[Music] over the past few years Kirby merchandise has really exploded in popularity there was always Kirby stuff coming out but recently we've seen countless plush sets gotcha pon figure sets and more be released but with all these new products coming out many people have begun to look back at what came before it but unfortunately especially with Kirby that's not that easy to do Kirby merchandise before the mid-2000s is really hard to keep track of there were tons of sets released but a lot of it was very poorly documented this is most prominently the case with very early Kirby merchandise and that's a shame because tons of early Kirby stuff does exist as early as Kirby's Adventure the marketability of Kirby was already in 4/4 there is a ton of obscure Kirby's Adventure merchandise such as this set of gotcha pawn plushies released by Bandai or this finger puppet set also by Bandai Bandai was responsible for a majority of the merchandise released under the Kirby's Adventure brand while Takara did handle a UFO catcher set of Kirby's Adventure plushies Bandai basically handled everything else including this very interesting set of plushies this is a set of four plushies released in 1993 by Bandai for Kirby's Adventure the set isn't that large consisting of only four plushies but they've been getting a lot of attention recently mostly due to how they look as you probably know kirby looked a lot different back in the early days of the franchise his face was smaller he had beady eyes and his cheeks were just dashes this kirby design has seen a bit of a comeback recently with merchandise at least with the 25th anniversary several companies have released plushies as well as other products with this kirby design as the basis that's really cool and all but there's some charm with early Kirby merchandise that just can't be replicated and I think this set shows that this set contains a star rod Kirby which came in both small and large sizes a parasol Kirby and a small keychain Kirby holding a star which I actually happen to own there's nearly no information on this set archive and they're all very hard to come by how rare are these you may ask well the star rod and parasol Kirby's were recently up for sale in Yahoo Japan auctions and they sold for well parasol Kirby ended for 77,000 yen star rod Kirby ended 489 thousand yen this set is probably the rarest set of Kirby plushies out there so let's not waste any more time and take a look at one of the most unique and obscure Kirby plush sets out there and with that said welcome to a look back at the Bandai Kirby's Adventure plush set here is a Kirby plush this one is sanae's all start collection Kirby he's basically a perfect replica of Kirby's current appearance but as we know Kirby didn't always look like this just a few years prior in 2008 the same company Senay released this Kirby plush he still looks pretty current but you can tell he's closer to his right back at you appearance rather than what we know today going back even further here's a kirby 64 plush of Kirby this was the first plush to really be close to Kirby's current appearance however he's still clearly an earlier less refined version of the design this guy comes from a UFO catcher Kirby 64 plush set that I absolutely love if this set contains characters like ribbon and Adeline and are some of my favorite kirby plushies I'd love to make a video on this set in the future however anything prior to Kirby 64 looks pretty weird by today's standards this kirby comes from a kirby's dreamland 3 set released by bandai in 1998 this set which was released through blind boxes contains kirby but also some animal buddies making this set really stand out and going all the way back to 1995 we have this kirby superstar plush here you can really see some of Kirby's earlier design shine he has no blue highlights in his eyes and his blush marks are dashes that brings us to 1993 with Kirby's Adventure giving way to some of the first plushies of Kirby I've previously taken a look at the Takara set which does contain some of the earliest plushies on the series along with the Takara set this Bandai plush set was released which again highlights the early design of Kirby my point here is that Kirby as a character has gone through tons of design changes and that makes looking at older merchandise of the series really fascinating the band I said I'm looking at today has really blown up in popularity recently no doubt thanks to how charming the plushies look given their early appearance however they're not only appealing design wise but also seem to be very high-quality plushies and this that is very well made and put together so let's take a look at them starting with the famous star rod Kirby here is the first plush we'll be looking at in this set or well first two star rod Kirby this guy is not only the most well known out of the set he also came in two sizes yes both small and large star rod Kirby's exist both share a very similar pattern with the only difference really being their size Kirby here is standing tall proudly displaying his well-earned star rod in his raised hand with a wide smile on his face Kirby's eyes are made of a hard black plastic which perfectly captures the light reflecting off this plush making his eyes really shine Kirby's mouth is open showing his tongue which is made of felt and looks to be simply glued on the mouth does look a little sloppily executed on the small kirby but it looks great nonetheless Kirby's blush marks are simple inbred or dashes which are perfectly positioned and look great and they even stand out from the plushies fuzzy material it's made of this is a very soft boy while I'm sadly never gone in the life-changing