Wonder Festival occurs very soon – I think it kicks off in just a few hours – and Otakon is also taking place this weekend. Anime Expo and San Diego Comic Con occurred just a couple of weeks ago. Worldwide con season isn’t over yet, though; Comiket, the mother of all doujinshi conventions, is coming up in the middle of August and that means comics and hobby goods – particularly dakimakura covers. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the first of a pair of dakimakura covers I recently purchased.
Yukino Ashikawa is the lead girl of Hotch Kiss, an ero visual novel by Giga. Giga is probably best known for their sci-fi games Baldr Force and Baldr Sky, but Hotch Kiss is a straightforward high school romance VN. Giga sold pillowcases of Yukino and castmate Misaki Haruhino a few months ago through their online webshop; the game’s other two girls were curiously left out and one wonders if they’ll get the dakimakura cover treatment as well.
The artwork for the game was done by two artists: Marui and Akemi Mikoto. Marui did the official art for Yukino and presumably was also the artist who designed this dakimakura cover.
Like many dakimakura covers not produced by Cospa, this pillowcase measures 160 centimeters in length and 50 centimeters in width (Cospa’s pillowcases are often 150 centimeters long). It’s made of stretchy two-way tricot, giving it a sturdy feel despite being very elastic. The front side shows Yukino giving off a shy smile while flashing her underwear and cleavage.
The reverse side is a bit more salacious, though still somewhat reserved given Yukino’s eroge origin. Her clothes are in noticeable disarray and her expression has become much more shy.
I have not played Hotch Kiss, but the game’s Getchu page gives some background regarding its plot and characters. Let’s take a look at them:
Yukino Ashikawa is the nominal lead girl. She is both smart, pretty, and well-regarded by the school’s student body. She’s also said to be somewhat socially clumsy or unobservant. She’s a member of the school student council but her effectiveness in helping her fellow classmates leaves something to be desired.
Misaki Haruhino is a classmate of the game’s protagonist. She’s a lively, popular girl whose milkshake brings all the boys to the yard.
Nana Sumiyoshi is the protagonist’s childhood friend. She’s a taciturn, somewhat detached girl, except when she is with the protagonist. People tend to treat her like a little kid, which she doesn’t like. She’s terrible at cooking.
Shizuku Mikage is Nana’s classmate and best friend. She’s also a member of the school’s radio broadcasting group. Extremely shy and introverted, she tends to rely on Nana for emotional support. She has a bad habit of carrying an alarm buzzer with her and activating it during inappropriate moments, such as when interacting normally with a male student.
I like this pillowcase a lot; it’s not nearly as naughty as some of the pillowcases I own (including two others that arrived in the same shipment with it), but I think that its relative modesty works in its favor. On the front side, I like Yukino’s friendly smile and the way that her shirt is unbuttoned, revealing her breasts and her navel. On the other side, I like the concerned look on her face, with her clothes looking disheveled. All in all, it’s a very cute dakimakura cover.
Next week, we’ll take a look at Misaki.
The left boob seems bigger than the right side -_- Other than this it’s all good, I like the expression on both sides a lot. And thanks to your review I’m now very interested in the game Hotch Kiss, GJ Tier!
Her arm is just covering it. It’s playing a mind trick on you.
Boobs often play mind tricks on us guys 🙁
Yeah, I think her arm is making her right boob look a little smaller than it is, and I think her left breast also looks larger because it’s flopping over to the left while her right breast is upright.
It looks like Giga has another game in the same vein in production. The characters look fairly similar, although it looks like they’ve added another artist to the team.
Yeah Wonfes just started and totally flashed me, I already saw so many nice and promising figures. I guess it were 35 items that picked my interest 😀
I guess thats strange, but I like the more modest side of this Dakimakura the most ^^
The girl is cute and wears a nice set of school uniform clothes, the pantsu design is also sweet-
There was a lot of nice stuff there. Off the top of my head, I liked seeing fortress Nanoha, the bunnygirl Nanoha figures (especially Fate), Kotobukiya’s Fate Testarossa, a ton of the stuff Max Factory showed off (thought it was pretty funny how Orchid Seed has had that dark elf artwork on display at every Wonder Festival for the last two or three years, and then Max Factory comes out and makes one themselves). I wonder where that 1/4 scale bikini loli Fate Testarossa figure that Gift said they would make is, though?
