Sunday, September 9, 2007

Give us video game action figures


Here's an idea: More action figures based on video games.

Hasbro, are you listening? Buy the license from Electronic Arts to make "Army of Two" (seen at right) and "Call of Duty 4" 12-inch action figures on a G.I. Joe chassis. Use that highly-articulted body design you were using when you quit making the 12-inch Joes a few years ago, except for the stupid hinged hands that wouldn't' hold anything; use the Kung-Fu grip-style hands already.


Enough with the "statue" figurines that have no real articulation. Those aren't action figures! And enough with making action figures all different scales. Make the video game hero series in 1/6 scale like classic G.I. Joes to increase their play value, so kids and collectors could throw them all together into a pitched battle! The little kids who play and the big kids who collect like customization and interchangeable parts, and 1/6 scale is the way to go.

Buy the license from Ubisoft to make "Rainbow Six Vegas" 12-inch action figures the same way. And "America's Army: True Soldier" would be a given. Hasbro could have a whole series of video game heroes, and the series would continually renew itself as new games became popular. Your market is guaranteed, because you wait until the game is successful before you produce a run of toys. Price them reasonably -- say between $10 and $20 -- and they would be wildly successful.

And here's a salute to Hasbro for coming out with copies of their classic old, basic, 12-inch G.I. Joe "Action Team" figures. They're at Wal-Mart, in a little box for $9. There are land, sea and air adventure guys with the fuzzy hair and beards, just like there were when I was a kid. Now bring back some costumes for these guys, and we're in business. After all, is anybody really buying those Sigma 6 figures in earnest? They keep ending up on the clearance aisle. Better to go with a proven winner. I gave one of the retro-12-inch Joes to my nephew yesterday, and he loved it.

And while I'm on a rant, why did you quit making 1/6 scale Star Wars figures? The little Star Wars action figures are great, but who can afford $60 for those 12-inch Sideshow figures? Soon there will be Star Wars: The Force Unleashed on Xbox 360, and then you can add some Star Wars figures to the video game heroes line, too!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I am glad to see you all