chance of holding one of these star rod Kirby's he looks very soft to the touch and band I used a fantastic material on these Kirby's hands and feet are small but that's accurate to how they were in Kirby's Adventure Kirby's Star rod is firmly attached to his hand and is usually sticking upwards though it does seem it can be bent out of shape easily the red and white pattern isn't perfectly stitched on to the rod but it looks fine this star looks very well shaped and even has a border around the edge of it to make it look more detailed than a simple star cut out this detail is on both the large and small Kirby - showing no details were sacrificed for the smaller size here's a look at the sets paper tag only the star run and parasol Kirby's seem to have come with this with the keychain Kirby having this sticker instead of a tag anyway the tag is based off the Japanese mane art for Kirby's adventure with the game's logo on a white background full of yellow stars the tag also has a pink border and the Bandai logo at the bottom corner along with that there are Hal and Nintendo copyrights along with text that reads Bandai 1993 made in China the tag is attached with a silver string a loop through the plushies touch tag the touch tag is a simple white tag with red text most likely used to match the Bandai logo as seen here here's the best look at the back of the tag I can find it's mostly just legal info but can see a nest III here which signifies the settle was released in 1993 I'm actually not sure how large these two are I imagine the small kirby is around seven inches with the larger one being closer to twelve inches going off of pictures at least now you may be wondering where do these pictures come from well if these pictures were actually taken at a get this Kirby merchandise museum I'll talk more about this later but the museum showcased nearly every piece of Kirby merchandise imaginable tons of stuff shown off here wasn't even known to exist they had products spanning the entire history of the franchise Kirby's Adventure plushies Kirby's 64 figures even merchandise from the anime basically it sounds like the greatest place on earth but as it turns out I guess how or whoever supplied the merchandise to go on display here just so happened to have tons of these old Bandai plushies lying around so they made them basically the flagship product on display here so thanks to the museum we now have pictures showcasing dozens of these plushies together now would be a good time to talk about how a rare and valuable this guy really is all right so what's the rarity of these plushies how hard is it to acquire these is it possible for you watching this video to someday own one of these well yeah but it'll take some insane luck a chunk of your life savings or a combination of the two notice how I didn't say how these guys were released well I actually don't know there's no way they were UFO catcher prizes they look to high quality for that so I want to say they were available for retail purchase if that is the case which it likely is they had to have gotten a very limited release and given the demand and hype surrounding these especially the star Rod Kirby they go for insanely high prices when up at auction I've only seen a handful of these guys go up for sale and almost every time they go for huge money I'll start relatively small there is one listing from a few years ago of the full set from the Japanese site man to Rocky I'll be referencing this listing a few times in the video but in the case of star rod Kirby the listing had the small went up for 20,000 yen and the large one up for 40,000 yen for reference at the time of me making this video 20,000 yen is roughly a hundred and eighty eight US dollars while 40,000 yen is roughly three hundred and seventy-five US dollars now it is possible that these were just rough guess is at their value as no recent auctions had happened at the time however they sold they sold for these prices and that's at least how much they're worth but if you think that's crazy just wait those were fixed prices that the store chose how much could these go for went up at auction on say Yahoo Japan well thankfully as I mentioned at the beginning of this video to recent Yahoo Japan auctions listings for the set showed up one of star rod kirby and one a parasol Kirby I'll touch on parasol Kirby later but star rod Kirby who was tagged and even bagged ended 489 thousand yen in USD that's eight hundred and thirty-four dollars which is significantly more than what Mandurah k was asking for to make this even more unbelievable it seems this was the small star rod kirby it wasn't even the large one it ended for over eight hundred dollars the small kirby I was blown away when I saw it and for that price but I guess it does make a little sense this said was released decades ago and had to have been made in very limited quantities they're also highly stylized after a fan favorite but previous design of Kirby as he appeared in Kirby's Adventure making them even more desired desire equals demand and with only a handful of them known to be in circulation it adds up and I've seen the plush in the past go for similar amounts so it's not like this was a one-time fluke all I can say is if you're after one of these plushies good luck one of the most marketable aspects of the Kirby franchise has to be the copy abilities over the years tons of plushies of Kirby using his abilities have been released we've seen tons of plushies of fire Kirby ice Kirby sword Kirby and many many more even as early as Kirby's Adventure plushies of these copy abilities were being made for example the Takara plush that had crash and freeze Kirby and this band I said also