Nice Ikuji. It's basically the artwork from chapter 989.

@puffing.cinema:

that's a disturbingly menacing Linlin, holy crap

Indeed.

Ichiban Kuji - Best of Omnibus (release date July 2021). Finally a scaled Big Mom figure.
Kaido and Big Mom both stand at 19.5 cm. Both Yonko are sculpted by the same sculptor of Ichiban Kuji Kaido (Iwakura Keiji).

Megahouse increased the price for POP but have to admit the quality is increasing as well…

@IORI_17:

Wow, extremely cool. I love Banpresto's style with "less anime more realistic" colours, they're a great contraposition to Megahouse's vivid ones

True that. And the latest two figures of Luffy from Banpresto are just fantastic in the sculpt and colours. Very impressed with the quality of these prize figures.
The scale is similar to King of Artist Luffy and Grandista Luffy.

Anyone bought these two figures as well? This Super Master Stars Piece Luffy Wanokuni has become my most favorite Luffy figure ever. Sculpted by VAROQ.
More details here…

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For half the price, this Maximatic Luffy figure also surprised me with the quality. They will release volume 2 as well this year.

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@Cyber-Robin:

Oh wow that Kaido looks real nice. Reminds me of that way old Banpresto Monster Chopper they did.

The older Banpresto figures were fully painted even the WCF. Then they changed to colored material in order to save cost which resulted in those figures look cheaper.
It seems that this figure is fully painted as well, just like Ichiban Kuji Kaido. I will order both Kaido and Marco.

New Ichiban Kuji, so far Kaido the dragon and Marco revealed. Official title is Ichiban Kuji One Piece EX Akuma o Yadosushatachi (those who harbor the devil).

Link to Ichiban Kuji page

That POP Croc is super good. Wonder how much it will cost. Latest POP Mihawk which also falls under Neo-Maximum line costs 16,500 JPY.

Btw I just bought a new camera, and I'm trying a few shots with one of my favorite One Piece figures. I almost forgot how fun it was taking pictures of your displayed figure in macro shot.

Ichiban Kuji Edward Newgate sculpted by Iwakura Keiji

Let me know what you think about the shots and the figure itself. If you like it, I will try to do more posts with these kind of figure shots.

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Thanks TC! I'm with you in the disappointment with POP focus on the bikini and SOC lines. We're lucky that Banpresto keep pumping out quality figures with interesting poses and sometimes non-mainstream characters as well. I'm rooting for them to make a Grandline series of Akazaya Nine.

I'm still not interested in FZ however I did notice their higher quality recently. Nice if you can do custom paint so things like that can be fixed. I also noticed that you did a bit of painting for your POP Snakeman. I didn't have the skill to do so, otherwise would love to bought those black & white prize figures and try painting. What kind of paint you used for the touch up?

Seeing old users coming back to this forum (just like what Kanji wrote) reminded me of how exciting the old days. Who still remember when we were pressing F5 at Amiami site for POP pre-order? And still missed the Pre-order!
At that time, One Piece was super hot and POP's demand was sky-high. I think the popularity started to go down after the Sailing Again series where One Piece merch were a bit saturated and the figures are more of the same. Or it might be because we're just getting old with this hobby and moving on from life. However, the next generation didn't arrive to take over…

Two weeks ago, while cleaning up my collections, my first daughter stumbled upon the POP Chibi Zoro as in my avatar. It was the first figure I collected. The journey started from there. I said I bought this figure before you were born, so the figure is older than her! She's 8 years now... It's quite amazing if you reflect on the start of your journey in collecting figures.

I'm sure some people have moved on from this hobby by selling their collections, but I can't seem to be able to do that (selling). I just limited myself in buying new ones. Apart of One Piece and Dragonball, I also collected Crows x Worst figures and a few Tales Series, Fate/Stay, Bakemonogatari, Vanillaware games series (Odin Sphere, Oboro Muramasa, DC) and from other random series figures. In total 300+ figures in my collection which I can only display probably 15% of them. What a ride (and what a waste of money people might think of it)...

This forum was the catalyst of this hobby. Where people shared their collections, their thoughts, and their feelings. I feel with age, people move on and you saw fewer and fewer fans (especially familiar names) in this forum. I hope the younger generation can find the same fun in collecting figures like what we used to have. I don't know if there are new users in this forum who are just starting to walk in this path. Even the mods are not even posting again in this forum. I'm curious what happened and why AP OP Collectibles Forum dying down much more quickly than other enthusiast forums. It's like we're dying in the same pace as the POP...

@jaypooner:

Where did you buy that Kaido figure? I didn't see it on sale anywhere. The Nightmare Luffy figure that you mentioned is probably my favorite figure ever…

Mandarake still had a few when I bought it. A bit pricey though, got it for 13,000 JPY