Having thought of this idea many times over now, I finally decided to put my thought into action here. With the ok from our forum/discord mod @fourthstartcg, I now present to you the Giant Merch/Plushie/Toy/Etc Thread!
This is an ideal place to share and talk about all things outside of the Pokemon TCG. Believe it or not, beyond cards theres an endless world of items which have been released since Pokemon’s inception and still more items which continue to be released consistently. Theres so much out there and sometimes so little information tied to a lot of these items, so this is where a lot of these discussions can now take place for us to share what we know and learn from each other.
hell yeah. I miss these and tech decks a ton but i always remembered the pokemon ones having less well made grip tape. but they were a ton of fun to play with
Figure id start with two of my favorite displays of plushies here which i love seeing everyday. Theres something about having that consistent red, green, and blue theme with the starters that is so eye appealing to me.
This is a fantastic idea for a thread! If anyone’s into Pokémon Facebook groups there’s a really interesting 3k+ member Vintage Pokémon Collectors group I joined recently which specifically focusses on non-TCG Pokémon products released pre-2005: www.facebook.com/groups/201611494595660.
My first contribution to this thread shall be my glorious balls:
The Pokémon Center Company has been partnering with various different major sports companies to create golf ball sets like these on an almost yearly basis. These two sets were both manufactured by Dunlop I believe they are the first two to be released, with the 6-ball set released in ~May 2000 and the 4-ball set released in ~February 2001.
If you’re into a more popular Pokémon, chances are a golf ball will exist with that Pokémon on, though the majority of the more recent sets (2015 onwards) only seem to feature Pikachu - perfect for if you’re a yellow mouse Pokémon collector and want to take out your anger on wannabes like Pikachu with a golf club.
The 6-ball box features some really nice artwork around the sides of the box as well:
@pichufan, its so cool to me to see random niche stuff such as those balls, but also how the art style reflects the time period and other merch of that era. I have some christmas plates from the pokemon center from around 2000 and the pika looks very similar to the one on the balls. Really cool to see, and also that group you linked is a merch paradise it seems haha. Just joined and really cool collections there!
@brendantheclayboy, cant go wrong with marbles! haha i remember those very vividly from childhood but cant recall at all if i had any. I had soo many toys that only a few stood out more than others, but im sure those were somewhere in my childhood.
@stagecoach, clefairy doll is a classic too. If youre interested in more clefairy doll variants, check out the secret base plushies. Theres one in there which i grabbed as a part of a lot of them all, and its very nice and well made!
The doll is just so basic and goofy. The model is this grotesque 90s CG render. It is a design that really only exists the way it does because the item itself is so trivial and this depiction of it is 100% informed by the technology of the time. One of my favorite kinds of collectibles are items that replicate their function or form exactly as they appear in-universe, so I like the really old Banpresto doll because it looks just like this picture. It makes me really happy.
The newer versions of Poké Dolls are cuter and look more like Clefairy itself, but they are also refined designs meant to be independently appealing and aren’t heavily based on the appearance of this TCG art. I do like though that “Lillie’s Poké Doll” is specifically an old worn out stuffed animal whose inspirations clearly go all the way back to the original card. It kind of creates continuity in-universe that the “old” Clefairy Doll is outdated even in-universe too. That’s fun.
@stagecoach, ah I see what you mean there, and thats a very good point as to why you enjoy it so much which i can respect! Ideally though pokedolls were created in order to mimic that of that in game dolls feature via gen 2, but with clefairy being the only doll to have its own tcg depiction its cool to see a plushie taking on all media forms. I almost wish there was such a thing for other pokedolls as well, which if not mistaken i want to say theres a jumbo card of some mons holding pokedolls but i can be wrong there. In my head i can almost see the image as if ive seen something to that degree, but id have to dig to see if my memory serves me correctly (oshawott and chikorita come to mind in this art too, but yeah im really unclear here).
These are super cool limited Sugimori art frames from the Pokemon center. There’s also one featuring shiny Charizard that’s impossible to find… actually all of them are pretty hard to find.
Pokepark Taiwan magnet board. The magnets were given with family mart purchases there, my cousins and I had a lot of fun collecting them all back then.
Man, im really enjoying seeing the collections of things here so much. There’s something about seeing a large variety of varied products all together thats just awesome.
On another note here, pokemon center US is releasing another one of their Parade figures for the the 20th anniversary tomorrow. If anyone isn’t familiar, they began doing this a few months back and can be found on their website. Im curious to see if theyre going to feature every starter mon made this far for additional figures, and judging by whats been released so far I believe thats going to be the case. So just a heads up if anyones looking!
