[Toy Review] LIGHTNING - Dissidia Final Fantasy (Arcade/NT) Play Arts Kai

In Randomly Random blog, lightning strikes more than 3 times in the same place. Dissidia Final Fantasy's FFXIII representative, Lightning gets a Play Arts Kai action figure treatment and it's a huge upgrade over the classic Lightning PAK when it comes to appearance. So how this new version fare with its older figure counterparts and some PAK figures? This is my first Dissidia PAK figure.

"Leave it to a god to just do as they please."

~ Lightning ~

PACKAGING

Front and back of the box.

The box have a dark atmospheric theme that looks consistent to the Dissidia character reveal trailers and promotional images where there are dark clouds behind the character's product image. Other elements on the frontside of the box are the Dissidia and PAK logos and stickers like the 30th anniversary and the holo sticker. The back shows more product shots of Lightning in different poses.

Opened front cover

Opening the front cover reveals the figure and its accessories through the viewing window on the right hand side and on the left side, you can read some info about Lighting and the game.

She's out and ready to fight.

Packaging includes: Lightning figure, Blazefire Saber (Sword mode), Blazefire Saber (Gun mode), Blazefire Saber (Gun mode) grip part, Gripping right hand, Trigger right hand, Open left hand, Display stand

THE FIGURE

This figure is kinda light. It's really presentable and easy to the eye thanks to the colors used in Lightning's character design that gives more color to my PAK collection where most characters wear dark attire.

Viewing lightning on four sides

If you have an older FFXIII Lightning PAK, you can really say PAK figures improved a lot when it comes to sculptwork and joint applications. I don't have the old figure so I can't compare the two side by side but I saw one and I'll say that this new Lightning is obviously much better than the old one.

She's got a nice face

Lightning's face looks really nice, but her cheeks looks flat if you view her face in different angles. Her lips looks wide because of her thick lip stick.

See how the light passes through Lightning's hair?

The hair is translucent (hurray!), it looks better if you shine a light at the figure giving it a kinda realistic look for the hair.

Lightning's Guardian Corps Uniform

Lightning is wearing her white sleeveless Guardian Corps uniform. It looks simple and good with those details and straps and pockets that are painted brown and the buckles are painted silver.

Her necklace looks weird.

Under her uniform, Lighting is wearing a brown sleeveless turtleneck vest with a silver zipper. Here you can see that she's wearing a necklace, it's sculpted and not a separate accessory.

Long red cape.

Lightning's long red cape is present at the back, it's lightweight and made of soft flexible plastic.

Lightning's right arm.

Her right arm have two sculpted accessory bands on her bicep and she's wearing blue fingerless gloves with gold knuckles. Very nice skin paintjob and shadings.

Lightning's left arm.

The left arm have a shoulder guard and she's wearing a long black arm sleeve under her blue gloves

The "skorts".

Lightning's brown "skorts" (skirt with shorts underneath) look simple but with Nomura's signature touch on unnecessary zippers. The skorts are made of soft plastic and its belt buckle have silver paint applied on it like the zippers.

Will you look at that... nice!

If you look very closely underneath Lightning's top, her belly button have a silver piercing, now that's paying close attention to detail.

Very nice bag.

She also have a red belt bag that makes an illusion that it's connected to her left leg. The red belt on the waist part is a separate piece. The bag on the leg is detailed with studs and pockets.

The Blazefire Saber's holster.

At the back, the belt have Lighning's weapon holster where you can store her Blazefire Saber.

Very fit legs!

Lightning got a nice pair of long, slim legs. Nice skin paint application there and the left lap have the belt bag's additional straps. Remember, the bag itself is not connected to the belt so that it won't impede the left leg's movement.

She got a nice looking pair of boots.

The pair of brown boots looks good with nice details. It also have gray straps with silver buckles and a gray outsole.

The boots have details at the bottom.

If you look at the bottom, the shoes are treaded.

ACCESSORIES

As expected, Lightning got her usual stuff, well because the sword is the only thing that she have in Dissidia. Good thing that even though the figure's Blazefire Saber doesn't transform, SQEX provided the weapon's gun mode that comes with the grip accessory. For extra hands she only have three.

The accessories lack something...

SQEX didn't make Odin's Zantetsuken/Gagnrad weapon and its pair of gripping hands for this figure which is unfortunate.

Blazefire Saber - Sword Mode

Lightning's weapon, Blazefire Saber looks really good. It got really nice details and paintwork. This is the sword mode. Fun fact: This weapon, especially on how it transforms, is likely based on the Balisong, a foldable knife that originated in the Philippines.

Blazefire Saber - Gun Mode

Here's the gun mode of the weapon, it features two removable parts: the grip and the iron sight. The paintwork and details are consisted to the weapon's sword mode.

Extra grip accessory

This is the grip accessory for the gun. You can swap this to the gun grip so that you can store the weapon on Lightning's holster.

This is what the weapon looks like if you swap the gun's default grip to the extra grip accessory.

Wait, before you store the weapon on the weapon holster, you need to remove the little iron sight above the weapon's muzzle.

The iron sight is removable.

You need to be careful, because you can easily loose this little thing.

The Blazefire Saber is properly kept in the holster.

After removing the tiny iron sight, you can now store the weapon into Lightnings holster.

