Time for a special one-off revival of Official vs Bootleg! This series isn’t coming back full time, but this bootleg was not to be missed. This will also be a bumper edition as we have two figure variants to cover. Hope you enjoy!

For those not familiar with these figures, the Cow Cat is the original release and the Lemon Cat was a limited edition recolour, though the edition size was large enough to satisfy demand. As of time of writing, Ribose have a number available in their Taobao store, and AmiAmi is still waiting on their stock.

Pricing

Cow Cat

MSRP (without tax): ¥JP 8,100
Price I paid for the official (inc shipping): ¥JP 7,635 (£40.05)
Price I paid for the bootleg (inc shipping): £9.50

The official I bought in a Hobby Genki sale

Lemon Cat

MSRP (without tax): ¥CN 369
Price I paid for the official (inc shipping): ¥CN 447 (£47.14)
Price I paid for the bootleg (inc shipping): £8.81

The official I pre-ordered from the Ribose Taobao store.

A bootleg that’s a fifth of the price of the original? What could go wrong, sign me up!

Box

Front:

The bootleg boxes vary significantly in looks and size from the officials. Also I’m hoping there’s a TARDIS in there for the signature accessory…
The official boxes have nice touches like foiling, understated design elements and telling us what year these were conceived in. We also get to learn that “DLC” is “Decorated Life Collection”, not downloadable content. Whew.
The bootlegs? None of that. Poorly-taken photos of both the figures should you want to see them in a worse light than the box view gives you. Well, at least the box photography makes me feel better about my own 😆. Google Translate tells me the Chinese translates to “Tea Party Cat Series”, so at least that ties up.

Side:

Both the left and right sides are duplicates on all the boxes. The Cow Cat offers us a “breakfast tea” design, and the Lemon Cat offers us lemons. The bootleg offers us the same ugly photo. Here we can see that the bootleg box borrows the colour scheme from the cow version and the design elements from the lemon version. So a small amount of points in combining the designs like that, only we’ll take them away for repeating that poor photograph.

Top and bottom:

Not too much to see on these. The bootleg uses the same kind of box construction with the triangular flap bottom. Though we can see the crease through the back of the box where it came flatpack with the figures. Yes, I had to box my own bootleg…

Back:

The backs of the official boxes come with lots of warnings and information about the figure, plus a blurb about the figure line. We also have a shiny authentication sticker.
The bootleg? Yep, same ugly photo as the other sides. Can’t get away from it!

Inner:

Both the officials come with a liner that matches the theme of the outer box. The bootleg is plain – well, at least we get away from that haunting photo in here.

For the boxes on these, there’s no mixing these up. Whilst the official boxes don’t offer a view of the figure there is a reason for this – I expect most people know why, but if not it will be revealed shortly.

Unboxing

For the officials we have two foam blocks:

For the Cow Cat only, we get instructions:

And all the boxes contain some kind of packaged cat:

Officials have some functional blisters and the bootlegs have a baggie. Well, I suppose the baggie stops all two or three pieces from making a break for it.

Accessories

Time to see what we get with each one!

Each one comes with an ice cube, should you wish for iced tea.
Cow Cat’s cube:

(yeah, these were some of the first pics I took, managed to get them around the wrong way… it’s been awhile!)

Lemon Cat’s cube:

The official ones are much more regular-shaped than the bootleg ones, plus have a yellowish tinge. The official ones are much more practical for posing, but I have to say the bootleg ones do have more character.

For the Cow Cat, only the official one has bases:

Yep, the two-footed base has “Illustrate by” on the bottom. The two-footed base is if you want to just display her balanced on the cube, the second base is for the accessory coming up.

For Lemon Cat both the official and bootleg have the two-footed base:

More “Illustrate by” action on the official one. The official base is paw-shaped but the bootleg has gone for a more flower-like shape. From the front view we can see this bootleg uses pegs whilst the official just has cups to hold the figure’s feet. The official bases also have the yellow tint the cubes do.

Only the official Lemon Cat comes with the singular foot base:

And now for the pièce de résistance accessory, the teapot:

The teapots for the official figures are packed well, so should survive international transit. Mine both did thankfully.

Cow Cat’s teapot:

It’s a nice teapot. No idea if it’s food-safe, but definitely looks the part.

