August 2022 Loot

 Okay, a big one this month!

Because my birthday present has arrived, and it is something very special, waifu related.

Check out the video for the visuals, but here are the links as always:

Lunamaria Hawke tattoo (and some stickers): this was placed by Dead Bones Tattoo, who specialises in anime style here in Belgium.

Slime 13, Darling 5, Thunderbolt 15 and 17 and two gachapon: these all came from Akiba Station.

Saintia Sho volume 5: I picked this one up at Mekanik Strip.

Pokemon Yamper glass: the mustard was bought at Carrefour supermarket.

HG grade Gunner Zaku Lunamaria Hawke Custom gunpla: I found this kit on Vinted.

SDW Arsene Gundam X gunpla: picked this up at 4Geeks. 

Super Mecha Champions model kits: these came through from AmiAmi.

So a pretty awesome month, full of manga and model kits as well of course my awesome waifu tattoo!

The Wheel of Time

 ECI was still a thing in Belgium, and the books where in dutch... that's how young I was when i read the first book of this high fantasy series.

And now, Amazon is making it into a television series.

Me and Noshi sat down to watch this what is turning out to be the first of three seasons, and while I had knowledge from the books, I didn`t tell her anything to see how she would take to it.

First let me state, it is beautifully made, with grand scenics and detailed costumes.  But that aside, was it any good?

 

Central in the story is Moiraine  Damodred, a spellcaster called an Aes Sedai, who together with her warden Lan seeks out the reborn dragon.  According to an ancient prophecy, the previous dragon broke the world, and the new reincarnation would restore it.

This leads her to the village of Emond's Field, located in the Two Rivers in the mountains.  Here, four young people are potentially the reincarnation.  As the village is attacked by an army of Trolloghs, she flees with them, leading to places such as an abondoned city where the Shadows turn out to be deadly.  Upon escaping, it turns out that the previous Wisom of the village, a sort of local weather shaman, survived the attack as well and joins them as they need to regroup.

But as they are each forced to make their seperate ways to their goal, new alliances are formed, as are new dangers encountered.  They eventually all reach the White Tower, but Mat is ever more detoriating, while Egwene and Perrin need to escape capture from a treacherous White Cloak and Aes Sedai hunter.  Reunited, Moiraine drives the shadow out of Mat.  The council of the Aes Sedai reconciles, but Morgaine and the Amyrlin Seat have their secret agenda.

Morgaine leaves with the young heroes to the Ways, and arrive at the last fortress city holding back the Blight. But Mat stayed behind.  Rand is convinced he is the Dragon Reborn after visiting a seeress, and alone with Morgaine they enter the Blight to save the others.  Facing the Dark One and his desires, Rand manages to eventually overcome him, but in the meantime the fortress is nearly overrun by Trogloth's.  The friends recover, but Rand has left them, while Mat is last seen entering the Shadow City once again.

This was a fun series, with lovely effects and setting, capturing the feel of the books as I remember.  Certainly, it has it's flaws, like the youngsters being rather 2-dimensional mostly, but let's hope they get delved in a bit deeper in the second season.

New Ink: Lunamaria Hawke tattoo

 At last!

 

 

After years of planning, having the design made years ago and finally beginning of this year, thanks to Instagram, finding a tatoo artist in Belgium and nearby, she is here.

 

A tattoo of my one and only waifu, Lunamaria Hawke from Gundam SEED Destiny!

 

The design was a 2D rendering made of a 3D chibi figure, drawn by a scandinavian friend of Noshi's, and the artist putting her in place is Kenny from Dead Bones Tattoo in Brasschaat near Antwerp. 

So, saturday the 27th I manned up and went to lay down on his chair to go through the horrendous terrors and pains of being tattooed.

She turned out fantastic, and while we wait now for her to heal and if needed a little touch up left or right, this artist is definitly going to become my place to go in the future for more ink.

The Haul Report 334: Lunamaria time

 This week is all about my uber-waifu, the gorgeous Lunamaria Hawke.

And while you will get better pictures tomorrow, let's say yesterday I made sure to carry her with me forever now.

Yup, I got a tattoo of my Waifu!

 

 

And some stickers because I was such a good biy sitting still.

But that is not all, as I also finally obtained the HG gunpla kit of her custom Zaku this week.

Yush, that is what I call an excellent week indeed!

But that was not all, no no, as more plastic kits arrived this week.  My AmiAmi order came in, containing the three sets from Super Mecha Champions!

Oh, and some new free beer glasses joined the collection as well.

So this is a great closure of the month in loot terms!

On the Painting Desk 211

 Well, I must say we keep painting lately, so that is a good thing.

And for this update, it is some more work on the Freedom Gunpla.

