Something seems fishy. I got out of the Japanese figure game

Basically exactly what you described. The yen only started doing well against the dollar semi-recently, so the price hikes are extra harsh now. Whether or not they'll come back down is the question (the answer is no).

>>6286397
That's not what happened. What happened was:
1. Japan prints yen because they want dollar to be stronger to increase exports.
2. Factory prices for toy manufacturers were already locked in prior to this.
3. We get tons of cheap as fuck toys for a while before factory prices are up for re-negotiation.
4. Weak yen, strong yuan and raising costs in China in general make newly re-negotiated factory prices go way the fuck up. This continues to happen in several phases until the current day prices.
5. Yen gains some strength back due to weakening dollar but the new crappier contracts are still in place and will continue to be in place. Japan does NOT want the yen to get stronger so toy prices will never drop back down to where they were. The only thing that will drop prices is if the dollar gains strength.

Prices will only get worse from here. There are other factors as well such as supply/demand. The less units that are sold the higher prices have to be to compensate, they become luxury items for high end collectors. Average collector in Japan can't afford toys that are double or triple the cost they used to be and they are the main market for most this stuff. They can try to cater more to a global audience but that only stems the bleeding a bit.

>>6286425
I might have to rethink starting this hobby up again.

>>6286397
That's no only with imports, all figures are more expensive now.

They get more expensive from one wave to the next.

>>6286442
It's a bad time to get back into the hobby because it's just not affordable if the exchange rate is just going to keep going into the shitter. We'd be lucky to stay at 108 at this point much less the 125 we really need to keep things semi-fair priced.

There are still some affordable lines though. SHF haven't gone totally ridiculous and those recent Marvel Yamaguchi are pretty fairly priced. SAS and figma are just out of control though, prices are getting ludicrous. RD are getting pretty high up there too.

God, I forgot how hard they fucked that figma up. It was such an easy job too. The goofy face looks horrible, and his hunched back looks terrible with the serious face.

>>6286425
>Yen gains some strength back due to weakening dollar
What? The US Dollar has been stable against the yuan since Q4 2016. In fact it's been stable against most currencies. It's just Japan engaging in all sorts of fuckery

>>6286569
I'm very familiar with the market, the dollar weakened. There were brief moments when it saw strength but in general it's weaker than it should be. It was starting to strengthen when markets thought Trump would focus on tax reform but then he decided to focus on other shit and it got weak again.

Yen is seen as a safe haven currency, that's why Japan is having such an issue keeping the value down when the rest of the markets can't step up their game.

>>6286397
GSC got greedy.