Friday, August 03, 2007

When I Kiss Play, I Kiss Play to win

I just ordered a Kiss Play Convoy, which is the Japanese version of Alternators Optimus Prime released last year as the premier figure in the Transformers Kiss Play line. Kiss Play is the Japanese only Transformers series where Takara packaged thier version of the Alternators molds along with small cartoony female figures. The figures in and of themselves weren't more risque than a lot of Japanese candy toys. Heck, compared to action figures you can buy at the mall of girls from video games, the Kiss Play figures were actually pretty mild. But where this line caused an uproar was in the packaging and associated fiction where the girls were depicted in a most hardcore Lolicon fashion. There was a bit of backlash from the vast majority of toy robot fans in America because of the overt sexualization of these characters and also because Takara discontinued the use of significant amounts of die cast in their versions of the Alternators. Consequently Takara began miscalculating demand and underproducing subsequent figures in the line, causing toy robots like Kiss Play Rodimus to be in high demand on the secondary market despite the vocal majority of collectors' condemnation of the line as tasteless and perverted. I was surprised to find a video game importer of all places selling Kiss Play Convoy and still at a somewhat reasonable $65. They rarely go up on eBay and just recently an opened one sold for $87. I see that there are four sealed Kiss Play Convoys on ebay right now with over five days to go and they've already been bid up to $35-$60 each. I expect they'll climb to somewhere in the $90-$100 range by auction end so I'm glad I jumped on the online retailer solicitation when I found it.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice find! I have picked one up :)

Weasel said...

Kiss Play never bugged me. Where I work, we sell Baby Bratz. Toddlers dressed up as hookers are far, far worse.

Heavyarms said...

If I didn't already have Alternators Prime...

...well, I still wouldn't buy Kiss Play Convoy. I may be a toy addict, but I'm an el cheapo toy addict. It's a curse.

Evil King Macrocranios said...

I'm glad I could help someone score something. I hope they actually have these in stock and it's not just an old listing. I try to think up alternate venues of finding stuff, like I did with Fry's sale on Classics a couple months ago.

And Lyn thanks for pointing out a better example for the point I was trying to make. I guess one man's perversion framed in the right context is another man's multimillion selling doll line.

Anonymous said...

I missed out again. Shoot. Dang. Poo.

naladahc said...

I want the surfboard weapon. But that's all.

Weasel said...

And Lyn thanks for pointing out a better example for the point I was trying to make. I guess one man's perversion framed in the right context is another man's multimillion selling doll line.

I live to serve. Took ya long enough to recognize me. ;)

Prime and I just got our first Kiss Play figure at this year's BotCon. I saw the Autolooper/Atari set with Kremzeek, picked it up and couldn't put it down.

It's still a lot less creepy than Baby Bratz. Or Bratz in general, for that matter. :)

 

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Evil King Macrocranios was voted king by the evil peoples of the Kingdom of Macrocrania. They listen to Iron Maiden all day and try to take pictures of ghosts with their webcams.