has some powering up Kirby's I guess technically star rod Kirby would count but the next plush we'll be looking at is the first ever plush of parasol Kirby look at this guy he's having the time of his life soaring through the air with a huge smile on his face just like the star rod Kirby's this kirby has beady eyes and is very soft he has a closed wide smile and again showcases Kirby's dashes for blush marks this kirby unlike future parasol kirby plushies really showcases the powerup well as he is in a flying pose to go with this flying pose this is one of the few official plushies I have seen that comes with a suction cup so you can hang him up and have him soar through the air anywhere you want if this is a great addition to the plush and is such a perfect feature the suction cup is attached to a ring that is not into a string that is attached to Kirby's back if this string is towards the top of Kirby's back so you can get that perfect flying position when he's hung up this suction cup is so great it's perfect for the design and is so versatile stick them on your windows stick them on your car stick them on your glass display case parallel to another parasol Kirby as they ascend into the skies above as fellow Star Rod Kirby's gaze in the distance below as for the parasol itself it's a big poofy design with the red and white coloring and a red knob at the top the rod of the handle seems to be made of a hard material overlaid with a softer material and the bottom part of the handle is made of felt which is stitched to Kirby's hand the overall construction of the plush looks very high-quality with the only issues I can see being the possible frailness of the parasol everything else about this guy is really appealing and looks great I really like the idea of the suction cup that's so ingenious and I'm surprised future Kirby plushies such as flying kirby plushies haven't done the same as for parasol Kirby's rarity I've only seen him up for auction once in which a bidding war got him up to seventy-seven thousand yen which is roughly seven hundred and twenty eight dollars oh yeah it's not like this Kirby is any cheaper than star rod Kirby in fact he's probably rarer sure he's sold for less money but that's probably because star rod Kirby is far more desired I bet star rod Kirby was made in higher quantities as it's the flagship Kirby of the set while parasol Kirby was more of an extra and he probably costed more at retail as he has a suction cup going back to that man Dirac a listing however that had him up for four thousand yen this is the same listing that has the star rod Kirby's for insane prices is this a mistake he sold for over $700 on Yahoo Japan I guess the seller just didn't know people would pay the same high prices for parasol Kirby and this was the in hand image from the listing so it's not like the Kirby wasn't a really bad shape either he's even tagged well in any case whoever got this guy for the equivalent of just under $38 got him for an absolute steal here's the last plush in the set a small mascot keychain plush of Kirby holding a star and yes I actually own this one I managed to find him for just $13 from a private collector and I'm really thankful I was able to find him when I did this is such a unique kirby plush I'm so happy to own a piece from this incredible set this guy is very small he's around three inches tall and fits in the palm of your hand the perfect size for a keychain Kirby's in a similar pose to the Star Rod Kirby's only this time with his hand positioning flipped the face on him looks pretty different compared to the other plushies as his eyes are smaller his mouth is a very cute u-shape and he has red embroidered blush marks Kirby's hands are actually much thinner than they appear with only a little bit of stuffing in them they're stitched to the plush of very well though Kirby's star is cut very well and it's made of a thick piece of film one thing you really can't appreciate about this set unless you're holding one in your hands is just how well-made they are unlike a lot of early Japanese video game plushies these were most likely available to be bought at retail and not to be won in UFO catchers so their overall quality is much higher and it shows the plush is very soft the embroidery is perfect he's stuffed well and it doesn't feel like things such as his feet will ever fall off I mean he has survived for decades and is still in this grade of condition so he's got to be a very strong and well-made and that goes for the rest of the set I really appreciate this keychain being gold and it's a pretty elaborate keychain at that especially compared to other mascot plushies I was fortunate enough to get one of these guys with their chain stickers still on I imagine a majority of people took this off so it's really cool that he still has it it seems he never out of paper tag and this was the substitute this side shows some identification tools such as a barcode and item number but the other side is a lot more interesting in Japanese it reads Kirby's stuffed toy keychain under that it says Bandai 1993 Japan and under that are the copyrights for both Hal laboratory and Nintendo as for mascot Kirby's rarity he's the least expensive of the set by far like I said I was able to get mine for just $13 shipped which was an incredible price that manderach a listing was only asking for 2,000 yen for him which is around 19 USD however well he can go for cheaper than the others there's still the fact that this guy never shows up for sale and these listings were from before the set became as well-known as it is nowadays so I'm sure he could still go for a lot went up at auction it'll be interesting to see one of these