Monday, July 21, 2014
Review: S.H.Figuarts Kamen Rider Blade King Form
| Figure Information | |
| Manufacturer: | Bandai |
| Origin Series: | Kamen Rider Blade |
| Scale: | Non-scale |
| Height: | Approximately 15cm tall |
| Original Price: | 4,725 Yen |
| Packaging: |
S.H.Figuarts Blade King Form's packaging design in general is the same as with his Ace Form's; though since King Form is a tamashii web exclusive (a first for a Rider's ultimate form) his packaging differs as exclusives these days don't have any clear windows anymore, so, you'll need to open and inspect it immediately the moment you get it which is a bummer for me; losing the window does give the box a more "premium" feel to it, at least in King Form's case that is. But yeah, everything else aside from the front takes an exact look as his base form's box.
| Details: |
Tackling his eyes first, much like his base form, SHF King Form's eyes are represented in a really nice compound eye finish although there's actually a catch on him, unlike his base form's eyes, the compound finish is harder to see than usual.
The mold reuses the exact same belt from his base form's figuarts rendition, retaining even the ports on both sides which you can use to port in his weapon, the King Rouzer.
As I've mentioned before on my review of his S.I.C. rendition, one of King Form's unique features is that his entire armor is reinforced with all 13 undeads sealed on the Suit of Spade Rouze cards and while the main chest brings out that wonderful detail of the Caucasus, the remains of the armor's undead details are a mixture of poorly detailed ones and also really well detailed ones; and I find it a bummer since they could've at least made him with extra attention to detail being an exclusive and all.
With the details tackled, the remains of the details lie on the paint; the paint certainly didn't live up to what Bandai had shown during its prototype phase which I will have below:
The final product certainly did not live up to that, but I'm actually glad it didn't else it'd probably be a chromed figure which is my most hated way of "paint" scheme since chromes are virtually fingerprint magnets (as to why I still can't bring myself to review the space sheriffs). Despite not as the prototype has shown, I think their choice on the gold and silver paints are actually pretty good as it does feature a less eye cancer than Kiva Emperor's color of choice.
| Accessories: |
King Rouzer aside, King Form comes with identical hand sets (fist, open hands, two variants of gripping hands and a right hand that can hold the included set of king form Rouze cards) as his base form, having gold trims this time instead of silver.
Similar to his base form's implementation, you are left to sticker out one of the alternate parts he comes with and this time, for his Rouze Absorber. It is less of a hassle since you only have a few stickers to apply here.
You don't get any alternative sticker options this time and that really leaves the question on why Bandai couldn't do it themselves this time.
| Articulation Points: |
One of the better advantages that S.H.Figuarts King Form has over his base form is definitely the neck movement; as the base form had that stiff feeling, King form improves on this as his head is now moveable to nice degrees.
King Form still retains the individually jointed shoulder pads and I forgot to mention this before but while they are easily moveable, be careful with it since the shoulder pads stand on very thin joints.
Everything else from the base form's frame is retained though with minor differences such as the elbows only being able to bend to just a 90 due to the armor's thickness. The rest of the arm acts the same with the shoulder ball + hinge joints, the bicep and forearm swivels and the trusty old wrist joints.
His whole upper body can still rotate a full 360 while the bending capabilities are actually intact and the fact counts that King Form can slightly bend outwards more than the base form.
The whole leg articulation retains with the same non-pull down hips, thigh swivels, double hinged knees and the neat little ankle joints with no additional limitations which is pretty nice as this makes King Form's points of articulation to be nothing but improvements on the already decent frame that his base form had.
| Poseability: |
Posing around King Form was a very fun experience and one thing that completely amazed me was that his frame didn't prevent me from posing him in various manners while double gripping his King Rouzer, a feature that King Form is most memorable with when he strikes with his gigantic blade.
The sculpts bulkiness as it should be definitely helps bring life to a lot of action poses from just punching down his enemies to different types slashing action. The card holding hands definitely function really nicely as well. Additionally, though I won't present any pictures in this review, the King Rouzer has the capability to actually store Rouze Cards inside it, a really neat feature that's really welcomed!
The best part of posing King Form is when you also have the Ace Form in your collection as you can recreate him dual wielding his King Rouzer as well as his Blay Rouzer as seen in his Straight Flush attack. And seriously, dual sword wielding riders have that much of a badass factor any time!
| Final Thoughts: |
Being an exclusive, King Form's certainly not that perfect but still a worth it for his higher pricepoint. Design-wise, he's really awesome but you should consider this as well if you take an interest with him, will you want to get his base form for the Blay Rouzer? A yes on that means extra spending for a mere weapon. But yeah, given that his frame has better capabilities than his original form, I highly recommend picking up S.H.Figuarts Blade King Form, though he now fetches for a more pricier range than his srp, getting it on a 7k yen price point is actually pretty neat already since you technically get him for the same price during pre-order since if you live outside Japan, exclusives like him are pretty pricey.
Once again, this has been another S.H.Figuarts review that's made possible thanks to the excellent services of Onegai Onii-chan!
I give the King a rightful 4.5 out of 5.
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