2023 HAUL VER 9.5
(note: images are hosted via AUKN for the meantime)
More parcels arrived throughout the week between Tuesday through to today, so I decided to bundle them onto a single post to make it easier to recap.
So in case you haven't noticed my posts on Discord, BSky or Twitter, I have been re-reading One Piece from the very beginning because I wanted to start fresh before reading the Box Set 4 volumes and you can also thank the live-action series for convincing me to read them. Now I'm currently at Volume 54 which is the start of Impel Down's arc but it's been a very enjoyable read throughout.
The point is that I do have a good amount of One Piece games in the backlog but earlier in the year they released One Piece: Odyssey for PlayStation 5, which was included in The Game Collection's £10 bonus reward points deal so I decided to get that now. The plan is to get to Volume 90 before playing most of the PS4/PS5 One Piece games as they cover up to that point (except for Pirate Warriors 4 which has half of Wano's arc so that'll be on-hold).
I mentioned it before but it was finally time that I received some replacement cases for my PS3, PS4 & Switch games. This is mainly due to some damage on the cases or the sticker residue was too much over the years. PS4 had more issues than the rest but at least Collection of Mana on Switch is now sorted with a better case.
This was a last minute (literally a "oh I forgot about this") pickup, but it's a good one as we now have Hideo Nakata's 1998 film Ring (リング) on 4K Ultra HD from Arrow Video. Surprisingly it's a regular slipcase and not rigid but I'm fine with that. The release is 4K UHD only but that's okay as I own the box set on Blu-ray. There are two versions of this release by Arrow, with the other using the original theatrical artwork as its front cover but I wasn't a big fan of it so I opted for the main one which they did use for their limited edition collection box set and standard Blu-ray of the main film.
Next we have three more Nintendo Switch games that arrived today.
Starting off with The Legend of Nayuta: Boundless Trails from NIS America which I ordered through The Game Collection as it was priced reasonably well for an new title. This is a remaster of the Japan-only PSP game which is also a spin-off of The Legend of Heroes franchise, with the main difference being the gameplay is more Ys-style than the Trails approach. Deluxe Edition includes a booklet and digital soundtrack copy.
And then we have our second Stackry order with DOOM 64 and PowerSlave Exhumed from Limited Run Games, and both were ordered through eBay's US sellers. Now the long story short of this situation was that VGP sold out on PowerSlave at one point and I went into FOMO because the LRG games on VGP's store are not reprints but rather last remaining stock - the worst part about this whole ordeal was they did get more in and I made an error by not being patient enough to at least wait a few more hours before jumping the gun. Now I was at least smart enough to choose Stackry for its destination rather than international shipping which eased the blow. That said, to remedy the situation I also used this opportunity to try out Stackry's consolidation and after some debating I decided to go for another eBay order located in the US which ended up being DOOM 64 (and unlike the other game, this one was actually sold out and not on VGP for Switch, plus the price was rather decent).
Now the Stackry journey was very much similar to the first phase back in August (see this post for context) but the main difference here is that this is just two expensive Switch games that were paired together into a single order. Shipping was $19.99 followed by $4 for consolidation and $5 for bubble wrap and fragile stickers (basically packaging protection). When you consolidate orders together you do have the option to keep the invoices if needed but its default unticked so those will be removed if there was any.
Journey progress:
2nd Sept (eBay order 1 made, then shipped same day) -> 5th Sept (eBay order 2 made) -> 6th Sept (eBay order 2 shipped) -> 7th Sept (Stackry received order 1 package) -> 9th Sept (order 2 package arrived at Stackry) -> 11th Sept (Stackry officially confirms arrival of order 2, basically it seems they don't work weekends) -> 12th (I request consolidation) -> 13th (Stackry confirms completion of consolidation) -> 14th (Stackry order shipped) -> 16th (processed in the US for UK) -> 19th (cleared UK customs) -> 20th (arrived with Evri) -> 21st (delivered)
Again, my overall thoughts are pretty much similar to the first one. The package arrived safely via Evri, there's tracking to see how it's doing (which was DHL then Evri like before for Global Mail) and the bubble wrap work was very good. They chose the right box considering the original two packages for both games could have easily been damaged - that said, similar to Collection of Mana my PowerSlave copy had the same problem with the slightly bent case affecting the artwork but I was fortunate to have a spare case to fix that. Good timing on that.
So yeah, stay tuned for Stackry Phase 3 arriving sometime in early October which focuses on a $200 Rightstuf order.
