Darth Vader Mania

There sure are a lot of Darth Vader figures running around these days.  Lets have them battle it out, and see which Vader is truly the Lord of the Sith(s).

The contenders:

S.H.Figuarts Darth Vader

Manufacturer: Bandai

Price: 5500 Yen

Height: 155 mm

Revoltech Darth Vader

Manufacturer: Kaiyodo

Price: 5500 Yen

Height: 170 mm

Mafex Darth Vader

Manufacturer: Medicom

Price: 4500

Height: 170 mm

Black Series 6" Darth Vader

Manufacturer: Hasbro

Price: 19.99 USD

Height: approx 165 mm

Not included: Variant Play Arts Kai Darth Vader and Movie Realization Darth Vader (both are too redesigned).  Also, Bandai's model kit, as this is an action figure battle.

We will compare them based on several criteria.

1.) Price

Winner:  Black Series
Even without factoring in import pricing and shipping, the Black Series Vader is the clear winner at 19.99 USD.

Loser: S.H.Figuarts & Revoltech

Even though they are tied for most expensive, SHF is the shortest and Revoltech has so few accessories?  Not a lot of plastic for your buck.  (Unless you count the 1st-run exclusive stand SHF comes with.)

2.) Size/Scale

Winner: Revoltech & Mafex

Both are 170 mm tall, accurately portraying actor David Prowse's huge stature at 1/12th scale.

Loser: S.H.Figuarts

Too darn short.

3.) Accessories

Winner: S.H.Figuarts (with caveat)

If you count the 1st-run exclusive base, then this is a clear win for SHF Vader.  If not, most are pretty comparable, except for ...

Loser: Revoltech

With no severed arm and no Anakin head, Revo loses this category.

4.) Look (YMMV)

Winner: Mafex & S.H.Figuarts

If you're going for screen accuracy, Mafex looks the most like the films.  If you want a little more stylized, SHF is the way to go.

Loser: Black Series & Revoltech

Black Series looks almost as real as Mafex, but the helmet is oversized and Vaders' lenses are too reddish.  Revoltech looks strange, with a squished face and lumpy, segmented cape.

5.) Posability

Winner: Revoltech

Based on Revoltech's history, joint tech and the official photos of Vader, it is obvious this Dark Lord is the most flexible.

Loser: Black Series

With far fewer joints, the American contender just can't cut it.

6.) Announced/Released Star Wars Figures

Winner: Black Series

There are already dozens of Black Series 6" figures out, with many more on the way, including in-scale vehicles and creatures.

Loser: Mafex

Only a Mafex Stormtrooper to keep Annie Skywalker company.

7.) Size of Figure Line

Winner: S.H.Figuarts

As one of the largest figures lines in the galaxy, SHF Darth will fit in with the hundreds of figures Bandai has done in this line.

Loser: Mafex

Darth Vader can mix it up with Spider-Man and some Batman characters, but that's it.

OVERALL

S.H.Figuarts: 3 Wins*, 2 Losses

Revoltech: 2 Wins, 3 Losses

Mafex: 2 Wins, 2 Losses

Black Series 6": 2 Wins, 2 Losses

*1 win based on 1st-run exclsuive

Those results align with what figure I pre-ordered (SHF, obviously) but many of these categories are pretty subjective.  I'm sure they're all great figures.  A lot of which one you should go for depends on how you weight the categories.

The Waiting Game`

The amount of time between first seeing a Japanese action figure announced, to having it in your hands (especially if you live outside of Japan) can be quite astronomical.  Let's look at some examples, for figures I have personally purchased.

My first example is an extreme one: the notorious Armor Plus Kongou no Shuu from Yoroiden Samurai Troopers (or Kento of Hardrock, for you Ronin Warriors fans).  He was first seen at a figure show in February of 2011, but not released until April of 2013.  That's over two years!

Tamashii Features 2011

It's worth noting that, as Shuu is part of a 5-man team, he was announced along when his teammates were.  He was the final one to see release, meaning he had by far the longest delay between announcement and release.  Bandai could have released them closer together, however, but perhaps they wanted to wait for fans' wallets to rebound.  Whatever the reason, waiting over two years is just ridiculous.

Here's a more recent example.  S.H.Figuarts Darth Vader.  First shown at Tokyo Toy Show in early June of 2014, he just saw release a day or two ago.  About one month shy of a year between his first sightings and release.  Now, as an American collector, we have to tack on the several days or weeks for it to ship to my house.

Lord Vader's first appearance

I think this is too long.  Far too long, in fact.  The best time to release a figure is when those looking forward to it are at the peak of excitement.  The memories of opening it and first posing it will be so much more positive.  For most collectors, however, the hype for a figure spikes much earlier than a year after announcement.  By releasing them so much after-the-fact, toy manufacturers are shooting themselves in the foot.  Less excitement means less buying, and those that do buy them will remember them less fondly, hurting future business.

