It's something that obsessive console loyalists would never admit, but our favourite video game companies borrow ideas from each other all the time. If something proves to be popular and especially profitable, you can guarantee that competing firms will weigh in with their own take on the product in the relatively near future. With Amiibo, Nintendo has stumbled upon something of a smash hit, and although the idea of selling small figurines that link up with software isn't an original premise, it's still something that's really taken off, particularly with the hardcore gaming market. Nintendo's success has made us wonder, though: would you be interested in PlayStation's very own version of Amiibo?
Now, we know that the popular little statues were created with the idea that they'd be great companions to various games, and the Wii U's hardware is built with that in mind, but we'd dare say that many Amiibo are flying off the shelves purely for collectible purposes. In that sense, we suppose that PlayStation's own brand of figures wouldn't have to tie into software, although we don't see why a PS4 accessory couldn't launch alongside the miniature personalities.
A sort of Skylanders-esque device would be a neat idea, and scanning your newly procured toys with it could allow for special abilities, weapons, or extra costumes to be unlocked. DLC would even be an option, as content could come bundled with the plastic peripherals. That's not to say that specific software couldn't properly incorporate the statues, though. Tying them into PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale 2 wouldn't be so bad, we suppose.
Nintendo's property library is littered with iconic characters, while Sony's stable is a little less bustling
Of course, this is all purely hypothetical, but we reckon that many of you reading this wouldn't object to such a product. We'd gladly fork out the dosh for a tiny Nathan Drake or Kratos, but this is unfortunately where a particular problem starts creeping up. Indeed, Nintendo's property library is littered with recognisable and even iconic characters, while Sony's stable is a little less bustling. That said, if the Japanese giant could wrangle the support of third-party publishers, we'd have a real selection on our hands.
However, we can't forget that Nintendo's creations are better suited to buyers of all ages, whereas Sony's tend to skew towards a market that begins with young teens. Still, just imagine it – you could have the likes of Solid Snake, Ryu, Batman, and Heihachi all standing proudly next to your television. And let's face it, people have a strange obsession with brand merchandise; if you slapped quality figurines in a box that boasted a PlayStation logo, we don't see why fans wouldn't be tempted to snap them up.
So, what do you think? Would you nab a miniature Cole McGrath, or settle for a pet Colossus? Or perhaps you have no interest in such trinkets? Have your say in our poll, and show us your best pose in the comments section below.
Would you buy a line of collectible PlayStation figurines? (75 votes)
- Yes, I would display them with pride
- Maybe, if they had a use with software
- No, they can stay on the store shelf
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Which of the following characters would you buy? (310 votes)
- Fat Princess
- Helghast
- Jak & Daxter
- Joel & Ellie
- Kat
- Knack
- Kratos
- Nathan Drake
- PaRappa the Rapper
- Ratchet & Clank
- Sackboy
- Sly Cooper
- Sweet Tooth
- Toro Inoue
- Other0%
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Comments 64
"Would you buy PlayStation themed amiibos?" Probably.
No intrest with Amiibo's or a Sony variation, but with Nintendo, it just makes sense given that so many of its IP's have a very charming, whimsical, and unique Nintendo-ish feel. Not to mention that a lot of it makes sense standing side by side despite being from different franchises.
Sony, no, don't do it.
How come there's no Cole Macgrath option?
You forgot to put the Chimera from Resistance on here!
id more than likely get them if sony did make some Mostly Ratchit and Clank lol
No. I'm not interested in Nintendo's amiibo, Sony's Amiibo would either end up like Vita, Move, Go, or PS TV or Microsoft's versions of Kinect.
Potential won't be realised, it will be a half-assed effort or completely unneeded or unwanted or all three. Kids eat up family friendly properties, 9 at best on that list fits but they are hardly popular or present. Its unknown if this venture would end up attracting PS4 like success (half would be more fair), don't even know if PlayStation - Now, Vue, Music will pay off. It will only pay off, if theres actual commitment and vision: something the above failed.
@Azikira @3Above Robert actually wanted to include both, but I thought we should stick with the 'big' names. There's an 'Other' option, though.
I'm a little exhausted from having to explain to Nintendoids why PS All-Stars isn't a rip-off. I'm not about ready to do that again.
Helghast for sure!
After being saturated with Skylanders (some of them in more than four variants) & Disney Infinity I am through with these cash grabs and they take up too much space.
Same reason I prefer digital vs disc (takes up less space and ease of use)
@get2sammyb Fair enough, but is Knack really a big name more than Cole or the Chimera? After all both those franchises have 5 games released to Knacks 1.
Iconic for me on PS it's just Spyro, Crash, Ratchet, Sly Cooper, Jak, Parappa, all the others are fairly recent and I don't care about statue of Joel or Drake for example, they are too common.
