GG Kendama KIN Seasonal Q4 Review

GG Kendama has been making waves throughout 2019, releasing a whole string of kendamas and being a huge part of growing the community in Australia. In fact, they held the FIRST EVER Australia Kendama Open AND are looking to grow their team.

I first came across them on Instagram while browsing the explore feed and reached out to review the KIN Seasonal Q1. Since then, I’ve gotten to speak to GG Founder Gideon Marvolo-Gaunt a few times and am constantly amazed by what they do for the community in their country.

On to the review, and a little disclaimer: Kin Q4 uses the KIN Premium V3 Shape, similar to the one found in my Q1 review.

1. Shape Uniqueness

The KIN Premium V3 Shape is relatively unlike anything I have seen before. Instead of opting for a slimmer sword and sarado, GG has opted to keep it the regular thickness ratio as that of an Ozora. The cups however, are enlarged. We’ll compare them to other shapes below.

Versus the Vivewood shapes, this is bigger than the V2, comparable to the V3 but smaller than the V4. While cup size is one thing, the KIN V3 is very clearly different from any of the Vivewood shapes. From spike length being longer, to sarado being thicker and base cup being wider – this is definitely not a factory shape.

Interestingly, this shape feels like an upsized version of the Ozora ken, sans the base cup hole and obviously better weighted sarado. The KIN V4 is one of those kens that is large enough to pair with 61 and 62mm tamas but not too big for a 60mm tama – pretty good space to be in if you ask me.

You can also see how it compares to other shapes below. For consistency, we will compare to the Prime, Shift and BL Shape.

Note all text are in comparison, i.e. if the column/row says Prime, Cup, Bigger – that means in comparison to the Prime Cups, the reviewed kendama IS BIGGER.

Shape Prime Shift BL Cup Size Big: Same

Small: Bigger

Base: Bigger Big: Same

Small: Smaller

Base: Bigger Big: Same

Small: Bigger

Base: Bigger Sarado Length Shorter Same Shorter Sarado Thickness Thicker Same Thicker Spike Length Same Longer Longer Spike Thickness Thicker Same Thinner

2. Aesthetic Design

The tama follows the design style seen across the entire KIN Seasonal painted series – a white scope, followed by thin colored line, thin white line (all these 3 totaling about 35%) and the rest with the color.

In this case, Q4’s color is green. In addition to that, there is the top of tama tracking spray painted on – which is the 19 circle (to mark 2019) followed by the white dot. Really easy to spot your stunt plane swaps with this.

What I noticed about the green however, is that it seems to shimmer in the light – as though there is some form of metallic coating applied to it. I really enjoyed taking this out to photo and noticing the little details that GG have put in.

The ken follows the aesthetics of the other GG kens – red ring stall lining, burn on one side of the handle and a sticker on the other. Really clean, and the red lining actually helps when tracking taps. It also features a base cup hole to improve the lunar balance along with the values of GG kendama.

A really clean design overall that I like – in fact I’d slap on the tama to other kens I have after this one is beat out.

3. Paint Durability

After putting through the play test (20 minutes daily play for 10 days) I see no visible peeling of the paint on the tama. Instead – my most noticeable wear and tear to the tama is the spike dents caused by the sharp spike that comes with the ken. Personally, I like the design of the tama so much that I went to sandpaper the spike more blunt after play testing.

Much like the Q1, this paint it tacky out of the box, but somehow does not seem to lose a lot of its grip over play. It is sticker than some of the sticky clears I’ve seen, so if you are worried about your lighthouse tripping, wet the tama a little but if you don’t those lighthouses and lunars just slap on baby.

4. Playability

In the playability section, I test the smoothness and ease of landing tricks in the 4 criteria, Lunar, Stalls, Slings and Kenflips.

A difficulty rating out of 10 (1 being easier than usual, 5 being no difference and 10 being much harder than usual) will be given to each category at discretion.

Overall the thick base makes it really smooth for kenflips, while the bigger cups and wide bevel make it easy for stalls to fit – but the thicker sword and sarado made it slightly more challenging for my bigger fingers to do slingers.

At $39.99 AUD (~30 USD), this is a super value for money full maple kendama with a unique shape. Packaging is a bonus!