So, why do they announce figures so far ahead?  I have a few ideas.  Hype is also built up through cross-promotion.  S.H.Figuarts Darth Vader was probably announced when he was in order to ride the hype-train that Star Wars Episode VII is generating.  Another factor in this case is competition.  Several other manufacturers were announcing Star Wars figures at this time, and Bandai did not wish to be late to the party and come across as ripoffs.  Perhaps companies like Bandai are overzealous, constantly overestimating how quickly they can develop a figure from prototype.  

My final theory is one I really hope is untrue.  Maybe by showing off a future figure so early, a toy company can gauge fan reaction, and, if negative enough, abort a figure before it has cost too much to develop.  While this might avoid a costly failure of a figure, it also greatly seeds mistrust between consumers and companies.  Even though almost all figure announcements say something to the effect of "Display Only" (meaning the figure is not guaranteed to be made) everybody knows what the strong implication is.  If you show a figure, you are expected to sell it.  By announcing later in development, a toy company would be forced to follow through on their word.  That would require much more cautious planning on their part, however.  That means less "experimental" figure announcements.  So maybe the price of such diverse figure offerings is long wait times and the occasional canceled figure.

I'd rather receive less figures, but at the height of my excitement for them, than have more to choose from, but get them over a year later.  How about you?

amiibo Part 2

Despite many of the complaints I have with the Super Smash Bros. line of amiibo, I have purchased several.  They are of fairly high quality, and likely the only Smash Bros. figure line we'll see in our lifetimes.  There are other "meta-Nintendo" lines, most notably Jakks Pacific's World of Nintendo line, but I appreciate that these amiibo are specific to Smash Bros.  The particular versions of the costumes, as well as the poses, are lifted directly from Smash Bros., with the Smash Bros. symbol as their base.  The problem, exclusively in America, has been in getting them.

I have been fairly lucky with my amiibo hunts.  I, apparently, like popular characters, because only a few of the ones I've wanted are considered "rare".  The few rare ones I did want, I suppose I was in the right place at the right time; I was able to easily pre-order them in my local Toys R Us.  There are more coming out I desire, however, so, hopefully, my luck will not run out.  I have several theories as to why they are so hard to collect here in the US.  Here are some of them.

Nintendo is a family company.  They are not accustomed to, nor interested in, pandering to collectors.  They are targeting younger audiences by flooding shelves with the characters most popular with kids (Mario, Kirby, Yoshi, etc) while ignoring some of the great characters from their more mature games.  Their sales numbers might back this up.  Mario always sells well, while the few Fire Emblem figures ever made might not have.  I hope the data from American amiibo sales do not reinforce this idea.  After all, if you ship less Marths, you'll sell less Marths.

Nintendo of Japan is proud.  Nintendo of Japan, like many, many older Japanese game companies are either completely mystified by Western tastes, or more likely, look down on them.  This pride lead them to foresee American amiibo shoppers as unsophisticated - simply wanting flagship mascots of children's games.  While it is true, Americans love Mario and the gang, the amiibo debacle has also re-proven that Western gamers have complex taste in games.  This pride could also be blamable for the breakdown in communications.  Nintendo of America has said almost nothing regarding the shortages, and I believe, a big reason is that they know very little of Nintendo of Japan's plans or ideas.

Nintendo is inexperienced in merchandise.  First, I will admit that there has been, literally, thousands of Nintendo-related toys released over the decades.  What I am referring to, specifically, is Nintendo's lack of experience in handling the manufacture, shipping and marketing of figures.  They have always licensed their merchandises out to other manufacturers, but with amiibo, they have taken on much of the responsibility.  And, frankly, they don't know enough yet to satisfy the myriad of consumer types around the world they have.  They completely missed the mark when predicting sales in the US, made too few of some characters and too many of others, and have shipped them in batches so small, they only exacerbate rather than relieve the situation.  Even retailers are frustrated with Nintendo, hurting relationships a more experienced company would already have cemented.

Nintendo is gun shy.  As this is their first real foray into collectibles, they likely erred on the side of caution, preferring to under-produce than over.  Figures not selling and sitting on shelves would have been costly for them, as well as edged out future shelf space for the next series of amiibo.

Nintendo is, maybe, an evil genius.  The amiibo situation greatly resembles the original Wii shopping madness.  Is Nintendo under-shipping to drive up demand?  For the case of the Wii, it worked quite well.  People were going crazy over it and, I believe, people that never would have otherwise bought one did for two reasons.  One, people who would have otherwise never heard about a console release learned of the Wii from news reports about its scarcity.  Two, people who were on the fence about buying one, when confronted with the chance to acquire one from the insanely low supply, felt pressured to get it now, or miss out forever.  Perhaps Nintendo was trying to recreate this fever with amiibo.

