SHIVA

 It was when Final Fantasy reached its full potential at the Playstation one when it was also born as an action figure brand. It wasnt the Play Arts line but Bandai and Kotobukiya the ones responsible of the Final Fantasy VIII action figures, main characters and monsters. I sell most of them sadly, but i keep a few and one of them was Shiva.

For some reason Shiva was extremelly difficult to find, she was rare along side Diabolus and Gilgamesh and my mother found her at one of her trips to USA, tough not the original version, but the clear version. Since then i been triying to get her original painted version but with no luck. Back then repaints of clear version of figures were pretty common, now day would be unthinkable.

And in Shiva´s scenario, the clear version fits her nicelly since she is the Guardian Force of ice. She is in the same scale as Siren, but unlike her, Shiva have a lot more articulations: her head, shoulders, elbows, wrists, legs, knes and ankles. All of them cut joints soo they can only move on one direction soo she is still not as posable as modern figures at all.

Also, articuations play against her since che cant stand on her own. To fix this they give her a kind of ice pedestal for she to be on top of it but of course...her ankles and knes articulations make her fall even with the base soo i had to use another one with an arm and a clamp to stand her. This is a very serious isse and i always wondered f the painted version had this problem.

The sculpt of Shiva is as close as it can be to Nomura art, her body is lean and pretty simple and aerodynamic and both the crest on the back of her head and the tentacles at the side are made with soft plastic, but still they get in the way pretty often and are very anoying.

She is of grey ransluscent plastic, with the back of her head, hands and feet un soft blue and the ice base in darker blue, wich looks really beautifull with the rigth light, is like an ice sculpture. She also have blue paint on her beasr and pointy sections as well as metalic pink on her tentacles soo she is nt completelly clear.

Tough her face have no paint so her face features arent too clear since they only depend on the sculpt. This is the detail i dont like, if her face was painted then this figure would have been totally perfect.

She has no accesory like Siren togh i guess the ice base count, but she have two companions: two extra Guardian Force creatures, Carbuncle and Moguri. Both are tiny, nicely sculpted and have some minor paint jobs on Carbuncles diamond and eyes as well as Mogu eyes and nose. Aside of that they are completelly transluscent, one cast in green and the other in red.

After 20 years i am still looking for the original version of Shiva, she is one of my favorite Guardian Force from Final Fantasy and she looks beautifull fully painted, tough for now this clear ice version is enough i guess, specially considering how difficult to find she is.

SIREN

 Turning back in time, to the last years of the 20th century, was when Final Fantasy reach its glory point as well as it was born on the action figures industry too. It wasnt FF VII the one that started selling figures tough, but it was Final Fantasy VIII in the hands of Bandai and Kotobukiya. Bandai released figures of the main characters while Kotobukiya put the "creatures" of the game on the shelves. The coolest part is that both companies used the same scale soo the "creatures" are taller than the human characters.

Sadlly, i sold all my collection and a couple of the creatures too but i keep a few and now i been triying to get again those misisng monsters in my collection. The serires focused on the Guardian Force and the very first one i got was as well the very first Guardian Force of the game: Siren. The scale is not as big as i rememberded tough since she is a a little smaller to the average modern action figure scale.

She cant stand at all thanks to the odd shape of her legs but she comes with a plane plate base with an arm to help her stand. Sadlly, i lose her base soo i had to use a generic one that works perfectly for her. As an action figure from that time, she is not very articulated: shoulders, elbows, legs, knes and wings and all this segments use cut joints, soo they only move on one direction.

There is not too much logic on moving her legs since she could not stand at all and the arms movement is soo limited, the most helpfull articulations are on her wings. The sculpt is nice, pretty faitthfull to Tetsuya Nomura design, she is almost like a statue and her legs are sculpted leaning to her side. Is a nice touch to not give her a totally generic pose.

Most of the details are on the feathers and face and still those details have a very soflt scultpting. Color is the same, the body is cast on flesh tone soo most of it is on her wings tough the colors are pretty nice and vibrant, blue, greens and purples, i specially love her metalic purple claws as well as her lips and eyes.

