The Bonkurasu Brigade

Actually I went there just to have a look and take some shots of these guys..


The Singapore Toy & Comic Convention, happening this weekend at Suntec City Convention Centre is the first of its kind in Singapore. As a guy who who grew up fiddling with everything mecha-related, I thought I would go down to have a look (well, Bandai is there).

Having not written much lately maybe I’ll write about my visit there.

Just right beyond the entrance is the large Nintendo booth. Beyond the entrance I get the “PC Show” feeling as that’s probably the only event that’s held in a convention prior to this. The Nintendo booth is promoting its Wii console. There’s a Guitar Hero challenge area and quite a few test stations to try out various Wii games. To the side of the main area theres a DS test area. Its pretty much the largest booth there.

The first booth you see as you enter

I continue to make my way to Bandai’s booth. To the right of Nintendo, there is Animax. They were screening Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children. Beside is D-Box showcasing their arcade-like driving seat. Behind them is Popcorn Pop (selling movie posters) and Seagate (Hard disks and Xbox360?), some names I never thought I would see here (another one is Macdonald’s).

The demo beside this one is the killer setup.

Turning to the right I saw the Star Wars booth. I saw the long queue snaking from its entrance. I decide to pass and proceed onto other booths, as I’m not too interested in Star Wars.

The queue goes along the outside of the enclosed booth

A look at the exit area of the booth

Passed by Chuang Yi’s booth as I proceed to Bandai’s booth. Other than just comics, they have trading figures on sale too, 10% discount if I remember correctly. Straight Ahdeais the Bandai booth.

Giant Ryuubi and his brothers greets the guests

The Bandai booth is the main agenda and coverage for this convention. Behind the “guardians” are three double side display shelves.
Shelf one at the left is filled with Master Grade kits. The shelf also has an area for new items, showcasing the MG Shin Musha Gundam, the 1/100 Avalanche Exia, the MG Gundam ver 2.0, the Gundam Wing HCMs and the Sangokuden (3 Kingdoms) Hero Encyclopedia series.

Shelf one, new items area.

The reflection and backlighting makes it hard to get nice shots.

The Shin Musha Gundam

Sangokuden Hero Encyclopedia, Battle of the Red Cliffs set

The second shelf behind Ryuubi displays the Sangokuden kits on one side and Ben 10 figures on the other. The upcoming Chou-un and Kannei+Ryomo kits are on display too. Five real type renditions of Ryuubi, Kan-u, Chouhi, Sousou and Shiba-i are on the top shelf.

Real type Sousou and Shiba-i (Ryuubi, Kan-u, Chouhi at the first pic)

Battle of Korou Fortress?

The last shelf has Saint Seiya figures, Power Rangers toys on the inner side and Soul of Chokogin, S.I.C Kamen Riders on the outer side.

Go go Power Rangers…

Found myself looking at these cute disc animals instead :P

At the back of the Bandai booth there is a Gunpla workshop for kids. They are using the SD Astray kit for the workshop.

Daddy gets a go at it too.

More random Bandai booth shots here.

Finishing my highlight I walked around aimlessly. Lots of designer toys and dolls around. The “Walk of Fame” area seems to be the most congested area as its where the booths of the special guests are all at.

Dolls of the EVA girls, scary or cute?

The Gloomy bear, my favourite paper “standie” out of all

Found out about this Singaporean ‘anime’ called “Gacha-Gacha“. The four seiyuus have a performance on stage, I thought they were to do some live-dubbing but they didn’t. Not that interested but its a start. Hope they will churn out something better, higher quality by the new convention.

Theres quite a lot to see. Local shops like Rapid Culture, Ng’s Collections and Toy Room have booths set up there too. Theres also an apparel booth too.

After going a round through the fair, I went out and found the registration booth.
Didn’t buy anything, the only thing I brought back home is the Events Guide I got on registration.

More miscellaneous random shots here.