It feels like it’s been a while since a notable Ikki Tousen figure was released. That’s sort of an odd thing to think, as a common complaint from a few years back was that too many companies were making Ikki Tousen figures. However, most of those figures were of fan favorites Kanu Unchou and Ryomou Shimei; nominal lead girl Hakufu Sonsaku never got that many figures. I suppose that’s not that surprising; while she was one of the first characters to be introduced in the manga, she wasn’t really all that interesting, and she never seemed to achieve the sort of popularity that the other characters gained. That alone makes this figure peculiar; what makes it even more unusual is its styling. Ikki Tousen’s character designs don’t stray far from typical anime conventions, but this figure provides quite a different take on Hakufu, so much so that one might not have been able to identify this character at first glance, even if one were familiar with the series.
As presented in the manga, Hakufu is an exuberant, loud, and aggressive female student whose formidable fighting skills compensate for her low intelligence and complete lack of common sense. At least, that’s my impression of her; the Tokyopop adaptation of Ikki Tousen is notorious for having taken enormous liberties with its translation, at least in the first few volumes. Hakufu is generally a kind and happy person, but she enjoys getting into a good scrap. She’s a likeable character but one can learn everything about her personality in just the first volume of Ikki Tousen, and that makes her rather less interesting than other characters, such as the poised, steadfastly loyal Kanu or the cold and enigmatic Kakouen Myousai.
This figure is manufactured by Dragon Toy, a company that hasn’t existed for very long but has already made some very nice figures. One of the things that makes their figures so nice is their size; their products thus far have been 1/6 scale or larger. Hakufu is no exception; she’s also sculpted in 1/6 scale, standing a bit over 26 centimeters tall to the top of her head and about 31 centimeters in overall height, excluding the base.
In my view, the face is almost always the most important part of a figure, so we’ll start there. Although Hakufu’s face incorporates the typical features of anime design, it still looks distinctive. In particular, the shape of her eyes is unusual; they are very round, which makes it difficult to discern her demeanor and personality, and they make her appear younger than she might otherwise look. Her mouth is noticeably small and contributes nothing to her expression.
While the elements of her face don’t stray from the usual conventions, her body shape is more realistic than most of her peers, except for the size of her breasts, which are quite large. She has long legs, wide hips, and her head isn’t overly large as it is with many female anime characters. Her youthful face makes for something of an incongruity with her womanly, fully-formed body. Not that that’s a bad thing; I like the contrast provided by this disconnect.
The discordant appearance effected by her face and body aren’t the only contrasting aspects of her design; there’s also a contrast in her expression and her pose. Her stance is flashy, closer in effect to a model’s rather than a fighter’s. Her strongly-arched back and the prominent swell of her hip heighten the sexual undertones of her pose but her face conveys uncertainty, perhaps even nervousness. Her eyes are wide open, giving her something of a hunted, haunted look, and that adds a certain edge to her look. Her pose is compelling but the circumstances of her situation remain vague.
The ambiguity of this figure’s appearance is heightened by her torn clothing. She’s obviously wearing a typical anime schoolgirl’s outfit – albeit quite abbreviated – but the tattered nature of her outfit accentuates the sense of disquiet. (That said, exploding clothing is de rigueur for all female Ikki Tousen characters and anyone that is familiar with this series – or High School DxD, or Senran Kagura, or any of the many similar shows – won’t bat an eye at the clothing destruction.)
Most obviously, her clothing is strategically torn to reveal one large, very perky breast. Hakufu is known for her large bust and this is one aspect that can be used to identify the character. (When I first saw the prototype, I thought that the character was Panty from Panty & Stocking, until I realized that her rack was far too large to be her.) Note that there’s no way to cover her up unless you improvise something on your own. Also note that there’s no way to reveal more, unless you are willing to inflict some damage on the figure; her shirt can’t otherwise be removed.
Her skirt can, however; it detaches on the right side, with several pegs slotting into notches cut into the edge. It’s a very well-implemented design; I generally loathe this sort of castoff system because it’s often highly frustrating to get the garment back on the figure but in this case, it’s very easy and it’s also quite difficult to tell that her skirt is removable at all. Dragon Toy deserves some kudos for doing a nice job with that.
All of the Ikki Tousen girls wear plain white panties. Hakufu’s underwear isn’t particularly remarkable, though the sculpting is quite nice, and a little more detailed than the norm, perhaps.
Removing her skirt does provide an opportunity to admire the skillful sculpting, however.
I really do like the sculpting style of this figure. To date, Dragon Toys’s figures have generally portrayed their subjects with older, more adult-looking bodies, and while I’m not sure if this is my favorite type of anime character design, I think it looks great. The detail of her legs is particularly noticeable; a lot of care was lavished on her knees, and while that’s not one of the body parts I tend to look at (I recall there was an anime that aired not too long ago that caused some people to talk about kneepits, but I can’t remember what it was), the intricacy of the sculpt is admirable.