Lemon Cat’s teapot:

This one feels more like a prop than a functional teapot, but it’s still pretty. Love the little design on the lid.

The bootlegs are sadly teapotless so not very tea time cats.

The official Lemon Cat also comes with this badge:

Is very sparkly and shiny.

Accessory-wise, you’re getting a lot more with the officials. Equally well, they cost more than a tenner. But in my opinion the accessories are worth it.

Cow Cat

Spin-around balanced on the ice cube:

Oh, erhm, looking like we get what we pay for here… Not gonna lie, the serious derpiness of this bootleg is why I resurrected the series for a special. So let’s get down to the nitty-gritty and look at the details.

Face:

I swear that bootleg is being angrysad at me… The bootleg’s hair lacks paint shading and is shiny plus the moulding has gone a bit globby. The bootleg’s face shape has taken on a much more rounded shape making her look fat. Also she is reflecting my lighting nicely. The eyes are reasonably detailed on the bootleg but can see how the print quality has suffered up this close. The paint job on the bootleg’s hat is poor, plus we have some good ol’ dirt. Just what everyone wants with their figure.

Let’s take a closer look at that hat:

The golden detail is supposed to be an anchor, not a candelabra! Or maybe a fishing hook? Not sure. Whatever it is, it shows how slapped-on the paint is on the bootleg and the lack of mould detail in some parts of this very cheaply made bootleg.

Backs of the ears:

An attempt was made at shading for the bootleg, but it is very roughly sprayed plus not a colour that blends into the design. Whack some white paint on it, I’m sure it’ll be fine.

Pigtails:

Here we can see where the bootleg had the extras added to the hair mould instead of being separate parts. One of those things you wonder if it was an earlier scrapped design or they actually went to the effort of modifying or recasting the mould to include them. Looking at the little details, I don’t think they parted out an original one and recast that – the shapes don’t align for that. Having the separate parts definitely adds to the figure – glad the official went this route so we didn’t have mutant hair. In the side shot you can see how it adds more dimension to the figure too.

Tail:

Again, some half-attempted shading for the bootleg and nowhere near enough paint applied to get it to properly overpower the black, plus a scratch on top. Official went for a more cream colour, which I think is more in keeping with the aesthetic of the figure. The bootleg has also lost detail in the mould as well as having a fairly obvious seamline. And more of that glossy-shininess.

Bow on the back of the dress:

The official is a much more delicate sculpt and has shading on it, whilst the bootleg ends up a bit too thick and a flat blue.

Bow on the side of the dress:

The bootleg has gone for making this part of the dress mould, which again loses that extra dimension a separate part would give you. Also missing the pearlescent paint that the official has.

Hands:

And yet more flattening of the moulded details with the cuffs – starting to think the bootleg’s dress is a dupe 😆. The white band on the bootleg is surprisingly competent given the rest of the paint mess in this area – not to say it is good, but better than other bootlegs in this regard. Interestingly, the bootleg’s hands stick out much further from the dress and are angled differently. The official has gone for some shading on the skin, but no nail polish whilst the bootleg goes with nothing.

Feet:

For the legs, both have gone for a bright white. Back leg on my official isn’t shaded the best, but the bootleg one has both legs shaded poorly plus scratches.
When we look under the feet, the official has toe beans, but the bootleg misses this detail entirely. Instead we’re treated to extra seams.

Under the dress:

Interestingly, the bootleg adds in knicker detail whilst the official doesn’t allow looking that far up the legs. Weirdly the bootleg has a peachy underskirt whilst the official’s is white. I didn’t capture it well in this shot, but the bootleg’s underskirt has a chunky and less refined feel to it, as well as being shiny plastic.

Lemon Cat

One cat down, one to go. So how does this one compare? First we need to assemble the bootleg, as the head fell off in transit:

The head doesn’t fit on too well on this bootleg so not surprised it fell off in transit. It wasn’t so bad it was falling off during reviewing but isn’t the tightest fit.

Here she is with her ice cube:

Ooh, ehehe. These two can balance without the cube, so here’s a spin-around without the cube:

With its neon-green dress, this bootleg doesn’t disappoint either. Well, so long as you weren’t buying this expecting authentic quality…

Now for the detailed look – let’s start with the face again:

Some sad pouting from the bootleg. And oh yes, more dirt. The hair on this bootleg looks worse in mould and colour versus the Cow Cat. The eye prints also fare worse as they’re not only slightly poorer quality but the wrong colour too. She also has the problem of an overly round face and shiny skin. She also manages to suffer from some poorly-applied rouge.

