Fun & Games in NYC: Toy Fair 2012

//////////
8 mins read

This year’s International Toy Fair was absolutely laden with action figures, statues, and collectibles based on some of the biggest games and franchises on the market. Take a trip with us through the land of all things plastic and sculpted.
What we’re going to do here is break things down by company and  property. Now Toy Fair is an absolutely massive show and I could go on for days about all the cool stuff there was to gawk at, but we’re going to at least attempt to be mildly coherent for a moment so stay with me. I promise you’ll be glad you did, we’ve got some reeaaaly neat stuff for you to see.

McFarlane Toys
For the most part, Todd McFarlane’s company was showcasing Walking Dead, Sports Picks (MLB, NFL, NBA), and Halo. Lot and lots of Halo.
Most of it has been peeped before, but there were some choice items on hand for buyers and roving reporters (Hi!) that not only had not been previously shown off- but were truly fantastic especially for a Halo fan).

No, your eyes do not deceive, these are Halo Xbox Live Avatars

Next up is a really nice box set featuring Master Chief as seen in the upcoming Halo 4 and the cryo-tube he nestled into at the end of H3. “Wake me… when you need me.”

I cannot overstate the awesomeness of the ODST Droppod. It’s huge, it’s heavy, and the sculpting is out of this world.

Almost as impressive as the Helljumper’s ride, the Pelican and Banshee are beautifully made. It’s McFarlane, so you know already that the detailing is top notch, but everything is dead on with these two. Right now, they’re just prototypes but cross your fingers- whatever they’ll sell for, they’ll be well worth it.

These little ‘epic’ scale guys blew me away. I wasn’t expecting anything special from the new line and I was (happily) dead wrong. These were the only sets shown, but they give a great idea of what we’ll be seeing at retail.

Square/Enix

Square continues to impress with their amazing Play Arts Kai series of gaming toys. Phenomenal detail and sculpts plus next level poseability- I don’t think there was a bad on on display. Or even a ‘meh’ one for that matter.
Metal Gear Solid

I forgot there was an MGS lineup in the works, but it looks great nonetheless. The booth’s lighting made it difficult to get solid (sorry) snaps, but hopefully you can get a sense of the work that went into these figs. Meryl’s face sculpt was particularly strong. Good stuff.

Batman: Arkham City

One of the best games of 2011 was represented with the currently available figures of Batman and the Joker, as well as the Summer arrivals of the armored Batman and Harley Quinn. Batman, for those on the fence, is a stunning rendition of the character.

Mass Effect

There wasn’t too much displayed about the forthcoming line of ME3 toys other than the unpainted proto’s shown below. Even without deco’s though, you can tell this is yet another winning set for Square/Enix.

Uncharted and God of War
I wasn’t expecting to see these guys so far along, but both Nathan Drake and Kratos were present, accounted for, and looking great. Lets hope for an expanded line with more characters- I need a Sully!

Kotobukiya

One of the coolest displays I saw at Toy Fair came from Koto. Their Yoshimitsu (from Tekken and Soul Calibur fame) statue was out of this world. Stunning detail and the sheer size of it made it one spectacular collector’s piece.

Now what’s tougher- finding room for him, or scraping together the cash? This bad boy will retail for almost five hundred bones.

Tekken Tag Tournament

This sexy mini-statue line of characters from Tekken Tag wasn’t really a focal point of Koto’s booth, but they were pretty slick anyway. There was also a rumor floating around that the line was all set to be expanded into Street Fighter territory with the arrival of the Street Fighter x Tekken mash-up game. Stay tuned for that one. Or don’t. Shoot- I’m not even sure I was supposed to say that…

NECA

NECA makes awesome stuff. They just do, it’s a fact- go look it up, I’ll wait…. see? Okay- there was a lot of stuff from upcoming blockbusters and some of the greatest series’ of all time being displayed at the NECA booth.

Assassin’s Creed: Revelations

Aside from the large scale Ezio you see below, there were some smaller variants of him and a prop replica of the hidden blade made famous in the games. It’s actually peeking out from behind him in the pic. Not that we were supposed to show that at all. Ahem.

Borderlands

This looks to be a mix of characters from the first title as well as the sequel. Cool looking stuff, if a tad ‘meh’.

Half Life

DO NOT take this to mean that Episode 3, part 3, or any combination of the words ‘half’ ‘life’ and ‘three’ will be occurring anytime in the near future. That said, it’s damn good to see Gordon in action figure for at long last isn’t it?

You can also spy some Left 4 Dead zombies in there with Gordo and the Headcrab.

Nothing was being shown from Bioshock Infinite yet except the hook prop and flag draped statue you see above. Operation Raccoon City was represented by the Umbrella Operative shown and Gears had loads of merchandise on hand- but most was seen before.

Oh, and then also there was this life size Portal gun with lights and sounds coming later this year… but you’re probably not interested in that, right?

And there you have it- all the best of the best that stuck out in my head and said ‘people have to see this’. 
Stay tuned true believers because if you liked this, we’ll have more coverage coming for the big ‘cons- SDCC this Summer and NYCC in the Fall.

This is the bio under which all legacy DigitallyDownloaded.net articles are published (as in the 12,000-odd, before we moved to the new Website and platform). This is not a member of the DDNet Team. Please see the article's text for byline attribution.

Previous Story

Hardware Review: PlayStation Vita

Next Story

It’s a GTA kind of weekend

Latest Articles

>