Environment Specific Action Figure: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:environment-specific-action-figure2 5633.jpg|link=Spider-Man (Comic Book)|right]]

 

 

* A snow version, with skis and a white winter outfit. Often called "Arctic Action Whatever."

 

Some [[Merchandise-Driven]] shows will introduce these sorts of 'gear', like the snow gear in ''[[The Batman]]'' (though in this case, the villain that justified its creation and inclusion already existed in the mythos), the new ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' episode with the backpacks, or just about any ''[[Power Rangers]]'' episode with the new bike or [[Super Mode]].

 

* The ''[[Street Fighter]]'' GI Joe line all had a standard assortment of GI. Joe weaponry such as rifles, handguns, knives, etc. The [[Street Fighter (film)|Street Fighter]] line had an Arctic Action Guile. At no point does the movie ever leave a tropical climate.

* ''[[G.I. Joe]]'' does this all the time for their regular characters. Average soldiers get jungle uniforms, space uniforms, toxic waste uniforms...despite the large number of characters who are specifically trained to deal with these environments. In many ways this is justifiable—when they wanted to go into space, Hasbro hadn't really produced ''any'' astronaut types. When they have too few such characters and have to go up against entire armies of Vipers encroaching on the Amazon, you gotta expect that Snake-Eyes (and Duke, and Scarlett, etc.) are going to end up fighting them. The real justification problem comes from why Cobra, a terrorist organization, even ''goes to these remote, non-urban environments'' in the first place when they already have excellent hidden bases of operation.

** Fun fact: [[All There in the Manual|According to the art book,]] the show's [[Take That]] at [[Scary Impractical Armor]] was in part a shot at toymakers' requests for armored variants.

* Semi-averted with ''[[Star Wars]]'', where although there are a ridiculous number of versions of each character, most actually are from one of the movies or [[Expanded Universe]]. But we say "most": there's a Han Solo figure with a back-mounted... ''thing''... called the [http://rebelscum.com/POTF2dlxhan.asp Smuggler Flight Pack]. It resembles Ripley's [[Aliens|Power Loader]] that is [[Awesome but Impractical|too heavy for his weight to support]] and has a hair trigger that will make its limbs deploy at the lightest touch. Also looks dumber than hell.

* ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' has more toylines than one would consider to be strictly necessary, so they had to fill them up somehow... The first cartoon's toylines, in particular, absolutely reveled in this sort of thing. Never mind noncanonical armors, the turtles were out there getting every conceivable job, from Green Beret to stage magician to, yes, [[Star Trek|Starfleet officer]]. (Does it scare anyone else that ''Raph'' is the medic?) There were movie monster Turtles, dinosaur Turtles, even ''clown'' Turtles. They're probably the [[Trope Codifier]] for this one. Interestingly, it took toymakers until about 2009 or so to actually make toys based on the 1st comic book incarnation of the Turtles...and they're all overpriced figurines marketed to the enthusiast collector market rather than kids, which makes sense if you consider [[What Do You Mean It's Not for Kids?|just how those versions were written]].

* While ''[[Power Rangers]]'' has begun integrating some of the armors from the toyline into the show, some of them are bizarre powerups and vehicles that never appear anywhere—and thankfully don't. (''Skateboards? '''Seriously?''''') Really, if you think [[Power Rangers Dino Thunder|some of the armors that were used]] were insane, swing by the toy aisle next time you're at Target.

* The figure line for ''[[Jonny Quest: The Real Adventures|Jonny Quest the Real Adventures]]'' didn't even ''have'' "regular" versions of the characters. You could get Race as a skydiver, Johnny as an astronaut or Jessie as a [[Badass Cape|cape-wearing]], [[Spy Catsuit|catsuit-sporting]] [[Ninja]], but good luck finding them in anything they actually ''wore on the show''. The closest to being [[Show Accuracy, Toy Accuracy|vaguely accurate]] were the [[Cyberspace|Quest World]] figures, but these featured [[Rainbow Pimp Gear|candy-colored paint jobs]] that were in stark contrast with the dark-colored suits on the show, and featured a toy of the motorcycle from one sequence with ''giant yellow training wheels''.

* The ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' toy line has an "invisible" (transparent purple) Espio, a [[Sonic Colors|Sonic with Wisps]], a [[Sonic Storybook Series|Sonic with Caliburn the Talking Sword]], and a Shadow who comes with [[Shadow the Hedgehog|his bike]]. Plus more [[Sonic Unleashed|Werehog]] merchandise than is really justifiable. That's not even getting into the plush line...

** For those who prefer outies, there's Shinji and Kaoru. If your interest is less prurient, there are even [[Moe]] versions of the angels. Yes, even [http://www.e-life.youthinks.com/picture/eva/lel02.jpg Leliel]{{Dead link}}.

* ''[[Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad]]'' was particularly horrible with this, considering all the variants of Servo were mere [[Palette Swap]]s of one another, with no different gimmicks. They even tried to pass off some alternate paint jobs as superhero versions of the supporting cast - including a pink and purple one as the girl (despite the figure having a very male [[Heroic Build]]).

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Toy Tropes]]