Bandai's gleaming new head office in central Tokyo could be bad for your health. From the giant video screens that pound out Technicolor epiphanies to Japan's beloved cartoon anime, to the rows of smart toys in the reception area, the elevator that announces floors in the squeaky voices of Bandai characters and the robot-like dolls with which president Takeo Takasu surrounds himself in the top-floor conference room, the premises seem purpose-built to induce sensory overload.
In the floors beneath Takasu's office, hundreds of designers and developers labour over the next generation of toys and gadgets, evidence of a corporate culture that has tapped into the pleasure zones of children for more than 50 years. To help these employees stay in touch with their target market, part of the day's work is to read manga comics and play with toys. It's a strategy that paid off spectacularly seven years ago with Tamagotchi, the virtual chicken that beeped its way into the lives of 40 million people at about HK$120 a pop. It is an impressive building, but amid all the hi-tech is an oddly old-fashioned corner. In the elevator hall off the reception area is a small shrine to American inventor Thomas Edison, and a single Chinese character carved into the wall, meaning 'dream'. It is a nice touch: a nod to Bandai's indebtedness to the dreamers and inventors of the past and an acknowledgment that the company's future is mortgaged to the power of the human imagination.
Japan's biggest toy company, and the world's third largest after Mattel and Hasbro, is basking in commercial glory with its stock price at a near all-time high after record profits of US$200 million (HK$1.56 billion) on sales of $2.1 billion last year. And it isn't planning to stop there: last year Takasu announced the company's ambition to grab the global number one spot, along with plans to roll out Tamagotchi II (officially called Returned Tamagotchi Plus). But if things look rosy now, it wasn't always the case.
Bandai was stunned, then overwhelmed, by the runaway success of Tamagotchi, which made its debut in November 1996. The little egg-shaped toy featured an electronic bird-like creature that had to be constantly fed and nurtured by its owner. It spawned numerous imitators and kilometre-long queues outside toy stores around the world. Thousands of Tamagotchi websites and fan clubs sprang up, and the once Japan-exclusive Otaku phenomenon (named after the obsessive fans of cartoon and manga characters) spread beyond the country's borders.
In Hong Kong in 1997, Tamagotchi appeared to be every child's - and more than a few adults' - demanding new best friend. A common playground refrain was, 'Hold on, let me feed my chicken first.' The electronic creature's constant beeping became familiar to all. At the height of the craze, the coveted pure-white model sold for more than HK$1,000. Yung Wai-ming, now a university student, recalls buying a red Tamagotchi for $130 when she was in Form 3 simply because many of her classmates had one. But soon she was hooked. 'Everyone played with them all day long,' she says. 'During lessons, we hid them in drawers to play.' Indeed so many children were distracted by their beeping virtual pets that many Hong Kong schools banned them altogether.
Other toy manufacturers seized on the trend, creating copycat products such as Dinkie Dino, a virtual dinosaur, and Nano Kitty, a cat. Stephanie Sin So-ting, 22, once owned a Dinkie Dino. 'Others had a Tamagotchi so I begged my father to buy one for me,' she says. 'But the others all had chickens so I asked for a Dinkie Dino because I thought dinosaurs were rarer.'