Bustn' Transformers Myths: Takara Tomy Makes Toys Principally for Children and not Collectors
While it might sound obvious to those outside the Transformers hobby, Takara Tomy, a company made up of a merger of two of Japan's most legendary toy companies, makes toys predominantly for kids and not aging collectors. The reason it is not that obvious is because you will still often see or hear when looking through boards and Facebook pages that Takara (the sub branch of the bigger firm who is responsible for the Transformers toys in Japan) caters to collectors, which explains why their versions of toys is oftentimes nicer than the Hasbro counterpart. All of that is false. Sure, Takara issues some toys for collectors, like the Masterpiece line, but their general Transformers toys, who have Hasbro counterparts, are catered to kids, just as the Hasbro counterparts are. They are also sold in toy stores, just like their Hasbro counterparts are. No reason it would be otherwise. You don't need to take my word for it. We will just take it directly from Takara with the following three quotes.
The best toy line in recent era to make it really obvious that Takara cared far more about reaching children than adults was the Arms Micron line (known as "Transfomrers Prime" in the west). Toys were changed and retooled to accommodate small figures (microns) which kids would build and then attach to their toys. This was something very different from the Hasbro components and that change wasn't made to woo any adults. Here is an exerpt from this line's wiki:
In an interview in Dengeki Hobby magazine, TakaraTomy designers Takashi Nakase and Hironori Kobayashi explained the reasons Microns played so heavily into the Japanese Prime line when it wasn't designed that way from the start:
Takashi Nakase: The biggest reason is that we wanted to raise the target age group. In past series, the target ages were small children and their fathers, but the age group which is actually able to enjoy transforming toys is 7 ~ 9 years old. We went back to the beginning and considered appropriate products for that age group, and came up with the concept of "customising". That is why Arms Microns need to be assembled from parts, and stickers are included to be put on the main figure - to give the feeling of "completing" the toy as one's own.
Hironori Kobayashi: We conducted a play session with children where they played freely with Movie series Transformers, mixed with various items such as Minicons, and found that they mostly enjoyed combining Minicons to make larger weapons or to customise the Transformers. We thought it might have some potential.
Model-making is huge in Japan for the 7-and-up crowd. Mega-huge.
Here is another quote from recent history, which discusses how it is great that there are now two generations of fans who buy Transformers in Japan. However, notice which of the two groups Mr. Noriaki Maeda, TakaraTomy Transformer Marketing Team Producer in 2012, is quicker to point out
here:
This year’s highlight was, of course, the third Hollywood live action movie in summer. The previous two movies in 2007 and 2009 gathered huge interest, and the number of the fans was steadily increasing when this highly anticipated third movie was released and (the brand) made another giant breakthrough. We introduced Animated last year even though we were far behind from other countries to do so, to prepare for this year. As we began to see the fans spanning over 2 generations, I am happy to say many young children obtained our products.
...
What surprised me was perhaps ”Arcee”. This character did not appear in the third movie, but she appears in the new CG animation show “Transformers Prime” coming next spring, and she is one of the core cast members. We added the Japan original redeco to the first wave of Movie toys as a hint, but as there were not many bike TFs, she was popular among children.
Finally, I would like to share this recent quote which comes from Takara's
official site and describes the Transformers Adventures series which started in 2015:
The Transformers Adventure series came right after the development of the Movie Advanved series (Age of Extinction) and uses a lot of technologies developed during that previous line, as can be seen with TAV 01 Bumblebee. One of the main struggles of the "Advanced Series" was to replicate the rapidity of the transformation seen in the films and thus needing to reduce the amount of steps from one mode to the next while still getting the right look in both modes. We wanted to go back to the G1 era where kids from 30 years ago were fascinated with these toys and the fact that they converted from one mode to the next quickly made for easy play. We wanted to incorporate that speedy transformation and instant playability with the technology we developed in all these years since.
Not only does this quote detail how it is Takara's goal to have a faster and more streamlined Transformation (which got pretty complex in the late 00s thanks to some movie line toys) but that they feel it is a way to return to the G1 spirit of how simpler Transformers toys were. This confirms the notions of Takara's love for the original Transformers era and how they want to recapture that era for today's kids. There is a distinction to be made here though, since this inspiration from the original Transfomrers era and adherence to stay loyal to it is often instead extrapolated by fans to mean that Takara caters to an older audience. It is instead just Takara looking at this brand which was meant for kids all along and making sure it is still accessible to this age group 30+ years later.
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