*here’s where I’d put a picture of everything if it would all fit*
Hello & here’s to another overdue unboxing since I’m too cheap to ship single CDs/keychains via anything other than SAL (only rich people use EMS lol ). I clearly got too excited by the fact I got some new shelves and decided that I needed to try and fill them asap so I kinda went a little overboard this month. I will say here that some of this stuff did come out at the end of December but I try to avoid shipping anything over the festive period since I think the poor postal workers are already busy enough without my weeb purchases clogging the system.
If you’re still reading then buckle up while I take you a tour through this month’s poor life decisions. A quick warning, this post may take a little longer to load since there’s like 80 images.
Since it released at the end of December, first up is Yoshiwara Higanbana Kuon no Chigiri for Nintendo Switch. Since there was no LE, etc… I decided to grab the Animate Set which came with 3 bromides and a short story booklet. It was actually kinda annoying since the characters featured in each bonus are different (the Stellaworth Set had the same bonuses but with the opposite characters if that makes sense?). I recently started playing this so here’s hoping it’s decent!
On this month’s episode of “random galge I ended up buying” we have Justy x Natsy, Karumaruka Circle & D.S. ~Dal Segno~. I only bought JxN because it was super cheap + if I remember correctly Whirlpool’s games are normally pretty funny. I’ve been wanting to play the other two for a while so finally got around to picking them up.
Another game I’ve been after for a while is Binary Star and when I realised that RiRi was the artist, I knew that I had to get the Limited Edition. The LE is one of Otomate’s older (smaller + more square) boxes but still comes with the usual drama CD + booklet. I just had to show a picture of the “image illustration” since it’s so pretty. I’ve heard that this game is pretty good so I’m looking forward to playing it! 🙂
I actually completely forgot that I bought this LE of Hyakka Yakou until it turned up at my door, whoops~ This game only cost me 1k yen though so that probably explains why I bought it despite not really being a fan of the artwork. The voice cast & opening song are great, plus the main scenario writer is “Tom” (Walpurgis no Uta/A3!) so the story should hopefully be decent.
So these two games were both on sale during Animate Online Shop’s winter sale. I had some points to use also so ended up getting these two for just under 1k yen each.
- Dynamic Chord feat. Apple Polisher – I have LEs of the first two games so was glad to continue the trend with the 4th game (now I just need to get the Kyohso game to complete my collection…). The LE is pretty similar to the rest of the series and comes with a drama CD + booklet that’s styled like a magazine and has character + voice actor interviews alongside the usual stuff. I really like Apple Polisher’s music so hope the game is good too~
- Majestic Majolical vol 2 – I also have the animate edition of the first game but haven’t played it yet. This game was so cheap that I just couldn’t resist. The set comes with the game LE ( which has a drama CD), a specially illustrated box & 4 badges.
Onto the only game I actually pre-ordered in January – the PS4 port of Zettai Kaikyuu Gakuen. I meant to buy the vita version but never pre-ordered and the game never really dropped in price since so I haven’t had an incentive to purchase it. However, with prototype adding in some new scenes/CGs for this version I made sure to buy it this time, haha. I bought the animate set which came with a large (A4) bromide, 4 badges & a short story book (interestingly only featuring Haru). The voice cast for this game is amazing so I’m kinda sad that there were no drama CD bonuses. I’m definitely looking forward to playing this, especially since I figured out how to move screenshots from PS4 to my laptop.
It’s a new month which means another Enstars album. This month we have fine, whom are a group I don’t really bother with a lot in the game but I like the more elegant touch to their music. I ordered from animate (surprise, surprise) so got two badges – I’m pretty happy to get Tori’s individual badge since he’s so cuuuuuute. The LE of the album comes with the character commentary CD, acylic panel, special booklet & an art card featuring “old fine” (which is beautiful). I really like the album as a whole, Tori’s character song is adorable!
I also ended up ordering a couple of Enstars character goods – the Rei keyholder was a pre-order since it’s so cute & you could just pick what character you wanted to buy. I saw that we’re going to be getting more of these designs soon so I’ll be keeping an eye out.
I’ve been really curious about these little manjuu mascots for a while so when I found Natsume’s one for a cheap price I immediately tossed him into my cart. They’re basically little balls filled with those micro beads or something similar – he makes a pretty great stress ball, haha. They’re kinda cute in an ugly way? Idk how to explain but I kind of want to buy more.
I really wanted to buy something from Stellaworth (which will be further down the post) but felt stupid ordering just one thing so ended up buying a couple of little Taishou x Alice items. I’m surprised but happy that I managed to get keyholders/stands in the two lotteries, haha. The Akazukin & Yurika stand is a BLESSING.
