Godzilla

So Target has these Godzilla minatures from Neca/WizKids in their "collectible cards and stuff" area for about $3. There's some based on the new movie and a set based on classic looks. I picked up the latter and.. it's okay. Not my favorite version of Godzilla. I don't  know if I'll get another one, I'm guessing no unless I have $3 burning a hole in my pocket.

Marvel Labbits and Nog'nz

So this week I found myself picking up some interesting Marvel clearance items. First up was the Kid Robot series of Marvel Labbits.

As you can see, they're Marvel characters interpreted into rabbits. (Labbits is a design Kid Robot has used in the past, so they just superimposed the Marvel properties onto the existing template.) This is hilarious to me, because the Marvel characters are humans, not rabbits. So I decided to pick one up. And then I got another one. And a third. And then I was afraid I'd get a duplicate so I stopped.

I got a Red Skull, Doctor Octopus and Doctor Doom. I really like the Doc Ock with his arms which make it feel like a more substantial figure. The Doom design I like because, hey Doctor Doom. Red Skull I'm kinda meh about, and his Nazi uniform kinda creeps me out a bit. These figures are blind boxed, so even at Clearance I don't think I'll be picking up any more. (Unless they go down to around $2 a pop, which they won't because that's not how the store I got these from does clearance.)

The other thing I picked up were Marvel Nog'nz. I don't know how much these went for originally, but at 50 cents for a pack of two, I was willing to risk it. These are hard plastic, they're pretty much rip-offs of the GoGo's Crazy Bones, and are designed to be played with by chucking them at one another or rolled around like dice. Because they're such hard plastic, they make a very satisfying clinking noise when you shake them together or crash them into one another.

I got the last two bags in the store, and I'm pleased with the selection, mostly. I'd totally pick up a few more bags at the clearance price. Doctor Strange, Cyclops, and Ghost Rider all look ridiculous and adorable when their visages are smashed up and chibi-ized. But War Machine looks like a gray blob.

Green Lantern Maxwell

This Green Lantern version of Maxwell from Scribblenauts looks too much like an actual Green Lantern I've seen in crowd shots to feel completely original.

But it's not horrible for a mini figure. 5 points if articulation, although his legs were warped when I pulled him from the package, so it was difficult getting him on the pega of his little base.

I got this because I had a gift card to gamestop and their video game prices are a little high for my comfort. These mini vinyl figures are blind packed, in boxes so even the pinch and feel method is out, so I doubt I'll get another one without a gift card. Because why would anyone spend real money to buy a blind item when they have an INSANELY EXCELLENT chance to end up paying for the same thing twice?

Only crazy people who don't have e-bay.

11th Doctor

I picked up an 11th Doctor in classic tweed costume on e-bay to finish off my set of Titans vinyl Doctors. Of course at London Toy Fair they showed off wave 4, with the War Doctor and probably Peter Capaldi vinyl figures that I will also have to go on ebay to get. I'm expecting to pay more than I'm comfortable with for the War Doctor. I think those figures are coming out later in 2014.

But for now... for this brief moment, I have all the available Doctors. (Not all the Titans Vinyl Doctor figures, since there are so many variants that it would be a fool's errand, and I don't care that much.) So for now... for this short period of time, I am content.... No I'm not. I REALLY WANT THAT WAR DOCTOR FIGURE! NOW!

Fluttershy

This was a blind boxed figure from Funko I found at Target. I picked it up because I thought it might be a form of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic that I might actually like. I dislike the combable hair on the regular figures, but I like a few of the characters from the show so I'd be willing to collect them otherwise. The normal PVC mini figures aren't doing it for me, so I figured, hey, sculpted vinyl mini-figures might be a thing I could get into. (The larger vinyl versions are cumbersome and don't feel like toys to me. They feel like "collectibles." Emphasis on the quotation marks.)

When I opened it up, I realized that the all black bodies the ponies had on the box weren't, as I assumed, just a weird box design. Nope, all the ponies are painted pitch black. Which I guess is an interesting design choice for a collector's series. It just doesn't appeal to me. To tell the truth, if I had figured out that this is what they would look like, I probably wouldn't have taken the risk of buying a blind-box.

Statue of Liberty Weeping Angel

So Darn Hot Topic. For the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who they inundated their stores with Doctor Who merchandise. At Buy 1 get 1 half off prices, I kept trying to get the most of my Doctor Who dollar. A lot of t-shirts, a bunch of mini vinyl Titans figures...

And then there were the 6.5" Titans. Apparently the mini-vinyl figures were so popular they made large scale ones, at surprisingly decent prices. For twice the price they more than doubled the scale. Didn't matter, because I didn't want giant versions of chibi vinyl Doctors... but then I saw the 8 inch TITANS! (Only $25... then apply a half-off discount and SOLD! Because they made an 8" Statue of Liberty Weeping Angel... At 8 inches, it towers over the normal 2 inch Titan figures and that's not really to scale, but it's still an awesome thing.