Hopefully, collectors who missed out on their favorite characters will get a chance in the future.  But with more and more amiibo being announced every month, I doubt it.

amiibo Part 1

Me and my fellow Smash Bros. fan friends were very excited for Nintendo's new toys-to-life series, called amiibo.  The initial line of amiibo are based on Super Smash Bros. for WiiU/3DS, a brilliant move, as Smash Bros features characters from throughout Nintendo's considerable history.  The initial prototypes looked great.  The promised gameplay sounded fantastic.

But, upon release, my friends and I were in for disappointment.  The first thing I noticed was the released versions were not as brilliant as the prototypes.  Now, as an action figure collector, I am very used to this, with regard to paint quality and sculpt accuracy.  The difference that bothered me, however, was the stands.  The prototypes boasted small, round, and clear tubes to hold aloft the flying or jumping characters.  The actual stands were much thicker, square and all sorts of different translucent colors.  I understand the thickening of the stands; these are family toys and stands the size of the prototypes would likely snap in a 4-year-old's hands.  But why show such a drastically different stand?  Did you actually believe you could have produced them that way?  I suppose, since this is one of Nintendo's first forays into figures, that can be forgiven ... lack of experience.  Far worse than the size however, was the decision to make them colored.  Clear plastic is perfect for stands, it minimizes their appearance, adding to the illusion the figure is gliding or hovering.  By making them brightly colored, they draw attention, rather than hide it.  For the Link figure, in particular, they chose to have a pee-yellow colored stand drip from between his legs down to the base.  It really looks like a power stream of urine.

The look of these figures is only half their appeal.  You can tap them on your console and bring them to life in the game.  But, as amiibos were getting into people's hands, me and my friends hopes were dashed again, as their functionality was strange, unfun and obscured.  Firstly, you could not play as your amiibo.  You could only spar with it, fight alongside it, or watch it fight alone.  Not a huge deal-breaker, but putting time and effort into strengthening a character would be best enjoyed by playing as it, as any RPG can tell you.  They also claimed the figure would learn from the events of the battles it was in, specifically.  That you could teach it moves and counter-moves by showing them it.  It is very unclear if this is the case.  There is no way to tell how or what your amiibo has learned, or if there is any more to the "learning" system than the amount of time it has fought.  You can only gauge its strength by its level, 1-50.

By level 50, the amiibo is very, very intelligent.  This excited me and my friends; something challenging to strive for.  But, we were, again, quickly disappointed.  As it get higher in levels, it also get stat bumps, making it stronger, faster and tougher than the version of that character the player can play as.  This isn't good design - its SNK Boss Syndrome.  Making something harder by giving it unfair advantages isn't fun to overcome; it feels cheap.  I wanted to be defeated by my amiibo's honed technique, strategy and skill.  Not its ridiculous stats.

All of these problems only arise if you can actually get an amiibo.  There have been horrendous stock issues regarding amiibo since the first day of their release.  These isssues have largely been restricted to the US.  Nintendo has been notoriously tight-lipped as to why, but in Part 2, I'll give you my guesses.

Boxes

When I first starting seriously collecting action figures, I always held onto the boxes they came in.  I kept the original box, all the plastic trays, and even the twist-ties.  I'm not sure why I kept them.  Perhaps it was because they were very well made.  Bright colors, see-through windows, and on the back, a bunch of cool shots of the figure in various poses.  Maybe it was just another way to scratch that collector "itch", or maybe I was feeding my packrat tendencies.  A sense of, "If I throw it out now, I can never get it back ... and I can always throw it out later."

Well, later eventually came.  As my collection grew, the pile of boxes grew even faster.  As a box must contain a figure, it is usually bigger.  I tried breaking them down in a way that preserved them, but it was no use.  I threw them all out in one big dumpster.  The accessories contained in them were put into hobby trays (usually used for beading, I believe.)

I was surprised by how little loss I felt, after trashing them.  In fact, opening up the closet space they took up was a big relief.  Now, I throw away a figure's packaging as soon as I'm finished opening it.  After all, the figure is what I'm after anyways.  And making more room means more room for more figures.

Now, some people never even open their figures.  This practice has always befuddled me.  Even despite my attachment to boxes (as admitted above), I still do not understand collectors who do not open their toys.  I do not judge them - whatever makes them enjoy their collection is just fine, and some figure boxes are incredibly well made and good-looking.  I, however, just want to pose and display the figure so much, I can't fathom keeping it locked away.

In the 90's, children's toys from decades past started to make waves in the secondary market.  Star Wars toys from the 70's, rare transformers from the 80's, and hundreds of others were fetching huge prices on eBay and at friendly local comic shops.  This lead to rampant speculation by adult collectors, buying up toys they predicted would be valuable in 10 or more years.  These collectors were planning on selling the toys eventually, so keeping them in the box made sense - a figure in original packaging is worth much, much more than loose.

