Skating Theme Dropped

One nugget I forgot to mention from Toy Fair-- the Skating sets have been dropped. They don't appear in the 2008 US catalog and they're being phased out. If you haven't yet got yours, you best start looking.

New York Toy Fair 2008 in a Nutshell

Right now, I'm reporting to you from the hotel lobby of the Doubletree Hotel in Times Square. The wi-fi here is free, but in the room, it's ten bucks. It doesn't make any sense, and technologically speaking, I can't fathom how they block it in there like this. But they did, so I'm here seated facing an elevator.

WARNING/GUARANTEE: I did not take pictures of the showroom area as there was nothing to see that was not already online in their catalog. If you want pictures of their Toy Fair setup, they aren't in this post.

Well, today I got to go see a close-up look at the Playmobil booth at the Toy Fair in New York City. The good news is that the USA lineup for the year is looking fairly strong. The bad news is that there seem to be zero surprises. All the Specials were revealed a few weeks ago, there's no holiday surprises shown (at least, none I could see-- no eggs or pumpkins), so it wasn't what you might call a revealing experience. If you picked up the 2008 Playmobil Catalog, it's pretty much the same as being at the Toy Fair booth. As an informed fan, it isn't as exciting, but it was really cool to see the stuff up close.

The most impressive unreleased items were the giant 4290 Large Pirate Ship and 4230 Circus Tent sets. The tent was enormous-- huge. The pictures you may have seen really do a poor job of illustrating the fact that you could probably hide a cat or two inside this thing. I wasn't a huge fan of the theme initially, but I must say this is a toy that really does aim to please. It features LEDs in the interior which add a lot to the wowie-zowie factor, plus there's ample seating for many a collector's or spoiled child's collection.

The Large Pirate Ship was indeed large. It was packed with features and so sizable you can't help but look at it and wish you had the room for it. The 4291 Giant Octopus set was also very impressive, although it doesn't look it in print. The creature is easily twice as big as the previous release, and it's a hard plastic and not rubbery like the green or color changing versions. In short, if you think you might want one, allow me to assure you that you do. It's quite nice and we'll be getting it for the site.

While the fairies aren't our thang, we did dig the whole Water Zoo and the new pirates Advent Calendar too. The new specials are good, the limited edition recycling truck looked very nice, and the city additions were great. It's a good year to be a fan, and next year should be great too.

If time permits I'll see if I can snap a picture or two of the booth so you can get an idea of what it was. If you really wish you were there just for this line, there isn't a lot new to see, but it is turning out to be a pretty great show with the showings from Diamond Select, Mega Brands, LEGO, Hasbro, Mattel, Quantum Mechanix, and other companies I've met with. I'm a happy camper.

Greetings From New York!

Hi Playmofans! I'm writing to you from the lobby of my hotel in New York City. I'm here for Toy Fair 2008, which means I should be able to snag a few good toy scoops to share with you here, on 16bit.com, and on Galactic Hunter.

My meetings haven't started yet, but I have visited the giant FAO Schwarz and the Times Square Toys "R" Us. Why do you care?

The new Playmobil figure 2-packs (the knights, mermaids, pirates, and Romans) were all there and in very limited supply at Toys "R" Us. I snagged the last pack of Mermaids, and it was about $4.50 before tax. I didn't see any of the new divers which seem to be hitting as of yet, so I'll be keeping my eye out for those elsewhere. Most of the selection at Toys "R" Us was stuff you've seen before, so I won't spend too much time there.

FAO had a huge Playmobil section with lots of neat stuff. I took a bunch of photos and saw that they had the entire Water Zoo theme available, as well as the dinosaurs and some other newish sets. The guy in the department was sure to let me know he expected the circus to be in stock very, very soon, which was surprising. Either way, it was neat, and I'll post my exploits there later.

More as I have it! We just started so odds are there arne't too many (or any) of you reading just yet, but I will update as best I can as news becomes available over the coming week.