Hakufu’s hair is sculpted as flying around in that way that only happens in anime, adding a bit of movement to her appearance. I’m not sure whether it complements or contrasts with the rest of her appearance; I suppose I’d go with complements, as her hair generally appears realistic rather than stylized. Moreover, her tresses provide another example of good sculpting; she doesn’t have helmet hair, and the strands whipping around aren’t fused in huge slivers as with many other figures.
Overall, this is a really nice figure of a character that I’ve never been interested in prior to its release. It’s a different take on Hakufu, to be sure; she looks both more mature and younger, even vulnerable, and none of those qualities are a good match for her personality and history. Nonetheless, this figure manages to pull this look off exceedingly well; the sculpt is fantastic, the pose is striking and of course, the amount of skin that is exposed is quite high. All of Dragon Toy’s figures have looked great and Hakufu is no exception.
wow Hakufu hot XD, I been wanting a Hakufu figure and maybe I’ll get this one
This one’s a pretty good one and there aren’t too many memorable Hakufu figures out there. I recall that Alter skipped her over back when they were making Ikkitousen figures, which I suppose shows the sort of love she gets from figure makers.
well I love her, she is my fsvorite next to Kanu
The style looks surprisingly similar to Daiki Kougyou’s Kan’u Unchou,
I have the feeling that they would be a good match. I thought really hard about getting
Hakufu or not but haven’t preordered her, after some pics on Flickr my interest grow again.
Her sculpting is really detailed and attractive, the little nudity is not bad, even though I guess some people would have preferred the option to cover her chest somehow. It actually doesn’t look naughty as a whole.
At first I wasn’t much interested in Hakufu as character also the first Ikki Tousen season was none of my favorites. As a different studio continued the franchise, I liked it a lot more. In the later seasons I l learned to like Hakufu, airheaded girls like her a fun to watch for me.
The figure gives Hakufu a quite different look, which is something positive in my opinion, Her face is cute and pretty. She’s also more elegant in her pose, I really like the articulation of her arms legs, even with her torn clothes she looks rather beautiful than ecchi.
They are of somewhat similar size, though Kanu has the fighting pose and Hakufu has the fashion model pose. I skipped over the first Ikki Tousen anime as well. As I remember, it wasn’t very well-animated, and I have the feeling nobody expected that Ikki Tousen would be the kind of commercial success that it became. I watched Dragon Destiny and Great Guardians though I don’t really remember much of either, other than that they had a lot of slapstick comedy moments. Not that the manga didn’t, either, but it was a little bit of a shame that the more serious elements of the manga didn’t really make it into the anime.
I liked Hakufu better as I read more of the manga, as well. A big part of that is that Tokyopop mangled the American translation for the first volume or two – as I understand it, they hired a comic book writer who knew no Japanese and basically made stuff up as he went along. The writing got better in later volumes, though then Tokyopop went under and I haven’t kept up with the series.
Cancelled my order for her, kawaii as she is I realized that for such a price…………..for I have made a vow, it had better be full cast off or non at all. Lol!
Got the Daiki Shirow Nanal G Shirow figure instead.
I skipped over Nanal but maybe I’ll look at it again if it gets a discount. I’d probably have bought it if she were standing up.
She looks great! I get the feeling that she was meant to compliment Daiki’s Ikki Tousen Xtreme Xecutor normal face ver Kanu. This also calls to mind the Bible Black girls done by dragon toy which almost look as though they are part of a set alongside the Daiki Imari.
In any case I’m really looking forward to getting my own. I have to say that her torn sock was not the only selling point for me but certainly a large one. Also, one of my only real concerns (her whirlwind hair) has been alleviated.
Yeah, I kinda got that feeling as well; I recall that the Daiki figure was sculpted by Shunji Hagii, and while this one was not, I remember that he has some involvement with Dragon Toy, too. Dragon Toy seems to have settled on 1/6 scale as their favorite scale size, which gives their figures a consistent look.
I really liked the torn sock, too; there’s something about the asymmetry that looks very appealing. I know I’ve said this a lot this year but I’m really happy with all the options that collectors have in buying ero-figures.
I’m told this figure is based on a scene in the manga, chapter 125, vol. 19. Judging by these pictures
http://i.imgur.com/V1W7TbJ.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/N1kjURu.jpg
the figure is very accurate, down to the missing shoe and torn sock.
Ah, interesting. I didn’t even know the manga was up to volume 19; I stopped reading it at volume 14 or 15 – whenever Tokyopop stopped localizing it. I probably should pick it back up, assuming that there are scanlations around; I really enjoyed it.
I preordered Hakufu, as I find the sculpting to be quite fantastic. Interestingly the sculptor Chocomint is not listed to have done anything else before this one, which makes it even more amazing! The review and photos are also terriffic, as usual! Interestingly, the way her hair floats on “one level” (which differs from the original drawings) might be because of a rotating left-right movement on Hakufu’s part, where her hair kind of hasn’t caught up with the rest of her body yet. Truly lovely!
This is a helluva first effort, unless Chocomint is an alias for an established sculptor. Dragon Toy has made some really great stuff in a relatively short period of time. I think you’re right; I just find it a bit amusing how unrealistic anime figure hair sometimes looks.