I also randomly ended up buying the first two volumes of mintlip’s A’sxDarling drama CDs (I believe there was a group CD released first but I don’t have that). I ordered from animate so the received the cast free talk CDs. I was only really interested in them after stumbling across the PV which is super cute. The theme of these CDs is focusing on the “turning points” of relationships after periods of time involving the number 3 (3 days/weeks/months, etc..) which is certainly unique? Each of the guys is also described as being like an animal personality-wise with these two being dog + cat-like. I really love how cute the inside of these CD cases are, I think it shows that the company put some extra effort into their product.
I’m looking forward to listening to these two, I’m actually pretty curious about the other two volumes as well, especially the “penguin” guy since I have no idea what character type that would be 😛
Now we’re finally onto purchases from my beloved(??) rejet. I finally got around to buying both of the ID Best albums since they were hella cheap. The LE bonus are these super extra flip-cards featuring some choice lyric “puns” from the songs featured. I laughed at that stupid “manhole” one for too long & am I the only one who thinks that the 愛 (いたみ) one just sums up rejet as a whole? Anyways, these were quite fun/interesting to flick through.
I was looking through the CDs and I actually already had a lot of the songs featured since hoarding rejet CDs seems to be a hobby of mine but it was worth it mostly for the TYB songs for me.
Next up is the second CD in the Marginal #4 Galacti9 Song series featuring R. Since I adore the twins I did shell out the cash for the “Deluxe” edition featuring special box (similar size/design to the enstars albums), mini-drama/cast commentary CD, badge & art card with commentary from Suzuki Yuuto. The animate bonuses were a postcard & badge.
Now, I don’t want to be salty since I do love the Marginal#4 series so much but I am /slightly/ disappointed with this deluxe edition because it’s more than double the price of the regular edition but I just don’t feel that the bonuses are worth it considering you can get a badge + postcard simply as a “free” shop bonus. The bonus CD is where most of the “value” of this set should be but this CD is literally only 22 minutes long, which is barely anything, especially when the cast talk is almost a third of the total CD length. I also feel that it was quite lazy that the deluxe edition didn’t get a specially illustrated box like the Ken ga Kimi duet songs did.
That being said, R is utterly adorable and I love the song a lot – it wasn’t what I would expect from his character song ( I thought L was meant to be the thirsty twin? ) but it’s too good. I do still plan to get the deluxe edition of L’s CD when it comes out in March since I adore him too much not to but I honestly can’t see myself buying the deluxe version of any of the other CDs in the series.
Time for some Dialovers now & here we have the third “super best” song collection. I really love the comic-esque design of the cover! Each CD comes with an art card too & I was lucky enough to get Azusa, yay! I just had to show a picture of the actual CD too since it’s so funny, it features each guy’s…umm…catchphrase(?) and Shin’s stupid “NIISAAAN” makes me crack up every time I see it. The 3 songs exclusive to this CD are pretty good actually + I’m glad to get my hands on Void since it’s one of my favourite songs from the series.
Here’s some more dialovers song CDs:
- Azusa’s character song – I have the song itself already since it was on one of the other super best CDs but I really wanted the drama section. He looks so adorably murderous on the cover too~
- Azusa vs Ruki Versus song – after figuring out that there’s an Azusa solo version of “luv apple juice” I knew I had to buy this CD. It did not disappoint.
- Kindan no 666 Single – I believe that this is the theme song to the more,blood anime (which I still haven’t watched). I like the song & this CD was cheap so I snagged it.
- Lost Eden OP/ED Single – I’m still playing the game at the moment but I really like the ED “Imitation Game” so I figured that I may as well but this CD.
I also ended up picking up Shu & Subaru’s CDs from the original Diabolik Lovers drama CD series. Interestingly Subaru’s was one of the cheaper re-releases & you can definitely tell that the packaging has been “stripped back” when comparing it alongside one of the original pressings. I dunno if you can tell from the picture but there was a huge crack on the cover of his CD case so I wonder if the case quality was worse too, hmm… It’s no big deal since I can just replace the case though. If you’re just interested in the drama CD as opposed to fussing over cases/booklets then paying half price for the re-release is definitely a good deal!
I really liked Azusa’s Bloody Bouquet CD so ended up buying five more CDs from that series (so basically all of the Dialovers characters that I actually “like”). They better be good, haha!
I’ve never really been convinced of the whole concept of the Dialovers “Versus” series of drama CDs but I figured if any pairing could convince me then it’d be Azusa & Kanato. The correct choice is always going to be Azusa though~
I’m actually looking forward to the Chaos Lineage game that releases next month so I had to go out and buy the three CDs that I assume that game will be based on. I’m looking forward to the Violet group the most (if only we could swap out Laito for Shu & it would be perfect).
