[TIME] How the toy industry is being outplayed by video games this holiday season

king zell

Member
While some hard-to-find toys emerge every holiday season, toymakers are heading into this one without a monster hit. Indeed, there has not been a Furby-style frenzy in years. Of 10 toy segments — yes folks, there are that many to the people who take toys seriously — only two, arts and crafts, and dolls, have generated sales growth over a recent 12-month period, according to investment firm Harris Nesbitt. Some of the weakest categories like construction sets (down 10%) and action figures (down 9%) are the ones aimed at boys, who suffer the most blisters from video games. Analysts expect one of the top stocking stuffers this season to be not a traditional toy but the new generation of Nintendo's Game Boy, the DS, which hit stores last week. Next year will bring more competition in handheld gaming, when Sony launches the PSP. Cell-phone makers like Nokia are also targeting kids with game gadgets. A recent Roper poll found that parents plan to curtail toy purchases this season in favor of gifts such as video games and consumer electronics.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101041206-832235,00.html
 
Cell-phone makers like Nokia are also targeting kids with game gadgets.
proving once again that the mainstream media doesn't quite "get" it.

kids are supposed to buy ngage? yeah, right. that's what all that dudical marketing and the WWII game is for.
 
ferricide said:
proving once again that the mainstream media doesn't quite "get" it.

kids are supposed to buy ngage? yeah, right. that's what all that dudical marketing and the WWII game is for.
I don't think I have seen a single kid holding an N-Gage. Seen plently of adults though. :lol
 
This argument once again proves that outside the angsty "I want to be teh mature" upper teen demographic, handhelds and gaming are still a vital sell to kids... anyone ignoring that market is insane.
 
Of course the handheld market is geared more towards kids. The handhelds are much more durable, and if you look at the licenses that Nintendo gives out, a lot of them are things that appeal to a much younger audience. Of course, that goes without saying that the handheld market is an extremely lucrative one.
 
Hell, man, all I see at toy stores now are toys I used to have as a kid, except uglier. At least with the gaming industry you see a push to create. There's no innovation in the toy market. And that, to me, friends.....is utter dispair.
 
kumanoki said:
Hell, man, all I see at toy stores now are toys I used to have as a kid, except uglier. At least with the gaming industry you see a push to create. There's no innovation in the toy market. And that, to me, friends.....is utter dispair.
That is exactly why the toy market has stagnated.
 
luxsol said:
I blame McFarlane "Toys"!

Blame? I feel like they're the only cool 'action figures' out there, although you can't really move them, they're more for display.

I'd KILL for some McFarlane detailed Zelda based action figures.
 
LakeEarth said:
Blame? I feel like they're the only cool 'action figures' out there, although you can't really move them, they're more for display.

I'd KILL for some McFarlane detailed Zelda based action figures.
McFarlane did some great work with MGS.
 
I don't think I've seen anybody with an N*Gage... but then again, nearly everybody I know owns a GameCube (or is getting one soon) :P
 
My interest in action figures and Hot Wheels waned after getting an NES for Christmas. Many of my friends recall that the year they finally got an NES was their favorite holiday season of their childhood. I have to place it in a tie with the Millenium Falcon Christmas. Good times.
 
LakeEarth said:
Blame? I feel like they're the only cool 'action figures' out there, although you can't really move them, they're more for display.

I'd KILL for some McFarlane detailed Zelda based action figures.
Well, not only because there is a glut of his unsold statues in toy stores but because other toy companies tried to follow his way. At first what he did was great, toys started to become even more detailed and better paint applications were used. Then less articulation was being used in favor for even better paint applications and more detail, but other companies followed suit (Hasbro being the second worst). Toys stopped being fun. Thank god that Stikfas showed up, though i'm not sure how successful they are, but Hasbro created its own Stikfa type toys after Stikfas left.

Did the collector's market crash or something? I remember back when I was heavily into collecting toys that McFarlane and Star Wars stuff would sell out immediately and you'd never see certain figures outside of comic shops or ebay, leaving only the duds to warm the pegs. Now I can find everything i want, even though sometimes it's months after released.

Oh, and those little Wind Waker Link and Zelda figures are so much cooler than a "realistic" Link would be! Course, that's just my opinion... i hated the retarded faces the McFarlane MGS figures had. The anime line wasn't much better either. Personally, I like gashapon or trading figures more. Great detail and paint app, but small enough to leave plenty of shelf space for other stuff to display.
 
Ironclad_Ninja said:
I don't think I have seen a single kid holding an N-Gage. Seen plently of adults though. :lol


I don't think I've seen a single person holding an N-gague

And yeah it seems, sadly, that the toy boom from a few years ago is far gone. I remeber going to TRu and finding shit loads of good toys (good stuff like <but not exactly this line> Batman:Return of the Dark Knight Figures) for a good price now all I see is power rangers and hotwheels, and have to resort to overprices online stores and ebay. :(
 
The first time I saw and N-gage was during Christmas last year. My little cousin got one.

The last time I saw an N-gage was when I looked over at his box of 'discard' toys.
 
Top Bottom