She have two accesoryes, one is her harp. Is nicelly sculpted and painted in green with gold and even the cords are metalic, tough is very difficult for her to hold it thanks to the shape of her hands, a reall strugle! The second accesory is a completelly different Guardian Force: Cactuar!!

Cactuar is tiny, perfectly sculpted and perfectly painted. The only downside is that he cant stand at all, but he match with any other FF figures line no matter the scale.

Despite the details could be better and the useless articulations, this figure was soo impresive back then... she looked soo pixelated and blurry on the Playstation game, it was such a luxury see this character in HD and this is also probablly the best design this monster ever had.

ZACK FAIR

 

One of the many selling points of the PSP was how much many companies like SquareEnix supported it releasing many big budget games on the system and one of them was Crisis Core, the long awaited prequel of Final Fantasy VII. I got pretty good memories of it and is one of the games i want to play again, but aside of that, Play Arts also take care of the game.

Sadly, the action figure serires consisted on Zack, Cloud and Aerith and ignores completelly Angeal and Genesis, wich was totally shocking considering theres lots of Cloud and Aerith figures already, soo i only got Zack Fair, not only was the only relevant figure, but i always liked him much more than Cloud.

Zack is taller than Cloud and Tifa but shorter than Vincent and Sephiroth and can stand perfectly but he comes with the standar black base from the old Play Arts days. He is articulated on the neck, shoulders, biceps, elbows, wrists, legs, half legs, knes, ankles and half of his feet bit he also have articulations on his shoulder pads, soo they can move around along side his arms. All of his articulations works really good and are strong enough, tough his legs articulations are kind of ugly looking and a little limited since they only move up and down.

Sculpt is good on hir hair and have enough detail on his face, like his scar. The shoulder pads have a nice metalic texture on them and his vest and front velts are really good looking. The flow of his pants are also good looking and help him to not look too stiff.

Paint is good too, on his face basically the big blue eyes, rest of the paint comes for the details like bucklets, the brown straps and boots, and of course, his earring, no detail was spared in here. Rest of the figure comes cast on the basic color tough i have to say, i dont like his skin color. Looks kinda...yellow to me while the other figures have a more normal tone.

He comes with a holding extra hand as well as, of course, his huge sword that later would be Cloud´s  main weapon. The sculpt and different colors of the metal are really nice and Zack can actually use his muscles and hold the sword himself, unlike weak and scrawny Cloud.

He also have a small bolt that can be put on a hle on his back to hold the huge sword, this way he can carry it on his back. Pretty handy for the display and works perfect, i wish Clod was smart enough to use this system.

many years later Square upgraded him with a Play Arts Kai, with ball joints, a bigger scale and better details, pretty close looking to the CG Zack from Crisis Core, tough this character is extremelly simple looking, soo i wasnt very excited to get this upgrade.

I actually felt very nostalgic about this particular line. Sadlly i didnt buy any other characters from the other games...i trully regret not getting Auron. I am feeling really nostalgic too about the older games but i wont go back in time for now, since my FF X figures needs some repairs before appeare in this blog.

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.

SEPHIROTH

 

With the second coming of Final Fantasy VII at the begining of the century, SquareEnix started to pay attention at theyr toy department with the release of the Advent Children action figures and that was just the begining since they would release action figures of every Final Fantasy game in the line. But they started with Tifa, Vincent and...not Cloud but Sephiroth.

I guess Sephiroth is endeed more important than Cloud? This figure is the tallest of the serires, he is huge (tough still smaller than the Kai Snow Villiers) and gladlly, he can stand perfectly tough he comes with the same standar base from the serires.

Sephiroth is articulated on the neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, legs, knes, ankles and his shoulder pads are also articulated soo he canhave total freedom of movement on his arms. All articulations work great, and even his neck is strong enough to keep the pose despite his heavy hair. All working good with its limitations of course, the cut joints just let movement in one direction.

