SaitouSad

Cybergundam put up a new promo pic. Nothing much new

I did too. I even have 2 RVF Parts to go along with. All that payment in advance and nothing to show for it till much later on. Kinda makes me think I should just cut down my Valks purchase, stop buying spares... Hopefully the 25S and YF-30 will be the last ones I pick up duplicates for.

Omg it's about time. please be a Web exclusive, please be a Web exclusive

HLJ had him heavily discounted to about 9000+yen during one of their sales.

darn. sounds like it's looking more like the 1st one, while I was kinda expecting the brown look in the 2nd. guess I was correct in cancelling the 2nd one

Thanks. Iancalot's explanation does sound plausible. Maybe I should just drop them a note to ask them about it haha ok, enough de-railing on my part. Just thought I'd share that weird occurence

ok, thanks for clearing that up. But what's with NY having the Big in Japan header in their email order confirmation title? It's so bizarre

Sorry to go a little off topic, but figured I'd post this here since people here have talked about both NY and Big in Japan. I thought it was strange that these 2 entities appeared to share the same email and to a certain degree, the same shopping cart template (though they seem to have different terms and conditions). After paying for my VF-25G Super Parts order, I got a Order Confirmation mail from NY with the header "[big in Japan] Order confirmation" So I guess these 2 are related.. or perhaps even the same company? Sorry if this has already been discussed before, though this is news to me.

Amiami suddenly has more stocks (probably cancellations n whatever). Man, at that price, I would have loved to jump on it. But I told myself I'm only allowing myself 1 CF.. Gotta leave room and moola for that VF-25S reissue, and the YF-19

ahh.. ok. Thanks for clearing that up

Wait, I thought NY doesn't do cancellations once they ask for payment (or risk getting blacklisted)? Or is that okay?

indeed.. what do.. and to make things worse, I have 2, 1 naked and 1 with the fold / fast pack I suppose I could try to sell 1 off (good luck with that), and keep the other in fightermode permanently or something

That is true. It's pretty much the only benefit of buying off a local shop. Though that said, most/all of my items have (thankfully) arrived safe and sound. and with EMS shipping, it's pretty much insured of any damages. I usually go with SAL Registered if I could though, to save on shipping. As for customs duties, we only get taxed if our total value reaches about $320 USD, in which case we get a 7% tax on the total value + shipping. Thankfully, with BiginJapan (and possibly Amiami), their total value with shipping is lower than that. Also we could declare a lower value with BiJ/NY. So there's that. All in all, local shops have just left a bad taste in my mouth, and I really only do go to them if I'm desperate, which hasn't happened yet. I'd like to support them, but the prices and occasional shoddy service is much to be desired. Afterall, this is just a hobby, so any savings counts.

As far as I know, Toysntoys hasn't taken any Arcadia preorders yet (not even the VF-1J). Most of our local shops are just import shops all the same (most of them getting their stock from HK suppliers). Often the prices are jacked up really high, making them more expensive than importing it ourselves. I don't blame them for the high price though, as the costs of rental here are pretty high. For example, 1 of the local shop here is selling the YF-19 at about USD 385 / 37,529 yen. Off course we're gonna go with importing, as even with the shipping fees, it's still a cheaper option than the insane prices local shops sell them at. Also, some local shops take forever to open up preorders. We won't even know if they will open preorder for certain items or not, unless we check with them. Also, after experiencing a few instances of local shops not being able to secure goods / or that 1 instance where a shop went bankrupt (pocketing customers' preorder money no less), I've decided I've had it with my local shops and have gone full import (it usually works out to be cheaper anyways).

Yeap, pretty much. Amiami might be a close 2nd, but they would not under declare the value for you. So BiginJapan or NY would be preferred as these 2 can declare a lower value for you. My only problem is having to pay up front at such an early stage. I'm still thinking about it.

so you can have more choices for poses. The VF-1s had them on top one that can be opened to hold the gunpod, so it'd be nice to have them for these as well

Up on Hobby Search for 29,520 yen http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10246266

Thanks for the tip. I think with EMS, it should be relatively safe. Worse case scenario, I don't get it. At least my money is guaranteed since EMS covers loss. I'm alright with late orders as long as they get it out at all hahahah. Looks like this just took out my entire toy budget for April

thanks. I didn't realize they gave est shipping hahah I'm from Singapore, so I'm weighing my options. They don't seem to do SAL Reg for the price of the item (because it cost more), or I could be reading it wrong. Last time, Amiami sent my Yamato YF-19 at 2900 yen with SAL Reg. Given the difference in discount, I might just stick with BiginJapan. Also, strangely enough, their EMS rate is cheaper than SAL Reg! Do they usually have issues with fulfilling orders?

Nice! I wonder what's their shipping like. Never used them before.

Up on NY for 29,750yen. http://www.nippon-yasan.com/lang-en/macross/5997-macross-plus-yf-19-with-fast-packs.html I guess I'll be going with Amiami then...

Up on Amiami for 28,980 yen! http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=FIGURE-002551&page=top

Not sure about the others, but my main reason was because I already have 1 on order at HS, and budgetting constraints this month. Too many releases this period, so I've decided to cut it down to just one for this as well.

I finally decided to cancel my 2nd one at HLJ (keeping the one from Hobby Search). It's a nice bird, but it's a heavy month, and with other releases coming in, I decided to just get one this round. So looks like HLJ will have plenty of spare stock once it's released, seeing all these cancellations going on.

Read a similar article yesterday. Interesting that it'll be a series (shown in theatres), followed by a theatrical film release in 2015. That's pretty much par for the course for live-action stuff in Japan it seems. I found it interesting that they're bringing back the seiyuus of Goto and Shigeo (though I couldn't tell who is who in the photos), as live actors. We'll just have to hope it'll be a nice adaptation. Wonder if they'll follow the comedic nature of the TV-series, or the more serious tone of the movies. (Mamoru Oshii usually likes to do philosophical stuff)