PlaymoFriends
General => News => Topic started by: Sir Gareth on November 21, 2005, 17:38:22
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I collect my Playmobil MISB and pay a lot of attention to the small scenes printed on the boxes. On one of my Pirate boxes set 3480/3051 Pirate crew released in the 80's I came across what I consider a fairly nasty little scene. It's probably not a very good thing to put on a box for a toy thats aimed at kids 4+, holding a knife to lady klicky's throat, so how do you think Playmobil got around this, I'm not showing you the full image just yet.
(http://)
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Those old box scans always crack DH and I up, just because it IS supposed to be for kids 4 and up. I will say, though, my 3 year old is pretty blood-thirsty ;)
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Then I guess I won't say anything about the old quartet-game I have with pictures of bloody bandages... ;D
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MBL,
You can dont have to say a thing, just post the pictures ;)
I do enjoy the older boxes for their dioramas.
There is a lot of fun detail in them.
i wonder what happened to the people who created them?
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OK, here they are:
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construction workers...
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firemen...
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hospital (with bloody details ;D )
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indians...
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knights...
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police...
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US cavallery...
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and western.
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aw, they only put the blood in the hospital pictures
and how come there are no pirates??? >:(
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and how come there are no pirates??? >:(
My guess is that the pirate theme didn't exist yet when this card game was released; these are cards from around 1976. Pirates first appeared in 1978...
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I love the old dioramas on old boxes as well. And in old catalogs. They are real pictures of real klickies. The modern photos are more animated and worked on in a computer. They don't "feel" so good. A old photo of a good old diorama can get you really exited 8}, the new pictures do not. :(
The cards are cool, I fancy the bloody hospital cards. Guess kids have to learn about the brutal world :-\
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Playmobil's policy is not to show extreme or unusual violence I believe, and I think they manage to follow it pretty closely when you see some of the stuff put out for children today or which children have access to.
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I completely agree with playmofire.
I especially think, that this policy became more and more important within the years.
So, one shouldn't forget that playmo started in the middle of the 70ties. So in Germany
a lot of things were pretty relaxed.
Thinking of pirates and cavellery and knights, these are topics that were pretty much
not an issue... Parents in the first place were happy when the kids got fresh air in the
backyard while playing blood-thirsty pirates and indians...
I still think that especially the game of man on man, let it be indians or knights, is an
important issue for little boys to get kind of a feeling of what is fair play and honor code.
And, hey, isn't there a pirates codex somewhere... ? ;)
Oh, by the way, as far as I know, Playmobil ran into their first scandal when having an
advert where a construction worker fell from the scaffold on which he was drinking beer.
Some people then raised the question, why there has to be a box of beer in a construction
workers set... ::)
Hmm... Okay, just realized there where actually 3 boxes of beer in the set...
http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3400.htm (http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3400.htm)
:lol:
best regards,
socrates
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Hmm... Okay, just realized there where actually 3 boxes of beer in the set...
:lol: I love Playmobil :lol:
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Hmm... Okay, just realized there where actually 3 boxes of beer in the set...
Now that is what I call realistic... ;D
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I completely agree with playmofire.
Oh, by the way, as far as I know, Playmobil ran into their first scandal when having an
advert where a construction worker fell from the scaffold on which he was drinking beer.
Some people then raised the question, why there has to be a box of beer in a construction
workers set... ::)
Hmm... Okay, just realized there where actually 3 boxes of beer in the set...
http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3400.htm (http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3400.htm)
:lol:
best regards,
socrates
Yes, the green beer bottles in the German produced set's for the builders was an outrageous thing to have. So being very English and proper when Playpeople produced the builders set's we had white milk bottles instead, we couldn't have our builders drinking beer on the job. ;D
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I think I may have one of the Lowenbrau crates
I knew about the beer, but didnt realize it came from a constuction set :omg:
Socrates,
its good for girls to learn codes of honor, too
But their codes of honor can be different than a boys code of honor.
I would rather having boys playing with pretend swords, than with pretend guns.
A wierd bias, I admit
M
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Oh, by the way, as far as I know, Playmobil ran into their first scandal when having an
advert where a construction worker fell from the scaffold on which he was drinking beer.
Some people then raised the question, why there has to be a box of beer in a construction
workers set... ::)
Hadn't heard about this before. How very naughty of them! ;D
Yes, the green beer bottles in the German produced set's for the builders was an outrageous thing to have. So being very English and proper when Playpeople produced the builders set's we had white milk bottles instead, we couldn't have our builders drinking beer on the job. ;D
I never knew that either! :lol:
I love learning about all these bits of trivia related to the sets. :D
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Beer you say? He he... I have one of them constructionsets with bottles, I allways assumed it was mineralwater. :P The innocent mind of a child ::) As the matter of fact, I did not realize it could be beer until tonight :)
However, it makes you think. There are some sets that may not live up to the ethical standards a serious toy should.... :-\
1) The pirates. Yes, they represents thrilling adventures on the high seas, love and passion, treasury, arrrrr mighty and a barrel of rum... :D But a few hundreds years ago pirates were murderers, kidnappers, thieves and wild beasts. They spread fear among civilian ships, raping and plundering where they so wanted. Several of the pirate captains were known for their inhumane treatment of prisoners, torture and mutilation. And today we have funparks to remember them, games that glorifies their life and behavior, and toys so that we can be like them, do like they did. Toys so our very own children may pretend to be a bloodthirsty pirate... Hmm.... Does this mean we will build funparks etc in honour of the Nazis four hundred years from now :o I doubt it, but there is a (dangerous) connection and makes you think. :-\
2) Mutilated klickies. Missing a hand, an eye, a leg. What an enormous personal tragedy to loose your leg or eye...