Sculpt is really good, with his face looking really androgynous but still different to Vincent. His jacket is made with soft plastic but my favorite sculpt is on his hair. Is a solid piece of plastic but flows behind his back nicelly and looks good on all poses.

Paint is almost no existant again, with most of the paint covering his grey hair, face and white on the end of his sleves. His skin tone is as pale as Vincent but his lips are soft pink and his big eyes green, almost with a feline expression.

He is the best equiped from the serires since he have two extra pairs of hands, to hold his weapon and open palms. As weird as this is, the diverity of hands gesture helps a lot to gives him a lot of personality, and out of the entire serires, he looks the best on almost any pose, with his long jacket, hands gesture and long flowing hair, this is a guy that looks like he is on a poster of cover of a game no matter wath pose you use.

His other accesory is of course hiss word, Masamune. Extremelly simplistic katan, its size is HUGE, almost bigger than Sephitoh himself

He was upgraded years ago with a Play Arts Kai and unlike Vincent, i really dig the Kai version since it comes with a giant articulated wing. Its a shame i didnt get him but this one version is not too bad, i think he is the best looking figire along Vincent and i have pretty fond memories of more inicent times with this figure.

VINCENT VALENTINE

 

Final Fantasy had some crazy times at the begining of this century when they release theyr movie based on FF VII. I remember everyone were watching it and enjoying it to the fullest soo it was no susprise Square released themselves action figures of the movie, starting with Tifa and later with Vincent Valentine.

Vincent is much taller than Tifa and have much more troubles standing thanks to his pointy shoes. Is tricky to find his point of balance tough he comes with a pretty standar and funcional black base that holds him from the waist, much better than the bases of the future Kai serires.

He is articulated on the neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, legs, knes, ankles and half feet...or better yet, the pointy golden part of his shoe. Not only he is less articulated than Tifa, but he is much more restricted as well!! His legs have cut articulations, no ball joint, soo he can only move his legs up and down like old 80s toys limiting his legs movement an awfull lot.

Lastly, his red...clothe thingy blocks completelly any shoulder movement limiting his poses even more. Its a shame how well articulated is this guy and yet how static he is. 

The sculpt is really good, his face is androgynous and cold and my favorite part is his golden gauntlet and how many details have those fingers and my other favorite bit is his red cape. Its made with soft plastic and while the shoulders section is anoying, the back side flows soo nicelly to the point it looks like is actually moving and can be moved around for some really good dramatic effects.

The paint, just like with Tifa, is at minimum with most parts cast on color plastic, the paint is limited to his golden claw, his face and the silver bucklets. Again, the paint on his eyes and purple and livid lips is perfect and atchs the sculpt perfectly, even if the features are well hidden by his hair and red clothe thingy (his head shuld be tilt down all the time to hide his mouth, no exception).

Just like Tifa, he have very little accesoryes but an extra hand to hodl his weapon, and the weapon it self: Cerberus. This weapon have a pretty impresive sculpt with a real chain in the end with the Dirge of Cerberus logo on it. Pretty impresive stuff for back then standars.

Mane years later they upgraded him with a Play Arts Kai that was bigger, more detailed and more articulated but also comes with a big articulated plastic cape. The cape was cool looking but i dunno....it looked stiff and heavy, for some reason i like much more the look in the figure, with a more lighter cape that flows like a feather.

TIFA LOCKHART

Long time before Play Arts Kai existed there was something else: Play Arts (with no KAI), the deluxe action figure serires from Square entirelly focused on Final Fantays and Kingdom Hearts. They figures were smaller than Kai, had weaker articulations and details and was cheaper too, tough back at the begining of the century they were pretty impresive toys.

I totally miss the first fogures based on Final Fnatasy X-2 but i fall for the Advent Children movie figures. The movie was awesome and pretty much the best videogame based movie and still is one of the best soo i was pretty excited for toys of it. Oddly enough the first figure wasnt Cloud but it was Tifa Lockhart.