With the second layer completed last week, I have begun the last layer, the one that puts the oumpf in.  To that end, the first thing to do of course is the white, which is also the largest area of the model, and as such will take several sessions to complete.

But we did make some progress on the model so far, if I can take about an hour or two every weekend this should be do-able in a good amount of time.

Because every session, I managed to complete a small section like an upper arm, or the beam cannons in the wings.

Now to push onwards and complete the whole white sections first!

Unboxing SDW Heroes Arsene Gundam X

 While I prefer HG scale for building and painting, when I saw this little fellow in a local store, I just had to pick him up.

The SDW series was fun, more so because very little Thorin back then enjoyed watching it every week on daddy's lap as well.

And the figure of Arsene, based on the french gentleman thief Arsene Lupin of the book series of the same name, was just one of the coolest characters in it.  With his top hat, he just looked regal and stylish.

So, for a measly 8.90 euro, I took him along, and let's see how he looks inside the box.

These little kits are fun to watch once done (I have an HeavyArms in my cabinet as well in this chibi scale) and he will probably be the next GunPla project to build once the Freedom is finished.

So watch this blog once building gets underway in the not uber-near future to see how he came out!

Gachapon 1/400 scale Victory Gundam

 The next, and fifth of the year, completed gachapon model for gaming is the Victory Gundam.

Now, in all honesty, that was one of the Gundam series I personally liked less, and the suit itself is pretty basic as well.

Okay, it can`t split up in the Core Fighter and leg craft like in the anime, deducting from it's awesomeness, but it really didn`t rock my boat like the Zeta or the Freedom did.

But, never the less as I had the model, we are painting it up for use in the games, and I did it with the same two tone colouring way I always did.

It's a bit of a boring suit in my opinion, but let's see if it is any good on the tabletop!

My Dress-up Darling volume 1 - Shinichi Fukuda

 After totally adoring the anime, it's time to start the manga!

Though why does it come in a plastic wrap with a parental advisory label on it?

 

Well, time to find out as I dug into the first volume of the series. 

Wakana Gojo, a loner boy who lost his parents at a young age, lives with his grandfather.  And just like him, he strives to become a kashirashi (a japanese doll maker).  On the other hand of the spectrum is Marin Kitagawa, a beautiful, always cheerfull girl and incredibly popular in class.  They accidentally meet in the sewing room after class, and Gojo agrees to make Marin's cosplay outfit, as he never met someone so unjudgemental.

 

 

So after sealing their pact, Marin shows up at Gojo's house for measurements to be taken.  Poor Gojo is so uncomfortable with a beautiful girl in his room, he fumbles and stumbles at first. Because what is the most gorgeous girl in school doing on his bed in her bathing suit after all.

Later at school, marin approaches Gojo casually with her friends, but because he wants to stop rumours of them going out, he runs from her.  She catches up to him, telling him he is silly and takes him out for a shopping trip for the costume materials.  Later, just before she takes the train, she tells him the event is already in two weeks time...

Ah, just as innocently nice as the anime I must say, but I don`t get the parental advisory label to be honest... is it for 1 perhaps suggestive panel or the 1 time an "adult word" got used????

And to wave off this volume, some wise words by the anime girl of 2022:

Gachapon 1/400 scale Gundam F91

 The latest gachapon Gundam I completed for wargaming, is the Gundam F91 from the movie of the same name.

A smaller type of mecha compared to other Gundam, this suit was mostly renowned for it's high speed and power output compared to it's smaller frame.

Piloted by Seebok Arno, I always liked it's "racey" outlook, so it was only a natural thing for me to paint one up and use it in MechaTop or other likewise game systems.

Using my regular two tone style, the model was already based on a round, the hexagonal base will be something to be added in the future, but for now he is already game suitable.

This was a fun model to paint, and I look forward to put him out there on the fields of battle for certain!

No Game No Life volume 11 - Yuu Kamiya

 At last, the story of this beloved light novel, and anime, series continue, as the 11th book has been released in Belgium.

And once again, Shiro and Sora, together with their companions, need to overcome grieveous games to further their plan of challenging the One True God, Tet, himself.

Sora, Shiro, Steph, Jibril and Emir-Eins find themselves somewhere completely unfamiliar: a Spratul, home of the ninth-ranked Ixseed, the Fairies.  Next thing they know, a booze guzzling, cigar smoking, foul mouthed Fairy named Foeniculum shows up and announces that unless they partner up into couples, they`ll be trapped there forever... Oh, and the whole thing is being livestreamed.  To emerge victorious, Sora must choose one of the ladies as his girlfriend, at last!