3) The struggle for survival and the battle between classes. The poor homeless man, his only comfort in life is a bottle and a bench (http://www.collectobil.com/images/items/5504.jpg). But the officials are allways after him, because the rich mansion owners in their huge mansion full of servants and expensive furnitures, does not want to be reminded about the cruel life for so many poor folks in this world. :'(
4) "Jus primae noctis" :hmm: Oh yeah :yup: I just realized that a set represents prima noctis. I will take pictures for documentation and post them one of the following days ;) (Unless the very subject is unsuited on this board ???)
BUT: If Playmobil allways was to be political and ethical right, what a dull and boring toy it would be. I think it is great that kids can learn about the real world, and they can even make an impact and change it ;) Who says that playmobilpirates allways win? Or that they even are evil? :)
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And Playmobil, whether we like it or not, is as the world is or was, while avoiding the extremes of violence.
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Socrates,
its good for girls to learn codes of honor, too
Hi Meg! Of course you are right... This have not been a educational view, but
more the limited view of a son's father...
But, thinking about it, I think Playmobil focussed more on being a boys toy, this
is why they had to add the pink boxes... ;)
Did you guys realized another detail on the box?
One of the construction workers is even working with a bottle of beer in his hand.
How really provocative these guys have been... :P
@kvart: Just recently I read that the number of piracy incidents (real ones!)
world wide is at about 17.000 a year! And I bet, the pirates have not become
better ones...
socrates
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I know what you mean about a parents perspective
Only have a daughter, but having had 3 older brothers, I am slightly familiar with boys.
A girls code of conduct can be very different from a boys.
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Great trivia folks. I didn't know about the construction workers beer break but it's actully very realistic based on the constucton workers I've known.
2) Mutilated klickies. Missing a hand, an eye, a leg. What an enormous personal tragedy to loose your leg or eye...
Actually I take the view that they should have more representations of disabilities (and more senior citizens too) as at some point most of us will have at least a temporary disability. I work with kids with disabilities and also with many adults. Few think of themselves as tragic but rather just really want to fit in. Losing a limb or and eye or being deaf or whatever is just another aspect of many people's lives.
Kids feel less "strange" where there are toys "like them" which is why toymakers started making ethnically diverse figures, boy dolls, and such. Once the only type of Barbie (for example) was white...but some bright person realized that by integrating Barbie's world more kids of color were included (and made good customers ;) ) and studies have shown that kids who have dolls of several races tend to be more comfortable with and accepting of people of various races. The same is true for disabling conditions but we've not really got past the token wheel chair figure once in a while...with the possbile exception of pirates. ;D
The poor homeless man, his only comfort in life is a bottle and a bench (http://www.collectobil.com/images/items/5504.jpg). But the officials are allways after him, because the rich mansion owners in their huge mansion full of servants and expensive furnitures, does not want to be reminded about the cruel life for so many poor folks in this world. :'(
I'm with you! I always want to say, "Hey, leave the guy in peace, he's not hurting anyone. :) "
One of my vary favorite "realistic"dioramas is from the 3627 Merry Men's Feast/Keg Party! (http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3627.htm) I love the priest with his mug of beer! :**:
Oh, and MBL, I'd never seen the hat the western woman is wearing! Cool.
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Well now I think it's time to let you see the whole picture on the box side.
It does seem on a lot of the older boxes, mainly western when there was a charge of Cavalry at the Indians and other similar battle scenes, playmobil decided such images are OK if they are in a film.
it sort of Say's IMHO, it's OK for kids to see violent images such as a knife held to the throat of a lady if it's in a film, because you know it's not real?.
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Oh, and MBL, I'd never seen the hat the western woman is wearing! Cool.
I think it's the same as the one in set 3345 (http://www.collectobil.com/catalogue/items/3345x.htm). :)
it sort of Say's IMHO, it's OK for kids to see violent images such as a knife held to the throat of a lady if it's in a film, because you know it's not real?.
Seems like that might be the thinking behind it. :hmm:
Thanks for sharing the pic. I've never seen that one before. :)
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This tread made me look at the boxes of my old Playmobil collection and found on set 3561 (the wintersport set) some pictures that may yield a slightly sadistic impression 8}. Here are pictures of a clumsy female ice skater...
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And here someone casually falls over the edge.... ;D
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But in many ways this is the "violence" of childhood, the sort of slapstick "violence" of the early cinema and the music hall. There is no venom in it, no desire to see anyone hurt, only in all likelihood a relief that it isn't you falling on your behind.
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I agree Gordon...a bit like old Popeye cartoons. Horribly violent but without "real" venom. Good word that.
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I believe you are right, Playmofire.
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I collect my Playmobil MISB and pay a lot of attention to the small scenes printed on the boxes. On one of my Pirate boxes set 3480/3051 Pirate crew released in the 80's I came across what I consider a fairly nasty little scene. It's probably not a very good thing to put on a box for a toy thats aimed at kids 4+, holding a knife to lady klicky's throat, so how do you think Playmobil got around this, I'm not showing you the full image just yet.
I think it's not realy violent :
- money or life !
- take my wife she's all my life !
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:)
I am not sure if it came up here as well...
...but recently there has been a campaign to stop the selling of the playmobil pirate ship in indonesia (?) because of the extenuation of the pirate action...
Actually, I think it is very interesting of what you have to think of if you place your product on a world-wide market... while still in germany pirates, cowboys and knights have a very romantic aspect of fights for honor and against dragons and hunting for treasures, in other parts of the world people loose their lives being robbed and savaged by pirates...
...just as well read in another newspaper that the number of pirate acts in the year 2004 has been estimated at about 25.000... 8}
best
socrates