Since many people have been purchasing FFXIII recently, I thought I would share this in case anyone hasn’t heard about it.

Square Enix has a members reward program where buying their games nets you points which in turn increases your membership “tier”. Gamers located in North America can sign up here.

Games like FFXIII and Star Ocean: The Last Hope, which are published by Square Enix, should contain a registration card with a serial number in it. You simply login to your members account and add the game to your “Collection” by entering the code.

Your tier level resets every year, and the date for the next reset is March 31st, 2010. The rewards program sends out free goodies after each reset.

Bronze tier members will receive a postcard set featuring Final Fantasy XIII, Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, and Star Ocean The Last Hope International artwork. Silver tier members will get a desktop calendar with artwork from Final Fantasy XIV, Front Mission Evolved, and other games. Gold tier members will get a music compilation on CD while Ultimate tier members will get an 8GB iPod Touch.

So if you have bought Square Enix games recently, it doesn’t hurt at all to sign up and register them. Plus, there’s usually a sweepstakes going on that you can enter. The current one is for a FFXIII Xbox 360 bundle.

So far it seems like one game will net you enough points for Bronze while two games is enough for Silver.

News Source: joystiq
Image Source: pixiv

A new series has aired for the Spring 2010 anime season and I didn’t even compile a comprehensive preview post yet.

Working!! is based on a 4-panel manga of the same name. The story revolves around the daily antics of the staff at a family restaurant. Just visualize other slice of life anime like Lucky Star and Minami-ke, except in a family restaurant setting.

From the first episode alone, the personality of each member of the staff is already defined. You have an energetic female lead who’s a 17-year old high school student with the appearance of a grade-schooler, and a 16-year old male lead that considers himself a “minicon” (loves miniature things). The connection there is pretty obvious. As for the rest of the restaurant staff, they each have their own quirks as well.

This anime aims to be a comedy, and it fulfills that purpose with ease. I found the first episode to be amusing enough, just don’t expect any profound plot developments.

Rating: Good

It has been ages since I’ve made any changes to the blog features/layout. Here’s the first of possibly more changes in the near future.

• All the blogs that I’m following on my Blogroll have an image associated with them now.
• The “Blogroll widget” on the sidebar has been replaced with a “Featured Blogs widget” that randomly displays three blogs on my Blogroll.
• A Blogroll page has been added.

Since many people don’t pay attention to the default Blogroll widget on the sidebar anyways, this will hopefully be an upgrade.

If you have a blog that’s related to Anime/Figures/Manga/Games/Japan and would like to exchange links, feel free to leave a comment here or on the Blogroll page. I’m always up for reading new and diverse content, but I’ve been a bit lazy on searching out new blogs lately.

I have a few blogs in mind that I’m already planning to add and will do so soon.

Image Source: Danbooru

I finally got around to acquiring the Saber Lily nendoroid, which completes the trio set of GSC’s Saber Lily ~Distant Avalon~ and Max Factory’s Saber Lily figma.

Unfortunately, the box was somewhat dented on the front, bottom, and back. A pro tip to sellers, don’t list your product as new and then make no mention of considerable imperfections. That’s not how business should be done, and we don’t tolerate that over at Figure Haven. If it’s not in perfect condition, then make a note of it.

Most of these are fairly well-known, but I just felt like sharing some of the videos that my friends and I link each other.

MOU IKKAI

K-ON! Yui rolling around the floor

Nyanroll

Azu-nyan Nyan Nyan

Trunks, All Talk No Game

I’ll take a potato chip -- and eat it!

Those are the main ones that come to mind for me. Know of any more?

Image Source: Danbooru

I haven’t posted in a while about manga, so here goes.

As I was browsing around looking for manga to read, I came across Baby Steps. At first I was skeptical as to whether it was any good due to its focus on tennis, which could possibly mean it’s simply jumping on the Prince of Tennis bandwagon. Fortunately, it proved to be an excellent read thus far.

The summary via One Manga:

Maruo Eiitirou (E-chan), a first year honor student, one day decides he’s unhappy with the way things are and lacks exercise. He finds a flier for the Tennis Club and decides check it out. He’s instantly captivated by it. With no prior experience and poor physical conditioning, join E-Chan as he embarks on a tennis journey using his smarts, dedication and work ethic.

The main character, E-chan, is an honor student who’s also a bit of a perfectionist (just look at his lunch). His constant effort in his studies is what got him to where he is now.

He figures that he could use some exercise and decides to try out tennis. By applying the same constant effort and analytical skills he uses for studying onto tennis, E-chan steadily improves.

There’s hints of a possible future romance, but so far the manga is focusing on the tennis aspect.

So in a way, it’s the opposite of Prince of Tennis. I actually think it’s more fun and interesting seeing a novice fight the entire way to becoming a pro. As long as the story and characters continue to develop and doesn’t get as ridiculous as PoT, I’m happy.

Image Source: One Manga

• Name: Miku Hatsune: World is Mine
• Series: Vocaloid
• Version: Brown Frame
• Maker: Good Smile Company
• Sculptor: Sakurako Iwanaga
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2009
• Buy it now!

Hatsune Miku

• Name: Hatsune Miku
• Series: Character Vocal Series 1: Miku Hatsune
• Maker: Max Factory
• Sculptor: Kenichi Tsumura
• Scale: 1/7
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2009
• Buy it now!

Shining Wind: Kanon Seena

• Name: Kanon Seena
• Series: Shining Wind
• Maker: Orchid Seed
• Sculptor: Kyosuke Arai
• Scale: 1/7
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2009
• Buy it here!

