Shogun Warriors

By the mid 1970’s, the toy industry had changed in a big way. Action Figure lines were dominating toy sales and every company was trying to get the next GI Joe or Six Million Dollar Man line. Mattel Toys was enjoying massive sales and success with their ultra popular Barbie Doll line for girls and Big Jim action figure line for boys. Mattel’s Big Jim may have been winding down in the U.S toy aisles, but it was still dominating across the globe on the International market. This huge success in foreign markets allowed Mattel to take some chances on other foreign properties as well. They saw that Anime and Tokusatu shows were huge in Japan, and across many Asian markets. Many of these shows focused on giant robots that fought other giant creatures. That gave Mattel the idea to create a new series of toys based on similar giant robots and creatures for the North American market. Thus, the Shogun Warriors were born. The Shogun Warriors focused on a team of giant robots, that borrowed from existing popular Japanese shows to fight giant creatures, that also borrowed from already existing monsters. Mattel’s initial Shogun Warriors line was released in 1977, and focused exclusively on the giant 24 Inch figures, but that would expand to a few other sized lines during its run. There was a 3 Inch series, 5 Inch series and the Action Vehicles series as well.

Mattel had a huge already existing universe of characters to chose from, when it came to putting their Shogun Warriors team together, and they chose some pretty iconic characters for their Shogun Warriors toy line. Throughout its run of different lines, Mattel used several different characters for the line. The team of giant robots included Daimos, Dangard, Dragun, Gaiking, Raydeen, Mazinga, and Voltes V…..just to name a few. The creatures lineup consisted of just two monsters for the good guys to fight, but if you had to pick just two monsters for a series, it would be these guys. Yes, we are talking about Godzilla and Rodan! Of course robot toys had certainly been done before, but never to this extent. Mattel put together an entire line of Japanese robot action figures for the U.S market, making this the first time many Americans were exposed to the robot toys from the far East. The Shogun Warriors line was a hug success with the U.S market, and sold extremely well in 1977 and 1978. It certainly didn’t hurt that the Star Wars franchise was turning Science Fiction and robots into the new norm at the time. Marvel Comics even got into the game by giving the Shoguns their own Comic Book series, which ran from 1979 to 1980. Despite its massive success, the Shogun Warriors toy line officially came to an end in late 1980.

Mattel released some real quality products from 1977 to 1980, and just like every toy line, the values of certain items can greatly fluctuate over time. This is based on several factors, including the item’s time period, scarcity, consumer demand and overall condition. The good news for Shogun Warrior collectors is there always a demand for items from this era, as Mattel created some truly iconic pieces. Loose individual figures can still be found in most secondary markets but boxed figures are becoming harder and harder to find in good condition. It should be noted that while some more popular main characters can still be found, the lesser known characters such as Daimos, Grandizer, and Combatra can be tough to find in good complete condition. Values on the Shogun Warriors items remain steady with not many recent changes but the market remains strong due to an ever present 70’s nostalgic desire. Boxed versions of the jumbo figures from this line remain tough finds on the secondary market and usually fetch high prices for any in good condition. The 3 and 5 inch figures can also be tough to find, but do come up at still reasonable prices. The Action Vehicle line remains up and down with more common ones still being found, but the late releases being tough to find in any condition. Items from the Shogun Warriors line will only increase in value as these figures become rarer and harder to find in the future.