Hat:

Didn’t take a photo of the hat emblem apparently, but the bootleg’s is the same “fish hook” design, but even worse paint. Feel like they tried even less with the hat on this bootleg and just feels like someone stuck a green macaron to her head.

Back of the head:

Some more poor airbrushing on display here with the bootleg. The colour is different, but works in its own weird way. The shiny yellow of the bootleg hair still looks tacky though.

Hair details:

Same story here of the official having separate parts but the bootleg moulding everything as one. And boy, did that bow on the right suffer for it. Interestingly the bootleggers busted out the gold paint for the starfish.
Looking at the dress collars the bootleg significantly deviates from the original design – it did sort of try and emulate the round part, but seemingly on a shirt under the dress. The tie mould is an utter mess and we’re entirely missing the white panel and instead have some smaller buttons painted directly onto the dress.

Tail:

We have the same colour mismatch here as the head, and the same mould loss and shininess of the other bootleg.

Hands:

The bootleg’s cuffs are even worse than the Cow Cat’s – barely painted with white and lacking the stripe. The hands also are poking out further, but this bootleg’s mould is so, so bad – mutant stubby hands.
Also the bootleg’s arms look like gummies to me. Mmm, forbidden sweeties…

Side of the dress:

And this is where the bootleg Lemon Cat really lacks – there is no attempt at the print on the official’s dress. Plus for whatever reason they’ve gone for bright green translucent plastic – not sure what they were thinking with this one to be honest. Some kind of 90s chic? We’re also missing the gold lining on the back part of the sailor uniform.
Again, we have bows made into part of the dress, plus the bow on her back shares the same flaws as Cow Cat’s.

And the front details of the dress:

Well, details for the official. Not so much the bootleg. Man, this bootleg dress is so, so bad…
As the bootleg lacks the white front piece, here are more buttons directly on the dress whilst the official informs us she’s the Lemon Tea cat.
Still unsure what the bootleg was thinking choosing this plastic for the dress.

Underskirt:

Again, the knickers make an appearance on the bootleg plus another peachy underskirt. The official mixes it up with a lemon-toned underskirt to match the figure’s theme.
The bootleg has much bigger brown patches on its legs, whilst the official the brown is limited to the feet.

Feet:

The bootleg’s feet have holes instead of toe beans – the bootleg they actually pegged to the base. Which was probably the most sensible design decision on show here from the bootleg. The official can balance fine on its base, but pegs would allow for the bootleg to be less centrally balanced. Not tested, but wouldn’t be surprised if the balance was off.

This bootleg, in my opinion, manages to be even worse than the Cow Cat one. The shininess issues are more apparent and it is very noticeably different than the official. If you bought this bootleg advertised with the official pictures there would be zero question you weren’t sent the item in the photos. And seriously, what’s going on with the dress? If it was 90s, sure, clear plastic was cool, but here it manages to look even worse than a mediocre paint job.

Conclusion

Overall, these bootlegs likely aren’t fooling anyone unless they’re unaware that an official version exists. But sometimes it’s fun to see how bad bootlegs can get. They’re not “Sader” level of bad, but… they certainly aren’t great. There are much better things to spend a tenner on than these.

You could use the ice cubes that come with the bootlegs with the officials if you wanted:

But that’s about the extent of the use of these figures. The moulds are bad, the paint’s bad, you don’t even get the full product. Sure you could repaint them, but you’d still have bits of blobby mould to try and cover up. Can only polish a turd so much.

Teapot time!

As the bootlegs didn’t include the teapots, I didn’t include them in the main body of the article. But I’ve gotta try ’em in their teapots!
Here’s the Cow Cats and Lemon Cats in their respective teapots:

It kinda helps the bootlegs be more cute… but let’s face it, not improving their looks.

Then I tried switching them:

Yeah, bootleg Cow Cat won’t fit into the glass teapot 😆.

So here they are, best as I could pose them:

Lemon Cat works in the blue teapot as well as the official Cow Cat in Lemon’s tea pot. However, nothing stopping bootleg Cow Cat looking beached. Truly not a good fit.

Hope you enjoyed this comparison, see you in, uh, three years or so?