The return of a long lost friend was witnessed in Akihabara last week. HD’s Senior Coffee Correspondent, Seiya, weighs in on this ongoing story.

As was discussed in the earlier AX post, we’re trying to scrape a little shindig together to put faces to the various e-names floating around the otaku blogosphere, forums, and elsewhere upon the internets at this year’s Anime Expo. Lacking any better ideas, here’s the plan:

I doubt anyone reading this is unfamiliar with the series of commercials that began airing last year as part of the Otomo Katsuhiro designed, Morita Shuhei directed Freedom Project OVA; for those unaware, though, or for those of us who thought the project began and ended with the commercials, it’s welcome news that the first episode of what is slated to be a six part series went on sale yesterday (June 26th) in hybrid DVD / HD-DVD format. For more info on the series, official Japanese and English pages are available, as well as the blog of Vong yonghow, the single non-Japanese staffer on the project at Sunrise’s studios in Tokyo. Kudos to him for prompting a further investigation! (no more)

G-Collections posted a listing over at JAST USA yesterday scooping the development and pending English language release of ZyX’s Binetsu Kyoushi Chieri, under the title Amorous Professor Cherry. Veteran designer Yamane Masahiro (now Sendorikun) returns to the brand for his last hurrah here along with Cresecendo scenario writer Minakami Tomohiro. It’s looking to be a fairly typical school romance between teacher (and teacher, and classmate) and student, though the protagonist seems a bit on the youthful side (HE’S OVER 18); it sounds like we can look for release toward the end of this year or possibly early ‘08. (no more)

After reviewing the first installment in Toypla’s ero-ero O-ji collection lineup I was under the impression that subsequent figures would be released serially in a similar figure + book format, but after seeing them all simultaneously completed in this blog post it may be that they’re coming out as a trading figure set… the details I’ve been able to uncover thus far are scant, but we’ll be continuing to keep an eye on the project as it develops. Pictures from the Toypla blog post are below, but bear in mind that the figures are still works in progress pending revision for final release:

June 29th, 2007 is a day that will go down in eroge history, not only for the earth-shaking announcements JAST USA has scheduled for their panel at Anime Expo but also for the absolutely insane release lineup of games scheduled to come out in Japan on that most fateful of days. While the wallet impact has lessened somewhat with the news that two of the heaviest hitters will be delayed, it’s still an ero-ero tour de force that should keep otaku everywhere busy for weeks and months to come. What follows is a completely biased take on this week’s eroge releases, featuring the seven titles I personally deem most worthy of attention as well as three that were delayed (a bit of anticipatory glee never hurts!). In no particular order, we have:

Figure maker Goodsmile updated their official site today with two new entries in their October ‘07 lineup: a PVC version of Idolmaster Xenoglossia’s Hagiwara Yukiho, and a Nendoroid Binchou-tan from the rather odd production by the same name. The former is notable for being utterly boring, while the latter is notable for possessing exactly the same design whether Nendoroid deformed or not. There’s a reason I didn’t go into detail on these yesterday (though Binchou-tan is rather cute)… (no more)

For a change of pace this time around (and because the visual aid I need for my next otaku vignette is proving surprisingly elusive) I would like to offer up a review. Rather than rehashing reviews of things readily available elsewhere in the world, I intend to dip into the hefty backlog of things that I feel have long been unduly neglected and unappreciated. In this installment: Lesbian Witches of the 1970s (kind of).

Late last night Hobby Channel scooped the PVC conversion of a figure that can only be described as sensational in just about every way: Aizawa Sanae, from Kotoyoshi Yumisuke’s eromanga Shokunyuu 2, as sculpted by Vispo, is coming from Daiki Kougyou in mid-October at it’s original 1/4 scale and a 15,750 yen price point. In the vast universe of bishoujo resins available I figured this was pretty low on the list for PVC conversion (so low that I managed to obtain the original unpainted / unassembled resin kit from Vispo at considerable personal expense, not expecting this development ;_;) but whatever you think of Daiki’s production quality I have to hand it to them for possessing the enormous balls to tackle such a project. Here’s hoping they can do justice to what I personally consider one of the best resins out in the past few years. Pictures below:

