[Toy Review] Cloud Strife FFVII:AC Play Arts Kai

Heeey! It's a Play Arts Kai action figure of Square-Enix's cover boy, Cloud Strife from FFVII: Advent Children! Should I give a bit of the game, the movie and Cloud story? Nah, most of you guys know him already, he's like the Mario of Final Fantasy. Now, I don't want to race to get this or get left out because the stores ran out of stock, so I earned and prepared an extra cash and pre-orded this toy, and it's my very first pre-order. I just hope that there are less or no factory damage or any other issues on this awesome and surprisingly cheaper toy than Tifa.

I pity you. You just don't get it at all.

There's not a thing I don't cherish.

~ Cloud Strife ~

PACKAGING

[left] Box front view

[right] Box back view

That looks very promising

I expected that the coffin-type box would be huge. Thankfully it's almost the same size as Sora's (KH3D) box. The design of the box remains consistent to the first wave of FFVII:AC PAKs. If you open the front cover you see Cloud and the swords *drools*. You may read the texts on the other side but I think you know the movie's story. Back shows more of Cloud's product shots.

Epic win!

Packaging includes: Cloud figure, Fusion Sword (assembled), 6 individual swords. Sleeved left arm, Left/right gripping hands, Left/right open hands. Display stand (with instructions).

THE FIGURE

This Cloud action figure looks awesome. The presentation and quality of this toy is really high and a major upgrade over the classic figure. But this is just my first impression after unpacking it.

Viewing Cloud on 4 sides

Check out his face

His face is accurate but he does look like Lightning LOL! Seriously, This is the best looking Cloud yet along with the Dissidia version. Paint and shading application is great. His spikey hair is really detailed and painted/shaded well.

So many belts and straps!

Cloud wears different clothing in Advent Children. It looks like his old SOLDIER uniform but more stylish and casual-looking. The bluish zipped turtle neck top is very detailed, it really looks like a knitted cloth with zipper. Overall the toy have great paint and shading applied on it.

Arms are kinda buffed

His arm looks much better compared to his old Play Arts and Dissidia PAK counterpart. It's more proportional but looks more muscular. The arms have different glove length, the right glove is longer and the left glove is shorter. The left arm sports a pink ribbon.

Showing off the longer right glove

Cloudy Wolf sculpt

The left arm also have a really leathery looking shoulder pad with a Cloudy Wolf sculpted on it.

That pants is baggy

Cloud's pants have a lots of wrinkles, folds and stitches for more detail but it looks odd on the knee area.

Nice shiny shoes... or boot?

The bottom part of the pants is a separate piece and it's attached by a strap. This is intended to make the shoes (which is also detailed) move freely.

It's real cloth, I tell ya!

One of the best parts of this toy is the mantle/side skirt thing. SQEX uses real cloth with wires in it so that you can also pose this mantle. This helps when you pose Cloud in an action stance. It also makes easier to move the left leg.

Even the straps looks real because of those tiny details

The skirt mantle is permanently attached to the surprisingly detailed straps that is also permanently connected on Cloud's chest piece.

The bulky-looking 4 sword holsters.

The back features the non-removable sword holsters, this is where you put up to 4 of Cloud's smaller swords. It looks durable enough to hold the swords. This is not included on the old Play Arts figure and forces modders to custom made one along with 6 combinable swords.

ACCESSORIES

Another great upgrade from the classic is that all the swords are included on this new PAK action figure, everything is here! with an addition of an assembled version (we will talk about that later), more replaceable hands and a sleeved left arm.

The Main Sword

The individual swords cannot be assembled like the custom ones made by modders. I guess that's OK so that the swords wont break, but I still wanted to have a partially assembled sword. Probably modders will make a new batch of these swords that can be assembled for this PAK version of Cloud.

This Hollow Edge is not really hollow on this toy

I don't know what they're called individually. I'll just call the swords on the pic above: Dual Saw Swords (first and second sword from the top) and the Hollow Edge (third sword from the top)

Side Swords' both sides

I'll just call these, "Side Swords". Can't think up of a better name, sorry.

The Fusion Sword

The fully assembled Fusion Sword is huge. It's almost the same size as a small real cutting knife.

Cloud's well-known pose.

Cloud can hold this pose without falling off balance. But the hands can't hold up the Fusion sword that long. They easily fall off.

Tsk, tsk, tsk, SQEX!

I'm disappointed on the chipped area of the Fusion Sword.

See those scratches?

All of the swords looks great, I'm not a fan of the matte finish paint application, because it makes the swords' edges not looking sharp. Those edges should be shinier. I also found some minor and barely noticeable scratch marks on some swords.

