Kit Review

Straight build

Size comparison with a cigarette pack.
It's a nice, compact little size.

Face and head parts

The hair texture is sculpted quite three-dimensionally and looks really convincing.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - The ribbon on the side of her head has a screw-shaped detail molded into it — there's no actual

The ribbon on the side of her head has a screw-shaped detail molded into it —
There's no actual screw there, it's just molded to represent the real thing.

The mark on the skirt comes pre-printed directly on the runner.

Feet section

Weapons

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Rear view with the head removed. There's a big ribbon back there, but it's mostly hidden behind

Rear view with the head removed.
There's a big ribbon back there, but it's mostly hidden behind the hair..

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - There's a USB port cover on her back — of course there's no actual USB port, it's just recreatin

There's a USB port cover on her back —
Of course there's no actual USB port, it's just recreating the look from the show.
I have a feeling... someone's going to mod this into a real USB port.

Oh my, how embarrassing..
Here's a look at the bloomers under the skirt.

Weapons and accessories shot

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - The weapons and accessories have zero color separation. You get a sword, a gun, and a broom (dek

The weapons and accessories have zero color separation.
You get a sword, a gun, and a broom (deki brush).

Two sets of hands are included — fists and weapon-holding hands.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - The weapons are secured by detaching and reattaching the fingertips, and the fit is tight enough

The weapons are secured by detaching and reattaching the fingertips,
and the fit is tight enough to hold things pretty firmly.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - The face is assembled by combining the eyes and face separately, and both come already painted o

The face is assembled by combining the eyes and face separately,
and both come already painted on the runner itself.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - There are 3 eye parts in total, but... at a glance they all look the same and it's hard to tell

There are 3 eye parts in total, but...
at a glance they all look the same and it's hard to tell them apart;;
If you look very closely, the pupils are ever so slightly different,
and the gaze direction shifts a little left/center/right...
but the difference really isn't all that clear -.-;

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - You remove the face (Face Off!) and swap out just the eye section. Looking at it like that, it's

You remove the face (Face Off!)
and swap out just the eye section.
Looking at it like that, it's a little creepy..;;

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - You can also pull out the back hair ribbon, and the pin that holds it in is shaped like an audio

You can also pull out the back hair ribbon,
and the pin that holds it in is shaped like an audio jack..

Articulation. Basically 90-degree bend joints.

Leg articulation with the skirt lifted up.
The skirt itself limits the range of motion.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Foot joint structure. It bends back quite a lot but barely tilts forward. Structurally, it's mos

Foot joint structure.
It bends back quite a lot but barely tilts forward.
Structurally, it's most effective when tilting the foot side to side.

The ponytail on top is on a ball joint, so it can rotate around reasonably well.

The back hair moves up and down to some degree, kind of like the Valsione from Super Robot Wars.

The side hair strands on each side move independently.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Starting with a crying pose~

Waaah~
Starting with a crying pose~

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Punching stance (1/3)

Punching stance

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Hoihoi-san basic pose — swapping in the left-looking eyes does give a slightly more glancing fee

Hoihoi-san basic pose
Swapping in the left-looking eyes does give a slightly more glancing feel.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Basic pose #2 (1/4)

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Basic pose #2 (2/4)

Basic pose #2

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Sword action (1/3)

Sword action

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Holding the broom (1/3)

Holding the broom

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Hoihoi~ She can stand on one foot, but you really need to balance her carefully.. (1/3)

Hoihoi~
She can stand on one foot, but you really need to balance her carefully..

Size comparison with the Super Robot Wars Hückebein

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Size comparison with the HG First. When you factor in the back hair ribbon, they end up being ab

Size comparison with the HG First.
When you factor in the back hair ribbon, they end up being about the same height.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Bonus fun with Hoihoi-san. She pairs up pretty well with all kinds of weapons. The photo above s

Bonus fun with Hoihoi-san.
She pairs up pretty well with all kinds of weapons.
The photo above shows her using the MG Zaku 2.0's machine gun.

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san - Using the 1/144 HG First's rifle. Because the hand opening is small, she can't hold 1/100 weapon

Using the 1/144 HG First's rifle.
Because the hand opening is small, she can't hold 1/100 weapons with thick grips.
Even with 1/144 weapons, you can't fit a finger through the trigger guard, so getting a natural-looking grip isn't easy..

