I got the soft vinyl figures of both the Ken Sato Ultraman and Emi, and then I picked up the S.H. Figuarts you have there when I saw it at Best Buy. What gets me isn't just that there are Ultraman figures out there in the U.S., it's that it's a fairly Japanese styled line too. I mean, soft vinyl figures (or "sofubi") are a fairly traditional way of making figures for kaiju related stuff going back to the '50s or '60s in Japan. I'm not sure how U.S. consumers would react to soft, rubbery action figures though. But they went with it anyway.
I got the soft vinyl figures of both the Ken Sato Ultraman and Emi, and then I picked up the S.H. Figuarts you have there when I saw it at Best Buy. What gets me isn't just that there are Ultraman figures out there in the U.S., it's that it's a fairly Japanese styled line too. I mean, soft vinyl figures (or "sofubi") are a fairly traditional way of making figures for kaiju related stuff going back to the '50s or '60s in Japan. I'm not sure how U.S. consumers would react to soft, rubbery action figures though. But they went with it anyway.
I got the soft vinyl Emi figure for my toddler and he loves it. It can really take the abuse and still looks good.