Virtua Fighter 1 Bandai keychain figures

 

At the same as I bought all those keychain Sega girls some time back I also got this set of six Virtua Fighter keychains. Judging by the auction they were produced by Bandai around the time the first Virtua Fighter game was released. I assume this is not a complete set either as Pai and Lau Chan are missing from the original roster of 8 here, or 9 if you count Dural but they rarely make toys of her. This is unless they just forgot those two for some reason, I guess I won't know unless I see some kind of packaging that these did not have. Either way check after the jump for more photos!

Sega Gals Keychain figures

I bought these two small keychain figures of Rage (from Virtua Cop) and Bahn (from Fighting Vipers) back at Summer of Sonic 2011, and ever since they have been waiting for some company from the same set..

..until now! Recently I bought this small collection of Sega keychain figures that are exactly like these two, right down to the little blue stands with their names on. These however are from a different set released at the same time (1998) of Sega's many ladies! Hit the jump for photos galore and more info on the (almost) complete set.

Aoi Sekai no Chuushin de: An anime with Sega characters, sort of.

Well this is the weirdest thing I have seen in some time. There is going to be an anime airing from next month in Japan called Aoi Sekai no Chuushin de that, according to MyAnimeList is:

Segua Kingdom has been losing the war against Ninterdo Empire but the tables are turned by the appearance of a boy called Gear. All the characters are parodies of Nintendo or Sega games such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda etc.

and they included an image:

 Not terribly obvious from that artwork but the guy with the blue hair is a parody of Sonic. Not clear enough? This image from the already existing manga probably will..

More info (what info there is so far) after the jump.

Japan's Sonic Generations Box is Crystal and Classy

Thought the European Sonic Generations collector's box was all we were getting? Think again! The Japanese release of Sonic Generations, due next month, is featuring completely new goodies! The laser carved crystal statue seen above is just the tip of the iceberg. The set will also include a cloth (seen after the break) and a CD featuring music from past Sonic games. The PS3 and 360 version of the collector's edition will have the White Edition of the CD, the 3DS collector's edition will have the Blue Edition. Each has a random mix of a dozen tunes, with no real real reason for the selection of songs. There is also mention of a bonus book, which I assume will be the booklet that comes with the CD.

Ever wanted to cuddle Seaman?

No? Me neither. You don't really cuddle fishes as such do you? Especially fish with miserable ugly human-like faces on them. Still, the Dreamcast game Seaman, in which you raised said creature and had chats with it via a microphone, was big enough of a hit in Japan for it to warrant merchandise including a surprisingly large collection of plush toys, one of which I have got my mitts on because....I don't know, really. Why not I guess?

More photos of this thing after the jump..

Those 'Sega Gals' Return

Oh the humanity!

Waaaaay back before I read or wrote for this blog, Gagaman wrote about some awesome Sega Gals capsule toys. Since finding and reading that post, I knew I had to get me some Sega gals! So, after a few months of occasionally checking ebay, I found the first series of six for a cool $24. As Gagaman already covered Ulala and Arle, I'll share the other four famous gals.

First up is one of my favorites from the first series of gals, Sarah Bryant of Virtua Fighter fame, specifically Virtua Fighter 4. I'm not an expert on action figures, but the paintjob is very nice. The gloss used for her body suit makes for a great feux leather.

"Better run home to Mama now."

Magical Flying Turbo hat Adventure: The More you Know!

Image from Segagagadomain

I'm sure you've all heard of the original Japanese version of the Mega Drive game Decap Attack, known over there under the crazy name of 'Magical Flying Turbo Hat Adventure', but it seems there was more to this than just a game.

The oldest Sega Commercials Youtube can offer

You probably already knew this, but the infamous 'SEGA!' voice wasn't first used at the start of Sonic 1, but in fact many years earlier in commercials on Japanese TV as far back as 1983! Hunting around Youtube you can find plenty of just-about watchable recording of some of these relics of Sega advertising, starting with this collection of ads selling Sega's first ever console the SG-1000. Oh, and you may want to watch this with your fingers in your ears at the start, as they may hurt otherwise.

No, really, Japan still likes Sega Pt. 2

One thing I didn’t mention in the previous article is there is actually more than one Sega Joypolis. I believe nowadays there are only three left open, but there used to be more. We actually encountered one of other the open ones elsewhere in our travels in the city Okayama. However, we didn’t give it a visit unfortunately due to our time in Okayama being cut short (thanks to a certain “closed” hostel, but I won’t get in to that).

So other than the Joypolis centres, what kind of Sega stuff did Japan hold? Well, actually, not all that much. However, there is a ridiculously prevalent chain of ‘Club Sega’ arcades throughout the entire country. Occasionally, they are titled ‘Sega Park’ or ‘Sega World’, but ‘Club Sega’ was definitely the more common of these titles. Usually, these were just your average Japanese arcade – dark, incredibly noisy, filled with smoke, weird but spectacular arcade machines and a bunch of angry looking people playing fighting games with ridiculous precision. Oh and lots of gambling. And I mean lots.

^ If you’re a nerd and find yourself in Tokyo, it is almost unquestionable that at some point you’ll end up in Akihabara, Tokyo’s ‘Electric Town’. This isn’t far from the station at all. I'm also a bad photographer.

Unsurprisingly, there are plenty of Club Sega’s dotted around Japan, which we stumbled upon frequently. However, most of them were pretty uncharacteristic. However, there was a slightly more unique one I stumbled upon in Fukuoka.

More after the jump..

