S.H.Figuarts - News and Reviews

The Scream Man said:

The gokaiger prices came down at Mandarake a fair bit, back into the 5000 yen range at times. Hope is not lost!

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Thanks! It took me a while to figure out how their site works (new used stuff daily, English search possibilities are limited,) but this looks like it'll be useful once items I'm interested in buying start appearing.

Well, except I'd had an inkling of looking for the Kyoryuger Figuarts there until I finally did see a listing... the Kyoryu Black and Pink two-pack for [does some math] nearly $180.00...!?

*goes through the stages of grieving*

Are there any other realistic possibilities for acquiring the Kyoryugers this late? (I made the mistake of assuming that BigBadToyStore would eventually list them, so didn't investigate back when preorders were possible.) Most of the import stuff I want gets sold by BBTS, but with Sentai Figuarts specifically, it looks like I'll have to look to actual Japanese sellers, and I've got no experience with that.

Any other recommendations? I suspect it may be down to random luck at this point.

(And since I always sound really grumpy in this thread: I'm really looking forward to Mario and Gaim!)

The problem with the Kyoryuger figures is that very few people seem to have bought them (which doesn't help the chances of future teams now) and now we have a lot of people trying to obtain them on the aftermarket. Low stock + high demand = super high prices. And since they were exclusives, there's no chance of them ever being rereleased unless Bluefin can get them out.

Ironically, if the people who wanted them so badly just preordered in the first place, the Sentai line might be in a better position. Their low sales has pretty much guaranteed we won't see the rest of the team at least.

I always try to buy my stuff new or pre-order items when I have the money for them. I buy Kamen Rider figuarts and Ultraman Ultra Act figures in the US from Bluefin to support them. Maybe they can't release Gaim in the US because the Rider figuarts have stop selling well.

They're bringing over Hibiki though, so I doubt sales have anything to do with it. I really think it's just due to the popularity of Gaim and Bandai not wanted to limit the Japanese stock. The fact we've seen a huge supply of Ryugen and now Gaim and Baron are pretty strong evidence of that too (we'll probably see the same thing happen for Zangetsu closer to his release).

When it comes to them being re-released, maybe Bluefin will be able to get a hold of some then.

Clocktower said:

The problem with the Kyoryuger figures is that very few people seem to have bought them (which doesn't help the chances of future teams now) and now we have a lot of people trying to obtain them on the aftermarket. Low stock + high demand = super high prices. And since they were exclusives, there's no chance of them ever being rereleased unless Bluefin can get them out.

Ironically, if the people who wanted them so badly just preordered in the first place, the Sentai line might be in a better position. Their low sales has pretty much guaranteed we won't see the rest of the team at least.

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This is why I laugh at many of the complainers I've been finding on here, Tokunation, and Rangerboard. If people were so gun-ho and passionate about collecting Sentai, they would have bothered to preorder the Kyoryuger exclusives instead of waiting for them to show up on the secondary market. Instead, they are now struggling to purchase these figures, the older lines they also want will remain unfishished, and the Sentai line is likely now dead.

I now feel like my collection is incomplete, as I will never see the rest of the Kyoryugers released. I'm at least happy we got the main six, but I'll always feel like there's a hole in my collection now.

Exclusives can coast around $50 - $80 depending where you buy them. I think people don't pre-order them because they don't have the money for them and they wait for them used on the after market.

This is part of why I was so confused. I haven't noticed a single Kamen Rider release that hasn't shown up for preorder on BBTS, and based on that, I assumed that acquiring the Kyoryugers was just a matter of waiting for the preorders to become available. I pestered them about it via e-mail every month or so (and checking HLJ), until I realized that the figures were actually seeing release in Japan, with nary a peep from my usual stateside sources.

(It also looks like I got into all of this right when Bandai decided that nobody is interested in Sentai stuff. Looks like I won't be-- WHAT DO YOU MEAN there are Persona 4 figures?! TAKE MY MONEY...!)

I do wish I could have at least the main 10 Kyoryugers but if I'm apparently oner fo the few people to actually preorder the 5 exclusives we got I guess I'm not surprised. I still wished we'd gotten Silver at least

RMuzzy said:

If people were so gun-ho and passionate about collecting Sentai, they would have bothered to preorder the Kyoryuger exclusives instead of waiting for them to show up on the secondary market.

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I live in the U.S., and I if there was anywhere I could've preordered the rest of the Kyoryugers from, I would've done it. I was checking a couple of websites daily in the hopes of preordering them.

What I've found is that, as someone new to toku and to import toys, it takes a surprising amount of digging to find viable options. I've been able to preorder the rest of the Figuarts I want; Kyoryugers are the only exception, since it looks like Bandai decided to give up on State-side Sentai releases right after Kyoryu Red. More's the pity: much like Kamen Rider ShinkenRed, I would've happily bought all ten if they'd been released. And maybe Dr. Ulshade Violet and Cyan from the final episodes.

Jetman Purple said:

I live in the U.S., and I if there was anywhere I could've preordered the rest of the Kyoryugers from, I would've done it. I was checking a couple of websites daily in the hopes of preordering them.

What I've found is that, as someone new to toku and to import toys, it takes a surprising amount of digging to find viable options. I've been able to preorder the rest of the Figuarts I want; Kyoryugers are the only exception, since it looks like Bandai decided to give up on State-side Sentai releases right after Kyoryu Red. More's the pity: much like Kamen Rider ShinkenRed, I would've happily bought all ten if they'd been released. And maybe Dr. Ulshade Violet and Cyan from the final episodes.

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Preordering Sentai or any type of limited toy from Bandai requires either middlemen or toy sites that usually put costs and domestic shipping into the price. There are a handful of websites, that do this, eg cstoys. I usually go through middlemen found on the toy thread.