Enterbrain announced the production today of upcoming TV anime Night Wizard, based on the “table talk” (Japanese jargon equivalent of tabletop or PnP) RPG by the same name. Direction will be handled by Yamamoto Yuusuke, most recently the director of Welcome to the NHK; given the spotty history of Japan-animated tabletop RPG spinoffs I’m not quite sure what to make of this, and while I have a hunch that it’s headed straight for the mediocrity barrel it won’t be for lack of interesting subject matter. (no more)

The scoops were scattered liberally across both Dengeki Hobby Magazine and Hobby Japan this month, prompting me to pick up both in an endeavor to comprehensify. The result here is hardly complete, but it does extract what I see as the best new offerings from the August ‘08 round of hobby rags: Alter presents a pair of gunslinger girls (not those, however), Kotobukiya and Wafuudou Ganguten show a brace of royalty, and Volks parades pretty things before us that we’ll never get the chance to buy. It’s a festival of anticipation at HDHQ tonight…

When this behemoth Tama-nee was figure first announced in April I was intimidated by her size, her leggy proportions, and her freakishly elongated torso. While Cobra-Kai’s rendering looks nothing like her original design, it was this precise fact that seduced me into picking the figure up (no giantess fetish here, honest); after her mutant novelty factor wore off was she truly worth the purchase? Read on…

An official site opened today for Figma, a collaborative project between maker Max Factory and sculptor / technician Asai “APSY” Masaki. Asai is famous for his work on fixed-pose and action figures alike, especially for his dynamic natural poses and inconspiuous points of articulation, and this looks like Max’s answer to projects such as Kaiyodo’s Revoltech, Konami’s Busou Shinki and Atelier Sai’s Duel Maid series. It will stand or fall based on the strength of its lineup, which is currently listed at three items; the first two are characters from the early 80’s manga and anime Puraresu Sanshirou, the progatonist’s fighting robot Juoumaru and the presumed love interest’s robot Sakura-hime. While the premise of this show sounds wicked cool (like a BURNING SPIRIT version of Angelic Layer), what is probably going to put the project in the black is the third model, that of a certain YUKI.N. She was scooped in the August issue of Dengeki Hobby Magazine, on sale today, and I’ve taken the liberty of reproducing that scoop below:

We scooped this with the release of last month’s Hobby Japan, and now it’s official: Amazon has a preorder page up for Bandai’s Otodama Nano Code Geass trading figures, complete with (sadly low-resolution) color sample images. Amazon is listing their sale date as August 25th, though I’d hesitate to take this as definitive pending further corroboration; it’s a must have item regardless for fans of Geass, Kimura Takahiro designs and bishoujo figures in general, especially those keen on obtaining the first in what is sure to be a rich dynasty of C.C., Shirley, and Millay figures (Karen’s debut came earlier, but we’re sure to see more of her as well). Tanoshimi da wa~ (pictures below)

August’s edition of Tech Gian magazine, on sale yesterday, scooped the announcement of Wafuudou Ganguten’s collaboration with Nanao Naru and Cerberus Project’s Sunny Day to produce a PVC version of Sunny Day’s Halloween-ko resin kit (based on a Nanao-rendered Tech Gian calendar pinup). The kit is castoffable, and scheduled to go on sale “around Halloween” this year at a retail price of 7,480 yen. Further information and visual evidence in the magazine scan below:

Much like her voice actress counterpart Inoue Kikuko the heroine of Kosuke Fujishima’s Ah! My Goddess franchise seems possessed of eternal youth. Not only is the AMG manga still running in Afternoon, her recent TV anime incarnation is obviously still fresh in the minds of the wizards over at Kotobukiya who put an official site up yesterday for this goddess uniform version Belldandy kit, due out in November at 6,090 yen retail. Her face in this sculpt arguably reflects her personality, which is perhaps not a good thing, but Belldandy fans (myself included) will no doubt be happy to see yet another PVC incarnation of one of the most enduring bishoujo heroines in manga history. (no more)