Craig Drobis is the SVP of Marketing for boys action figures and collectors for Jakks Pacific. Craig will be answering your questions for all Ask Jakks submissions. ToyHypeUSA will be sending him monthly questions and we will have your answers back on or around the beginning of each month. Send us your questions to [email protected]. Send in your questions by June 26th.
Jakks Pacific products can be ordered on Entertainment Earth, BigBadToyStore, Megalopolis: City Of Collectibles, Hobby Link Japan, and Amazon.com.
1. Following up on my question of the anniversary of Super Mario games from Super Nintendo from the early 1990’s, would characters such as the Koopas that wear the Football outfits as featured in the game ever be considered for the 2.5” or 4” figure lines?
Yes, the Koopas in their Football outfits will certainly be considered. We want to have variety and freshness in the line and are always interested to hear what characters people want to have in their collection.
2. Depending on how Bowser’s Castle does in the 2.5” scale, do you think that a 4” version of this castle could someday be made? Perhaps as a kickstarter type approach due to the larger size and cost?
We just started seeing production samples of the 2.5” Bowser’s Castle and it is looking great. We are excited to release it and we are very confident it will make all Mario fans happy. Look for it at stores starting in August at Target, Amazon, Meijer, and others. We do have other levels and themes in development for this year and next for fans to build out the world with the 2.5” figures and playsets. As for also having one in 4” scale, that would be a really big set. If we were going to do it properly, we would want Bowser to be significantly larger, so the Bowser’s Diorama pack with the 6” Bowser, 4” Mario, and 2.5” Bob-Omb is probably the best way to present them. It would take a really big Castle to hold all that. The focus in the near term will be the 2.5” figures and playsets.
3. Jakks has been hitting a lot of the core characters in the Super Mario 2.5” and 4” figures scale, but one figure I haven’t seen is the Mario with cape that also allowed him to glide through the air. I was also wondering if Jakks could revisit Donkey Kong in either scale at some point?
We are always looking for new ways to release Mario. I will definitely add Mario with cape to our discussions with the design team. Mario Odyssey, in addition to being a great game, presents a lot of opportunities as well. Donkey Kong is always in the discussion for new releases.
4. For Mega Man: Fully Charged, are human characters like Ashley, Peter, Suna, Burt and others a possibility for the line, or is Jakks more committed to the Robot Masters, Mega Man, Rush, as well as the other villains?
We consider all the core characters when building out a wave plan. When a brand has a lot of success, we eventually get to them all. We want to start strong and have enough depth to keep consumers excited and returning to stores. We feel the characters in the first wave are the strongest and give kids and fans plenty of fun characters to play with whether Mega Man: Fully Charged is their introduction to the brand or they are a long time Mega Man fan.
5. When are the Sonic the Hedgehog bendables supposed to come out? Are additional waves planned or just the four figures for now?
The Sonic line is one we plan to be producing for a long time to come, so rest assured that more waves of figures are coming. The figures which were unveiled at New York Toy Fair will arrive to retailers this Fall, as early as August. Look for them at Target, Amazon, Meijer, Kohls, and others.
