Toys! and a trip to the toy store!

[Melooon]

(Logo of a local toy store chain that Iv visited as long as I have memories)

After returning to Ireland from my travels in Italy I met up with @Pirik for coffee and we walked around the city and visited some shops we enjoy including a local toy store. One of the nice things about returning from travels is that you often look at normal things with a new perspective and I found myself realllyy looking at the toys in the store, in the same way as Id look at artifacts in a museum. I wanted to share what I noticed and hear about your thoughts on toys today too! 

Personally Iv always been fascinated by toys and toy culture (I blame the movie Big for this), although I don't collect or keep up with the trends very often.


Firstly the Lego section is HUGE, like ridiculously huge and very expensive Another interesting observation is that the boy section of toys is now entirely taken up by game or youtuber branded toys, this is not all that different to how it was when I was little, but back then it was cartoons instead of youtubers.

Also bonus; Smyths Toys still gives away free physical catalogues that list all their toys and prices and its a joy to browse!
Here is a page dedicated to some monster chamber toys made by that MrBeast guy with the creepy smile. I dont know much about him; other than he said in an interview he as no life outside youtube ~ that seemed sad; but the line of beast toys actually look pretty cool and I can imagine enjoying them as a kid (though they also give me try-hard vibes and they seem to lack articulation - I'd still prefer a Bionicle over these because you can break and fix them)


A lot of the toy's seemed like cost cut versions of toys that were released when I was little, even this stupid robot-rex is still here and he's been disappointing kids for almost 20 years! (Is that an actual crime?? That said the new LED eyes are super cool + they gave him wings for some reason?)


Overall the boy targeted toys section was a little lack luster, and it really felt like they were only aimed at kids under 7 ~ after that it seemed like young boys are expected to buy a games console and focus all their investment in video gaming. The only boys toys that broke the 50 euro price tag where ones clearly more aimed at older collectors (mainly Lego and game branded toys).

This is in TOTAL contrast to the girl targeted section where many toys were clearly aimed at 7-12 year olds and prices regularly broke the 50 euro mark, often falling into the 80 euro mark.

Maybe I'm being harder on the boy aimed toys because I have stronger memories of them; but it really felt like this category had stagnated in a way that contrasts to the girl aimed toys that I'll look at next. This actually seems like a serious problem ~ all kids should have access to awesome toys, and there's something missing here ~ there were no big dream toys aimed at boys, no impossible wish Christmas present robot, no goal to save up your pocket money for, and I think that's a loss.

In terms of design, quality and overall coolness factor the girl aimed toys were in general awesome; the quality is higher, and they had a strong range of toy-centric brands that were memorable and not dependent on youtuber personalities. Some of the standouts to me were Magic Mixies, Monstor High, Bitzees and Mini Verse!


Magic Mixies seem to be an Australian brand of magic themed toys that all center around a gimmick of performing a magical ritual to reveal a doll from its packaging. Usually this involves mixing ingredients that dissolve to reveal crystals that can be placed in a slot to unlock your doll. It doesnt come acorss in the picture, but the overall packaging and visual design of these toys is incredible! With holographic letters and a general sense of mystery and magic; the dolls themselves seem a bit cheap, but the character designs are cool and the overall package is so well done!


Monster High seems to be a big deal; its after my era and I'm unfamiliar with it but Im aware it has a cartoon and a LOT of toys made over the last 10 years - the toys are quite traditional (they are all plastic and could have been made anytime after the 70s); but the design, particularly character design is way beyond anything I remember when I was little; back then there were Bratz, but I would say MH is a significant advancement over those; being both more characterful and generally more inspiring and polished. I also wanna note, that castle play set is 250 euro!?!!


BitZees are one of the few things I would consider buying! They are a kind of virtual pet that uses a persistence of vision hologram to render your pet - I think you actually poke the hologram to interact with it!!? I dont remember anything like this existing when I was little, so this is a good development in virtual pet design ~ there were also a lot of other virtual pets, but most were re-releases of Tamagotchis that I remember.


Finally we have Mini Verse; these are traditional mini object toys; slimier to what you'd get from one of those coin dispenser machines in Japan, but they seemed a little higher quality; I could totally enjoy collecting a few of these today, and I would have loved them as a kid! 

Finally Finally, I wanna mention the video games section ~ I hate to end of a downer, but it was SO depressing  There were no demo-games to play, no consoles on display and no deals or bargain bins. All the consoles were stashed behind the counter like cigarettes in a corner shop; I found the whole experience really off putting and I would not want to get into video games if that's what I saw as a kid ~ buying a console or a game should be a special occasion that feels important and magical, so I was really disappointed to see the state of the video games room.

Anyway - that's my toy store adventure; I'm curious about what toys stores are like in your part of the world and what you look out for in them? How have toys evolved in your life time and how do you feel about them today?

(Aside note; I also know there's a big emphasis on gender divided toys in this post, and that's because the toy stores here are super gender divided, really nothing has changed in my lifetime surrounding this despite the wide spread discussion of the subject ~ maybe its different where you live?)

[TheFrugalGamer]

So I'm familiar with quite a few of these because I have an interest in toys, and also collect dolls and miniatures. The Make It Minis are some of my favorites, but they got pulled off of shelves a while ago because they had toxic resin in them with little to no warnings about using it carefully.    They've apparently remixed the formula so that it is no longer toxic, but I haven't had a chance to pick up and try any of these new versions.

I've also seen the Bitzees because of my obsession with virtual pets, but haven't picked up any myself yet. Maybe someday!

As for what's around me, all of our toystores locally closed, so we're just limited to toy sections of larger stores now. It would be fun to have a place to go looking through, especially now that my kid is old enough to exercise self restraint, and not want everything in the vehicles section! Toy stores are so DANGEROUS for parents, lol!

And yeah, I agree on the gendered toy thing. I do see attempts to make things more universal here and there, but it doesn't always catch on. I'm not a big fan of gendering anything, really, though I don't think everything needs to be made with neutral colors either. I just wish it were acceptable for boys to play with dolls, and girls to own LEGO, and both could find things in every color they want. Then we could just market toys towards "kids who like pink," or whatever!