Category Archives: Toys

Yano, ps2, ps1 games, red dead revolver, atari lynx

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yano, ps2, atari lynx and other items bought in Feb-March 2011these are some of my purchases from January and February 2011.

ps2 with random usb controller $25 at savers
Yano big furry robot toy $2
furby $2
random pokemon figures about $7 each at big w
orange GBA $23 from a friend who got it in china
black GBA $19 at cashies
Atari lynx set $40 inc postage i think from a member here, power point input point still works (my other ones are broken)
ps1 games about $5-10 each
kingdom hearts and red dead revolver ps2 $6 each
quantum leap book $2ish
plants vs zombies game of the year edition + peggle nights $8 and $13 each at EB games. had to return peggle for a new disc because the picture started flaking off :S
other ps2 games $3 each at op shop
Borderlands GOTYE new from EB for $38
doom 3 expansion and red dead revolver $6 each
mario kart lolly toy $2-3
donkey kong and dixie kong figures about $7 each
simpsons handheld game $3ish
donkey kong arcade replica $19 at Game Traders

Yano Interactive Storyteller

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Yano's face may be the last thing you see before you die

Yano's face may be the last thing you see before you die

Sometime in early or mid 2010 I saw this unusual and creepy toy at the Camberwell Sunday Market. I found it interesting and the owner claimed it was worth hundreds of dollars on ebay and they were willing to sell it for $35 or something like that. I tried looking up whatever they said it’s name was but i couldn’t seem to find out any information on it. I didn’t buy it and forgot about it. Last week I was at an op shop and found a Furby, all their soft toys were $2 each. I looked around to see if there were any more Furby dolls and then saw Yano’s face looking out side of giant wire framed basket under a pile of other boring toys. I grabbed it and noticed the face was damaged but considering it’s age and the material it was made from it seemed ok. I took it home and realised it still had batteries in it and wow. My friend who was with me was super creeped out by it’s loud grinding gears as it’s head turned and his face moved as he talked. It told us an awful story called “The Magic Singing Stone”. To continue the story we had to press either the Yes or No button on its chest. I’ve since found out that it is meant to come with a special controller that is better for communicating with Yano, but I’ve since been back to the store and couldn’t seem to find it anywhere. Not a big deal.

Yano compared to a Furby.

Yano compared to a Furby.

Yano was made in 2001 by The Original San Francisco Toymakers Ltd. Some searches on Youtube have shown that this toy was just as terrorifying to kids in 2001 as it would be now. It reads stories out of a chip that is inserted into the bottom of the toy. It runs on several C cell batteries. One video mentioned that the kid’s parents used to threaten them with Yano if he did not eat his vegetables or something. Other people have made amusing videos using creative lighting to highlight how creepy this toy can be and other people have modded it and used it’s robotic face for their own uses.

Turok action figure – Adon by Playmates

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Turok Figure Adon complete in box

Turok Figure Adon complete in box

Turok Figure Adon back of box

Turok Figure Adon back of box

In Janurary 2010 I went to Geelong with a friend and went to the closing down sale of “Card Mania”, a store I remember hearing about when I was in primary school. During the Pokemon craze of the late 1990s this store was quite popular with people buying and selling their trading cards there. In recent times, it seems collecting trading cards is not as popular as it was during the 80s and 90s. This is probably because the Internet makes it much easier for people to access images from their favourite movies and TV shows. There is a bright side to that store closing down, they have opened a similar, more modern store nearby called Pop Cultcha or something along those lines. It is pretty similar to Minotaur in Melbourne, selling various video game and science fiction merchandise. I went to Card Mania during a 50% off sale and picked up set of 3 Turok action figures. They were marked at $36 for the set, but with the discount I got the lot for $18 which was an awesome bargain. Especially since I’d bought a few Little Big Planet toys that day for $15.

Fake Nintendo plush claw machine / skill tester dolls – Luigi

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Got the real Luigi doll on the right from a claw machine at a proper arcade ages ago. Well… I think one of my friends won it and then gave it to me. Can’t quite remember. Then a few months ago I was killing time before I had to pick my mum up from work and found a claw machine outside a super market and noticed a Princess Peach doll,which was the only doll in the set that I’m missing. But then on closer inspection I noticed that many of the dolls in that machine were fakes based on existing claw machine dolls I was used to seeing (from various childrens movies such as Monsters Inc. I can’t remember if the Peach doll was real or not but the Luigi and Donkey Kong were horrible. Especially the Donkey Kong which had giant black eyes with no colour in them. The regular claw machine Donkey Kong is pretty horrible looking to start with (giant bulging eyes that poke out of his head) but this other one looked like it was dead. It was too hard to pick up though so I could only get the Luigi.

If you compare the two dolls the one on the right is much cheaper looking with un-soft fabrics and very weird hands with giant thumbs. His clothes appear to be too small for him and his hair is held on with minimal stiching so it looks like he is wearing a wig which could be easilly pulled off. His eyes are printed rather than embroided as well. He also has no swing tag. The real one does but you can’t see it too well in the picture.

The real one are made by Hunter Leisure and are made for “Amusement only, not for retail”

The retail plush toys are slightly nicer again. This official doll is a bit fat and weird looking as well but but is still nicer than the fake one.

Mario Candy Container by Au’Some

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Mario Candy ContainerI got these in America at the same shop I got the gummy candy from. They were probably about $6-7 USD. Basically just Mario / Fire Mario standing on barrels that are full of generic lollies. The arms and head are posable. 3 points of articulation here. The pain job is a little bit blotchy and cheap looking. I think i remember the total of these and the gummies were about $20 usd. which was rather shameful. These toys are similar to the the ones by Popco/Ban Presto but a little smaller and made of cheaper plastic rather than vinyl.

