Hey Shingo, nice review, I was hoping some retailers would carry this product for international buyers like me :\

I want this, is it available at any websites in English?

I was actually quite disappointed with it, really. Not being a fan of many of the artists within, I only found several drawings worth a second look. I’d recommend it only to Ikkitousen fans, or fans of the participating artists.

Furthermore, this book isn’t actually 18+. Tora no Ana had it with green stickers, i.e. non-ero.

>>Manning
Unfortunately not; at this point it seems you’ll have to use a proxy service (such as one of the four linked in the lower left sidebar) to acquire a copy from Yahoo Auctions.

>>DJnerate
A glance at the artist list before purchase might have saved you 1,050 yen. ^^;;

While there are no shots of exposed genitalia or hardcore depictions of intercourse in the book there are certainly images of the bare human female torso, which for some reason tend to injure the tender retina of children in certain countries. Tora might not flag the book as ero but it’s certainly not work safe, and I’d rather be safe than sorry.

>>Y
I’ll have a review of Velvet Skin up on Friday, hopefully (assuming shipping goes as planned). I can’t wait… :3

>>DJnerate
I was a bit disappointed with the selection of official art in the book, as it’s all been published in other formats already (a few of them here). Then again that’s not why I bought the book; I knew there would be stuff in it that I didn’t care for but I was looking forward to the chance to see some familiar artist takes on the Ikkitousen cast (CHIRO!!) and maybe discover some new (to me) talent, which I did (Oshare Kyoushitsu++, I knew his work from Oshiri Princess but never put a name to the art).

Overall it’s an item that smacks of opportunism and probably isn’t worth it from an objective standpoint – if you’re going to do an artbook do an artbook for crying out loud and not something this half-assed – but I’m happy with it from a suppport-the-artist perspective as well as for its utility in finding new artists to follow.

I hope for an official artbook as well, especially if it compiles all of the limited edition work that came with the R2 DVD releases. Wish I’d been on top of those when I had the chance…

well, this book will definitely not pass Sinkapore’s censors.

Guess, I either have to smuggle it in and risk getting a fine and maybe even jailtime for smuggling ‘pornography’, or just enjoy the digital photos of Shingo here.

Thanks again to Shingo, and in general the Internet for giving us ADULTS freedom to make up our minds what to view and what not to view.

*dances around in delight*

Friend won one for me on Y!J ^___^