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Sonokong is a South Korean company that has held the license to manufacture and market Takara toys, including Transformers and the various Brave series, in Korea since 1995. The Transformers franchises that Sonokong has produced are Beast Wars II, Beast Wars Neo, Car Robots, and Micron Legend (aka Armada). Sonokong's Transformers toylines appear to be largely the same as their Japanese and American counterparts, with some notable differences:
- Sonokong Transformers toylines do not include all the original toys from those lines. For example, their Car Robots line is missing the three basic-size Destrongers and the three Super Car Brothers. Other lines are even less complete, with their Micron Legend line including less than half of all the Takara Micron Legend toys.
- Sonokong Transformers toys are often packed in windowless boxes.
- Small toys from the Sonokong lines were released in versus packs and gift sets rather than individually. For example, the Car Brothers were released only as a 3-pack.
- Sonokong has done two weird repacks. They re-released a couple of their Beast Wars II toys in Car Robots packaging. They also re-released two 4-packs of Beast Wars Neo toys in generic "Dino Robot" and "Jungle Robo" packaging without reference to Beast Wars Neo.
- Sonokong QC is arguably sometimes a little lower.
- Sonokong boxes are often less protective than Japanese or US boxes because the toy is in a less secure plastic insert that allows it to move around inside the box more.
- Individual toys have some very small differences, such as Mach Alert having "Police" written in English on his door and Brave Maximus's tower sticker being placed upside-down.
The Sonokong versions of Gigastorm and Brave Maximus have become popular among Western collectors seeking lower-cost, easier-to-find alternatives to their respective HasTak G1 predecessors.
Sonokong appears to deal with Takara rather than Hasbro, as evidenced by their release of their two Japanese-exclusive Transformers toylines and their many Brave toylines (not to mention their Beedaman and Jenny toylines, which are also originally Takara products). Sonokong's competitor, Young Toys, appears to deal with Hasbro rather than Takara, and imports and produces Hasbro Transformers for the Korean market as well.
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