[TokuChris]

There's a number of factors that go in to why these figures are not imported here as is.

1) Cost

The complex engineering on some of the figures is just too much to justify on this end of the ocean. Add that to the fact that the Japanese market tends to create larger mechs meaning heavier mechs and a lot of times the cost is factored in by the weight of the figure (see: Transformers and why toys that used to be Deluxe size are now smaller and cost more).

2) Safety

In some instances, a toy wouldn't pass a safety test. The most popular safety test is the "drop test" ... if a figure drops from a certain height, what breaks and are the things that break sharp edges or harmful for kids? A lot of the Japanese sized mechs would never pass a drop test. Blame moms for that one.

3) Demographic markets

The one thing that Bandai of America figured out is that releasing toys that cost $40 a pop and don't interact with the previous year is a line-killer. The Zord Builder feature allows for all the toys to interact with each other no matter the year. From a marketing standpoint, it's brilliant and it's paid off immensely. That will probably never change.

The one thing I would like to see is the removal of the "Zord Builder" feature on the Legacy toys. In some cases it works fine (IE: MMPR Megazord), but in others it doesn't make sense (Dragonzord, Tigerzord).

Either way - the playability that comes with these new zords looks great. Where Super Megaforce failed to have the individual zords have any importance or playability themselves, Dino Charge has made each zord have some special feature that you can unlock (whether it's a laser, or a claw feature, or a spinning feature, etc.)

Great stuff.