Tifa is pretty small, the smallest of the serires soo she is a little bit smaller than the standar McFarlane/Neca action figure but not by much. She can stand perfectly on her own tough the figure cames with a generic black oval base with a rood and a clamp to hold the figures from the back. MUCH better than the first Play Arts Kai bases.

She is articulated on the neck, shoulders, biceps, elbows, wrists, waist, legs, knes, anles and half of her feets. All this articulations are cut joints except the elbows and legs, soo they just rotate to one direction. Pretty basic to the ball joints from the later Kai serires, this articulations make a little bit harder give her a natural pose than dosnt looks like a robot, but it can be done. Actually she is pretty fn to pose around given her martial arts skills.

Skulpt is good, there is enough detail on her costume and her hair is pretty simplistic, my favorite parts are of course, her face and her shoes, those big black snickers are pretty good looking. To the oposite side, i hate the big ribbons on the sides of her legs and the black....thing...wathever it is, that cover her back side. Is made with soft plastic but is the heavyer part of the figures and is very anoying for her legs movement.

Paint is almost no-existant. She is entirelly cast on skin color and black plastic with only pain on the white details of her shoes, shirt and face. This gives her skin a pretty consistent anime look. Also the pain on her face is soo beautifull, her soft pink lips, her big brown eyes, they are both perfectly painted to match the perfect sculpt.

She is lacking on accesoryes tough since she only have a pair of extra hands, fist with gloves when she is on battle mode and thats it....nothing more, wich was kind of the standar back then.

A decade later, they would upgrade her with a Play Arts Kai version wich was bigger, better articulated, and came with more hands and an extra head with flowing hair, it was really spectacular but i didnt upgrade her i am not sure why. I think it is because i have very good memories of this figure as basic as it is.

OERBA YUN FANG

Final Fantasy XIII was such a weird game, like a shiny and impresive jewell with imperfections and a premium action figure serires as companion. While Lightning wasnt as despicable as i was expecting her to be, the character that made a big impression on my was Oerba Yun Fang, the very last character to joint the party and just like Quistis Treepe and Lulu in VIII and X, i fall in love of Fangs pretty quickly.

Not only she was pretty strong (she saves the entire Ccoon in the end) but she was absurlly pretty in the game and ultre femenin, with her raven wing black hair with blue and purple tones, her tribal tattos and crimson red lance, It was always a pleasure have her on screen, soo it was easy to buy her figure.

Part of the new Play Arts Kai line, she was a big figure tough in scale with Snow, she is shorter than him, thiner and much more lighter too. And just like Snow, she have extremelly weak ankles soo its even much more harder to make her stand, and like Snow, she cames with an ugly and useless base that dosnt help her stand (gladlly, Square get rid of those bases).

She is articulated on the head, chest, waist, elbows, shoulders, biceps, wrists, legs, knes, ankles and half feet and aside of the weak ankle movement, everything else moves fantastic and keeps the poses perfectly. Her shoulder articulations are not as ugly as Snow´s and while her wrists articulations are pretty basic and stiff, its pretty fune to pose her around.

The sculpt is OK, her face is pretty simplistic and most of the details goes to her costume, or lack of costume i say, she is barelly dressed since most of the cover comes from the blue robe wrapped aroind her body. This rove is made with sift plastic soo it dosnt get in the way of the articulations too much except on the left leg, since it almost cover it entirelly.

She got a necklas made with seashells and a hole on her chest to put the neckaless in place with a peg, but this neckaless keeps moving around soo the chest hole gets to be very intrusive visually.

The paint on her robe is really good, made with metalic and shiny blue and the simbols on the white part are perfecto. Sadlly the rest of the figure paint is not very outstanding aside of her tribal and Cie´th tatto on both her shoulders, her skin tone and face looks very lifeless.

Her hair is just a mass of blacknes and her eyes are perfectly painted and very femenine, but dosnt looks at all like Fang did on the game. Maybe is because her character model of the game is soo amazing, but she looks even more plastic than Snow do in this figure...

