The TAMACAT

I bought a Techtron Sensor Cororobo TAMACAT robot kit the other day, it looks like it was made by Bandai as a toy. From what I've found on the web it was from 1984 and cost ¥3000 which is about £25 nowadays.

Apparently TAMA means a ball or sphere (or even a gem) according to a translation website. It's also a city in Tokyo according to Wikipedia but I'm not sure if there's any relation.

Box Art

The box art and typography is really nice and has a definite 1980's feel to it. I love the mix of the funny cartoon, retro futuristic typefaces and logos, bright colours on a white background and the mix of bright plastics and electronics in the toy itself.

Box art

Inside the box there's some more retro futuristic graphic design and the logo again. I've not opened it up yet but there should be an instruction booklet inside along with the case and components, and some more cartoons. The only reference I could find to the toy line was on this YouTube video that showed another model.

Inside the box

I really like the styling and photographs of the assembled toy as well, the glossy floor and action shots have a really nice style to them.

Photos on the box

Photos on the box

1984 Sales Brochure

On the YouTube video someone had shared a link to a Japanese webpage with what looks like a sales brochure from Bandai with all the different model kits. There's some really nice design and photos on this brochure, loads of different kits and plenty of robots.

Sales brochure page

It looks like there were a few models in the product line, but four that had a similar spherical body; a Tennis themed model, Skiing, a Mouse and a Cat.

The MECHAMOUSE

The mouse is available on eBay but unfortunately the seller doesn't post to the UK. It's a bit of a shame because they would have made an interesting pair of toys. The mouse was called MECHAMOUSE which I found amusing.

Box art for MECHAMOUSE

It makes me wonder if the two robots are designed to work together so one chases the other. That would be a very neat toy idea, robots that interact with one another in unique ways and unlock new behaviours!

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