Yay! More hands... and an arm!

The extra hands are really detailed with stitches and other textures. These hands can make Cloud do more stuff, like dual sword wielding and more convincing action gestures and poses.

Sleeved left arm

The sleeved extra left arm looks OK, no problems there. It's really easy to swap the bare arms and the sleeved arm, just pull the attached arm off the figure then attach the other arm. I will use this instead of the sleeveless left arm.

Shrugging about the Fusion Sword's chipped area.

All swords kept in the holsters

Cloud can stand properly even with all the swords on his holster while dual-wielding swords. The swords are lighter than it looks, except for the complete Fusion Sword...

Now that's awesome!

Display stand with instructions on the blister packaging

The display stand is useful on this Cloud figure because he does a lot of aerial moves in the movie. For the first time I'm tempted to use this stand, but still... I'm not gonna use it.

ARTICULATIONS, POSING AND SCALING

Because of Cloud's design, the articulation points works great. But that doesn't mean some of these joints have problems (hopefully mine is problem-free). Problem or no problem, everything can be worked out... unless it gets broken, ouch.

Good thing his face is not on emo mode.

Cloud's head can look left and right because the collar's sides is soft, but it's limited when tilting up because of the hair and harder back part of the collar. The neck articulation helps Cloud to look around better.

[left] Neutral stance

[right] I think he posed like this in the movie when he's using the Blade Beam limit break

Classic PA Cloud doesnt have chest articulation, but this new PAK version does. He can now do some more action poses thanks to the soft chest piece. The straps around Cloud doesn't hinder the chest, abs and waist articulations which all of them have nice range of motion.

I cheated on pulling of Cloud's fighting stance by using an open left hand

His arms doesn't have butterfly hinges, they're replaced by ball hinges (is this a new PAK standard?). It's still possible for Cloud to hold his Fusion Sword with both hands. The arms can rotate, the biceps swivel same goes to the ball hinged elbows and wrists that can also tilt up and down nicely.

[left] Defensive stance

[right] Ready stance

The left shoulder pad is adjustable because it's ball hinged. It doesn't hinder the left arm's movement.

[left] Prepared to defend from an aerial attack

[right] Attacking an enemy mid-air

Legs can twist like a real normal leg can. Cloud can technically sit, kneel and do the kicks and probably the splits (I don't want to stress test the toy) because of the double jointed knees that looks weird when folded because the articulation cuts are noticeable.

Cloud is suffering from Geostigma.

The ball hinged ankles and the pant's roomy bottom cuffs makes the feet move pretty well.The feet have toe hinges for more believable poses but I prefer the swivel toes. Let's just hope SQEX will find a way to combine the toe swivel and hinge.

*Facepalm*

Now let's pull off some more poses!

Blocking/defending

Blade Beam attack released!

Crouching attack

Pulling off a Finishing Touch Limit Break

Let's move on to scaling...

Cloud and Tifa

When it comes to fellow Advent Children character like Tifa, they're at scale with each other.

Sora, Cloud, Tifa and Lightning

Unfortunately Cloud PAK is taller than Lightning (LR:FFXIII), but thankfully the scale of both figures is acceptable. Sora (KH3D) is obviously shorter. BTW this is a younger version of Sora.

Raiden, Cloud and Leon

Raiden (MGR: Revengeance) is a bit taller than Cloud thanks to his ninja heels. Leon is embarrassingly shorter than Cloud, RE6 PAKs are built a little off-scale with the rest of the PAK figs.

Reenacting a scene from the movie

QUALITY ISSUES

I didn't find any problems on my Cloud PAK, everything is intact and functional but I heard rumors of some Cloud PAKs having both left feet, loose joints and/or poor paint application, so better check the figure first before purchasing it. I'm lucky that the only quality issue that I found is the small chipped area of the assembled Fusion Sword which can be fixed by minor sanding and applying paint on it.

CONCLUSION

I got one of the hottest PAK figures of all time! I'm pretty sure that he will go out of stock quickly. This new and very satisfying PAK version of Cloud is a colossal update from the old PA version. It's very presentable (another conversational piece on the table or shelf), durable and came with complete set of swords and extra hands. I have a feeling that SQEX will make a separate Fenrir bike that have a working sword rack on the sides this time, if that bike comes to reality then I guess I will pre-order again. See you on the next toy review!

Here's another nice edit of Cloud doing some Braver Limit Break.

Bahamut Sin sure had it coming

Cheers and Happy Collecting!

and BTW...

This is my 100th post on this blog, so... Huzzah!