Topps 1982 Donkey Kong Cards, Stickers and Gum

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Topps 1982 Donkey Kong Cards, Stickers and Gum

Bought these just outside Disneyland California in a collectables store. Can’t think of the price off the top of my head probably about $3-5 USD each. Bought 5 packets but didn’t open any. As they say they contain 3 Rub-Off Cards, 3 Stickers and 1 Stick of Bubble Gum. As I haven’t opened mine I haven’t seen what they look like inside, but some quick googling gave me this: https://www.atari2600.com/cat–Video-Game-Memorabilia–SUB120.html so those look pretty cool, it a random scratchie version of the arcade game, guessing you have to take the right path without hitting an obstacle.

I have feeling the gum inside them would be pretty horrible by now I’m not sure what it was meant to be shaped like but it seems to be all broken up inside the packets. I don’t think they were like that when I got them but it doesn’t really matter.

Mario Kart Wii pullback toys by Furuta

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note the hole in the front of the box

note the hole in the front of the box

I bought these a while back and they are my favourite Mario Kart toys so far. They are from Japan are packaged with a lolly. I find it amusing that it comes with an expiration date on it for the little lolly that comes with them.

When these are for sale, they come in a tray that holds 1 of each character so if you ever see these for sale in a shop, they probably have the whole set (or did originally).

You can tell which character is which by looking through the hole in the front of the box which shows a card covered in numbers, you then look at the back of the box and see which character the number matches with.

These cost me $12 each which was about the price they would have cost on ebay at the time. Pretty expensive set, but nicer than the dozens of Mario Kart DS toys.

If you buy these and want to keep the boxes like I did, open them from the bottom instead of tearing the tab on the top of the box. This way it will still look unopened. I opened one of them from the top and it looks really bad now. The rest all look fine.

On ebay there are similar looking sets to this which are really cheap but they are much smaller and not as nice and come with more characters than in this set.

they look good on the Mario Kart DS race speed race set

they look good on the Mario Kart DS race speed race set

Mario Party water games – Mario Bros and Donkey Kong

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Mario Party water toys front of packaging

I bought this set for $5.95 USD at a shop called Puzzle Zoo on my family holiday to America over christmas 08.

These water games are made by the Tara Toy Corporation in 2006 and are officially licensed by Nintendo.

The set comes with 2 of each game, one with Mario themed pictures and another with pictures based on the original Donkey Kong arcade game.

These are meant for being given as prizes to children at birthday parties I guess. But instead they shall sit in my cabinet unopened.

Judging from the back it looks like there are also key chains and pinball games in this toy series. I didn’t see any of these there for sale, but this shop had a few other cool Mario Kart toys and whatnot.

mario party water games back

Super Mario Bros 3 1989 McDonald’s Toys

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1989 Mario Mcdonalds Toys

I was born in 1988 and these toys came out in 1989. I have had these since I was a kid but I’m sure I actually remember getting these toys, even though I was very young. So perhaps they came out here a while after they did in America or something. It is also possible that my dad got me these in America or something.

I have two each of Mario and Luigi and only 1 Goomba. I am missing the Koopa Troopa figure.

Mario is in his Super Mario Bros 3 Raccoon suit and like in the game, this toy can “Fly” for short periods of time, but instead of by running and holding jump, you get to push down on his head and a suction cup + spring combination shoots mario into the air moments later. It seems kind of dangerous really, I’m sure I remember shooting myself in the face with this when I was younger. I have another one that I removed the spring from years ago so it would be more of a figure than a weird floating man on a spring. I lost the spring from that toy so I didn’t include it in the photo.

Luigi is a pullback toy that does travels drives around all over the place in a strange pattern. I have two of these as well but one is a bit beat up.

The Goomba was always my favourite of the set, pushing its head forward makes a little suction cup stick to its feet and then a moment later it does some kind of crazy flip. It doesn’t land on its feet but I recall trying to make it do that years ago, or perhaps it used to do a proper flip but does’t land properly anymore. I’m not sure.

I probably should have taken photos of all of them but the extras aren’t much to look at.

Super Mario Figure Collection (Donkey Kong)

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Donkey Kong Figure Collection

I like the Popco/Ban Presto 5 inch “Super Mario Figure Collection” figures, It has been a pretty long time since Nintendo have had a proper action figure series available at regular retails stores.

When they first came out in Australia (stamped as Nintendo BP. 2008 China) they cost $19.95 at Kmart stores and I think Gametraders stores were either the same or a bit more I didn’t bother getting them as I knew I could get the Japanese Ban Presto Prize Collection versions cheaper on ebay / private forums / anime stores. So I bought some off a Palgn forum member for a price similar to Ebay’s sets and the rest from a shop in Melbourne. But then Kmart reduced the set to $15 each so I bought a Mario, Luigi and Yoshi a while ago (they had lots of Luigi and Toads left over, but no Donkey Kong.

Donkey Kong has been pretty hard to get, I noticed this ages ago and considered buying one for full price one of the few times I saw one for sale, but didn’t. Anyway I finally got one for $15 and now I’m just waiting to get a Toad (which won’t be too hard, just waiting to see if there’s a further price drop or toy sale coming up).

My older figure is actually in pretty bad shape, it came with its plastic bag sort of broken and its face looks a bit squashed and there is red paint on it from his tie that makes him look injured. This is a bit of a problem for the Japanese figures, I’ve seen others in shops that look a bit squashed. I think my pink Yoshi figure is a bit squashed too actually.

face is a bit caved in

face is a bit caved in