especially one of the star rod Kirby's and go up for sale on us eBay but it'll probably be a while before we see something like that happen so you may be wondering where did the recent popularity of these plushies come from if they're so rare what are the origins of all these blessed images of the plushies well thankfully we have some answers for starters this famous photo comes from a 1997 issue of the magazine 64 dream and it shows the star Rod Kirby standing proudly in front of the Hal laboratory sign that one's simple as for the images that showcase a bunch of the plushies altogether I've already mentioned the Kirby Museum so let's talk about that before that though I have to pay special tribute to this this image was taken at the Kirby sweet shop promotion set up at the Japanese toy store kittyland in 2015 as you can clearly see there is a set of Bandai plushies housed in a glass case alongside them are these plushies of Rick ku and kind as well as a Kirby holding a leaf I'm actually not exactly sure where these plushies come from if there is that set of Kirby's Dreamland three plushies in fact you can see the box they came in behind the Kirby but no these aren't them could these be from dreamland too sure but I find that to be likely anyway as for the Kirby merchandise museum it opened in September 2016 and where do I begin well game wise they had every single physically released Kirby game on display but that's easy stuff merchandise wise there is so much stuff here that I've never even seen before they had figures plushies posters t-shirts basically anything that ever existed with Kirby on it was here and was on display they also had some more unique stuff such as these paintings as well as these illustrations they also had tons of internal assets on display such as Kirby right back atcha sketches used during the show's production and my personal favorite this Kirby disco ball which was used in several Japanese Kirby nightmare in dreamland commercials but of course the thing that caught everyone's eye were the band I plushies they had tons of these scattered throughout the displays the big one though is this row consisting of nothing but small and large star rod Kirby's considering how valuable these are seeing all of them lined up together like this is absolutely unbelievable I guess how must have had a bunch of them lying around and decided to use them for display sort of like what Sega is doing with their soap shoes Sonic plushies one of my favorite displays they had set up was this advertisement for new kirby hats being released in which they had Star Rod Kirby's wear them you can also see a parasol Kirby at the bottom of the case moving away from the museum and back to kiddie land here's a display from a promotion in March 2016 once again we see the Bandai plushies as well as the animal buddy plushies but I'm curious about this star rod Kirby he's a much lighter color than the others is he just sun-faded given how these were likely provided by how and were internal stock maybe this lighter Kirby was a prototype that's just speculation though I think it's really cool how had so many of these guys saved it's really nice knowing at least a handful of them are in good hands being taken care of considering how rare they are finally we saw them again in November of 2017 and another Kirby museum set up at the same store I really hope these become a yearly thing they also had some newer merchandise such as the Nendoroids on display and had some other Kirby Goods up for grabs I really hope we see these Bandai plushies again in the near future people clearly like them so I think it's only a matter of time before we see them again [Music] it's such a shame that so much early Kirby merchandise has essentially gotten lost over the years and if it wasn't for a few select yahoo japan listings and some sightings here and there this set would have been nearly lost as well for example this is the only image I know to exist of this small bandai Kirby's Adventure plush set which for the record would be considered a separate set from this one there's just so much Kirby stuff that's been lost did you know that there was a mystery set of kirby 64 plushies look there's a circle plush in there so much of this stuff is so hard to find information on this band I said has gotten a lot of attention lately and that's a great thing sure it means the plushies are now worth even more than they were before but it's fantastic that more people are looking into older kirby plushies like this cuz these really do deserve the attention this set is getting if they're incredibly charming plushies and even if they don't look that accurate even to classic Kirby they look very appealing and capture Kirby's cute factor perfectly the variety to the set is also great sure half of it is Star Rod Kirby's but we also have a parasol Kirby which showcases the game's copy abilities as well as this standard mascot Kirby which represents the game's artwork it would have been absolutely incredible to see Bandai take on characters other than Kirby could you imagine a DDD in this set style but I still think this is a great little set of kirby plushies too all of you looking to buy this set good luck they command a huge price and I'm sure many of you watching have been completely turned off by that but if you really want these I wish you nothing but the absolute best of luck they don't show up often but I'm sure if you're patient enough and have the deep pockets these require I'm sure you can get one [Music]
But seriously why are these plushes so hard to find
History of God’s creation
Kerbe
this is a kirb reference goldmine and i love it
i have the dead yellow kirb from the adventure set