V.I.P. To Heart 2: Lucy Maria Misora

• Name: Lucy Maria Misora
• Series: V.I.P (To Heart2/Kawata Hisashi version)
• Maker: Good Smile Company
• Sculptor: yr?
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 10/2006
• Buy it now!

Figma – Tsukasa Hiiragi: Summer Uniform ver.

• Name: Tsukasa Hiiragi
• Series: Lucky Star
• Version: figma 045 – Summer Uniform version
• Maker: Max Factory
• Sculptor: Masaki Asai
• Material: PVC / ABS
• Release Date: 10/2009
• Buy it here!

Figma – Ryoko Asakura School Uniform ver.

• Name: Ryoko Asakura
• Series: Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
• Version: figma 023 – School Uniform version
• Maker: Max Factory
• Sculptor: Masaki Asai
• Material: PVC / ABS
• Release Date: 11/2008
• Buy it here!

Nendoroid – Tears to Tiara: Arawn

• Name: Arawn
• Series: Tears to Tiara
• Version: Nendoroid
• Maker: Good Smile Company
• Sculptor: Itou Reiichi
• Material: PVC / ABS
• Release Date: 10/2009
• Buy it here!

Domo-kun: 4″ Flocked Vinyl Figure

• Name: Domo Kun
• Series: Domo Kun
• Version: Classic Brown Limited Edition
• Maker: Dark Horse
• Material: 4″ Flocked vinyl
• Release Date: 10/2009
• Buy it here!

Pastel Chime Continue: Rindou Rina

• Name: Rindou Rina
• Series: Pastel Chime Continue
• Maker: Alter
• Sculptor: Tokunaga Hironori
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 10/2006
• Buy it here!

Otoboku: Itsukushima Takako

• Name: Itsukushima Takako
• Series: Otome wa Boku ni Koi Shiteru
• Maker: Alter
• Sculptor: Saito Fumiki
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 10/2006
• Buy it here!

Magikano: Ayumi Mamiya

• Name: Ayumi Mamiya
• Series: Magikano
• Maker: Max Factory
• Sculptor: Shinji Koshinuma, Yukiwo Ageta
• Scale: 1/7
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2006
• Buy it here!

Fate/hollow ataraxia: Matou Sakura Battle dress Ver.

• Name: Matou Sakura
• Series: Fate/hollow ataraxia
• Version: Battle dress version
• Maker: Alter
• Sculptor: Adachi Satoru
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2006
• Buy it here!

Fate/hollow ataraxia: Caren Hortensia

• Name: Caren Hortensia
• Series: Fate/hollow ataraxia
• Maker: Alter
• Sculptor: Fumiki Saito
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 12/2006
• Buy it here!

Da Capo: Kotori Shirakawa

• Name: Kotori Shirakawa
• Series: D.C.S.S (Da Capo Second Season)
• Maker: Max Factory
• Sculptor: Max Factory Motion Study Department – Shinji Koshinuma, Atsushi Yagi
• Scale: 1/8
• Material: PVC
• Release Date: 07/2006
• Buy it here!

Everything we have in-stock is finally in the system and all available on our website!

The two 1-hour long Fate/stay night TV Reproduction OVAs have been released and subbed.

The first noticeable difference is the newly redone OP and ED. You can view them here at one of my previous posts.

Each OVA summarizes 12 episodes of the 24-episode TV series that aired back in 2006. It has been awhile since I’ve last seen the anime, which made it somewhat difficult to pick out the limited new scenes that are included in the OVAs.

For the most part, the OVAs are the major scenes and battles from the TV series all cropped out and linked together. Considering that they’re trying to stuff 8 hours of content into only 2 hours, many things had to be left out.

It felt like it was constantly jumping from battle to battle nonstop. If you’re new to Fate/stay night, you’re better off playing the visual novel or watching the TV series. Without prior knowledge, it’ll be hard to keep up with what’s going on in these OVAs. Otherwise, it’s a good refresher to put you in the mood for the Unlimited Blade Works movie.

On an ending note, I thought these OVAs were well done and served their purpose as a summary of the TV series. The animations, plot, characters, and setting are all the same as before. I liked Fate/stay night back then, and I still do now.

Shiki has been adapted into an anime airing this July.

I made a post about the manga version quite some time ago. Since this is coming from the same author as Juuni Kokki and Ghost Hunt, the story should be something to look forward to.

I’m still following the manga adaptation, so it’ll be interesting to see how they present this in anime form.

Image Source: AniDB

The first of 6 50-minute OVAs has been released on the Japan PlayStation Network. There will be a simultaneous worldwide DVD and Blu-ray release on March 12th.

Quick summary from AniDB:

* Adapted from the Gundam Ace novel series of the same name, authored by bestselling Japanese writer Harutoshi Fukui.

The story is located in a colony “Industrial 7″ in UC (Universal Century) 0096. It depicts an encounter of a 16 years old student Banagher Links and the pure white mobile suit “Unicorn Gundam”, and also depicts the global basis war over the forbidden box “Laplace”.

Since the only Gundam series I’ve seen were the Gundam Seed and Gundam 00 ones, I wasn’t familiar with the Universal Century setting. I think the way the story was presented could have been made clearer by giving more explanations about the history, or maybe it seemed fine to people that were already knowledgeable about this Gundam universe.

As would be expected of an OVA by Sunrise, the animation quality is very high. Don’t be put off by the seemingly “retro” character designs. The setting, characters, and Gundams were all rendered with great detail. I was especially impressed by the battle sequences, which I thought were more well done than Sunrise’s previous work on Gundam 00.

Unfortunately, the episode ends with a cliffhanger and the second OVA isn’t due until Fall 2010.

Rating: Very Good