Nope. Nintendo has the iconic characters to make this work, Sony just doesn't. Same reason PS All-Stars Battle could never hold a candle to Smash Bros.
I personally wouldn't mind but as soon Sony do something like this people and the media will be quick to jump on their backs, accusing them of copying Nintendo. You only need to look at the reaction to PlayStation All stars to see evidence of that.
Yes, I would if they were cheap enough. I'd definitely buy Kat, Knack, Kratos, and Sackboy. Even if they weren't implemented well, I wouldn't mind as I just wanna have the action figures and so far I haven't seen any at a good price.
@adf86. Sad but true.
Funny thing is, when Ninty copied Activision with Amiibos, there was no backlash. When PS-All stars came out, "OMG rip-off!". Double standards much?
@naruball. Very much Same thing with Move vs. Wiimote but not Kinect vs. Eye toy.
I probably would just for collection purposes. I always wanted some PlayStation collectibles and if these came around I'd definitely like some.
Never understood the amiibo thing to be honest.
Now I want a Sackboy amiibo.
@3Above
Yup. Completely forgot about that (even though I'm a huge Move fan).
I have skylander and disney infinty bring on the playstation amiibo's!. They could be added to collectors ed of the games! I love to see this opened to every game not just 1st party games. People love collectables. Sony and Microsoft should do this for their fans.
Heck no. I'm already sad Nintendo has taken a greedy route and locked on disc content behind re****ed figures, and even sadder that it hasn't crashed and burned. If you give the option as DLC too, then it's one thing, but to completely lock content behind overpriced useless action figures that you can lose is unacceptable. I hope Sony doesn't do this.
No crash bandicoot, he would look great
Nope. I dont buy the silly nintendo ones either for my wii u. They dont do enough in my opinion to warrant getting them
While I'm opposed to the idea, there's something funny about the pole. It doesn't have Cole Mcgrath of Delsin Rowe on it. I would think that they'd deserve a place more than a lot of people who placed on there.
@Punished_Boss_84
Exactly. Sony would just half-a$$ it & screw it up like they do everything not named PS4 or PS3.
And they already tried the blatent rip-off route with the PS Move. And how did that work out? Not well.
The characters aren't iconic or well known enough to get anyone other then Sony fanboys buying them. I have friends who are after Captain Falcon, Toon Link and Samus as well as others that haven't been announced despite none of them owning Nintendo consoles. Cole McGrath, Sly Cooper, Jak et all just don't have the same draw, hence PS All-Stars all but bombing.
@naruball People had been calling for Nintendo to do something similar for years and they added in the extras that any game can be compatible rather than one. Bit of a difference. Like with PS All-Stars bring just a quick (and awful) attempt at cashing in on Smash. Should Nintendo have been slammed a bit for it (and for it taking so long)? Yes. Where they? Yes. So basically what you wrote should've happened did actually happen. Only way you wouldn't have seen a backlash is if you visited only pro-Nintendo sites otherwise you'd have seen plenty.
I said this before, but if you wanna cater to the crowd that formerly had a Wii... You need more than Sackboy alone. There are lots of people really interested in gaming, but need to be pulled in by either a fad like move controls or a recognizable character like Nintendo has tons. I feel PS should consider Monokuma in a more vital role with first a Danganronpa collection for the PS4 and then a Monokuma spin off. Sackboy is nice and all, but doesn't represent PS' more gritty side. Sure, the spinoff should make him a bit more of a fun loving lunatic, but as an image he is pure gold: once you've seen him, you won't forget him.
@Godsire- The PS move was in development years before the Wii was announced.
YES YES YES I was thinking this the other day when i saw them & heard they are selling really well to. Thought SONY should do this to but i want Crash Bandicoot to if they did do it They look cool i think to.
I don't know, while a lot of Sony games are amazing, they aren't iconic as Nintendo brands. I don't know...Maybe Joel and Ellie
While i would do (i have bought a few amiibos), i dont get the same feeling with Sony characters, i love mpst of their games but i dont feel particulary moved by their characters
I'd get cheap $13 figures of certain characters from Sony's library, even if they didnt have functionality. Figures are something I've always collected here and there.
A Classics line would be nice. Old school Lara Croft, Crash Bandicoot, Cloud Strife, and Logan (Syphon Filter).
Nathan all day, every day!
@Jaz007
That's not correct. And I am taking this from Wikapedia:
Sony started develpmental work on the EyeToy, not the same thing as the Move, in 1999. That didn't come out till 2003. They didn't even start working on the PS Move controller until 2008. The Wii came out in 2006. Also, they only released the Move because of the success Nintendo had with the Wii.
