With the Fate/Stay Night Curtain Raiser promo causing literally dozens of rabid would-be Fate fanboys to get all excited, I figured this would be a good time to taunt people post a retrospective on some of the previously released Fate/Stay Night figures. Just so I don’t get people mentioning the absence of the GSC Rider figure, I’ll point out that this isn’t all of them, of course, just the ones I have personally.

These are the Battle Combination Trading figures. Its a series of six figures (no chase figures) split into Master/Servant pairs in vaguely more exciting than usual poses. The figures join at the bases to form three pieces are pictured above. The Shiro figure looks kind of odd facially, but the rest are good – the Rin/Archer figure in particular is fantastic, its a great pose as well as being on of the few Rin figures with her in school uniform rather than that red sweater. A warning for anyone who goes looking for a set – there are transparent variants where some of the parts are transparent, mainly the hair. The transparent version of Archer is pretty neat, actually, as its the swords which fade into transparancy as the get towards the points.

The Palm Scenery Saber and Shiro twinpack. The Palm Scenery series of figures are probably best known for the classic Disgaea sets of trading figures, though more recently they’ve somewhat expanded by producing figures for series like To Heart 2 and Genshiken spin-off Kujibiki Unbalance. This twinpack (which is still available at a few Japanese toy sellers) was wonderfully cheap and pretty cute. You get your choice of three weapons for your characters to hold – Sabers sword, a practice sword and a ladel ^^;

A series of Fate/Stay Night gashapon (capsule) figures. These are pretty small – they are actually shorter than a typical Bandai HGIF series, for example – though they are pretty well made and has a rare figure appearance by Ilya. Despite the size, these were actually a touch more expensive than most gasha.

At the time of writing these Good Smile Company trading figures are (to the best of my knowledge) the most recent series of Fate/Stay Night Trading figures, and quite probably the nicest. Most the characters people would want are represented (sorry Fuji-nee fans), and these are really well made with it. The Ilya figure also has an optional jacket like that from the gashapon series, but its an absolute pain to get attached properly (it looks good when it is, but I removed it for some pictures a while back and never got around to re-attaching it). If I remember correctly, there is also an alternate version of Rider without the mask. Most peoples highlight here is the chase figure, though – Saber in PJs posing in an attempt to make her look tall and busty. So cute ^^

Enough with the dinky things and onto something bigger. These are two rather larger (1/8 scale IIRC) PVC figures produced by Kotobukiya, based on some kits they had released previously. Rin, for those wondering how it stands, is held in place on the stand by two metal screws in her foot. I’ve had it on display since release and, unlike many similar figures, its yet to have displayed any horrid leaning. Huzzah!

Good Smile Company strike again with a pair of awesomely dynamic figures. These two proved popular enough to get a re-release recently (which is actually when I picked them up). What I don’t have, however, is the Rider figure GSC also released. This Rin figure is probably my favorite of the ones I got. Easy panty shot aside, the pose is just awesome and it simply looks really awesome.

Last but certainly not least are these figures by Clayz. At 1/6th scale these tower above all my other Fate figures (in fact, the only bigger figures I have are the LE figures from Scrapped Princess vols 1 and 2). You pay for the priviledge, of course, but for figure collecting Fate fans they are definately worth it as they both look great. Its certainly my favorite Saber figure, anyway, and they are satisfyingly solid to hold.

Thats is for me right now, but with the recent release of Hollow Ataraxia and the forthcoming TV anime there are plenty more Fate figures on the way. Coming up soonish are a lovely looking magical girl version of Rin from Goodsmile, a swimsuit version of Rin and a casual version of Saber, and you just know there are going to be more on their way soon.