Kotobukiya has put out another groundbreaking item.
It's none other than Hoihoi-san from the manga and anime "Ichigeki Sacchuu!! Hoihoi-san," released not as a figure
but as a plastic model kit. Given that Kotobukiya is known for their figures, this is something
you'd naturally expect them to release as a figure... but nobody anticipated that
Hoihoi-san would come out as an injection plastic model kit.

Ichigeki Sacchuu!! Hoihoi-san is a
miniature robot developed in the future for pest extermination,
standing just over 10cm tall and dressed in an adorable maid outfit.
Unlike your typical girlpla/maid fare, Hoihoi-san is just a robot that
expressionlessly goes about catching bugs... but she's won plenty of fans
thanks to her unique charm.

Opening the box, it's a typical injection kit with runners packed in bags... but
the amount of runners feels a little sparse for the price. Sure, the runners
themselves are on the larger side, but the overall package feels a bit thin for what you're paying.
As expected, the color separation is done quite carefully, so just building it
straight out of the box without any extra painting gives you a pretty nice result as seen in the photos above — though
the seam lines running vertically down the arms and legs are unavoidable.

Since this was essentially my first time building a fully color-separated
assembly-style figure like this, it was quite a unique building experience.
There's real fun in assembling a cute figure piece by piece yourself, and compared to
previous Kotobukiya kits, the molded colors are nicer and the snap-fit goes together better —
so the whole build feels genuinely novel and satisfying. That said, it doesn't have that
smooth, crisp snap you get from Bandai's latest kits; the stiff, tight feel
that's characteristic of Kotobukiya is still very much there.

Overall articulation isn't particularly great, but thanks to her inherent
cuteness, even simple poses turn out fun and charming.
The joint strength is definitely not loose, but honestly it feels way too stiff...
The neck joint in particular is so tight that when you try to turn her head, you often end up
accidentally popping off an arm or having parts come apart instead.
Because of this, even though it's snap-fit, I'd recommend gluing the arms, legs,
and other key parts for your own peace of mind.

The best-executed part of this kit is probably the hair.
A similar approach was tried recently with the Valsione from the Super Robot Wars series, but
Hoihoi-san does a much better job of breaking the hair down into multiple
separately articulated sections.
The front ponytail, the side strands, and the back hair all move independently,
giving the hair an excellent sense of three-dimensionality.

One of Hoihoi-san's hidden bonuses is that you can actually put various mecha
model kit weapons in her hands. Of course she can't hold every weapon —
it works best when the grip is thin and there's no trigger guard.
Trying out various options, I found that the MG First-type rifles with their thick grips
were impossible for Hoihoi-san's hands to hold. On the other hand,
the MG Zaku machine guns have thin grips and matched up well with her hands.
For 1/144 weapons, she can hold most of them, but
weapons with trigger guards do look a bit awkward.
Anyway, compatibility isn't all that high so only certain weapons will work,
but there's still plenty of fun to be had mixing and matching.

There are a few things that seem a bit off though... The biggest head-scratcher
is the eye-swapping feature. There are 3 sets of eyes looking left, center, and right,
but the difference between each one isn't clear enough to make swapping them feel very worthwhile.
If you're going to have swappable parts, it would've been better to swap the entire face
like the Valsione from Super Robot Wars to allow for different expressions, or if you're
only swapping the eyes, at least make the gaze directions more dramatically different.
Sure, Hoihoi-san herself is a pretty expressionless character in the show, but
if the eyes are this ambiguously different, you have to wonder why they bothered including 3 sets at all~

Overall, this attempt at a figure-style plastic model kit seems like a success.
Whatever you think of the contents or quality, the fact that it sold out almost immediately
after release says a lot about its appeal as a product.
To be honest and fair though, when you consider the stiff joints and the somewhat pricey package for what you get,
it's not a kit you can call top-notch quality. It's more that the concept itself is fresh,
and people just can't resist the sheer cuteness that radiates from it even when it's just sitting there.

And unlike figures you just buy and put on display,
there's something special about a plastic model figure you assemble piece by piece with your own hands. You end up feeling more attached to the cute character you built yourself — or to put it another way, it's a kit you build with pure "otaku devotion." In short, a kit that's squarely aimed at hardcore fans.

And with Bandai having announced an MG Son Gokou,
it makes me wonder if the drying up of mecha plastic model subjects is what's driving the evolution of figure plastic models. Kotobukiya got a head start with Hoihoi-san, but it'll be interesting to see how the mecha plastic model market shifts from here. :-)

Hoihoi-san ID-3 Hoihoi-san | 2009. 9 | ¥3,000

AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.