Kotobukiya is a company known for quality figures, that much is for certain. And when we first saw their take on Sengoku Rance's Isoroku Yamamoto ... well, we figured it'd be more of the same, as we were blown away by how good she looked in the press photos. From the look on her face to the design of her clothes, she looked like a winner. Colette called Isoroku" really lovely" and Eva said, "I can't get over how amazing this figure looks."

The question, though, was whether she'd look just as good when she was released to the public, as the past two Sengoku Rance figures from Kotobukiya were good, but not great. The folks at Kotobukiya were kind enough to send Isoroku our way, so it was only right that we took a good hard look at Isoroku Yamamoto and gave you, the Tomopop reader, our two cents on this 1/8-scale beauty.

Hit the jump to see if Isoroku lives up to the standard we've come to expect from Kotobukiya!

Isoroku Yamamoto is based off a real-life person of the same name. Except that person didn't exist in the Sengoku period: Isoroku Yamamoto was commander-in-chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II. How this translated into a bow-wielding female, I will never know and maybe I don't want to know.

Isoroku's box alone gives you the feeling that this is a quality figure. She'd displayed prominently in the open-faced front, while the design on the box is elegant, yet simple. Kotobukiya lets the figure speak for itself, and the end result works pretty well.

The plastic shell that holds Isoroku and her parts in place is your standard two-part snap-together setup, which seemingly should make it easy to get her out while providing a lot of support (or so I thought). Unfortunately, I picked a rather blustery day to do this whole photo shoot on, and as such, the lightweight plastic kept flexing and trying to roll away.

And here are the instructions. In Japanese. Thankfully, there are pictures to go with it, too. Any figure that comes with instructions for putting it together means only one thing: you get to see me assemble it! Since it was a bit windy outside, I ended up doing it indoors.

To be honest, I could do a whole post just on this part of it. It was quite the adventure getting Isoroku out of her packaging, starting with the plastic packaging. The hair was in a plastic part all by itself, which was taped into the rest of the packaging and had to be removed first. The bow was in a separate plastic bag taped to the side of the plastic packaging and the rest of the figure is packed inside a relatively easy to open plastic shell. Well, relatively easily except for one thing:

Yet once again, my old adversary, the twist-tie, has returned. I really hate these things on my figure packaging because they're often so hard to remove and they can sometimes get stuck, no matter how much extra support they provide. Thankfully, this wasn't as awful as my last experience with twist-ties on Monsieur Bome's Kasumi figure, but it was still a bit of a pain in the ass.

Hold on, miss. I've almost got you free!

Isoroku seems a bit indifferent, though.

After getting rid of the twist tie, I had to deal with this sticky tape-like plastic that Kotobukiya had wrapped around some of the more fragile parts. It's a lot of packaging for just one figure

And now, on to the hair -

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF-

OK, we've freed the hair from the evil twist-ties of doom. As you can tell, the piece is separate from the rest of the figure and feels a little bit fragile in my hands, but it also feels a bit sturdy, which is odd. It pops in snuggly to the back of Isoroku's head and doesn't seem so fragile once it's attached to the figure, though.

Isoroku's bow is actually pretty cool. The detail on the handle is pretty good, but what steals the show is the string on the bow. Not only is it a string, albeit a plastic one, but it's also wrapped around each end of the bow in a manner reminiscent of an actual bow. It's a nice little detail that really adds to the figure.

And the last part of it all are these two arrows. One is supposed to fit into a notch in Isoroku's right hand, while the other is meant to be placed between her fingers. There's a nice bit of detail on here, and surprisingly, once they're set in place, the arrows don't move as much as you might think they would.

After a good 10-15 minutes of getting everything out of the box and putting it all together, the end result is quite gorgeous. I love the way the entire figure feels like it's flowing, from the folds in Isoroku's hakama to the way her hair swirls like clouds in the sky. Her pose is one of strength as she holds her bow, arrows in hand, ready to strike down her foes across the battlefield with a look of determination and focus on her face.

From the side, you can get a glance at some of the elaborate detailing that has gone into the figure. There's also a distinct lack of any painting mishaps, resulting in a very clean looking figure that seems to be without flaws. The only bad thing is that not everything's perfect ...

Well, you see the problem. Maybe I just had the bow in her hand the wrong way, but it does move around a bit too freely and it's quite easy for the bow to fall right out of her left hand. It has, in fact, already done this to me a few times, even after I brought it inside out of the wind. As mentioned earlier, I sincerely thought the arrow in her right hand would be the real issue, as it's only held in by her two fingers, but that arrow is actually quite stable, even in the gusty breeze.

A closer shot of the face shows off that steely look and the detail on her bangs and her eyes. Again, note that there aren't any painting mistakes on this figure: the colors are not only inside the lines of the figure, but they're all painted correctly. Kotobukiya has a reputation for this kind of quality, and I'm proud to say Isoroku lives up to that reputation.

Another closer shot here of her upper torso and clothing, showing off more of the great detail Kotobukiya has worked into this piece. There's no part of this figure that makes me stop and think that they've missed something, which for a collector is a very, very good thing. 

The base Isoroku stands on isn't perhaps the best option Kotobukiya could have gone with. A translucent bright red base that stands out and could draw the eye away from Isoroku herself? Just seems like there could have been a better option here to get the logo on the base and still keep the focus on the figure herself. One of those options ultimately would have been just a transparent, colorless base.

But again, it's mostly forgettable because of the great detail on Isoroku. I mean, take a look at that katana, sheath and hilt. Doesn't that make you help forget that she's standing on what could be mistaken for a block of molten lava?

So what can be learned from all of this?

1.) Do not do photo shoots on windy days.

2.) I hate packaging that's hard to open and has a ton of twist-ties I have to undo.

3.) Even so, Kotobukiya's Isoroku Yamamoto figure is gorgeously sculpted and well-painted, perfect for any collector, even those who aren't Sengoku Rance fans.She is every bit as beautiful as we first thought she would be.

If you want one of these figures for yourself, they are available on some Japanese online figure shops right now. Many have already sold out of Isoroku, but Amiami's brand-new English site has her in stock right now for 6,535 yen. She's also getting a North American release later this month, so if you can wait a little bit, you can probably pick her up from Kid Nemo and other retailers once their pre-orders are taken care of.