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Post by xiombarg on Sept 22, 2005 19:22:28 GMT -5
In the SOC room, I expressed my opinion that I thought Doraemon was a far stretch as being labelled "chogokin", but then this got me thinking. What is the proper use of the word "chogokin" (if there is one), and am I wrong about Doraemon? I associate the word chogokin as basically being the same as saying "super robot", because I vaguely remember reading somewhere that the word "chogokin" was first used by Popy as a label on the die-cast super robots of the seventies. Anyone have answers about this?
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Post by 00silvergt on Sept 22, 2005 19:36:17 GMT -5
I think that Chogokin was always meant to refer to the diecast (zinc) content of a toy. I can be be wrong. But yes they were marketing diecast as some super alloy, I think that's what the word means in Japanese.
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Post by cybermuton on Sept 22, 2005 20:00:36 GMT -5
Chogokin does mean 'Super Alloy'.
Apparently, the real Mazinger was made of a Super Alloy - or 'Chogokin'.
Popy, keen to capitalise on this when they got the license to make Mazinger GA01, said that he was not made of normal 'gokin' (gokin = alloy), he was made of Chogokin, like the 'real' thing.
Then, of course, it became generic across Popy toys in the GA and Super Robot series. The actual real-world alloy that was used was zinc, hence Bullmark using the terms 'Z Gokin' and 'Zinclon' for their diecasts.
Zinc has been used for ever for diecasts - the old Popynica cars were Zinc, as were the old Matchbox & Dinky toys that inspired them.
It was only the Mazinger inspiration that turned a zinc robot into a 'chogokin'.
Since those days, the term has come to encompass and categorise pretty much any diecast toy figure.
Hence my comment about Doraemon - if we use the contemporary definition, it (he? she?) is a chogokin - an alloy figure - but if we wanna get pedantic (what - an obsessive toy collector get pedantic? whatever next...) then the only toy that could really be called a chogokin is a Mazinger derivative.
It's still a cute toy though.
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Post by Ben-Ohki on Sept 22, 2005 20:10:58 GMT -5
There's another reason to call a certain figure "chogokin" - look at Panda Z, he's got the "THE Chogokin" yellow-black logo on his packaging.
I say if it's got chogokin anywhere on the box, who the hell are we to argue the point?
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Post by xiombarg on Sept 22, 2005 20:14:13 GMT -5
Thanks guys. I guess it will have to remain a word that holds some degree of ambiguity, but it's more fun that way.
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Post by Falconhood on Sept 22, 2005 20:25:18 GMT -5
i always thot it meant "Shogun Kind" as to distinguish the warrior robots from the cute robots like R2-D2 and Robby the Robot
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Post by Ben-Ohki on Sept 23, 2005 8:13:00 GMT -5
Well that's my point... the Gundam MMM line-up (well, there were two of them, does that qualify as a "line-up?") - it had the term "chogokin" on the box. And Gundam is neither a "shogun warrior" nor is it particularly cute... PS: Robbie the Robot is not "cute" either.
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Post by JoshB on Sept 23, 2005 9:01:48 GMT -5
Any diecast japanese toy that is mostly metal, to me is chogokin.
It is a brand name used by bandai, referring to a line as well.
Takemi, Takatoku and other companies just used Gokin, or "alloy".
So i guess, to use a blanket term for all metal robot toys, you should use gokin.
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Post by Chen on Sept 23, 2005 9:02:54 GMT -5
Gokin means steel/iron/alloy, Chogokin means Super steel/iron/alloy and is what Mazinger Z was made of. The Soul of Chogokin line means Soul of /steelIron/alloy and is named after the allot used in Mazinger Z, so any robot that has diecast is a gokin figure like MaxFactory's Max Gokin line or Aoshima's Gokin line.
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Post by Shin Getter P on Sept 23, 2005 11:04:52 GMT -5
Hmmm... I thought that Go Nagai used the term "chogokin" in the Mazinger Z series. Chogokin was the name of the material that was used to create Mazinger.
SGP
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Post by cybermuton on Sept 23, 2005 11:42:17 GMT -5
Exactly - Chogokin literally means 'Super Alloy'. No ambiguity, it's just a word.
Then it's been genericised to describe a figure, usually a robot, made with some metal content.
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Post by demizer on Sept 25, 2005 23:39:09 GMT -5
I believe Godaikin is a contraction of the word Gokin,meaning metal or alloy,and Daikin which I think loosley translates into God.Though not in the western monotheistic sense.But stemming from the Shinto tradition of animism.Chogokin was essentially a branding by Popy,now genericized to mean almost any Diecast toy.Hence if you cruise the chogokin sec. of Y.J. you will see the odd car anti theft thingie etc.chogokin super alloy.Anybody have any thoughts on this?I think we as collectors associate the word with giant robots.But I think it applies to almost any Japanese character toy made with diecast.By the way the term for the cute character toys in Romanji is Kawai,like Doreamon & panda-z.If anyone knows the artist Takeshi Murikami he is very influenced by Otaku culture Kawai & Mecha.
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Post by Chen on Sept 26, 2005 4:51:01 GMT -5
The word Chogokin was created by Go Nagai but has been used so much that it has become part of the Japanese language that people don't know where it originated from. It's like the saying "what a duesy" and "a mile a minute" was both used and named after Duesenberg automobiles
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Post by demizer on Sept 26, 2005 18:26:30 GMT -5
By the way, I'm pretty sure Doreamon is male,I thinkthis is his girlfriend.
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Post by xiombarg on Sept 26, 2005 19:48:16 GMT -5
Now that is freakin awesome! I would love to put her right between my Starscream Supreme and my 12" Mandarin Spawn. Think what a trio of tyranny and chaos those three would make!
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Post by demizer on Sept 26, 2005 21:15:56 GMT -5
I just found out that Doreamon is a robot designed to look like a cat.
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Post by gomcse2002 on Sept 28, 2005 18:23:43 GMT -5
By the way, I'm pretty sure Doreamon is male,I thinkthis is his girlfriend. This is Doaremon 's sister (not his girl friend)
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Post by mpchi on Sept 28, 2005 18:56:20 GMT -5
Thats not Doraemon's girlfriend. Thats his younger sister Dorami Chan. LOL
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Post by demizer on Sept 28, 2005 19:13:35 GMT -5
:-*Well,shut my mouth.
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