While the limited availability of various amiibo figures helped draw me towards the craze, staring at pegs filled with nothing but Mario is really starting to wear me out. Online retailers like Entertainment Earth and Amazon have helped pick up the slack, but I can't shake the preference of tracking down collectibles in person. It's a shame that there's no variety in my local stores right now.
I know amiibo figures are only two waves in, but there are plenty of characters that feel completely mythical at this point. I'm not only talking about the elusive Marth, Wii Fit Trainer, and Villager either. I've seen Peach and Pikachu around...and that's pretty much it. Otherwise, I'm drowning in a sea of Marios.
Nintendo is well aware which characters have the widest appeal, and their amiibo case breakdowns reflect that. They want to make sure icons like Mario and Link are available at all times, even if it means limiting the availability of everyone else. The business-driven reasoning behind this should be clear, as younger kids and parents not as familiar with the likes of Pit have the most buying power overall. My experience with action figure collecting has shown me how easy it is for companies and retailers to overestimate just how many of the marquee names need to be included in each assortment however.
Enter: The Wall of Bumblebees.
Starting in 2007, there was a good five or six year stretch where Hasbro offered as many different Bumblebee figures as possible in its various Transformers toylines. Each release was heavily packed. The character's popularity in the live action movies made this a necessity, but it's clear that the manufacturer went overboard in trying to meet the demand. It was sometimes possible to find dozens of the poor things clogging the pegs, many of which were hanging unsold from the previous year.
Even so, it's worth noting that the Wall of Bumblebees wasn't always as bad as the photo above. Availability of items like these will always vary. The problem was common enough to fuel sizable collections of similar images however, and Hasbro ultimately realized they'd gone a bit far.
I'm sure my ability to traipse into Wal-Mart and see several rows of Mario every single time isn't universal either, but I worry he'll remain so over-packed that future amiibo assortments aren't given their 15 minutes. If the action figure parallels continue, heavily stocked items from the first wave have a bad habit of lingering throughout a line's entire run. I'd hate seeing future releases like Mega Man become a hassle to track down because there's just no damn room.
The early talk of discontinued figures might not be true, so perhaps Nintendo will ultimately get a better grip on effectively balancing the demand for each character. Mario is the king of all mascots; a solid peg's worth of his amiibo should definitely be kept on hand. I just hope it doesn't spiral so far into the other direction that we're ultimately left with entire walls of them.
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