Some one week ago, over the Twitters, Omo posted the following statement:

@digikerot one of these days you should do a post on all your im@s merch. could be neat.

My response to that is, well, it probably wouldn’t be, because it’s mostly just a whole bunch of CDs. You see, there’s several things about iM@S when it comes to me and merchandise. For one, iM@S as a thing that I was a fan of came along at a really awkward time for me – namely, the point that I’d run out of room for bulky, space-consuming merchandise. Like, you know, toys and figures and all the cool stuff like that. Yes, the point at which I was getting into iM@S was also the point where my merchandising purchases started to be filtered by a ratio of size to functionality which figures wouldn’t pass through. Which meant I missed all the cool stuff, by which I mean the characters I’d actually want to buy figures of in costumes I’d want them to be wearing, by which I mean Brilliant Stage Ritsuko (and I’m not really much one for switsuit figures, if I’m entirely honest).

Secondly, most the best iM@S merch, or at least the stuff it’d be interesting to own, tends to be rather more of a pain to get for those outside Japan – we’re talking store exclusive pre-order items or Lawson-exclusive items sold around major iM@S releases or live events. I’ve no patience for auction sites or using weird online stores or proxy services these days, even though I’d have loved to eat a tub of iM@S crisps.

Then there’s the year or so that I spent completely out of the purchasing, release-tracking part of iM@S fandom. This came around about the release of Dearly Stars, which, to this day, I’ve still not got around to actually playing. The thing about that particular game is that it came at that point where I’d already bought myself a European DSi, and therefore was finding it difficult to go back to playing a regular DS with the slightly smaller, less vibrant screen. Of course, with Dearly Stars being DSi enhanced, I couldn’t play it on my EU DSi due to the region-locking. I can’t play it on my 3DS either. I’ll get around to it one day (probably when they do a 3DS redesign, that being a convenient way to justify to myself buying a Japanese 3DS), but until then, I’ve been avoiding, to this day, anything with significant Dearly Stars related content that may spoil the game. This means I’ve got absolutely no attachment to the games characters, though, and therefore have no related product.

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This is one of those things which would probably register as being “weird” as opposed to merely “curious” if it were happening in a different show, but the ninth episode of Sengoku Collecion threw in a bunch of references to the Korean martial arts movie Volcano High…
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From Carnival Phantasm EX (a particular instalment I’ve yet to see), this example of a box-as-armour was submitted by King Author over a month ago now.

Which apparently is around about the last time I updated this blog, a move which was not entirely intentional – I could have sworn that I’d updated just a couple of weeks ago, but I guess I’ve been consistently telling myself that for the best part of the last month. Whoops.

Also, the amusing not-actually-irony of someone who seems to have conceptual issues with iM@S pointing out that I’ve not updated recently isn’t entirely lost on me.
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From Episode 18 of Bodacious Space Pirates, being used as a platform by Ai, who is clearly too short to reach the ships wheel without it. They aren’t just regular Mikan either, they’re Uchu (Space) Mikan. What, precisely, makes them Space Mikan as opposed to Regular Mikan is, I fear, going to remain the shows greatest mystery until it’s conclusion.

It is also unclear as to whether the Mikan contained within the box are as bodacious as the pirates who stand upon them (though, saying that, I rather suspect that Mr. Show fulfils a large percentage of the shows quotient of bodaciousness, rather than the pirates themselves).

After being rumoured for at least the last couple of weeks, iDOLM@STER: Live in SLOT! was announced yesterday (PV here for the curious complete with new song, We Have A Dream).

Live in SLOT, aside from being a pretty stupid sounding title, is a pachislot game. Basically (as is my understanding, at least), it’s a slot machine on which a game also runs on a video screen at the top of the cabinet. The reels on the cabinet are essentially the randomisation element of the game – an event plays on the game screen, and the result is determined by what comes up on the reels. Whilst I gather at least some of these machines have some limited player control over the stopping of the reels, in generally, like all slot machines, they’re designed so that the establishment ultimately takes as much of your money away from you as possible.
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