Also: Statue of Liberty weeping angel figure.

Geez, I might have to start a Statue of Liberty tag. For all 3 of the Statue of Liberty Toys I own. Maybe not.

Today I'm thankful for...

...blogger erasing the beautiful post I just wrote and wait, no... No... I am not thankful for the blogger app on iPhone being a piece of crap and forcing me to bust out a laptop to rewrite a post.

But I am thankful for luck. What kind of luck? Toy luck.

Hot Topic had one of their regular Buy 1 Item get 1 Item half off sales. And as a reward card member I got an extra 15% off the sale price, which means, HEY! Blind boxed vinyl figures are no longer the slightly higher Hot Topic prices but rather are cheaper than MSRP!

In my mad quest to get a Second Doctor Titans vinyl figure I bought 14 blind boxed figures from the Doctor Who Titans 50th anniversary wave. The plan was simple, weigh the boxes in my hand, try to figure out how much vinyl was packed into the box, and hope I was right about the contents within. Keep going until I got a double,

With no context of how much vinyl each figure used and uncertain how much weight the accessories would add, I never correctly guessed what figure was in each box I opened. But luck was still on my side for a while, as I didn't get a double until Box 8. (Some cheating in that Box 6 was from a different wave and would have been impossible to produce a double.)

As I opened the boxes I revealed: 9th Doctor, 6th Doctor, 2nd Doctor. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. But in my hubris, I wanted to see if I could get any of my other favorite Doctors. More boxes: 4th Doctor, 1st Doctor, Adipose, 7th Doctor, 1st Doctor.

And that's when I stopped, because it was a slap in the face. Who wants two 1st Doctor figures? Not me.

But of course that means I only need the 5th and 11th Doctors for a complete set. But should I buy them on ebay or open the rest of my blind boxes knowing that the odds are not in my favor and I could end up with a bunch of toys I don't want in boxes that can't be returned because you can't just can't return open blind boxed items. (Unless you're returning it to a ruthless merchant who knows that you're trying to return the rare variant and wants to resell it for a huge profit.)

Titans 50th Anniversary Wave

I fucking HATE blind packs. It's okay but annoying for $3 items. It's almost criminal for anything costing over $10. Especially if you're going to make certain figures in a wave rare.

I spent $40 trying to get a 2nd Doctor in the Titans 50th Anniversary wave. But because I got doubles of one of the "common" figures I feel like I wasted $10. I don't even hate the figure, but I don't need two of them and I know trying to sell or trade will not end well with me because it's a "COMMON" figure. And it doesn't help that it's near impossible to find these figures retail... ARGH!

The really screwed up part? I'm not even that huge a fan of the design. I like it, but a lot of the figures are hit or miss for me. I like the angles on the 10th Doctor, but the 8th Doctor looks a little generic and misses some of the nuance of Paul McGann's great face. And the 3rd Doctor needs a more wrinkled look, he needs to look old-young.

I'm annoyed at how this came about, but I know there's a fricking good chance that I'm going to buy more blind boxes to try and get the one I want, and I know that's even more annoying to me.

Violet Parr

Violet is my favorite Incredibles character, and the one I was most looking forward to playing in the game. I was really hoping that they would get Sarah Vowell to do the voice again, and they did! It's awesome hearing her do super-hero banter and quips... as well as her impatient idle time lines. In the game her regular attack is throwing force field bubbles at enemies, making her one of the few Disney Infinity characters to get a distance attack as her regular attack. Her "Powerful Attack" isn't actually an attack, she turns invisible and enemies will ignore her. And while that's cool, your attacks are strong enough that it doesn't really matter if the enemies see you or not. So sometimes it feels like a wasted opportunity to have her... I dunno, have an exploding force field. (And yes, you do get to use her force field as a force field; it's her "block" move.) Still, she's proven to be my favorite character to use in the game. 

The figure itself is a little odd. The paint varies from figure to figure, and I noticed that at one store all the Violet figures had a rosy face that wasn't apparent on the figures I had seen at other stores. Like they had all been given a layer of blush. (The makeup, not the facial reaction.) Another issue is that the character model dictates very thin arms and legs and a stick of a torso, which ends up giving the figure a flimsy feeling not apparent on the other figures, most of which are basically blocks of plastic.

