So this post won’t be my usual figure post, but rather just me documenting some findings after moving some of my figures around, particularly the bunny girl version of Suzukaze Aoba. She is from the NEW GAME!! series, and FREEing produced a bunny suit figure of her a few years back. There aren’t a lot of NEW GAME!! scale figures in general, so I ended up buying her and Takimoto Hifumi in 2023 because I loved their poses.
As I was re-arranging my figures yesterday, I noticed something concerning: there were hairline cracks on the paintwork. At first I thought I might have scratched her in some way, but that didn’t make sense because it was literally all over the glossy portion of the paint. This issue wasn’t limited to the bunny suit itself, but also on both her shoes and bunny ears. Here are some photos to illustrate:
Notably, the skin portions of the figure, including her face and arms, are completely fine. Her hair also looks fine.
I’m pretty disappointed at what’s unfolded with respect to quality control (QC), but at this point, it’s no use crying over spilled milk (or however that saying goes). That being said, I still love this figure of Aoba: her pose is very cute, which was ultimately the reason I bought this figure to begin with. I can only hope that the paint or plastic itself won’t disintegrate and crumble and it’s just the cracks themselves, but I don’t have any confidence given the state it’s currently in. I guess it really is: only time will tell.
Since Hifumi was also in the same cabinet shelf as Aoba, I also checked her for signs of issues, but she still looks fine and in pristine condition. All other figures within that cabinet also seem to be fine, as well as adjacent ones, so I don’t think my climate or anything of that nature would have had such a detrimental impact on how Aoba turned out. My figures are all displayed out of sunlight and all use the same LED lights, so I’m just baffled. Genuinely, I don’t think this is indicative of any systemic quality control issues either: the other FREEing figures I have, especially the first one I got (Veronica), are all still fine, as is Priestess from Goblin Slayer. The only thing that would make sense is if there was a manufacturing issue for this particular figure. I did ask on Reddit to see if anyone had the same experience, and apparently that has been a common issue when folks were trying to sell. If anyone else has FREEing’s version of Aoba, I would love to hear how your figures are holding up to the testament of time.
After this experience, I’ll probably have to audit my figures closely and do it more often. I look at Aoba and Hifumi every day, but they are both on the bottom shelf of my DETOLFs, so I usually have to squat or sit on the ground to see the bunny suit up close. Then again, even if I did that, all I could do would be to document it and ask around to see if anyone else . Sigh…
Anyways, that’s really all I had this time around. Until next time.
~Lui