Back when I pre-order her I had some doubts – given the fact that this could be the first one from the sculptor (Chocomint?) , and that I barely know the original series. Turns out here I am a happy customer. Thank you DragonToy.
I had a bit of complaints about how dull her undies are, but as I look at her muscles on my desk now, lores aside, I think it all makes sense. Brilliant work from the sculptor.
Nice photos as always, especially the pretty hard top lights and deep contrast. With that tough background of course! (Is that really some hard textures or just some paper?)
Yeah, I always thought it was a little funny how every Ikki Tousen girl wears the exact same type of underpants, though in this case I think they look nice, since she’s wearing a pretty conventional outfit. The background is a wood panel with some plaster smeared on it to give it a little more texture. I’m pretty happy with how it turned out, aside from the plaster flaking all over the place; I’ll probably do red and gray versions with a rougher texture to make it a little more noticeable.
I can’t stop staring at these photos. You lighting brings out just how beautiful sculpted her body is. Sadly, I’m having to severely cut back on purchases, otherwise I’d buy this for sure.
Thanks very much! Yeah, I’ve been thinking I ought to dial back my figure buying as well, being that I’m out of space and that I have some other expenses to think about (mainly my car, which has had some problems recently). Escalating prices really don’t help, too; it looks like those >10k yen prices for 1/8 scale figures are here to stay.
Yeah, tell me about the car thing; I just put mine in the shop for some routine maintenance and now I’m looking at close to five thousand in repair and parts. ><
Cutting back on fig collecting was something my husband proposed for both of us, due to money and space. I've got a lot of my collection up for sale, mainly Nendoroids and figmas, since I've just felt like they're not worth the money anymore for all their issues. As for the rising prices, that's also a big part of it. For the same price of a pretty basic 1/8 scale now, I can get a 1/6 doll that will be of better quality and that I can customize (I bought my first two BJDs earlier this year and I am in love).
Ouch >.< My car repair was much less than that, though I also had to get the air conditioning fixed a month ago. Quite annoying, that, since my car is 13 years old and it doesn't make a ton of sense to spend a lot on repairs, but I really don't want to have to buy a new car. I wholeheartedly endorse selling off nendoroids XD Dolls are definitely a ton of fun, though I kinda went through an opposite progression; I started collecting dolls a while back and then got into anime figures (the dolls that I collected were made by Takara and Blue Box, and they dropped the line a couple of years after I started collecting them).
The expression and the pose.. probably she was defeated in a fight, and the victor wants her sexy picture as a bounty?
Thanks for the review anyway, it turns out to be an awesomo figure, and if nothing else come in the way, I’ll be sure to get her real soon.
Perhaps! Though from the source illustration it looks like some sort of dream sequence; Ikki Tousen had a lot of tie-ins to mythology, which I think tend to get lost in all the bouncing boobs and exploding panties.
“(I recall there was an anime that aired not too long ago that caused some people to talk about kneepits, but I can’t remember what it was)”
I think you’re referring to amagami ss, the part about the MC kissing the back of Morishima Haruka knee. Well I could be wrong, I have watched it once but that was ages ago.
Ah, yes, you are absolutely right; that is indeed the scene I was thinking about. Thanks very much for the reminder; Amagami was one of those shows that I meant to watch but never really get around to it.
I usually avoid overt nudes, but I made an exception for Hakufu and I’m quite happy I did. Hakufu was never my favorite Ikki Tousen heroine, but this sculpt presented her in a way that I found very appealing, perhaps because of the atypical styling. Dragon Toy did quite a nice job on this figure. I’m feeling more likely to pick up their Iriza, too, after seeing Hakufu in person. I also wouldn’t mind seeing them give another Ikki Tousen girl similar treatment.
Regarding the manga, I have long avoided it over the reputed translation liberties you alluded to. I had hoped that someone would come along with a license rescue and a new translation, much like VIZ did with Tenjho Tenge after the butchery that series received at the hands of CMX, but that may be wishful thinking at this point.
Yeah, I felt the same way; I didn’t care too much for her character as I didn’t find her personality or presentation to be all that interesting, but I really like her stylized appearance here. I’m still on the fence about their DominancE girl, though, since she is really curvy and I prefer figures that are a little slimmer. I’m really looking forward to their upcoming Tony figure, though (the one with the blonde girl sticking out her rear; truly a classy appearance on that one).
Ikki Tousen (or Battle Vixens) got a lot better after the first couple of volumes. It’s too bad that Tokyopop went under as it was the only manga series that I was actively collecting. I also avoided Tenjo Tenge due to the censorship; I could tolerate Tokyopop’s questionable translation but I despise unnecessary censorship, particularly in a series like Tenjo Tenge.
Hi, How I can get this Figure?. And how much is the price.
Honestly, I have no idea. I would look around Mandarake and other secondhand shops and websites. I doubt this figure sold all that well, but I also think they didn’t make many of them (and I’m not selling mine).