Japanese Toys Like Gudetama, Sushi Cats, Hiyoko-chan, and Puzzle and Dragons

Japan has a pile of neat and cute little cartoon characters.  They then do an amazing job of making merchandise based on them that you want run out an buy.

Sanrio has Hello Kitty, and dozens and dozens of other cute characters that you've never heard of.  One of the newer ones is Gudetama, the lazy egg.  This cute little egg yolk usually lazes around in a series of short cartoons.  You can find them on Youtube if you look.  The egg is found in a variety of different food type situations and I'm not sure I could eat him myself.  There is a pile of merchandise for him though.  The LA Times has a write up about Gudetama.

Gudetama plushy

Gudetama display

Gudetama merchandise

If you don't like eggs, you could also get Kirimi-chan, who is a salmon fillet.

Lots of merchandise and plushies!

Sushi Cats are another Internet meme and this last year had them released as gashapon characters you could buy.  They are very cute and you have to have a set.  There is an official video for them that will kind of blow your mind the first time you see it.

Sushi Cats cell charms.  I took the hooks off so they can be put in a display case.

Gashapon machines with sushi cats in one of them.  Pretty rare to find at the moment.

Rement was also selling them by the case.

I bought a box to get a set from the blind boxes inside.

You get the little sushi cat inside.

Hiyoko-chan is the mascot for Nissin Chicken Instant Ramen.  I have to say this particular chicken ramen is one of my faves and is even featured in Ponyo, the Ghibli movie.  The cute little chick has me wanting to buy the chicken ramen and the ramen celebrated 55 years of being in 2014.  I have a blog post about chicken ramen here as it needs its own post.

Hiyoko Chan stuffy, mini chicken ramen, and Hiyoko ramen timer toy.

Hiyoko Ramen Timer Toy.  It also plays a few games with you.

You open the egg and by default, Hiyoko will be a timer, telling you that your instant ramen is ready in 3 minutes.

There is this store on the main floor of Divercity Mall in Odaiba (where the giant gundam is) that sells lots of Hiyoko merchandise.

Hiyoko gashapon machines.

You can decorate your house with the little chick.  I like the face towels in the little cellophane bags that mimic a pack of instant ramen!

5 Packs of Chicken Ramen!

Finally, Puzzle and Dragons, the android and iPhone game that has captured a whole pile of wallets in Japan and around the world.  There are all type of cool little characters from the game showing up. I'm a pretty big fan so I managed to snag a gold dragon gashapon dispensing machine based on the rare egg machine.

The gold dragon gashapon dispenser is fairly big.  Cat included for scale (not to mention she photo-bombed me)

Comes in a nice box.

Back of the box.

You load the capsules in through the mouth. Pull the arm to drop a capsule out of the tummy slot.

An assortment of puzzle and dragons merchandise.

Some figure I picked up on sale.  These things cost too much otherwise for me.

Evolution spirit figures.

Cell charms

Puzzle and Dragons screenshot, if you have never seen the game.  Basically a match 3+ puzzle game with a big monster team building and collection element.

That's all for now. 

More Japanese Pop Culture Posts.

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