My point is/was Sony was being completely reactionary to a move Nintendo did first. They hopped on the $$$ bandwagon fad known as motion controls & failed. The PS Move was a complete & blatent rip-off of the Wii controller. Was it better? Sure, but that's because it came out many years later. And that doesn't mean they didn't rip Nintendo off. I hate Kinect, but at least that was somewhat original, due to there being no controller involved at all. Sony didn't even bother doing something even a little innovative.
Oh and what happened? Yea the motion control fad died and Sony didn't support the Move anymore. Gee, what a shock.
I went to a local store to buy an amiibo or two. But I bought nothing. This amiibo figures look like badly painted 10 euro figures and not up to the usual Nintendo standards. I would buy Sony amiibo from Final Fantasy, Chrash, Metal Gear or Tomb Raider if they would be somewhat good even if they would be slightly more expensive than 10 euros.
@Godsire- Wiki is incorrect https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2010/09/witness_playstation_moves_origins_on_playstation_2
The most they ripped off was with releasing a prouduct that had already been largely developed.
@Jaz007
Like I said, Sony was reactionary with their motion controller. They weren't innovative, because they never bothered to advance the technology to the phase Nintendo did until Sony saw how much $ Nintendo was making. And putting something out in stores, for consumers to buy, is what counts. Nintendo believed in what they were doing & were brave in following through with that technology, for better or worse (I hated the Wii), & should deserve the credit.
All Sony did was see how much money the Wii made, & tried to lazily jump on board that bandwagon with an ill-advised add-on. And they didn't even bother to come up with something different. Just another wand type controller. And then they didn't even support the thing worth a damn.
The motion controller was a gaming fad. And what's worse than a gaming fad? Being the company that tries to blatenly copy that fad, but fails. Then to make it worse, they stopped supporting their product (gee, sound familiar?) after telling you how "innovative" it is. Pfft. PS Move, Vita, PS TV. See a pattern here? So what would make anyone think it would be a good idea for Sony to have Amiibos?
Btw.....You know another company that got in trouble for using these types of business practices? Sega.
Fat Princess
@Godsire- The design wasn't a rip-off though, it's about as much a rip-off overall as the Kinetic I'd say.
And while the Vita is sadly it getting much support, I'd have to say you're lumping in with fads is incorrect. It was following the sucessful PSP, which wasn't a fad.
We do agree about the bottem line of "no Sony amiibos" though.
No thanks, sony is no longer innovated. Just sees someone else success and copies. PS+ wouldn't had exist if it wasn't for xbl.
Nope characters not iconic enough
@Jaz007
I don't think the Vita is a fad. I just meant that Sony isn't supporting the Vita like they should. The Vita is actually a great handheld. If Sony would only have the backbone to give it the games it needs, then it would thrive.
@Jaz007
Might be on disc content for some games, but, it's on-disc content that is above and beyond the already finished game and content that wouldn't otherwise be there, which means it's not ripping consumers off. The only reason people cried against on-disc content is because they felt they were missing out on huge chunks of the game that were already finished- basically, part of the "should-be game" being sectioned off for a price. But that's not the case with Amiibo. It's always extra content that everyone knows is on top of a finished product. They didn't unlock characters in Smash, you already got the characters, they don't unlock in-game characters in Code Name STEAM, they unlock Fire Emblem characters, they don't unlock standard Mario Party modes, they unlock a brand new additional mode, etc...
I also don't think $12.99 is overpriced. Heck, most normal figures cost at least that much, and don't do squat for extra content. Imo, the figure alone is worth the asking price, and I also think the extra content (though bite sized for most games) alone is worth the asking price. Because you're getting content for dozens of games across a span of two systems, and that content adds up fast. A dollars worth here, $5 worth there, 75 cents worth here, etc, before you know it you've far exceeded the meager $13 price of entry.
Of course, whether or not they're worth it is completely up to the individual buying them. But I'd find it a stretch to label $13 greedy for not only a collectible figure with surprisingly decent quality, but added content for dozens of games. I've never got so much content for $13 anywhere else.
I'm glad Sony isn't making Amiibo, because I'm going broke with just Nintendo. Last thing I need is ANOTHER set of figures to collect, and believe me when I say, collect them I would
No. Considering I'm never going to buy any actual amiibo I would certainly never buy any Sony-themed ones. Nothing against the whole "toys-to-life" craze, but gaming is an expensive enough of a hobby as it is. I would much rather spend my hard-earned money on actual games than on pieces of plastic that don't really do anything.
It's one thing when you're a kid and mommy and daddy buy you things. But when you're a grown man who has bills to pay you need to be selective with what you spend your money on. Would I rather get 100s of hours of enjoyment out of Diablo 3, or spend the same amount on 3 amiibo which would collect dust on a shelf?
