Gashapon: The Collectors Dream
The geeks are taking over and they love their toys. It began as a few random action figures as a child and has evolved into grown men devoting entire rooms to their collection of toys. The advent of cheaper access to plastics, paints, and more skilled artists to sculpt these pieces of art, the toy industry is churning out everything you wished you had 20 years ago. But while a majority of American toy companies churn out endless variations of the same toys like Batman Lightening Strike Neon Glow Clown Wrestler edition, there is a new realm of memorabilia for collectors in America.
Japan, who has brought us transforming robots, pocket sized comics, and cartoons with men fighting in a constant state of orgasm have finally brought their cute little sister the mini figures collectively known as Gashapon. These are is named after the sound you would typically hear after spinning the dial on the vending machines which dispense these little toys in capsules with a PON. Now, these tiny terrors are hitting the US specialty shelves with full force. While not all Gashapon are mini figures, some are key chains or little handheld video games, we will be focusing on the action figures exclusively.
The fact that these extremely detailed and cheap figures are received on a completely random basis, as one would never know what they would get from a vending machine, is part of the excitement. On average, the figures sell anywhere from 100yen to 500yen, with the conversion is roughly one US dollar per 100yen. While the concept of a vending machine toy is nothing new to Americans, the amount of detail and complexity of the figures produced in Japan is nothing short of astounding. Their range of offerings varies from your typical static Gundam robot to figures with moveable limbs and even spread to the sordid realm of hentai-based figurines.
Japanese companies have the market cornered, almost every anime is well represented. Thanks to the low cost of production, you would often find that a Gashapon series of toy is typically more expansive than its full-sized figure counterparts. So while the larger more costly figures have to focus on the more popular characters with endless versions of said characters, a gashapon can afford to create even the most obscure characters, much to an avid collectors dream. Familiar names such as Bandai and Yujin are joined by Megahouse, Yamato, and Kotobukiya in the crowded but ever growing Gashapon market. Between them owning rights to create Onegai Teacher, Sega Gals, Ultraman, Dragonball Z, Gundam, Naruto, Cardcaptor Sakura, Streetfighter, and the Disney Heroine collections.
Currently available in America are the westernized version of the very Gashapon you’ve come to adore, made with a slightly more inferior plastic and packaged in a clear bubble card, which honestly takes away the excitement of the hunt. With sets such as Love Hina, Ghost in a Shell, G-Taste, and sets based on the artwork of Masamune Shirow already released we can expect much more in the near future. Luckily, with each figure typically at a height of 3 ½ inches, they had a collectors shelf in mind. You can line a shelf with several sets and still have space to put your Mountain Dew somewhere. The only real question is, are you ready for it?
