[TAO's Note: It's time for some ninja love, and Clark is here to deliver it. He's taking a look at Ryu Hayabusa, from the famed Ninja Gaiden video game series, which is known as one of the toughest ever. Unfortunately, the toy might not be so tough. Keep reading to see what that means!]

Name: Ryu Hayabusa
Line: Player Select: Ninja Gaiden II
Manufacturer: NECA
Price: Retail: $13.99-$15.99, Online: $12.99-$19.99
Scale: 7 in.
Accessories: Sword and Scabbard, 2x tonfas (giant, monster-slaying tonfas), 2x sets of hands
Sponsor Listings: Ka-Razy Kings of Toys-$7.50 (sale price)

After Wes chose Chun-li as one of his toys of the year I decided to spend the money on her. Yes, she is pretty dang awesome, and I was so excited for her I decided to get another Neca figure. Ryu Hayabusa is the head ninja from the Koga clan, he possesses the swan dragon sword that feeds on on the energy of his slain enemies to become more powerful, and he is from the future.  Okay, I just made that whole rambling sentence up. I really don’t know what the story is behind Ryu. All I know is that I was playing the Ninja Gaiden game on the Xbox, and it starts off in what appears to be ancient Japan, and then the next thing I know I’m in a flying ship killing futuristic soldiers. It’s actually a really fun game, and if I had an Xbox 360 I’m sure I would find Ninja Gaiden II equally enjoyable. (BTW: if this review has an unusual amount of poor grammar please forgive me, I’m working on very little sleep) 

Ryu has the type of sculpt that you are just not going to get with a more mainstream figure. As much as I love DCUC (my favorite mass market figures) and the four horsemen’s sculpts, the truth is Mattel is not going to flip the bill to put thousands of somethings this crazily detailed on pegs all across the country. However, he is not without his faults, but lets get the good out of the way first. Ryu is wearing a very distinctive ninja outfit. It is certainly not something that a ninja from the Edo period would wear (I don’t know if there were ninjas during the Edo period and I don’t really care to look it up, I’m content in knowing that ninjas are made from mutagen and eat pizza). 

His suit is made for protection and function, but I don’t think for comfort. It appears to be a combination of leather and chainmail, and is covered in various buckles and rivets. The more I think about it, it is a pretty silly suit, and I don’t know how Ryu is able to run in the thing (much less flip out and kill everybody), but Neca’s sculptors have made it awesome. The chainmail is interwoven throughout the suit, with patches on the legs, torso and back. It may not be an exact replica of the way chainmail looks, but it is very convincing for a toy figure, and the texture brings some nice variety to what would otherwise be mostly smooth black plastic. Another great way to break up smooth plastic is to add some textured armor pieces on the shins and forearms, oh and while your at it lets put some leather straps and buckles. Ryu also has a soft plastic scarf around his neck (glued in place at the front) that has the texture of a knitted fabric. Ryu’s ninja mask is actually more of a helmet, with cloth covering his mouth and nose (texture matching the scarf). The trademark silver crest thing on Ryu’s forehead is made from a very soft rubber, but is still equally detailed as the harder plastic used for the rest of the body.

Equally impressive is Ryu’s sword.  The hilt gives the impression that it is truly wrapped in fabric, with an impressive but not ornate hand guard. It is pretty tempting to make swords oversized for action figures, but Ryu’s is nice and proportional to his body.

Alright, I’ve pretty much gushed over this figure’s sculpt, so why does he not get a perfect score? The problem with Ryu are is proportions. The legs are much too long for his body and arms. I think most of the extra length is in the calves, but I’m not sure. The proportion issue can be ignored to a degree when he is posed in dramatic stances. The other problem is that he can’t really stand in a neutral pose. If you try to straighten his legs and stand him up his knees cock in, and then you really notice how long the legs are. The length of the legs to the arms really irks me, and I’m surprised that Neca has made Ryu look like he’s walking on stilts.  

Sculpt Score: 7 / 10

Neca has gone above and beyond other companies in their painting of this figure. Most of him is just cast in black plastic, but there subtle applications of different grays that make him look amazing. Obviously Ryu has silver highlights on his buckles and rivots. There is also silver piping on his helmet, forearm guard and shin guards. In addition to the silver, there is also a gray piping on his feet, and armor, as well as gray on his body. Even the scarf, which is cast in black rubber, has a lighter gray wash over it, and really makes it look like fabric. The paint applications are very well done, but there are just a couple of splotches here and there and there is a strap below his right knee that is painted gray, but the corresponding strap below the left knee is just the black plastic (although the rivots were still detailed with silver). These issues are a bit knit-picky and I don’t think are very evident, but at the same time I didn’t feel right giving him a perfect score.

Ryu’s weapons are all nicely painted as well, from his sword that has a vibrant red hilt with gold details, to his tonfas have a nice weathered metal look with silver detailing. Once again, Neca has schooled mass market retailers with their efforts in the paint department.

