Bandai Co. Ltd. has just made an unexpected announcement as devoted fans of the “Digimon” franchise are in for a great surprise to celebrate the said franchise’s upcoming milestone anniversary. To celebrate its 20th year anniversary, Bandai has revealed that the beloved original Digivices are making a comeback soon—this time upgraded and better than before.
The creators of “Digimon” have set up a countdown timer, counting the remaining days before their 20th year anniversary hits. As soon as the said timer hit zero, Bandai has revealed that it will bring back the original and beloved digital devices, popularly known as Digivice, to the market to commemorate this festive event. Aside from returning it for fans to go wild about it, it will be released in an enhanced version for better virtual toy experience, which will be released on March 27 this year at approximately $32.30 with shipping starting in June.
The new Digivice will still have the original features from the early version, which includes feeding, playing, training, and combining digital monsters, but a new single player arena mode has been added wherein users can train their Digimon in several battles as well as the ability to upload the Digimon to the internet to compete in the virtual D-1 Grand Prix. The new digital devices will still enable battling with other devices and will also be compatible with the older versions. The 20th anniversary Digivice will come in two versions, Original Gray and Original Brown, wherein Gabumon will be exclusively in the former while Omnimon will be exclusively available in the latter version.
“Digimon” initially started as a franchise that sold toys, specifically the virtual pet toy they referred to as Digivice. The Digivice was first released in 1997 and its original version has sold over 8 million units that it gained long lasting popularity in the gaming industry, rivaling the likes of the popular Tamagotchi, which was also released by Bandai in 1996. The “Digimon” Digivice acted like a virtual pet wherein owners of the said toy take care of a digital monster, hence the name “Digimon” that reside in the Digital World.
The Digivice was sold in various series of digital monsters that people can choose from. The virtual toy was highly influenced by the style of the Tamagotchi, but was later on created to have hard-edged designs inspired from the American comics instead of the cutesy tiny pocket virtual toys Tamagotchi donned. The virtual pet toy became widely popular that it eventually stemmed out to other media productions.
The franchise eventually bore a video game titled “Digimon World” and an anime television series adaptation titled “Digimon Adventure”. Both developments were released in 1999. The series brought in more fans and the video game eventually turned into chains of titles, expanding to various genres such as fighting, role playing, racing, life simulation, adventure, strategy, video card games, and even massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG).
The “Digimon” video game series consists of many titles that ventured into different kinds of genres but remained true to its original story. There are 15 “Digimon” video game titles alone released in North America and they were made available on different platforms including the various versions of PlayStation, Nintendo, Xbox, and even the old WonderSwan Color portable console. The latest “Digimon” video game titled “Digimon World: Next Order” will be released on Jan. 31, 2017.
