Final Fantasy VII Cloud Strife

For those of you unfamiliar with Final Fantasy VII, Cloud Strife is the main character that you control the entire span of the game. The story goes something along the lines of him being an ex-SOLDIER, who is now working as a mercenary for hire. Somehow, he ends becoming involved with the other two characters: Tifa Lockhart (childhood friend) and Aerith Gainsborough (a flower-shop girl), whose figures will be reviewed at a later time.

What loosened my grip from my cash is the fact that the character designer of this series, Tetsuya Nomura, was in charge of the overall production of this line. In other words, I became more confident in the figure’s quality upon hearing that the creator was in charge of the overall process of producing the figure. Needless to say, I’d be very happy if more toymakers were to make note of this and follow suit. This figure is basically an exact replica of the character drawings (done by Tetsuya Nomura). It’s hard to say that this figure is “game-accurate,” mainly because the in-game graphics were blocky and the characters were much shorter. I’d say that this figure is a representation of both the realistic and fantastic versions of Cloud all rolled into one.

The size of this figure is pretty big (8 inches tall because of his spiky hair). The paint application on this figure is well-done with the exception of one noticeable black mark on the back of Cloud’s head. The detailing on this figure is just incredible! Both sculpt and paint application of Cloud’s belt and suspenders look like it’s made of actual leather. Even his shoes are well-crafted. In fact, they’re impeccably detailed that it gives the zippers on both shoes the illusion of being able to unzip them right off of Cloud’s feet! Careful attention has been given to the detailing of the metallic shoulder pad giving it the “been-in-battle” scratch and dent marks. The same can be said for his sword. Cloud is also a bit on the pale side, but that doesn’t detract too much from the figure. Strangely, his shoulders seem to have gotten a tan.

According to the packaging, there are “over 22 points of articulation!”  However, I’ve been spending way too much time admiring the craftsmanship of this figure to even verify this claim, so I leave that to you guys.  From what I’ve noticed, Cloud has a ball-jointed neck, ball-hinged shoulders, swivel wrists, swivel forearms, swivel/ball-hinged hips, swivel thighs, ball-hinged knees, swivel feet, and ball-hinged ankles.  Interestingly, Cloud can be made to sit down, or spread his legs wide open (probably because he wears [the] pants and so that he can ride on his motorcycle, which is due out sometime later this year).

Cloud Strife is packaged with the most accessories from Volume 1: A total of three interchangeable hands (1x open-grip right hand, 1x close-fisted right hand, and 1x close-fisted left hand); his trademark Buster Sword (measuring a little over 8 inches tall!); and a peg (a little over half-an-inch, to stick in the back of Cloud so he can carry the Buster Sword).  It also comes with one fancy display base which includes a stand that can hold your figure around its waist to keep it from tipping over.  This allows Cloud to hold more poses than your average action figure.