The extra hands

The extra gripping and trigger right hands are for holding the Blazefire Saber's sword and gun mode respectively. The open left hand are for other poses and gestures. These hands looks good and consistent to the design and paintwork.

It's said on the manual that the grips are made into two detachable pieces so that you can easily slide in the gripping and trigger hands then re-attach the grips. I tried to detach these things but it's hard to do that and I'm afraid that I might break them. So I just did some finagling to make the gripping and trigger hands hold the grips.

Display Stand

If you want to pose Lightning like she's doing the air dash or any other aerial attacks, use this display stand. As always, I'm not going to use this.

ARTICULATION

Mimicking the Lightning's scene in Dissidia 012.

This new Lightning figure have more articulations than the old FFXIII version. This Lightning is highly poseable, but we'll see if SQEX screwed up some of this figure's articulations.

[Left] Waiting...

[Right] Reaching for her l'Cie brand.

The head can move, the collars doesn't hinder its movement that much but her hair does especially when looking and leaning to the left. The head can look left/right, tilt side to side and look up/down. The neck can also move but it's a little hard to use this joint because of the turtle neck.

Dissidia pose

Lightning's "ab belt" hides the chest articulation, that good. She can turn and lean side to side and do ab crunches and she can lean backwards a bit.

Wielding her Blazefire Saber.

I tried to move the waist but I find it difficult. I'm not sure but I think the waist joint doesn't exist in this figure.

She's serious when it comes to fighting.

Both arms moves well. The left shoulder guard doesn't hinder much of the left arm's movements. The shoulders features the still weird ball-peg/hinge combo. They move really well but sometimes they leave a noticeable gap if you pose the arms in some ways.

Her fighting stance.

No bicep swivel on both arms while it's possible to put one right under the right arm's 2nd strap and the end of the sleeve on the left arm. Good thing that the ball-hinges on the elbows can do the job. The elbow hinges moves nicely and can bend more than 90 degrees. The wrist ball-hinges moves fine and it doesn't look bad.

Ready to charge, guns blazing.

The skorts have cuts on the side so that the legs can raise up forward and sidward with few limitations. The left leg's movement is hindered by the bag that's made of hard plastic. The skort always gets bunged by the bag. Both legs can twist on the joint but there are no leg swivel that will still look good if they're present on this figure thanks to Lightning's undershorts.

Shooting

Both knees are double-hinged. they move well but still looks ugly if you bend and look at it at the front.

Dodge and shoot

The boots have ball-hinges for ankles, it looks good and moves really well. the boots also have the classic toe swivel.

Pulling off one of the poses on the box.

By the way, the red cape is also articulated via ball-hinge. But still, I would like this to be made of cloth with bendy wires in it just like PAK Cloud's (Advent Children) skirt mantle.

SCALING

Time to compare this Lightning Dissidia PAK figure's scale with the rest of the figures in my collection.

Two Lightnings and a Serah.

Let's start with the FFXIII series. Well, the new Lightning is a tiny bit taller than the LR:FFXIII version. Serah (FFXIII) is really short in this picture.

Lightning with the FFVII team.

Lightning is awkwardly shorter than Cloud (FFVII:AC) and Tifa (FFVII:AC). I think it's OK that she's shorter than Barret (FFVII:AC) and Sephiroth (FFVII:AC).

Lightning with the people of Ivalice.

Both Gabranth (FFXII) and Fran (FFXII) are taller than Lightning, I don't see any problem here.

Lightning with the guys from the world of Eos and a royalty from Ul'dah.

Noctis (FFXV) , Aranea (FFXV) and Cindy (FFXV) are taller while Lunafreya (FFXV) are about the same height as Lightning. I also included Nanamo (FFXIV) as an extra.

Lightning with the Keyblade duo and a couple of Variants.

Sora (KH3D) and Riku (KH2) are obviously shorter than Lightning. The Variants like Hatsune Miku is a bit shorter and Catwoman is taller than Lighting.

Lightning with random characters.

Raiden (MGR) and Lara Croft (RotTR) are taller. Harley Quinn (B:AK) and Leon S. Kennedy (RE6) are shorter.

Lightnings!

Here are my four Lightning figures (including her Trading Arts Kai mini figure). As you can see, the new Dissidia Lightning is a tiny bit taller than the LR:FFXIII version as I mentioned earlier and the FFXII-2 version is obviously shorter. If you ask me the LR:FFXIII version have the prettiest face and for that reason, this figure will stay on my shelf. The FFXII-2 version, my first PAK figure, will go back to her box for safe-keeping.

Well this is disappointing... Overall this new Lightning PAK figure is short. I expect this to be taller actually.

QUALITY ISSUES

This is surprising, I didn't see any major problems around the figure. No minor problems like paint slacks, sticks and drops around this figure too.

CONCLUSION

I have four Lightning figures and I'm happy to have her three different versions. This Dissidia Lightning PAK figure passes on the looks, presentation and quality department. This figure doesn't offer anything new when it comes to articulation (except for that weird new shoulder joints) and it also lack some standard joints. The accessory count is standard and there are stuff that really needs to be included. Lastly, her scale comparison sucks. If you have the old FFXIII version, I think it's time for you to upgrade to this Dissidia version... well, it's up to you.

Here's the continuation of the toy comic featured in my Aranea Highwind PAK review.

Lightning's having trouble changing clothes.

Cheers and Happy Collecting!