep things brief, I've decided to narrow it down to the 5 that I'm most excited about. On top of that, I'm sticking to figures that are at least sculpted, although there are TONS that have just concept art right now that I'm excited for as well.

5)  Good Smile Company - Pyra and Mythra - Re-release

Big news from the show that Pyra and Mythra (aka. Homura and Hikari) from Xenoblade Chronicles 2 are being re-released! I passed on them last time around because I felt like the price was too insane at ~$200 + S&H for each figure but this time I think I need to at least get Mythra if not both (even though best girl, Nia, deserves a figure more). Curious if it will still be a store exclusive.  I think they were available on Amazon.jp last time, regardless, so I might go that route this time to save a bit on shipping.


4) Skytube - Gal Sniper - 1/6 Scale

I was excited for this figure last time, and seeing her painted now hasn't changed that one bit. Artist Nidy-2D is extremely hot right now with lots of figures on the way from different manufacturers. I had huge expectations for the more lewd figure makers this show (Skytube, Native, etc) but to be honest they didn't bring much that got me excited beyond this figure which I had already seen before.  Still, I really like finally seeing the tanned skin tone on this figure, as well as the scenic base. I suspect this will also come in standard and deluxe versions as has been the case for many recent Skytube releases. It's another one that I'll probably wind up getting on Amazon.


3) Emontoys - Iya na Kao Sarenagara Opantsu Misetemoraitai - Yuina - 1/7 Scale

“I Want You To Make a Disgusted Face and Show Me Your Underwear.”


2) Vertex - Elf Mura - Linsia

Finally the third character in Vertex's Elf Village line of original characters gets a sculpt! I skipped the second one because it's gross (and yes I'm passing judgement because that figure looks terrible), but I've got Priscilla on pre-order and am very much looking forward to Linsia. I love her halberd, and her more toned physique is quite different than the other figures in the line so I think she'll look great with them all together. I expect the price will be quite high, but like the previous two I've ordered I can mitigate it with some TOM bonus points and hopefully catch a promo near when she goes up for pre-order. She'll probably have a deluxe version as well but the prices on those have been crazy for relatively small extras, so I think I'll stick to the standard version. 


1) Alter - Azure Lane St. Louis Light Ver. 1/7 Scale

Hail to the king, baby.  I feel like ALTER is back, finally, after years of slogging away making Idol Master figures I couldn't care less about they've come back around to making figures of characters who actually have bodies worth sculpting, and on top of that are doing it in a mobile game I've been wasting too much time playing for the past couple of months. St. Louis looks amazing; her thighs and breasts too thicc for her outfit. Side-boob and impossibly and an impossibly short skirt, St. Louis has it all. This is one that I'll be slamming the pre-order down on day 1 assuming it's not insanely overpriced like their Prinz Eugen is. I expect she'll just be normal overpriced, like their swimsuit Atago, and that's just fine by me. I'll be going through Amiami for this one, most likely.


Look at her! She's perfect!

Anyway, there were A LOT of figures that look awesome this show. I barely just scratched the surface here. I haven't been ordering the insane quantity of figures that I ordered in 2019 so far this year, but the year is young and there is time for me still to make terrible financial decisions in service of this hobby. The bad news is that my time is so insanely limited right now that I can barely unbox the figures I have already. The good news is that figures get more and more amazing every year. So much so that I'm mostly okay with the prices getting more and more insane. On that note, I'll be swinging back around to my previous post about budgeting for this hobby with some data about this year, but probably not until the end of the year.  I've changed a few things about how I manage my money for this hobby, but I think it'll be a while before I have enough data to say whether or not it made an improvement for me. 

Also, since this is my first post of 2020, happy new year and hopefully I will have many more posts this year. I have my figures in a new space in my house now, and have many many to photograph and write about, so I'm hoping to share them with all the visitors to this site as the year goes on. Stay tuned. 

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