Comment by firecall

4 days ago

I recently learned that many collectables are sold this way!

Labubus just happened to get a wide appeal and had a moment in the US for some reason..

"Gatcha", from Japanese "gatchapon"; there's little dispenser machines which sell plastic eggs containing a random collectible from a set. There are thousands of different product lines.

Basically game lootboxes, but IRL. People like gambling, it seems.

They are and I hate it. It‘s bad enough with trading cards, but now every single collectible is employing gacha mechanics and it’s frustrating.

  • I don't get it. It's a "collectable". Your "hobby" is "collecting". You put your "collection" on a shelf and look at it.

    That's not a hobby to me. It's just consuming for consumption's sake.

    • Well, they took that formula and made it worse because now you can't just buy it, you have to roll a dice or get a second hand.

      Also nothing wrong with just having a shelf with things you like to look at.

      2 replies →

  • For eg Magic cards, a secondary market formed very quickly where you could buy exactly what you wanted.