(note: images are hosted via AUKN for the meantime)
More parcels arrived throughout the week between Tuesday through to today, so I decided to bundle them onto a single post to make it easier to recap.
So in case you haven't noticed my posts on Discord, BSky or Twitter, I have been re-reading One Piece from the very beginning because I wanted to start fresh before reading the Box Set 4 volumes and you can also thank the live-action series for convincing me to read them. Now I'm currently at Volume 54 which is the start of Impel Down's arc but it's been a very enjoyable read throughout.
The point is that I do have a good amount of One Piece games in the backlog but earlier in the year they released One Piece: Odyssey for PlayStation 5, which was included in The Game Collection's £10 bonus reward points deal so I decided to get that now. The plan is to get to Volume 90 before playing most of the PS4/PS5 One Piece games as they cover up to that point (except for Pirate Warriors 4 which has half of Wano's arc so that'll be on-hold).
I mentioned it before but it was finally time that I received some replacement cases for my PS3, PS4 & Switch games. This is mainly due to some damage on the cases or the sticker residue was too much over the years. PS4 had more issues than the rest but at least Collection of Mana on Switch is now sorted with a better case.
This was a last minute (literally a "oh I forgot about this") pickup, but it's a good one as we now have Hideo Nakata's 1998 film Ring (リング) on 4K Ultra HD from Arrow Video. Surprisingly it's a regular slipcase and not rigid but I'm fine with that. The release is 4K UHD only but that's okay as I own the box set on Blu-ray. There are two versions of this release by Arrow, with the other using the original theatrical artwork as its front cover but I wasn't a big fan of it so I opted for the main one which they did use for their limited edition collection box set and standard Blu-ray of the main film.
Next we have three more Nintendo Switch games that arrived today.
Starting off with The Legend of Nayuta: Boundless Trails from NIS America which I ordered through The Game Collection as it was priced reasonably well for an new title. This is a remaster of the Japan-only PSP game which is also a spin-off of The Legend of Heroes franchise, with the main difference being the gameplay is more Ys-style than the Trails approach. Deluxe Edition includes a booklet and digital soundtrack copy.
And then we have our second Stackry order with DOOM 64 and PowerSlave Exhumed from Limited Run Games, and both were ordered through eBay's US sellers. Now the long story short of this situation was that VGP sold out on PowerSlave at one point and I went into FOMO because the LRG games on VGP's store are not reprints but rather last remaining stock - the worst part about this whole ordeal was they did get more in and I made an error by not being patient enough to at least wait a few more hours before jumping the gun. Now I was at least smart enough to choose Stackry for its destination rather than international shipping which eased the blow. That said, to remedy the situation I also used this opportunity to try out Stackry's consolidation and after some debating I decided to go for another eBay order located in the US which ended up being DOOM 64 (and unlike the other game, this one was actually sold out and not on VGP for Switch, plus the price was rather decent).
Now the Stackry journey was very much similar to the first phase back in August (see this post for context) but the main difference here is that this is just two expensive Switch games that were paired together into a single order. Shipping was $19.99 followed by $4 for consolidation and $5 for bubble wrap and fragile stickers (basically packaging protection). When you consolidate orders together you do have the option to keep the invoices if needed but its default unticked so those will be removed if there was any.
Journey progress:
2nd Sept (eBay order 1 made, then shipped same day) -> 5th Sept (eBay order 2 made) -> 6th Sept (eBay order 2 shipped) -> 7th Sept (Stackry received order 1 package) -> 9th Sept (order 2 package arrived at Stackry) -> 11th Sept (Stackry officially confirms arrival of order 2, basically it seems they don't work weekends) -> 12th (I request consolidation) -> 13th (Stackry confirms completion of consolidation) -> 14th (Stackry order shipped) -> 16th (processed in the US for UK) -> 19th (cleared UK customs) -> 20th (arrived with Evri) -> 21st (delivered)
Again, my overall thoughts are pretty much similar to the first one. The package arrived safely via Evri, there's tracking to see how it's doing (which was DHL then Evri like before for Global Mail) and the bubble wrap work was very good. They chose the right box considering the original two packages for both games could have easily been damaged - that said, similar to Collection of Mana my PowerSlave copy had the same problem with the slightly bent case affecting the artwork but I was fortunate to have a spare case to fix that. Good timing on that.
So yeah, stay tuned for Stackry Phase 3 arriving sometime in early October which focuses on a $200 Rightstuf order.
