Korean Bootleg: Bican Robot

I don't remember when or why I bought this, mostly likely an eBay impulse buy, but it's an interesting piece. Korean toys, at least bootleg ones are a strange bunch. They take a nice box with cool artwork, a Styrofoam tray, then stick the cheapest toy possible inside of it. And yet it's still cool somehow. I think the box is what really gives the toy it's charm. The toy on it's own, let's say you find it loose in some toy lot, ends up just being a horrid piece. It's just slightly above being party favor quality.

The piece I have for you guys today, is called Bican Robot made by a company unknown to me. It's mostly laid out in Korean so I have no clue what's going on. What I do know is that it's a bootleg of Baikanfu which is a nesting robot. So you have the outer robot, then you have a secondary inner robot called Kenryu. Then nestled inside of Kenryu is Rom Stoll. Yes, this is similar to Gordian/Gardian, another nesting robot. This toy however, does not have Kenryu built in. They pretty much bypass him and give you a teeny Rom Stoll.

The front of the box is actually pretty cool and very 80's. See the window where Bican is peeking through? That's actually cut out by hand! You can see the scoring marks from a pen and parts where they overcut.

The artwork on the back is awesome. Probably the best part of owning this. Notice how colorful Bican Robot is. Korean kids must have been very pissed onced they opened the box.

WTF? What happened to the very colorful robot depicted on the front of the box?!! That's what I meant before about Korean kids being pissed. There are two different plastics used. White and Blue. Bican takes up

Bican stands about 4" tall, not sure exactly. The amount of time required to measure isn't worth my time on something of this quality. Rom Stoll is there just chillin'.

Seeing as the front of the figure is boring, the back is even more so.

They've gone ahead and skipped the whole part where Rom Stoll nests inside of Kenryu that nests inside of Baikanfu. Although the rest of the toy design would give the impression that other body panels open up for fitment of another robot, only Rom Stoll is included... oh and nothing else really opens up, they are fake hinges on the sides of the legs.

Here is Bican with his included weapons. By the way, this is the actual color of Bican Robot, not the yellow the other pictures lead you to believe. I just had the white balance set up wrong.

I still like this piece regardless of how horrible it is.

New Vintage toy videos up on YouTube RocketPunchArmy channel

I've been bombarding my YouTube channel with reviews of some affordable vintage stuff. I've also done a review for each and every one. Check out the pictorials coming soon here on my blog and make sure to also check out the videos for each one.

From L to R: Windam, Sankan-Oh, MR-18, VF-1S, Gyakuten Oh, Bull Ceasar

Bandai 1991 Windam Vinyl Review:

Takatoku Sankan-Oh Diecast Review:

Popy Machine Robo MR-18 (Gobots Road Ranger):

Macres VF-1S Valkyrie (Macross VF-1S KO):

Mark Gyakuten-Oh Pocket Gokin:

Marushin Takemi Blocker Machine Blaster Bull Ceasar:

RPA Updates 12/19/11

Well, the year is almost over and I wanted to choose what I believe is the toy of the year of all the toys I reviewed since it's only fair I choose from what I've had in my hands. That will come later before the end of the year.

Let's see... video review wise on my RPA channel I did:

S.H. MonsterArts Godzilla



Hot Toys Superman

Bandai Chogokin AEGIS

TFC Toys heavy Labor

ES Gokin Baikanfu

Part 6 of Ultraman MAT build

Currently I have the written review on queue for collectiondx.com so make sure to check that out soon. I am also working on the Fujimi Spinner model kit... not my most fun project. Paint does not like cold weather and Tamiya paints officially suck from a spray can. I am sticking to automotive paint from now on. After all the friggin delays in getting the right color blue and I use right color loosely since it's still not accurate, but a little white balance adjusttment will do wonders for the final review.

I have the two Fewture gokins coming of Arale Chan and Toriyama. Was expecting them today since they were sent EMS and somehow they are not in the states yet. I usually get them in 2 days and its been about 4...maybe holiday delays.

I am also going to upload a review of two little vintage Seven toys based on Xabungle and Iron Gear. So keep an eye for that if you like those pieces. If you haven't already done so, subscribe to my Youtube channel to keep up to date with all my videos.

What's up with issues on expensive toys?

