We get a large coffin-type box, you know, where you open the front cover to see the action figure and its accessories and the story's plot summary. And at the back we see different poses that Lightning can pull off and lots of text in multiple languages.
Because Lightning have three versions, my bestfriend call this latest figure a "Lightning Mk. 3", inspired by Iron Man and I agree haha!
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| Viewing Lightning's body |
Lightning is more beautiful than ever, but still I prefer her FFXIII-2 appearance. Anyways, being a large action figure, we expect that every detail and paint application is superb, well it passed on the detail department, but sadly, it failed in the painting part because I found few and noticeable paint "drops" and "sticks" on and around the skirt-mantle area
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| She's pretty |
I like her face, it's now more accurate to her game counterpart. Her face, even though it kinda looks neutral because of (spoiler alert incoming!) her lack of emotion in the game, it still shows that Lightning is more confident and battle hardened, evident through her experiences in the past two games. Her hair is not translucent like in the FFXIII-2 version but it's painted, shaded and highlighted well.
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Equilibrium, Lightning's default garb
And I think her boobs got bigger |
I don't have any particular favorite part in this figure, because I like everything! The colors, the design and details are great. Most joints are hidden quite well because of the design of Equilibrium, Lightning's "battle dress". The game's logo is present on her chest area.
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| It's flowy. Is that even a word? |
The leathery pauldron with mantles and the skirt-mantle with pockets of Lightning's battle dress are soft and in fixed flowing motion and doesn't hinder the figure's articulation.
Lightning's arms and hands are also super detailed. Skin paint jobs are flawless.
The boots have cool-looking knee pads with belts, buckles and straps that I think she borrowed these from Vincent Valentine. Too bad the toes doesn't have the swivel articulation.
Peg holes are present on Lightning's back and left arm, this is where you attach the sword and the shield. To me it's OK to put a peg hole on Lightning's back, but I don't know why they decided to put a hole on her left arm, I mean the shield on the FFXIII-2 version worked quite well.
ACCESSORIES
Lightning's have few accessories and that's a downer. Lightning only got her sword, shield, open left and right hands and a gripping right hand... But this time she comes with a display stand.
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| As usual, this is what the Lightning figure got, standard equipment and few extra hands |
Where's her cool shades as seen in the game!? It can be a separate little piece, just the shades or a swappable head (or face) with shades just like Catwoman.
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Crimson Blitz
The sword's design reminds me of Lightning's old necklace. |
The sword, called Crimson Blitz looks awesome. It looks simple but have that streamlined futuristic look. It got the game's logo painted on it. The sword is kinda thick so don't worry about it snapping into two pieces anytime soon, unless you break it on purpose just to mimic the way how Lumina (spoilers!) breaks the sword. An odd and awkward looking ball joint is attached to it so that you can mount it on Lightning's back.
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Night Lotus
I like its texture and design |
Her shield, A.K.A. Night Lotus also looks awesome. It doesn't "fold" like you can see in the game. The front and back of the shield is well detailed. The game's logo and some texts can also be seen here. Like the sword, this shield have a ball joint attached so that you can connect it to Lightning's left arm.
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The back of the shield
Looks like a real thing! |
The kinda Victorian-style ornaments on the sides this shield are soft so that it wont break, and it's good that SQEX made this move, because these ornaments are thin.
Seeing these logos in her battle dress and equipment makes me think that she is sponsored by that god, Bhunivelze or something... hehe spoilers again!
Here's some pictures showing the sword and shield being equiped:
The Crimson Blitz mounted on Lightning's back.
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| Night Lotus equipped on her left arm. |
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| Imitating Lightning's official render pose. |
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| No, you're not getting out of there, Display Stand. |
Here's the display stand. It's sealed in a blister pack and I don't plan on taking it out. Oh yeah, I said earlier that there's no instruction manual, that's because it is located on the sides of the stand's blister packaging.
ARTICULATIONS, POSING AND SCALING
Because she is a larger PAK figure, Lightning can pose better than her FFXIII-2 version, and probably can pose even better than her FFXIII version because of the new joint system.
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| She's pretty. I think I said that earlier. |
Now on to articulations, Lightning's head can move like a real head normally moves.
The packaging's suggested poses. I can't do the third one :(
Her ball jointed chest and waist can move pretty well without any problems because she wears that skin-tight leathery black armor/bathing suit thingy. Shoulders have butterfly hinges so that the arms can move closer to the chest.
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| That's one fancy sword |
The elbows, wrist, legs and feet have clicky ratcheted ball joints. Knees are double jointed and they're ratcheted too. Other articulation points include swiveling arms, biceps and legs.
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| Equilibrium garb victory pose |
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| Incoming overhead attack! |
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| Lightning's well-known battle stance |
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| To battle! |
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| No string's attached. The skirt-mantle can hold Lightning's weight! |
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| [Lightning] Come with me if you want to be saved |
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| I don't know why I like this pose the most. |
The size of this figure is larger than the older and mid-generation PAKs. It measures around 10 inches (almost the same as MGS figures), this messes up my FF Play Arts/PAK figure collection.
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| Lightnings with same pose! |
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| Even Sephiroth is shorter than this Amazon named Lightning. |
I think this is Square-Enix's new action figure scaling standard for all future figures and I hope this never changes. I don't want any scaling inconsistencies in the future. And SQEX, please don't make a large FFXIII-2 Lightning.
QUALITY ISSUES
Aside from few painting problems, I found one major flaw in this figure, the left pocket on Lightning's skirt-mantle is missing a strap! SQEX's toy department must double or triple check the quality of their merchandise, especially PAK figs!
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| WTF!? Again!? |
Well at least I can make one strap out of polymer clays, if I have any.
CONCLUSION
This new PAK version of Lightning is impressive. It's beautiful, elegant and have great build quality. This figure is also a step up over the previous versions. The figure's downsides are the paint problems, the missing strap and standard amount of accessories. It makes me feel that I got ripped off. I know they included a display stand, but the Lightning figure can stand well on its own. Well anyway, I'm still happy that I got this third PAK version of Lightning, and I'm getting her first version soon (hopefully along with another "secret" and "elusive" PAK figure). Now I'm looking forward for more LR: FFXIII figures... come on SQEX, make me a Snow and Lumina figure! Please?
Here's a nice photo edit that I made for Lightning.
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| Inspired by one cinematic from the game |
Cheers and Happy Collecting!
you sir have poisoned me further
ReplyDeleteexcellent review
as my Lightning (the first) is feeling quite lonely even though vergil is keeping her company
Thanks, man!
DeleteWant me to cast Esuna to cure your Poison? LoL :D
I think your Lightning want to see someone else for a change.
eventually haha I currently have no funds to buy her even though I wanted to sometime this year maybe
DeleteBetter save up some money, because PAKs are getting more expensive.
DeleteI can see that, each blowing up on prices recently, good thing for me I'm interested on a few ones and they are not a top priority,
Deleteunless a favorite character comes a PAK