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

He's a SeeD merc from Balamb Garden and he's very angsty. If you don't know who that angsty loner kid is, well... It's Squall Leonhart from Final Fantasy VIII. This Play Arts Kai action figure of him is not from the original game version though, this Squall is from Dissidia, Arcade/NT to be specific. Square-Enix got another reason to release this guy. If you guys didn't know, there's a smaller version of Dissidia Squall action figure.

"I'll send you packing in no time."

~ Squall Leonhart ~

PACKAGING

Front and back of the box.

Squall is the first character from Dissidia Arcade/NT that got released as a PAK figure. The coffin-box's design is consistent with Dissidia boxes with the dark clouds on the background of the figure and the usual stuff in front. The back shows more product shots of Squall PAK in different poses.

Front cover opened.

Open the front cover and look right to view the action figure and the accessories included inside through the viewing window. You can also read the texts on the left hand side.

He's out to complete his mission as a SeeD mercenary.

Packaging includes: Squall figure, Relvolver Gunblade, 3x gripping right hands, 1x open left hand Display stand

THE FIGURE

I'll say it now, if you have the old Squall Dissidia PAK, sell that old PAK and buy this one. It's a huge, huge upgrade over the old one, because this new PAK version of Squall is super accurate to the in-game model and cutscenes.... but there are some problems that I've encountered though.

Looking at Squall on four sides.

He looks good when you look at him on different angles. The design of the Dissidia version is very stylized than the original game version.

He's so handsome he almost look like a girl.

Now look at that handsome face! It's like Squall just jumped off the TV screen to the real world. The headsculpt looks great with nice skin paint/shading. His blue eyes really stands out and the scar between the eyes are sculpted.

GAP!

There's a downside on this head: there's a gap when you view the figure on the side, making the head look like it's floating.

His clothes is not ideal for summer season.

This leathery get-up is what Squall's wearing in Dissidia, it's more stylized than his FFVIII clothes. It's mostly black with leathery texture and wrinkled parts. The zippers are painted silver very well. Squall is also wearing a white shirt (or tank top) with stylish black trim underneath the unzipped jacket.

Backside

The back of the jacket shows more wrinkles and few other details.

Furs on a leather jacket!

The white furs as the jacket's collar have nice details and shadings around it.

Cool necklace.

The necklace is sculpted on the figure and it's painted pretty well. I just wish they made the necklace a separate accessory like Squall's old Play Arts figure.

Arms looks good.

The sleeves are black and have a lot of wrinkles. Squall is wearing black gloves.

I wonder how frustrated Squall is while undoing these belts
when he's going to take an emergency leak or dump.

Squall wears a lot of belts. These brown belts have nice details. I like the silver painted lion buckle. And on the sides a couple of white furs are present.

Skirt mantle for sytle

The right leg have this black mantle thing that's made of soft plastic and it doesn't move, having a simple hinge on this part makes this figure a bit better.

Squall's pants... are these made of leather too?

The pants are black too and just like the whole jacket, it got a lot of wrinkles for detail. The right leg have 3 straps with glossy finish. The bottom end of the pants is kinda soft and have cuts on the side for feet movement.

Cool boots.

The boots looks great it got silver studs and other details. They're flat at the bottom.

ACCESSORIES

Squall comes with a total of 5 extra accessories: One gunblade and four extra hands.

Squall's stuff

The amount is pretty standard for a PAK figure and I can't think of anything more to add except some spell effects or a Lionheart gunblade.

The Revolver

Squall got his Revolver gunblade. It's a sword that have parts that resembles a revolver pistol. It looks really good.

Is that a lion or a griffin?

The sword have some cool details like the lion-like creature that's etched on the blade.

The rotating bullet chambers.

The bullet chambers of the gunblade can rotate which is cool.

It got an actual keychain.

Now this is the reason why I wonder SQEX didn't give Squall a real necklace accessory because his gunblade have a real keychain on the bottom end of the grip.

Lion pendant

And you can tell that the pendant on the chain is a lion. Details!

The extra hands

Squall got four extra hands, three of them are gripping right hands that have different kind of grip on the gunblade. He also got an extra open left hand.

Display Stand

This is a disaster, the display stand on the Squall that I got have weak adhesive applied on its cardboard packaging making the parts of the stand to scatter. No wonder why it rattles every time I shake the box. Even though the packaging is already opened, I'm still not gonna assemble and use this display stand.

