CLOUD STRIFE

 

The second coming of Final Fantasy VII not ony came with movies and prequels and secuel videogames and lots of merchadise, but with action figures as well, Square´s own figures line, Play Arts, that lasted for almost 15 years. The first full serires of figures came with Tifa, Vincent and Sephiroth and didnt add the protagonist, Cloud, until serires 2. I wonder why?

Cloud is really small and thin...same size as Tifa soo both Vincent and Sephiroth towers him and despite this, Cloud have a lot of troubles standing by himself...his ankles articulations are pretty lose, but the Play Arts standar base was not only good looking, but functional as well.

Cloud is articulated on the neck, shoulders, biceps, elbows, wrists, legs, knes, ankles and half feet, all cut joints except the shoulders and legs soo they can move only in one direction. All articulations works well but somehow, the....weird piece of clothes that Cloud have tied to his torso as well as the black sleve blocks compeltelly his arm and legs articulations. Its pretty anoying....and is actually pretty weird how he dress.

The scult is good, with a very femenine face (really?) and a pretty nice yanr texture on his vest as well as the lion crest on his shoulder. The cloth thingy on his torso is made with soft plastic but still is soo heavy and anoying and his free shoulder looks soo weird.....deffinetly my favorite part is his head, specially his hair since it looks like a chocobo butt from behind.

The paint is at minimum again, with color only on the buckles, zipper and face, this gives him a pretty soft and nice look and the face painting is perfectly deffined and crisp, specially on his eyes. I love those electric blue eyes.

He dosnt have too many accesoryes tough, just one extra gloved hand to hold his sword and his giant sword. The hand looks a lot like the basic one i see no difference, and the sword have a pretty cool industrial design and metalic paint but is soo heavy, he cant hold him for too long, i mean with those thin and scrawny arms....

He was released in a special edition that included is Fenrir bike wich was pretty cool and years later he was upgraded with a much better looking Play Arts Kai that included a big ammount of swords and of course, a huge fenrir too, with an astonishing price of course.

Out of the entire line, i think this guy is the least i like...somehow he looks weaker than Tifa and is much more limited than her as well. The second serires also included Yuffie, Reno and Kadaj. I always wanted Kadaj but i stoped getting them after this Cloud.