But then it dawns on him, they might just as well leave him behind by pairing up with each other!  His only chance then would be to obtain a key through the tips of the people viewing are donating.  Because it turns out Fairies are nothing more then reality TV loving video streamers, out to see as much love-life drama as possible to nourish themselves.  But Sora figures out Foeniculum is in the same boat as them, with the fate of Elkia in the balance.  But it seems it is not Elven Guard that is behind it all, but apparently the Dragonias.

Sora and Shiro start to see a way on how to win though, trying to run games their way, and make the games interactive to have the Fairy subscribers and the tips flow in like mad.  But the game comes with a serious drwback, as it disrupts the harmony between the siblings as a result of the Fairies actions, causing a breach in communication between them.  This results in Shiro thinking she is actually might be romantically in love with Sora.

The emotions wreck her up, resulting in a mental breakdown as she takes over the Spatul of the fairies, transforming it into an apocalyptic wasteland instead.  But this "Black Shiro" who turns out to be a lolli dominatrix is hellbend on making sure her brother never wants a girlfriend ever again.  In a capture the tower style game, the other girls have two hours to free him from this fate, but they have to stand up to Shiro's superior gaming skills.

But while Black Shiro keeps humiliating Sora, the girls form the Girl-on-Girl Alliance, allowing their forces to grow so big to overpower Shiro by sheer strength of numbers.  But as they think they defeated here and break their alliance, Black Shiro starts making a come back, meaning there is someone beside her helping her out.  And that can be only one person!  Together, they defeat the Alliance, and the game, resulting in everyone being able to leave the Spatul.  With the amassed souls, Foeniculum becomes the Fairies agent, and joins the Elkian alliance.  Together, they plan to take on Elven Gard, who's agent had indeed beaten Blank for the first time in their lives...

 

But the plan and how the game came into being is explained, as before their memory loss, the ruler of Dragonia appeared, asking them to take back Elkia and as such save two races from extinction.  With the help of Foeniculum, they would try and do so by beating a Spatul created by Fairies enslaved by the Elves.  The Commonwealth still faces a broken of faction of other race backed spies, an internal strife looms around the corner.  But the member races reforge their bonds and prepare to pick up the pace again after the one time Blank actually lost...

A rather special volume I must say, as I can imagine the Black Shiro part being uneasy on some readers, but never the less it read like a rollercoaster.  Now the saddest part is to wait for the next book getting written...

The Haul Report 333

 This weeks haul contains a little item, being one of the SDW GunPla kits.

I just think some of them are mighty cute, and when I saw it lying in the store for a measly 8.90 I just grabbed it.

Don't know when I'll come round to the little fella, but at least it is in the backlog stack now before it goes out.

So a modest week, but a fun one!

On the Painting Desk 210

 Just had a few days off from work, not really holiday but because little Thorin needed some minor surgery.

But that did mean I found a few little holes to get some stuff painted.

Namely, I finished the Victory gundam gachapon this week, bar varnishing and basing.  I hope to actually get that done, as well as for the F91, during this weekend.

Now, these are some minor things to do.

Bananaman season 1

 Okay, I admit, I spend an hour of my life just for cheer nostalgia!

This bloke was my very first superhero when I was still a tiny wee lad, and I found the first season of 10 episodes accidentally on YouTube.

So I just couldn`t resist watching Eric eating a banana.  In a not wrong way if you google that stuff these days.

The cartoons are about 5 minutes in length each, and to be honest the art is still funny, but of course age shows as this is created way back in 1983.

But the stories are still fun as Dr Gloom and the likes plot to take over the world and defeat Bananaman, like the one he is turned into a baby and the likes.

So yeah, if you are my age, it might be a fun little watch, though I only "did" the first season for the fun of it, but if you are of the far younger generation you are going to find this old BBC cartoon prolly silly as hell.

And you would be right, it is silly, but it is my kind of silly!

LEGO Brickmasters exposition Wijnegem Shopping Center

 In the WSC for short, two short tramstops past my front door, a LEGO exposition running from july until august 19th.

So I popped along and took a look at the builds.

It was fun to see a heap of names I still know from my Belug days, like the pirate ships of Stefan, the roman builds of Tom or Hans's mosaics.

Most of the builds are located in the central part of the shopping center, including some huge Paw Patrol models.

But scattered around the shopping center, some more of the big statue builds can be found.

It was sheer fun seeing them on display, some I knew from my convention days with the club, like the Zelda mosaic or the Flying Dutchman, others I hadn't seen and I keep being awed by the looks of things that where made by the talented builders.

Surely a fun exposition!

Hope you liked this little picture report of the exposition.  While my brick-y days might be well behind me, I can still appreciate the lovely toy, and the creations people make with them.