Mrs. Incredible / Elastigirl

Let's start with Helen Parr aka Elastigirl. She's usable in the Incredibles part of the game and her powers in the game reflect her powers better than a third person game has any right to. Her punches and kicks basically turn her into Dhalsim and her "Strong Attack" imitates her rubber arms version of the Spider-man swing, allowing you to attach to buildings and or enemies and then slingshot yourself towards them. It's such a useful power and well implemented that the game eventually gives you an accessory so any character can imitate it. And I mean any character. It's available in the toy box mode so now Jack Sparrow can slingshot himself at walls and enemies.

Holly Hunter doesn't return to voice the character, but EG Daily does a pretty good job with the southern drawl. The figure looks awesome, the paint is sharp and the pose really showcases the character's effectiveness as a badass. You may want to check the paint around the mask though, I noticed a few figures where the paint can be a bit blurry around the eyes and edges of the mask, but it's barely noticeable. I'd say it's one of the better figures in the first wave, although really, all the figures in the first wave are pretty well done, with a few noticeable exceptions.

Disney Infinity

Let's explain the concept before reviewing the figures.

So some store I visited was throwing this sign away. Right place, right time.

Disney Infinity, the video game that is pretty much seen as a knock-off of Spyro the Dragon: Skylanders. Basically you buy the game and the only way to unlock the content on the disc is to buy figurines that you place on a reader. Then you can play as the character depicted on the figurine! Of course each figurine only works in the level (or as they call them: playsets) that is associated with the figure's movie property (So Pirates of the Caribean figures won't work in the Monsters University game) or the Toy Box, which is essentially Little Big Planet using Disney themes. The Toy Box is surprisingly well done, with the ability to use elements to make sports games, side scrollers, and racing games. Disney is even releasing pre-made Toy Box levels, like an ESPN themed race track or a simulation of Columbia from Bioshock Infinite.

I was going to ignore this game at first, but then I found out that the Incredibles level was basically GTA: Incredibles and that some of the original voice cast appeared. Hearing Sarah Vowell talk as I beat people up as Violet makes me happy. I played a little, got obsessed, and ended up buying every figure from the first wave. Fortunately, if you were willing to shop around you could get some good deals. For example, Wal-Mart had all the multi-packs of figures for half-off.

I'm slowly opening the figures. There's about 4 hours of gameplay per figure, more if you want to level them up (which doesn't improve their plat stats, but does earn you currency to unlock more Toy Box items and pretties up the character's display in the virtual exhibition hall of collected figures.) The starter pack (video game, figure reader, 3 figures) comes with the figures for Mr. Incredible, Jack Sparrow, and Sully and the figure that unlocks their respective levels/games. So far I've been playing through the Incredibles and Monster University playsets. (And yes, it IS like GTA: Incredibles. I've drop kicked the mayor more times than I can remember. Monsters University is more of a... stealth collection puzzle game?) The games are fun, and what I've done with the Toy Box so far shows some promise. I'm hoping to figure out a way to make the side-scrolling work in a way that I can create a good brawler or 2D fighting game.

And yes, the blind packed Power Discs which either add a bonus to your character during gameplay (like a shield or extra currency rewards) or add new elements to the Toy Box such as exclusive vehicles or background paint, those are a pain in the butt. Especially since some of them are "rare" and so now you get a collectible aspect into this. $5 for a two-pack of accessories that unlock something already on the disc you had to pay $75 for. But I still want some of them, because the unlocked skies include new background music, so the Alice in Wonderland background has a creepy old school song loop that implies a threatening psychedelic environment.



How bad is the power disc thing? Last Saturday Toys R Us had a event where people could trade their discs and get an exclusive disc. End result: they sold out of the exclusives in less than an hour and the store was fricking packed, or so I'm told by employees since I had to work and wouldn't have participated anyway because I don't want to be the creepy adult trying to trade toys with children. Which is a shame because I wanted the exclusive Tron disc... (Which is actually going to be included in the wave 2 blind packed power discs coming out sometime before December.)

Riddler

At Stockton-Con there was a vendor who was selling blind box vinyl figures. But if you didn't like what you go you could put it in a special box and take something from the box. One of the figures was a Riddler from Funko... so SOLD!

I got a Penguin, put it in the box and took the Riddler.

I asked what they do if someone doesn't want a short-packed figure. The lady said they'd treat it just like any other figure, it goes in the box. They say they'll be doing this at cons, so if you see them, check them out.

Granny Apple

I've wanted the non-neon version of this figure for a while because it's a horse using a walker. This happens every now and then on the show My Little Pony Friendship is Magic, but c'mon the idea is hilarious.

It's a horse with a bad hip who needs a walker.

Unfortunately, the only way to get this figure is in a 3 pack with 2 figures I don't care about. But yesterday I found one in the wave 8 Neon Pony blind pack box so I figured, why not. I'm pretending that the coloring is due to her being an irradiated horse who is using a walker. Because I've read comic books an have come to understand that radiation = magic.