Does this feed into the reasons collectors nowadays don't open their toys?  A sense of lost value?  It is a one-way ticket.  Once opened, a toy cannot become mint-in-package again.  I guess it's about loss aversion.  You might want to play with the toy, but can't bring yourself to incur a perceived permanent loss in value.  I suppose this is the same mentality that caused my reluctance to throw the boxes away.

How about you?  Do you open your figures?  Why or why not?

Glossary Part 3

Here is the third in my ongoing glossary series.

Action Features (aka gimmick)

Action features, more commonly called gimmicks in Japan, are interesting things a figure can do, beyond be posed or equipped with accessories.  Many lines used them extensively, either all sharing one gimmick, such as Transformers, or using a different one on almost every figure, like Masters of the Universe.  I'm only listing one relevant to modern adult collecting here.

"Lifelike" Action Features

Light-Up.  A simple gimmick, a light-up feature is when a switch on the toy "lights up" and electronic light.  This can really add life to a figure, making it seem much more real, despite being inanimate.  My limited edition Robot Damashii Gundam 00 Qan[T] actually has a blacklight emitting base, while the figure itself is blacklight reactive.  This creates quite a spectacular effect.

Sound Effects.  While uncommon in collector toys, some figures emit sounds or sayings when you press a button on the figure.  This breathes life into the figure by making it appear as if the toy was alive enough to speak or make sounds.

Moving part.  Many figures, especially in the 80's and early 90's has part thatmoved automatically under certain conditions.  Squeezing the legs of a Super Powers Batman, for example, would cause his arm to perform an uppercut punch.  Other examples include: being able to fire a spring-loaded missile, using a rip cord to spin around or even walking (often through the use of wind-up techniques).  These types of features usually come at the cost of poseability or realism.

Toys-to-Life.  I touched on this in a previous Glossary, but this is technically an action feature.  This is when a toy can interact with an electronic medium, such as video games, like amiibo.  I suppose old 80's TV-interactive toys, like Captain Power, count as well.

"Technical" Action Features

Transforming.  The aptly named Transformers line of toys pioneered this gimmick, and continue to master it into today.  I don't have any official Transformers, but I really enjoy a transforming toy.  That fact that action figures can be posed in many ways multiplies its appeal (at least, to me) over a static figure.  There's just more ways you can display it.  Transforming gimmicks take this to the next level.  Ultimately, a transforming a toy is just posing it in an extremely different pose.  You get multiple figures in one, increasing the toy's potential while saving shelfspace!

Combining.  These are toys that are initially separate, but can combine into a larger figure.  Combining figures share many of the benefits of transforming toys.  Like transforming toys, they multiply the potential of a figure, giving you many more ways to pose and display them.

Interchanging Parts.  One of my favorite gimmicks, interchanging parts gives you a whole new level of customization and pose potential.  This is when the parts of some figures, for example, the cockpit pods of my ES Gokin Aestivalises, can be switched between multiple figures.  You can take the pod of the ground-type Aestivalis and place it inside the air-type, and visa versa.  With toylines that have multiple ways of interchanging, you can really explode a figures potential for customization.

Ecchi Figures

Although I am a Japanese toy collector, I am not a collector of ecchi, ero or any kind of "sexy" figures, which are a sizeable chunk of the figure market in Japan.  I have no problem with such figures existing and I do not judge those who buy them.

I'm an action and adventure fan.  The types of franchises that excite me are usually sci-fi, fantasy or heroic, which often lack ecchi themes.  So, when I purchase a figure to support something I like, it has a low chance of being an ecchi figure to begin with.  However, many fictional universes crossover between the two, so there are still figures of properties I appreciate that are quite sexy.  I still tend to avoid these figures, and here's why:

Looking at or posing a figure evokes memories of the franchise by being recognizable characters from it.  They also evoke a similar sense of style.  A figure from an action movie will evoke a sense of action, simply by its nature.  An armored techno-samurai looks fierce and cool on a shelf, regardless of knowing the source material.  The visceral sense of a figure is delivered though it's style, pose and form, in addition to what show, game or book it came from.

Sexy figures, therefore, evoke a sense of eroticism, just by being erotic to some degree.  Eroticism is not bad, and can be felt powerfully through many mediums, including figures.  However, it is not a feeling I'm interested in, with regard to figures.  I'm interested in cool, action-oriented and fierce looking characters.  They are often sexy too, but, if the feeling of sexyness overpowers the sense of action in a figure, I quickly lose interest.

There are other feelings a figure can bring out that I tend to avoid, such as comedy or horror.  These are not nearly as predominant as sexyness in the Japanese figure collecting industry, but I do not collect them for identical reasons.