Saturday, March 30, 2013

S.H.Figuarts Kamen Rider Gai Review

Hi folks today i'll be reviewing one of the S.H.Figuarts Kamen Rider from the Ryuki series. And what better way to start then the Tamashii Exclusive Kamen Rider Gai?
I just started collecting the SHF Ryuki series recently after knowing that Bandai will be releasing all the riders and their mirror monsters from the series. 
I got Gai for quite a high price on EBay but is he worth my buck?
Let's find out.

The standard compact brown mailer box that comes with all Tamashi Exclusives which houses... 

... the box with a small clear window showcasing the figure and some of the accessories inside.

Back of the box has some pics designed in a glass cracking theme of Gai in various poses like final vent or strike vent etc.

Here's the inner tray when we open the box.

Here's Gai out of the tray and i really dig his sliver metallic coloured armor. His (mirror world) contract monster Metalgelas is a huge rhino like monster so his costume design is based off that as well.  

His upper body has the heavy armour feel.


The head sculpt is also very good with excellent paint apps



He's light on accessories for a tamashii exclusive and would have been better if he at least came with a customised tamashii stage. But that aside he comes with everything he needs.
His 'Strike Vent' rhino theme weapon, 8 extra interchangeable hands and the 5 advent cards which he used in the show.

One of the things that got me hooked on this line is the miniature advent cards that comes with these figures.
They are very small but still Bandai took the effort to replicate them like their on screen counter part and that says a lot (at least for me anyways)
From the top 2 'Confine' cards, Strike Vent, Final Vent and Metalgelas

The Card Deck(Advent cards holder) cane be removed and the sculpting for such a small accessory is very good

But the paint apps is off by quite a lot as you can see(just nitpicking but you can't really see unless from very close range). The Card Deck fits snugly on the V-Buckle(his belt).

One thing that i like about this figure is the design of his Visor(device which activates the advent cards when inserted in)
 Let's try Strike Vent.... 

One of the extra hands holds the mini cards snugly....

The black case at his left shoulder is his Visor....just slide open and

slide in the advent card and slide to close again.
(when we slide to open again the card is automatically pushed out again.
This is very good engineering on Bandai's part and this is a very COOL feature!)

Now that we summoned Strike Vent, let's try posing Gai

He has mostly the usual joints of SHF and there is not much obstruction from his armor. 


This figure has tight joints and his hands are also easy to swap in and out.




Final impression, now that all is said and done(except pose Gai with Metalgelas lol) I'm proud to say that i am one happy owner of this solid figure. Little nitpicks here and there, i would recommend this figure to fans of the Ryuki series. He's quite rare and very expensive now on the after market but not impossible to get lol.
So i'll leave you folks at that for now and thanks a lot for taking the time to visit my site as always :)
Here's me signing off for now, Have a nice day ahead! Ciao for now






"Final Vent!"













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