Pop! Pops

These Kidrobot vinyl figures of balloon animals are adorable and I've been meaning to get one for a while now. Usually I balk at the price, but I went to a comic book conventionthis  weekend and after the prices in the dealer's room, paying $8 for a miniature sculpture of a balloon doggy didn't seem that outrageous.

Plus it turns out I got a green one! (They're blindboxed with one sculpt, various colors.) That's a great balloon animal color!

Dr. Whooves and Derpy

Okay, officially the character isn't named on the box, but we all know it's Derpy Hooves, the production error that turned into a fan favorite character. Why? Because the internet, that's why. I just love that they've now made at least two figures of this.

And we also see the popular DR. WHOOVES, the MLP Doctor Who easter egg that has taken the world of Bronies that are also Doctor Who fans (A surprisingly vocal group) by storm. Again, the internet, that's why. He's got an hourglass as his cutie mark, so time travel and all that. I think I just like the idea of a time travelling character in My Little Pony. Or maybe I'm amused that MLP has decided to ponify Doctor Who, but is familiar enough with it to do a pretty accurate parody.

I ended up buying a t-shirt with both of these characters on it. It is ridiculous and hilarious.

Damaged Cyberman

I know I said I didn't like the design of these things up, but you know what, damaged cyberman. It's one of the harder to find figures in the series and it was for sale, loose, for $10. So it was a deal, but you know...

Because CYBERMAN!

Yeah, so basically I saw it in person and realized that the design isn't that bad. And I love me some cybermen.

Ecto

This is a Moshi Monster moshling from the blind packed series 2. I thought it was supposed to be green, like on the package. Nope, translucent purple with glitter. That's odd. Dunno if I prefer it this way or not. I feel like, if he's green you get a better sense that this is supposed to be a ghost.

Either way, it was on sale, which is good because the MSRP of $2 is too much. $1 though...

TARDIS (Doctor Who Titans)

These Doctor Who mini vinyl collectibles (think Kid Robot but not) are blind packed so trying to get what you want is kinda hard. Unless you e-bay opened packs! For a few dollars more uncertainty is removed from the equation! Which is really important because I don't dig the designs for the figures, but I really wanted a tiny vinyl TARDIS, which is packed at a ratio of 1/20. (Or 1/40 for the variant "night time" Tardis with green windows.)

Hooray! I got another TARDIS. To see how small it really is, I've posed it next to a Lego minifigure and a Doctor Who Character Building minifigure.

Vacation window shopping

I went on vacation last week. Here's some of the stuff I didn't buy.

I was sorely tempted to get Elvis a Pegasus to ride, but I realized I could buy one of these sets any time. No need to waste precious luggage space by buying it on vacation.

Hey, they made a Hobo Superman costume.

They had Transformers at Universal Studios because of the Transformers 3D ride. They cost $10 more than they do in regular retail stores.

Although I was tempted to get the exclusive EVAC figure. Evac is a character created for the ride, he's basically the car you ride in. I love when they do figures for this kind of exclusive character, but $25 was too much to pay for a novelty.

I was tempted to get this POP! vinyl figure of Gonzo, but I just had to pass.

I also went to Downtown Disney (not Disneyland itself) and the Disney store there sold all the theme park exclusive figures. Of the "Disney Characters as Star Wars" figures they had, the one I considered getting was this 3 pack of the Duck Nephews as Jawas. They even come with pars of an R2 unit. But in the end I decided that it wasn't worth the $25 considering their insanely limited articulation. I dunno, maybe if they were in scale with regular Star Wars figures I'd be more interested, but the issue is moot.

Holy crap, Don't get any Blinkus

I saw some Blinkus packages at the Dollar Tree the other day. I've seen them at Target and was curious. I enjoy lenticular technology, and the idea of basically fusing that technology to what are essentially cheap Go-Go Bones rip-offs appealed to me. Especially if it served to give the figures a little more personality. So I kinda wanted to get a blind bag and check them out, but not for the prices they go for at Target. A dollar for a bag of three seemed like a safe amount to gamble with, so a purchase was made.

And then a disappointment was had.

I could forgive the bad paint application, I mean for this size and price point, bad paint is almost a given. But the lenticular sticker, the thing that pretty much defines these things, they were peeling off all the figures in the bag.

The glue was pretty dry too, no quick fix here. Nope, it seemed like the stickers would peel off completely soon after I had bought them. Disappointing? Very much so. I mean I spent $1 and felt ripped off. That's just not right.

Add to that the disappointing figures that I got. A couple generic monsters which were pretty lame, and a robot which had, I thought, a cute lenticular transformation from a nervous robot into a robot with a bullet hole through its head.

But one figure I liked out of three, with all three having issues with their stickers staying on, well, I'm not getting any more of these, for any price.