Probably to my girlfriends dismay, I acquire a lot of crap. I make that sound like it just appears and I shrug my shoulders and go about trying to find a space for it. This isn’t the case so I should probably rephrase my previous statement. I willingly purchase a lot of crap.
I obviously don’t think it’s crap or I wouldn’t have bought it, but I am aware a lot of people would think it was. Anyway, from out of one of the boxes dedicated to video game toys under the bed, I have decided to look at 5 random video game action figures. The selection process wasn’t particularly spectacular. I simply felt for a zip-lock bag and pulled it out. If it was a toy from the same franchise as one already pulled out, I went for another.  So here we are, not in any particular order.

1)

This is probably the most recent figure on this list  in terms of when it was manufactured. And it really isn’t a favourite, I will be honest. I love the Zelda series but haven’t played Skyward Sword which is the game that this version of Link comes from. The reason I dislike it is because when it was still stuck to its card, it looked like this.

 

What’s wrong with this figure? If you turn your eyes to the left of the figure, you will see the words “Mystery Accessory Included!”. At first I was intrigued, would it be a hookshot, or a rupee or some other weapon? No. It was his shield. His fucking shield which I had failed to notice wasn’t anywhere else in the packaging. Why does this bother me? Because Link nearly always has his sword and shield with him. You can’t make his shield a mystery item! And I am going to use Star Wars as an example here like I always do, but can you imagine a Boba Fett action figure with a mystery item included, and you open it and it’s his jet pack? No! You can’t use it as a selling point. It is a staple of what that character is! I know Jakks Pacific have since done an Ocarina of Time Link which I want but I am hoping they didn’t decide to pack his shield as a mystery item. This Link isn’t an awful figure really. It took ages s to fit his shield on, and he doesn’t ever want to stand up on his own with his sword in his hand. He’s okay. He just isn’t great.

2)

Anyone who has played Final Fantasy VII should agree that Tifa is an awesome character. With her fantastic pair of fists and her huuuuge part in the story (Did you think I was going to say something else there?) she really deserved to be an  action figure that  could kick as much ass as she does in the game. This is not that action figure. I really don’t know how you can call something an action figure when it is stuck in such a rigid  and very un-actiony pose.Why couldn’t she be more articulate? The Cloud in the series was, so why does Tifa have to be stuck like this? She didn’t really have to be more articulate, just look more combat ready. She does come with a frog though, and I automatically like any figure a whole lot more when it comes with an overgrown amphibian.

 

3)

 

I love Dhalsim. As a kid, he taught me not to be a special move spamming little pussy. I used to go to an arcade when we were on holiday with my parents, and used to play Street Fighter II with my Dad. I  usually used Blanka as he was green and if you tapped the one button repeatedly, he could become electrified, shocking your opponent if they touched you. My Dad used to button mash mostly, and neither of us knew how to do any other characters special moves. A few years later I went somewhere with my Auntie, and wherever we were had a Street Fighter II arcade machine. I don’t remember playing against the CPU before, only ever playing my Dad, though I am sure I must have. Anyway, the game started and I chose Blanka, with my first opponent being Dhalsim. I heavily spammed the electrocute button, and in a haze of fire, teleportation and stretchy limbs, Dhalsim beat 7 shades of green shit out of Blanka. I learned a hard lesson that day, and gained a great deal of respect for Dhalsim. (I already respected him a bit, as I would for anyone who can carry off the look of wearing what looks like  Halloween decorations around their neck.)

I really like this figure. He came with a load of accessories which I am sure would instantly get him disqualified from any organised street fight. Does he really need a hunting bow? Who cares, he has one. All of the GI JOE Street Fighter figures were like this, packaged with a vast arsenal of weapons, probably because they were part of GI JOE as well as Street Fighters. I wonder if Cobra Commander or M. Bison would have been the top dog in that little universe.

Like all GI JOE figures, he is nicely articulated. He really looks like Dhalsim from the games, whereas most of the figures in the line really do not look like their video game counterparts. I will probably do a post looking at the whole line one of days, just to bring to light how weird some of the figures are.

 

 

4)

In the Halo series,  Grunts are the cannon fodder of the Covenant military. In groups they could pose a threat, but individually they were usually very weak. Prior to Halo 3 (where they had a redesign to make them look fucking evil) they were quite cute looking. This is a figure based on the first game, when they were very much still in the realms of cute.

Joyride Studios did some really nice figures, they were often very articulate but had this very toy ‘feel’ to them. Mcfarlane who took over making Halo toys after Joyride lost the license made very gritty figures, with an over-wash of paint, making stuff seem dirty and more realistic, but I much prefer these figures. They are much larger for one, about 6 or 7 inches, and are detailed enough for my liking. They also don’t break easily, something I found with Mcfarlane figures. This Grunt comes with the Plasma Pistol and a Needler. He has a really nice bumpy skin texture as well and is pretty articulate. There is also a red version, and  a clear plastic stealth camouflage  version from Halo 2. This is probably my favourite though. I don’t really have much more to say on this figure other than it’s quite nice.

 

 

5)

I actually laughed really really hard when I opened the next figure from the packaging. I don’t think a photo could really convey how awful it is, so I shall do my best to describe. Imagine if there was a porn star, of whom they made an inflatable sex doll. Then imagine they made an action figure but used the inflatable sex doll as the design basis. With that in mind, please look at this last figure.

 

 

First off, those lips. It’s like she did the Kylie Jenner challenge over and over again and didn’t stop until it was medically far too late. She looks like she could suck your soul out through your dick with those lips. Her boobs look a lot less pointy than her video game counterpart, but hardly look realistic. I think they used an X-men Jubilee figure for her torso or some other female member of X-men, Maybe it looks better on them, but on this toy it just adds to the porn star aesthetic.

I was wrong about the  Tifa figure. Maybe it is better to hold a normal pose and not have much articulation than to be in an action pose and not very articulate. She comes with a variety of weapons, of which I take some issue. Whenever I think of Lara Croft, I think of her wielding two pistols which fit comfortably in each hip holster. This Lara for some reason has holster for a sub-machine gun on her left hip, and a holster for one normal pistol on her right hip. It looks stupidly unsymmetrical. I cannot remember if this is a thing in Tomb Raider 2 or 3, but it really just looks bizarre. The SMG looks just too big for it to go in a holster on a hip. Because of her arms being in a fixed position, it is too difficult to fit her other two handed weapons into her hands. She also stands like someone who is drunk, staggering home through the streets after a night out.

Like Tifa with her frog, I instantly warm to this toy because of the animal inclusions that come with it. I like vampire bats and I like weird red demons. I would like them both more if they could stand up properly unaided, but seeing as Lara Croft struggles to stand up unaided, I won’t hold it against them that they can’t.

This was the first Video Game figure from Toybiz. They really upped the game in my opinion with their Resident Evil line,  (which I will take a look at in the future) so I guess I should acknowledge that this figure was probably one of the first video game toys to be released. It’s still fucking awful though.

 

I hope you enjoyed my looking at these figures, and if you didn’t, well it’s over now. I will be doing more random action figure posts in the future, so subscribe if you want to see more.