Paint Score: 9 / 10

This is an area in which, until recently, Neca had always been severely lacking. Luckily they have decided to expand the posability of their figures (starting with the Street Fighter line I think) and this figure has comparable articulation to Toy Biz’s Marvel Legends figures. The main difference from the ML figures and this guy is that I don’t find Ryu’s articulation to be distractingly ugly and break up the look of the sculpt, and Ryu’s joints are tight and the ML figures tend to be pretty loose (especially with the passage of time). He has pretty much all of the joints that you would want, with a good range of motion. Ryu is ninja’d up with swivel/hinge joints at neck (where the neck meets the body), shoulders, wrists, hips and ankles. Double hinge joints at the knees and elbows, an ab crunch (with great range), swivel biceps, swivel waste, swivel thighs (at the hips), hinged toes, and a balljoint where the head meets the neck.

All of the joints are tight, and the only semi-weak point are the shoulders. At their lowest point the arms stick out slightly from the body, and you can’t quite raise them up to be parallel to the ground.  So the arms are left with about 60-70 degrees of wingspan capabilities without feeling like you are forcing them. The head ends up having a great range of motion with the combined swivel hinge joint at the base and balljoint at the head, this can add real character to his poses.

Articulation Score: 9 / 10

Ryu is certainly a fun figure that has a very cool design and can hold some great poses. I don’t have much use for the tonfas, I find them irritatingly large, and his hands don’t hold them very tightly, but his sword is great. Ryu was supposed to also have three throwing daggers that can slide onto his left thigh, but these were left out of the package. However, I contacted Neca and they said that they could mail the throwing daggers to me. I sent them my name, address and copy of my receipt but have not heard back again, so I don’t know if they’re on their way or if I’ll have to contact them again later. There is a quality control issue that I ran across with my figure. When I decided to swap his hands for the first time to see what the tonfas would look like, his sword holding hand broke when I tried to remove it. I was able to get the peg out of the forearm with some needle nose pliers, but then I was left with a couple of options. I put the alternate tonfa hand on, and found that it could hold the sword just fine. However I like the look of the actual sword-holding hand, so with a little hot water I was able to take the peg out of the tonfa hand and put it in the sword hand. This little surgery ended up being a simple procedure, and I haven’t had any problems since. I am left without a usable tonfa hand, but since I’m not a big fan of them anyway it’s not a huge loss for me. Unfortunately, due to this little issue I had to knock his fun score down a bit.

Fun Score: 7 / 10

 

I got Ryu for just over $15.00 with shipping, and I feel that it is a fair price for a figure like this. He made in smaller production runs than Marvel Legend or DCUC figures, but is larger. Actually, with the recent price hike of DCUC, I can’t leave Walmart with one of them for under $16.20 including tax. So when I consider that this guy is now cheaper than Mattel’s premiere 6” line, and much cheaper than their collector friendly MOTUC figures, I am real happy with the purchase. Sure he doesn’t have loads of accessories, but what he does have are nicely detailed. He did have that QC issue with the hand, but it was an easy fix, and I can’t find anything online that makes me think this is a common problem with him either.

Value Score: 7 / 10

  

7 / 10 - Nicely detailed sculpt, but wonky proportions knock him down a bit.

9 / 10 - Near perfect paint, and kudos to Neca for going the extra mile and adding dark grays on top of black plastic to really add depth.

9 / 10 - Plenty of joints to do all of his crazy ninja stuff, and don’t kill the look of the sculpt.

7 / 10 - Would have been an 8 or 9, but time spent fixing a broken hand knocks it down.

7 / 10 - A very good price for a collector figure like this, also would have been an 8 had I not had to fix the hand, or if the throwing daggers were included in the package.

 78 / 100 - This is a Good Toy

Dang it, Ryu, you just missed out on greatness. Actually I think Ryu is better described as a “very” good toy, but still not quite great. Had it not been for the broken hand, that basically was too tight in the arm so it didn’t come out cleanly, or if his legs were slightly shorter, then I am certain he would have ended up at about an 84. Unfortunately, I have to calls them as I sees them.

-Clark

This could be the figure given away in this month's Review Commentator Contest. Join the discussion by leaving a comment on this review for a chance to win!

Update: One week after I wrote NECA an email about getting the throwing daggers for Ryu Hayabusa, sure enough they showed up in the mail.  They aren't anything spectacular, just small silver knives.  They fit nicely in the straps on Ryu's left thigh, and can be held in between the fingers on either Ryu's left hand, or in his sword hand.  They are incredibly smaOne week after I wrote NECA an email about getting the throwing daggers for Ryu Hayabusa, sure enough they showed up in the mail.  They aren't anything spectacular, just small silver knives.  They fit nicely in the straps on Ryu's left thigh, and can be held in between the fingers on either Ryu's left hand, or in his sword hand.  They are incredibly small and will be immediately lost once they fall on the carpet, only to be sucked up by the vacuum soon after that.  Still I am incredibly excited to get them.

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