She is! Yeah, I like the modest side as well; both sides are pretty good looking, I think. With Misaki’s pillowcase, though, I definitely like one side better than the other.
The 1/4 loli Fate from Gift was at WonFest.
http://myfigurecollection.net/item/117636
Ah, so it was; thanks for the link, I missed it completely while looking through Akibahobby’s pictures. I must admit that I was hoping that Fate might wear something a bit more scanty, but I suppose that would be exceeding the bounds of good taste. Still looks quite cute, though I’m getting some K-On! vibes from her face.
The daki looks great with subtle sexiness from it. Just the right amount of exposures. I usually believe that the face is the most important part of the illustration whether its a picture or a figure; and the shy/cute expression looks perfect.
On the wonderhype. GSC showing off their stuff, getting western franchise (avangers anyone), and some surprising figma news along the way, but not much into scale stuff. Alter on the other hand gave us the “stab in the back” surprises getting figures from unexpected animes like Steins Gate, Horizon and among others. As for nanoha stuff, yeah they have large bunnysuits a 1/4 fate and fortress nanoha (Expecting another alter nanoha but a bit disappointed but oh well wallet saved for once).
I would agree with that; the face is almost always the most important part of the illustration. Unless, I suppose, the character is blindfolded or something. I actually have a dakimakura cover with just such an illustration.
I guess it wasn’t hugely surprising that GSC showed off more Marvel stuff, since I remember hearing of a Spider-Man nendoroid, However, I’m still wondering where their Snoop Doggy Dogg products are. Being a fan of Marvel Comics characters, I’d be pretty happy if GSC made some scale figures of the X-Men. I wasn’t hugely excited by most of the stuff that Alter showed off, though Kazuno could turn out very nicely (especially if they show her with those huge asphalt swords she threw around), and the Steins;Gate girl (whose name I do not know) looks pretty cool, too. I like FREEing’s stuff, though I wonder how they will turn out in the end. Bunnysuit Nanoha and Fate look very nice, and if I got those two, I guess I might feel compelled to get Hayate, too.
i like nana..she’s my favorite
She is cute for sure. I wonder if she will get a pillowcase, too.
That Fate swimsuit figure doesn’t give me K-ON vibes in the slightest. 😐
Looks amazing, imo.
Oh and, she’s wearing a 2-piece. What did you want? A thong? Okay, I admit, I would love to see Fate in a thong…but, that borders on fetish fuel. I rather swimsuit Fate keep her cute persona and not be used as someones fap material.
Yeah, I want her in a thong. Or a slingshot, maybe. I’m counting on enterprising Japanese modders to improve her appearance.
This is a very nice cover. In fact I have a hard time deciding which side I like more. On the Front side, I like how she is just sensual enough to look charming, but not overly slutty. The skirt slightly pulled up, shirt unbuttoned to expose her navel and cleavage just seem to work overly well in this cover.
On the back side, she has the same things going on but now add the underwear slightly pulled down and the exposed chest. I actually like the natural look of her breasts and how they are laying on her. Too often the breasts on dakimakuras don’t look alien. The only thing I am not overly fond of is her quizzical look. It is almost like she is wondering how her clothes got in such a disarray.
Good review as usual. This looks like a freeware eroge VN again, but it appeared to only be in Japanese so I didn’t try to download it.
Yeah, both sides are very nice; I don’t have a lot of schoolgirl figures but I do still like the archetype, particularly when presented like this. Having one side with a happy-looking girl and the other side with the same girl looking embarrassed seems to be a staple of dakimakura cover design, but Misaki smiles on both sides.
Hotch Kiss is a commercial VN; I saw it listed on Amiami and was thinking of buying it to try it out, but I need to find out if it can be machine translated. Maybe I’ll see if there’s a demo on Giga’s website.