She dosnt have too many accesoryes either, just an extra hand to hold her spear and of course, her draconian spear. The sculpt is really good as well as the crimson colors, this spear can help her greatlly to get balance and stand and is also an incrediblly cool loocking weapon to fight.

Swnow was a little bit of a letdown but this Fang was much more a dissapointing for me. Its a shame that this is the only figure exist of such an amazing good looking character. The rest of the figure were not better tough since they all looked pretty anime and had theyr scale messed up (Hope was the same heigth than Snow) soo i just stoped getting them with Fang.

SNOW VILLIERS

 

Last entry was about the last figure that closed my Play Arts Kai collection: Gladio from Final Fnatasy XV. Now lets go backward to the past, to the very first figure that started the Play Arts Kai collection: Snow Villiers. I cant stop to feel nostalgic with this figure...the times when Final Fantasy XIII was released. I know that game gather a lot of hate but i actually loved it back then and now, 10 years later, is much more impresive than Final Fantasy XV itself in many departments.

The game wasnt perfect, sure it had its issues like a messed up narrative, linear progress and weak villians, but it still boast a lot of personality close to the core of FF. And it started the Play Arts Kai line, the premium quality action figures directly from SquareEnix.

The starting set consisted on Lightning, Snow and Vainille and of course, my main point of interest was the beedcake of Husbando Snow. He was really really tall for back there standars, a trully huge figure, tough with the time, the Play Arts got bigger soo compoared to Gladio and Nyx, Snow is no longer as bigger as it was back then. And he can stand on his own.....kinda....the thing is, his ankles articulations are very lose soo he tends to fall pretty easy and find his point of balance is not as weasy as it seems.

The figure came with this....ugly and horrible looking base with a strange "H" shape and an articulated arm with a claw in the center. The base not only was pretty ugly but didnt help him stand at all soo i got rid of it.

He is articulated on the head, chest, stomach, shoulders, niceps, elbows, wrists, legs, knes, ankles and half bot as well as two extra articulations on the back of his long jacket. All this articulations works really good except the ones on the ankles, that are really lose, the rest are fine and is very fun to pose him around given the nature of the character. The best part are the articulations on the back side of his old jacket since it could be easyer to give him a one piece jacket, but instead Square divided it on secttions with movement.

Also, i hate the look of the shoulder articulations. There is a big gap between the torso and the arms, it looks very...."toyish" and this articulation was in fact an eternal issue on this line. Also the wrists only have a cut articulation soo the hands are really stiff.

Sculpt is good tough really simplistic. His half beard is sculpted tough his hair looks kinda like gum. His costume is nicelly done, the jacket have its buttons and every piece of cloth is a different scuped piece: his jacket, his vest, the chain on his waist, the blue cloth hanging from his belt, his baggy pants and the super detailed boots. Both the end sides of the jacket and the cloth from the belt are made with sift plastic soo they are nice to touch.

The only things that mess with the sculpt are the shoulder articulations and the end sides of the jacket and the sleeves, they are supposed to look old and tear apart but they looks like made of cake...

The pain is nice too, with different yellows and blue shades on the jacket and some soft shadows on his chest and face to give them volume. The blue eyes are very nice tough they are extremelly anime looking. The Lu´Cie tatto on his arm is sharp and clean. The rest of the body is cast on the color of each piece soo theres not too much paint work in here.

In the accesory department he is lacking tough since he only have a pair of extra open hands. Its easy to exchange the hands tough they are still not very expressive thans to the simple articulations on the wrist and given the nature of the character, is difficult to expect some more xtra items for him.

In the end tough, both the sculpt and the brigth colors make it looks too....anime...too cartoony. I like this figure a lot tough it dosnt looks as beautyfull and perfect as he looked in the game... the game looked soo realistic yet this figure looks almost 2D.  A fun and nice figure but with some flaws, just like the game.