Monday, February 15, 2016

Aragami

The Aragami (荒神, アラガミ; violent gods) are giant chimeric monsters from the game God Eater. I have not played the game, but it takes place in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by various species of Aragami whom the players kill and harvest for resources.


The game franchise expanded into an animated version of the story which started airing last year. The anime version of God Eater belongs to the action-oriented seinen genre, with violence, gore, and underboob.

The story is pretty standard fare, but one thing that really stood out for me was the primary antagonist Aragami known as Dyaus Pita.



I found the creature to be terrifying, particularly because it had a human face which seemed to be completely devoid of human intelligence.

Anyway, I liked the monster so much, I went ahead and bought some of the Bandai trading figures (超造形魂; Chouzoukei Damashii) that were made for the game.


The Vajra Aragami is the base type of its species. For some reason, it is always shown with a broken fang.


Dyaus Pita, a sub-type of the Vajra. There is also another version in the game known as Dyaus Pita (Resurrection) with skeletal dragon-like wings.


Prithvi Mata, is another sub-type of the Vajra. It has not appeared in the anime.


All three of the figures have the same basic body, but vary with respect to paint scheme, face/head, and neck frills. They also come with their own 80mm bases.



As far as size goes, I think they work well with 1/72 scale humans when compared to the 1:1 scale Vajra display used at events [1],[2and how they are portrayed in the games.




The anime versions of the creatures on the other hand, are a lot bigger (although the size will vary a bit within the game as well). This being the case, I see the option for some to use the figures for 10mm or 15mm gaming as well.


The final monster from the set that looked interesting was Sariel.


It is a chimeric creature that seems to be part siren and part butterfly, with maybe a bit of fish mixed in. I don't know anything else about it, and I don't think it has appeared in the anime at all.


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