Splendid Japanese Sonic plush toy of 1991

After my last plush toy find at a car boot sale led to this abomination, I was convinced that finding some of the nicer, older Japanese toys would be quite a long stretch (although I did mange to find a small Japanese one a while back with a SegaSonic tag on it which wasn't too bad). To my surprise the other week I found this one sitting amongst someones junk. I recognized it from one of Rhia's many photos of her collection and it was only a quid. An over abundance of photos ahoy (after the jump)!

Tiny Sega keychains of awesome

As you may of noticed, I have managed to stumble upon quite a few bits of Japanese Sega junk in recent months, from Gashapon Sega gal toys to that art book and the little NiGHTS pre-order bonus. A little while ago (the last few posts have mostly been backlog) I also got my hands on this set of Japanese Sega keychains. They were quite cheap and there was two sets all selaed up amongst them, although one of the designs shown on the card (a white Sega Saturn) was missing. Even though they're keychains you could easily take the chain part off and keep them as little figures, which I've done by sitting them along my Dreamcast game shelfs. They're rather neat, I must say. Photos after the jump!

The Itty Bitty NiGHTS Toy from Japan

When that new NiGHTS game came out for the Wii in Japan last December, many of the first copies came with a little NiGHTS toy as a bonus of some sort (as seen in the commercial above). When the game popped up over here however, we weren't treated to this little extra gift, much in the same way that we don't get a lot of things Japan does, like expensive box sets for anime games full of spoons and pillows. If you look around on Ebay for long enough, however, you may just come across one of these little figures separate from the game. Considering I only paid £20 for the game itself, paying £11 for the toy didn't seem like too bad a deal. They weren't kidding about it being small though, but with the amount of shelf space I have left maybe that's not such a bad thing.



The toy has been designed by besidegames as part of their PaPETCH range of little figures all based around the same template (in fact, it appears to be the first one released) and ever since this NiGHTS design it looks like video game companies have been jumping at the chance of having their characters re-created in tiny figure forms. Have a look at their line up and you'll see characters from Exit, the Kunio series and Hammerin' Harry. They also show artwork of a Reala toy, although it's hard to tell if that one has been released or how you could get it, though. maybe it's a special one you only get in the box if you're lucky (if someone could translate the text in red under Reala, that would be great as it could explain).

So not a lot can really be said about the toy, really. It's about 6cm tall, made of some kind of vinyl and comes with a little plastic stand so it doesn't topple over from it's large head. It's obviously a simplified version of the character's design but still a good likeness.

But what did I think of the game? Well, at first, it doesn't give off the best of first impressions. The FMV scene is the usual top north stuff we've come to expect from Sega games, but the in game cut scenes run at a low frame rate, look washed out and features voice acting that seems to be mostly done by one very annoying voice actor/actress. At least Reala and Wiseman's voices do their job well enough, but story scenes are really quite embarrassing to sit through and on the first run unskippable. Even the cut scenes from Sonic Adventure were a bit more bearable. Much like those 3D Sonic games, they also make you play away from the main fun of the game sometimes, with tedious missions and clunky exploring levels where you play as the children.

The main stages and bosses, however, are great. The visuals for some reason looks far better than the rest of the game here, as if all the extra stuff was thrown in near the end of production, and the game play is just like the original, if you ignore the fact that they changed the aim of each lap a bit. One thing that also bugged me at first were the Wii remote controls: the remote pointer is a joke and completely broken, and the Nunchuck mode doesn't quite feel right either because the analouge stick isn't quite up to the accurately needed for flying in circles, but once I had a go at using the Gamecube controller I never turned back.


As I got further into the game I found myself warming up to it, and the final stage and boss redeemed the whole game for me, and there was more beautifully animated FMV scenes to boot. I'm rambling on here but if you decide to buy this game and get put off by the start keep at it, as it gets progressively better and once you have completed the story you can go back to beat your scores (without having to see those cut scenes again), as well as have a go at the online racing mode, which is pretty limited but a nice addition. It's not the perfect sequel, but it's defiantly one of Sega's better games in recent memory. At least it was more fun than Sonic and the Secret Rings which almost drove me to drink from frustration. If you liked the Saturn game and can excuse some imperfections, get it. If you didn't play the original...play that first.

Sega History Collection

This collection of consoles arrived in the post today. A member of the racketboy forums by the name of GrittyKitty sold me this whole lot for just $20 (about £10 in my money).

But no, I didn't just get the console bundle bargain of the century, as these are not the real consoles. Rather, they are miniature toys of them, about one 50th of the original size! Did I fool you? Nah, you probably already looked at the other photos and know I mainly post about stuff like toys at this blog. If I did get a stash of real consoles like this, though, you would probably hear about it anyway! More photos after the jump.

'Sega Gals' Capsule Figures

As many who know me may well know, I'm one of those sad gits that has a room littered with not only games, but toys of said games. I posted an article at the Dreamcast Junkyard a while back about a few of the Sega related ones I have, but just today I got four new ones sent through the post, as much as I have been trying to A) sell any figures I don't want anymore and B) stop buying the darn things because I'm running out of space. I couldn't resist these one though.

These are four of the 'Sega gals' series of little Capsule Toy figure type things. There is about 12 of them in total to collect, and this guy on Ebay had the lot of them, but to be honest I didn't recognize some of them because I don't play many RPG's (or any RPG's, for that matter), so I just bidded on the ones I know well. There was also one of Sarah from Virtua Fighter that I was gonna have but I got outbid on it, and the Golden Axe one was kind of tempting but it wasn't anything special. These were my four favorites.

More after the jump!