ARTICULATIONS

Cool chill guy pose.

I bet that Squall's slimmer character design will help the articulation points of this figure to move with less limitations and problems.

Looking up.

Thanks to that gap, the head can move without any problems, that gap is really ugly. The neck joint helps the head move around more.

Face palming because he got a huge gap on his head.

Both arms moves really well, no problems there. They don't have bicep swivel though, but that can be done by the shoulder and elbow ball-hinges. The wrist ball-hinges moves fine but kinda limited by the cuffs of the jacket.

He's doing the Blasting Zone.

The chest articulation is hidden or rather kinda invisible. The whole torso is a soft piece and have a huge cut or gap at the back for articulation purposes if you peek beneath the leather jacket.

His pose when drawing magics from monsters and opponents.

SQEX did this so that the design of the white shirt wont get ruined when you move the chest. The chest can move but kinda limited because of that "invisible articulation" design.

Ready and alert stance

The waist moves really well too, once again this is a hidden articulation because of the soft torso piece that goes above the crotch piece because Squall's white shirt is not tucked in.

This pose suggests he's about to do the Lionheart.

Both legs have really nice movement range thanks to Squall's almost skin tight pants. Both legs can raise really high on the sides and just good enough range to go up forward. Almost no movement to the back.

Pulling off the cool pose from the box.

Both legs have thigh swivel joint but the right swivel joint on my figure is really stiff or stuck and I can't move it.

Footsweepin'

The double-hinged knees looks good, not really ugly (but still ugly) when totally bent.

Unleashing the Fated Circle

Both feet have ankle ball-hinges and they can point up and down just fine and they can pivot so that's good. They lack toe hinges though that might work well on this figure.

SCALING

I watched some of Dissidia NT's cutscenes, specifically the earlier scene where Squall is with Lightning, Terra and Zidane. I'll say, this is my major complaint on this figure, here's why.

3-man Dissidia team.

As you can see, Squall is the tallest on this Dissidia team with Lightning (Dissidia) and Terra (Dissidia) but like I said, I watch the cutscene and Squall should be a bit more taller.

Hanging out with the protagonists.

We know Squall is a tall person right. In this picture, Squall is the shortest. Cloud (FFVII:AC) is taller than him and he's a guy with an average height for males. Zack (CC:FFVII) and Vincent (DoC:FFVII) are obviously taller.

Squall with the FFVII party.

Tifa (FFVII:AC) and Squall have the same height. Sephiroth (FFVII:AC), Barret (FFVII:AC) and Cid (FFVII:AC) are all taller than Squall.

With the guys from FFXV and also Nanamo and Cait Sith.

Noctis (FFXV) and Aranea (FFXV) are both taller than Squall. Lunafreya (FFXV) and Cindy (FFXV) are shorter.

Shortest to tallest.

Left to right, shortest to tallest: Serah (FFXIII), Lightning (LR:FFXIII), Squall, Fran (FFXII) and Gabranth (FFXII).

With the Variants and Keyblade weilders.

Now this is a better-looking picture. Squall is taller than Sora (KH3D), Riku (KH2) and Hatsune Miku (Variant). Catwoman (Variant) is a bit taller than Squall.

Random group photo.

Raiden (MGR) is the tallest in this group. Lara Croft (LotTR) and Squall almost have the same height. Harley Quinn (B:AK) and Leon S. Kennedy (RE6) are both shorter.

Overall when it comes to Final Fantasy characters, Squall's height comparison is almost a fail.

QUALITY ISSUES

The quality issues I've encountered on this Squall PAK figure is the gap on the head which all of Squall PAK figures have, the super stiff right thigh swivel joint and it looks like the right leg looks longer than the left leg.

CONCLUSION

The Dissidia Squall Play Arts Kai action figure is a great-looking action figure because it's accurate to the in-game counterpart and this is a better version than the older and smaller Dissidia version. The accessory count is pretty standard and comes with a cool gunblade with rotating bullet chamber and a real keychain.  The figure is super poseable too which I really like even though there's a single part that's very stiff. What I don't like on this figure is its height, this Squall figure is too short if you compare him with the other characters outside the Dissidia title. I'm still happy I got this PAK figure and at a cheap price at that. So far I got all the PAK figures from the Dissidia series and I still hope SQEX will make more. I only recommend this figure if you're a Squall fan or someone who wants to complete the Dissidia PAK collection.

Cheers and Happy Collecting!