Having issues and problems with expensive collectible pieces has always been the nature of the beast for the most part. There's always a batch of good releases in between the bad ones so that takes the sting out of the whole thing. But what about getting three defective figures in a row that cost a whopping $450 when you factor in shipping? Is this in any way justifiable? Aren't we paying good money to receive a good product? I understand the cost has something to do with the amount of units made versus production costs, but it still sucks when I can pay $10 for a bulletproof Transformer figure but when you spend $250 on a Masterpiece Rodimus, panels are snapping off, parts are breaking, springs are getting twisted and who knows what else. Then Takara turns around and releases an updated version and basically says "piss off" to all the people who jumped at ordering the first release.

Takara's $250 first release version with trailer (not shown) and QC issues on left and my own customized $60 Hasbro version without QC issues on the right. FYI, I've never transformed the Takara one out of FEAR of breakage. The Hasbro has the updates and I still won't transform it cause I don't wanna mess up the paint.

My bad luck streak started off with the Hot Toys Superman. Now it's not that bad because mine only suffered a couple of problems instead of suffering 10 like other people. Mine had the shiny forehead and the copper cape wire that poked out of the cape. The cape was relatively easy to fix and I was able to source a replacement head (which ironically also has a shiny forehead but much less noticeable.)

OK, the issue with this guy was more from package design (plastic tray rubs on head) than factory defect so it's not too bad... but still. Should be a non-issue on a $200 figure.

Next came TFC Toys Heavy Labor which is part of their Non-Devastator Hercules combiner. I decided to do a shoot for CDX. Instead of doing my research first to make sure nobody suffered QC issues, I went ahead and opened it up. During the interview I decided to look it up in my phone and I read about the gear shearing action of the hip ratchets. Lucky for me I had already clicked the joint once. That means it can't possibly have broken right? WRONG. One racthet motion is all it took to shear the gear tooth. Awesome. So I decided to take it apart. This required messing up the screw plugs to get to screws. However folks, TFC Toys does not leave their loyal customers to eat elephant shit like multi-million dollar Takara. They actually keep customers up to date with issue fixes, include replacement parts with new figures and issue new parts etc. This is definitely much better than being stuff with a bum figure but at $100 a pop, this should not even be an issue. Not only does this hurt the small company's profits, it creates a bad customer experience and bad mouthing on the net...and we all know how TF fans can be. I mean if it only took one movement of the ratchet to mess it up (on EVERYBODY'S) didn't they realize this during testing? Donit they grab one off the assembly line and check it out? Or were they aware and shipped 'em out anyways to meet their deadline?

This is the ratchet gear piece that gets stripped. The opposing piece does not "give" so it shears the teeth. Luckily for me I did not try and move the other leg so this one is fine.

The last straw was during my ES Gokin Baikanfu review... wow did I love this set. I still do but it wasn't until I really started handling it that things got bad. You'll have to watch the review to get the full effect. Basically small plastic bits snapped, I found that the ankle on one of the figures had been forced on in the factory and I'm still not sure if the ratchets on the toes broke or if the initial ratchets I heard were just freak happenings. Oh and the chrome sword that looks like it was stepped on for a full work day..what the hell?

Oh, these are cool, yes, but don't tug the head too much or else.

The gray piece has a tab that snapped on mine.

I want to know who thought putting this in the tray was a good idea.. this is the side that face up on the tray!  Way to go Artstorm. Glad you don't sell cars cause people tend not to buy cars with scratches all over them.

We live in 2011, going into 2012...how are the toys of today going to withstand the test of time if they fall apart within a couple of days after receiving them or suffer from QC issues? I have toys from my childhood still intact after rigorous play. All you MISB guys beware, not to make you paranoid or anything but what you think is in perfect condition may have tons of QC issues or missing parts...just sayin'.

Super Gobots Defendor and Warpath

Although I had my share of Gobots and/or bootlegs of Gobots as a kid, they didnt quite do it for me although I did have a couple I toyed around with for a while. I never did get a Super Gobot of my own until just recently when I got 2 of them. The boxes were were in relatively good shape but the figures were absolutely pristine. So much so that I couldn't get myself to transform them. I tried but realized I may scrape something or break it so I left 'em in robot mode which is my preferred mode. Let's take a look at Defendor and Warpath.

WARPATH