I actually pre-ordered vol.5 of the Dialovers Zero but tossed it alongside some other CD so never received it until late Jan. It came with a bonus CD & a small clear file of Shin since there was some fair going on or something. Am I the only one who thinks that the artwork for this series is a step up? Maybe it’s just in comparison to the games but I was looking at the sprites for this series and they were all so pretty!
This was a really random purchase but I love KENN’s vocals on these two songs so much & it’s quite rare to see any of the dear vocalist CDs discounted particularly heavily so I totally impulsed this CD.
These CDs were both cheap so I ended up sneaking them into my cart. I have two of the other fresh kiss 100% CDs and remember them being cute(?) so hope this continues the trend. This guy is voiced by Masuda Toshiki (who is forever being stereotyped as “idol” characters) so as you can guess the song is great. Ikuto seems to be more of a cutesy-type compared to a lot of characters Masuda typically plays so I’m looking forward to listening to this.
This was also cheap & I don’t have enough CDs by Nojima Kenji so this was a no-brainer. I’m pretty sure that I have another one of these CDs (the Yonaga Tsubasa one?) but the voice cast is so good I might have to get the rest. This CD came with a cute artcard & I really like how much effort was put into the packaging, with the illustration in the booklet being 3D (like those greetings cards you sometimes get?).
This was a really random purchase since I was randomly searching for Lip on My Prince on yahoo auctions & stumbled across this little Seiya acrylic strap. As anyone who has a drama CD husbando knows it can be really hard to find goods of them so I just had to snag him >w<
And finally onto my recent obsession – Black Wolves Saga. Let’s start with the CD collection – all of the OP/ED singles + the OST. The music for this series is amazing so I needed these so badly, Testament is one of my favourite ending songs of all time. It’s worth mentioning that the drama CD included with the OST is actually pretty long (just under an hour).
I really liked that the older CDs had fold-out covers & the 3 CDs come with reversible character/art cards that you can put together to make the adorable picture in the last image.
My favourite guy from the games was definitely Julian so I just had to hunt down some merch of him ofc. The acrylic stand was sold by Stellaworth at their AGF booth but is still available on their website sporadically.
The big keyholder was something I found for sale on yahoo auctions randomly since a lot of merch for this series is out of print due to its age. This keychain is pretty huge so isn’t exactly practical but is too cute. Such a good boy.
Okay, this was a really random purchase – I cam across a BWS goods “lot” for sale on Yahoo Auctions one day & was too curious not to buy since it was only 1000yen for everything pictured above. It came with 54 badges & 20 keyholders/straps but there are quite a few repeats. That being said, there was a fair amount of Julian stuff so I’m pretty happy. Maybe there’s a tad too many Auger items for my liking though~
I have never bought any doujin before but when I came across this Julian x Fiona comic on Surugaya I immediately NEEDED it, lol. I believe this is called “Koneko no Rondo” by the seemingly defunct circle Adabana. It’s only like ~30 pages long but is very cute & is about Julian speaking to Fiona about his childhood. The artwork was cute & ofc Julian was adorable. If all douin are this nice then I might need to hoard collect some more…
Finally we have two books from the BWS series – the official fanbook & the visual works books. I’ll speak about them seperately since they deserve it.
First up is the fanbook which is pretty typical of your otome game fanbook with detailed character pages & world building alongside walkthrough information & petting guide. There is the usual image gallery & CG compilation too. The staff interview is also worth a read & there is a short story for all of the main guys (Julian’s is TOO GOOD). It also comes with a double sided poster featuring both of the covers (very cute!).
The visual works book, cruelly titled “Zodiva” is more of a collection of artwork & rough sketches. It does have a similar CG gallery to the fanbook though. Since it was released a number of years later, this book does have some more recent artwork of the series, which was definitely appreciated.
A thickness comparison (fanbook on left / visual works on right)
I feel like I could do a whole post on these two books but both are definitely worth the purchase. The visual works was around 50 pages longer & the paper felt thicker/better quality but it was pricier (and expensive to ship since it weighed like 1kg by itself). I personally will probably enjoy flicking through the visual works more regularly but did appreciate the short stories & character interviews in the fanbook too!
Yay we’re finally at the end of this post! Thanks for sticking with me through this ridiculously long post – I may have gone a little overboard but I don’t have much ordered for Feb (pretty much only the Saitou Souma 2wink album). I may do a post for all of my March orders though since there seems to be a lot of things releasing then (RIP wallet).
Thanks for reading & here’s a baby Julian b/c it’s the most adorable thing I’ve seen:
Zettai Renai! 