Japan Inc. - August 2008: Toys are sweet

Unfortunately, many of these toys look delicious, but we don’t recommend eating them. You know…with all the plastic and everything.

In the August issue of Japan Inc. magazine we wrote about all the food-inspired toys and fashion that debuted at this year’s Tokyo Toy Show. Food fashion, especially for sweets, has peaked with a wide variety of items from mobile phone straps to Mister Donut playsets.

Satisfy your sweet tooth by clicking above for the full piece, along with the rest of Japan Inc.’s amazing content.

Tags: Fashion, gadgets, Japan Inc., Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage, Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends

QFO, Wonderspin flying their way into our hearts

Mini helicopters and other flying…err….things have been all over the place in the last year or so, but the coming production trend is focused on a more space-aged theme focused on rotating the entire device, not just a propeller for lift. This is a combination of much older spinning/flying toys with new control technology and onboard electronics.

What’s interesting to us is how many indoor flying toys come out for a country with such small living quarters and low ceilings!

The QFO from Takara Tomy doesn’t have much information about it on its homepage yet, but we were able to see some samples and a demonstration at the Tokyo Toy Show. From what we can tell (nothing confirmed), the QFO spins and flies, but can also be controlled via infrared and has a red light on the top.

Our favorite so far can be shown in the video below from the crew at Gizmodo Japan. The Wonderspin from CCP Japan (a subsidiary of Bandai), spins around as a center-balanced propeller and can be controlled remotely. In addition, it also employs motion sensors to keep it away from walls, but also to allow users to control it by moving their hands around it!

Photos via Nikkei and CScout Japan

Tags: CCP, gadgets, Takara Tomy, Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage

Tokyo Toy Show 2008 with video and photos

As promised, and just like last year, we’re covering the annual Tokyo Toy Show with lots of video and photos to keep your toy and gadget-minded brains busy.

This year, as we’ve written about extensively in the past, almost every major toy manufacturer was knee-deep in toys that either help you cook, make characters out of food, or are dessert-related in some decorative way. Toy Show 2007 had air guitars, 2008 has the cutest little lunch in the whole wide world.

As has been the production trend in recent years, there’s an even bigger focus on so-called “adult toys”, meaning creating fun lifestyle goods for a population that is increasingly older. We’ll cover all the goods after we sort it all out. In the meantime, enjoy our short video overview!

Tags: Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage

B.S. Alert: Japan’s “robot for lonely men” is quite the opposite

Like many (most?) foreign press accounts on Japan, today’s coverage of the Tokyo Toy Show is no exception. The headlines below from the New Zealand Herald via Reuters and linked to from the Drudge Report fit right in to the perception of Japanese men as lonely nerds that would rather date miniature robots than flesh-n-blood women.

“Japan’s robot for lonely men“?

Sure, but only if you forget to note that the robot in question isn’t even Japanese and is only licensed by Sega Toys from WowWee with a different exterior.

For the record, WowWee is a Hong Kong-based company founded by Canadians.

This is just one more example of the foreign press seeing something on its surface, speculating like hell, and making Japan into something it isn’t. After all, would Reuters have ever called it “America’s robot for lonely men”? Of course not…American men aren’t THAT pathetic, right?

While these types of events are typically reserved for out-of-touch newspapers like the New York Times and their QR Code discoveries, it seems that the whole world is determined to turn Japan’s love of technology into some kind of delusional behavior (from the future, of course).

Speaking of the NYT, they’re STILL getting quoted in other media on this piece about “Media Immersion Pods”, a term that the author made up herself to describe what are, in fact, manga/internet cafes that have been around a long time already. Not quite the “new trend” she described, but who needs facts?

Sorry for the unusual post of bitterness, but if the foreign press wants to stop speculating and get some real information, we can only give them one suggestion.

Tags: MSM, robots, Tokyo Toy Show
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage

Homestar EX from Sega Toys

UPDATE: The official name has now become the Homestar EXTRA, and it’s coming out in December 2008!

For our first post from the first day of the 2008 International Tokyo Toy Show, we are proud to introduce the latest in Sega Toys’ Homestar home planetarium series. Yeah, they just debuted the Homestar Spa in the last couple of weeks, but the Homestar EX is poised to be the Pro-version of the…err…Homestar Pro? (product page link)

Though it won’t be released until the end of the year, the Homestar EX uses large star discs, is a much higher-quality home planetarium than anything else in the Homestar series, and is bright enough to see the stars clearly with the lights on in the room! Other new features include a digital multi-function remote control, and a truly random (not fixed) shooting star function.

Of course, such high celestial technology doesn’t come cheap. While no price has been determined, the Homestar EX is expected to sell for over $800 when released.

Tags: Homestar, Homestar EX, Sega, Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage

HomeStar Spa planetarium from Sega Toys

UPDATE#2: JapanTrendShop now carries the Homestar Spa.

UPDATE: The even newer Homestar EX!

It’s been awhile, but we’re finally getting a nice update to the immensely popular Homestar “Home Planetarium” series from Sega Toys.

After the original Homestar became so popular, the much-improved Homestar Pro and the portable Homestar Pure hit the market. However, aside from some special editions, there hasn’t been an update in over a year.

Coming soon, the Homestar Spa is a home planetarium for your bathroom!

Homestar Spa is combining elements of popular ambient and bath toys for adults (JapanTrendShop has tons), with waterproof design and additional projection elements such as “flowers” and “kaleidoscope“.

While not yet out on the market, HomeStar Spa will be debuting at the upcoming Tokyo Toy Show, and we’ll be there as always for in-depth coverage of this year’s latest gadgets and toys, including plenty of photos and video.

Tags: Homestar, Homestar Spa, lighting, Planetariums, Sega Toys, Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage

Tokyo Toy Show 2007 coverage with video and pics!

The CScout Japan team went to the Tokyo Toy Show 2007 today, and had an amazing time checking out all the newest toys and gadgets from Japan for this year. There are many cool things coming out, and we’ll go into much more detail over the weekend, but today is just a basic overview. As usual, we were most impressed with Sega, especially their lifestyle gadgets like the Homestar Pro, but Bandai and Takara Tomy were right up there as well. Konami is a definite must-see, but only because they have the best models

We also got to see the Puchi Puchi virtual bubblewrap up close, as we mentioned in this post. For some reason there was a major surplus of three kinds of items: Helicopters, air guitars (the kind not made of air, which was confusing), and models of Tokyo Tower (we saw at least five). No shortage of girls either! Check out the rough video coverage below:

We can’t possibly fit everything in here at once, so we’ll cover our favorite items in the coming days, one-by-one. Click below to jump and see some eye-candy from the show before we unveil some exclusive pics of some very cool Japanese products coming your way soon…

Click here for more

Tags: Bandai, Homestar, Sega, Takara Tomy, Tokyo Toy Show, Toys
Category: Technology & Gadget Trends
Other categories: Marketing & Ad Trends, Fashion & Lifestyle Trends, Press coverage