Nah, if sony still had the crash bandicoot series I'd be into that, or if they got sega in to make some yakuza ones like Kazuma or Majima I'd be all over that.
Sony already tried to ape Nintendo with Playstation Allstars. That didn't work out, I think this would fall into the same trap.
Wouldn't work, Sony's IP's do not have the brand recognition that Nintendo have, and sure we all know Sony would drop support of their 'amiibo' pretty quick, just like everything else.
No interest at all. Don't care about the Nintendo amiibos either.
@Godsire- ok dude, are you dumb? You just said sony made the eye toy in the 90's then called kinect "original" dude, you just said the "kinect" idea originated in the 90's. Seriously? How is it original? Microsoft fanboy much? Also, we all fail to realize pelican made motion controllers back on the original Playstation so everyone copied them, not Nintendo.
Lot of factors to consider, nobody could possibly predict in advance how well they would sell or what part they would play in gaming.
As a father of 2 boys and we are collecting all 3 sets - amiibo, Sklyanders, DI- here's our personal experience to help shed some light.
First - we have over 30 Pokemon toys from before the letters NFC even existed, so we collect toys, period. We have the entire set of Planet Heroes characters, 1 of the best toy lines ever invented, even if it is a direct descendant (not a complete rip-off, but close) of Toy Story. So if Sony made toys, they would probably sell.
Second - um, it already happened. Skylanders first game is "Spyro's Adventure". The 3 original - great - Spyro games were only on Playstation. So in a way the entire Skylanders line started as a Sony Playstation line.
Third - Skylanders, DI and amiibo are all very different, much more so than I imagined before actually playing w/ them all. We have over 60 Skylanders and they are the most "Game" like. 2 amiibo that are almost never used and seem the most unnecessary. About 8 DI toys that are mostly used in story modes which are really just mini fetch quest collections and level editors that can't hold a candle to Minecraft.
Add that all together and who knows what Sony would do w/ NFC toys. Why even call them amiibo, we've had NFC toys 3 years before amiibo came out, Activision has said Skylanders made over $1 Billion w/ a B $ and that was 2 years ago. And while many of them are new ideas, as I've said Spyro is Insomniac and a Sony original, and you can get Sparx, but not play as him.
So what would Sony choose to do w/NFC toys? A known IP line, or something knew, maybe w/ media Molecule and their marionette game? And how would they work, very limited but spread out like amiibo, game-centric like Skylanders, or in between like DI? I don't forsee PSASBR2 happening anytime soon, but there are still game types out there that haven't been done w/ NFC. Something like Free Realms or Home. Home is shutting down, imagine a reborn "Sony Home" w/ playable toy characters. Or a 3rd person team shooter like PvZ Garden Warfare. Nobody expected a "kiddy" game like LBP years ago, something could surprise us.
BTW it's only a matter of time, 3 to 5 years maybe, when we all own 3D printers and make our own toys. Only issue is the NFC chip. Or maybe somebody creates software to print QR codes on the bottom and we scan them in that way? 3D printers will be bigger than VR.
@dacendarin
Wow. Sammy told me that I can't lash out against this type of response, so I will just ignore the ignorance & clear lack of reading & comprehention skills on your part & move on...........dude. lol.
@Godsire- If there was a clerical error it would have been on your part, I read what you said and responded to the words you wrote. If you neat something completely different then perhaps you wrote the wrong words.
@rjejr "3D printers will be bigger than VR"..... Woah woah woah woah woah.. HUGE call.
I would like to know why North America and Australia have 30 more themes than we do in the UK.
@eLarkos - Well in the immediate future 3D printers will be bigger than VR. Just from the fact that nearly every home in the US has a printer attached to their computer, and few people even have 3D tvs. When 3D printers hit $99 they'll be everywhere.
150 years from now when we all have "nurseries" in our home nobody will care about 3D printers. Or much of anything else.
http://www.d.umn.edu/~csigler/PDF%20files/bradbury_veldt.pdf
@rjejr well That story disturbed me a bit.
but at least it reminded me to do more around the house.
so I don't end up like those kids.
I'd say no amiibo figures (I don't think the A is ever capitalized) don't do enough currently to justify a purchase with a few exceptions being Captain Falcon, Shulk and Ness (because I love their games and may never get a chance to own a figure again).
No interest in such thing personally, but clearly they would sell.
@ryanorly Same here TBH. I think you buy tamiibos to unlock characters in a video game or sumthin?
Anyways to answer this poll, no I wouldn't buy PS themed amiibo.
I would get a couple regardless of software use. Any Naughty Dog character, Sly and maybe Parappa.
Meanwhile, I have like 10+ amiibo with plans to get a lot more. I am clear on whose characters I love better.
They'd have to do it JUST RIGHT to get my interest. Already sinking hundreds into Nintendo's line, thanks.
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