Review – Glyos System Winter Nibbler (Vision)

Onell Design’s Glyos System toys are rapidly collecting a number of awesome fan and professionally-produced customs, from cobbled together/painted customs to resin heads to these slush-molded Nibblers from Tarantulas Twit (blog, Twitter). And as tough as a lot of the customs have been to snag, the Nibblers are becoming legendary in their rarity, with the toys selling out moments after release, despite the high (roughly $40-$5 US) price tag. So is this little guy worth the money?

Yes he is.

A Glyos Toy Without the Customization Potential

While many of the varied Glyos custom toys aren’t likely to be broken into their independent parts and reconfigured into new designs, the majority of the customs on the market retain the Glyos toys’ individual components and could be snapped apart and used with other bits to build new toys. Not the Nibbler, though, since the toy is only built out of three pieces and the unique part — the body — has zero building options. You could paint the body, but that’s really not what this toy is about. No, the Nibbler emphasizes the “art” in art toy; this isn’t exactly a playable toy.

He May Not Be Playable, but He’s a Fantastic Work of Art and a Great Addition to Any Glyos Collection

Okay, so we can admit up front that you’re not going to reconfigure the Nibbler into a new design, but I think everyone who has been lucky enough to score one of these would agree with me that he’s a beautiful design and looks great in a Glyos collection. The Nibbler’s face, peeking out from the folds of his Jawa-like cload, screams character, from his pointy eyes to his almost skull-like teeth. It’s a fairly simple design, but the sculpt is professionally executed and the entire package comes together perfectly.

There’s a reason these Nibblers sell so fast when they’re released. It’s just a great-looking design.

One Minor Problem

As cool as the Nibbler looks, there is one slight problem with the toy that contributes to my declaration that he’s not a playable piece. The arms are loose in the sockets, and the slightest jar can knock an arm loose from the toy. It’s a minor issue for what’s effectively a statue and not an action figure, but when so many of the Glyos toys hold together this little problem is pretty glaring in comparison to other toys in the line, whether production piece or custom art. I don’t see this issue as a strike against the toy, but it’s there and something I wanted to mention in case someone sets out to buy a Nibbler because of this review.

How Did He Do That?

You know, the body may be one piece for us, but I have to wonder how the Tarantulas built the toy. I think that on his end the body and face are two separate parts and he glues the head in place. That’s the only way that I can figure out how the face could be a glow-in-the-dark component while the rest of the body is just a yellowed plastic color. Slipping my finger into the hooded portion around the face I find that I can slide a fingernail between the top of the head and the hood, and I suspect that with pressure I could snap the face free. I’m not gonna try it, but I figured some of you without a Nibbler would find (my suspicions about) the construction of the toy interesting.

Closing Thoughts

The Nibbler is a fun addition to the Glyos line and a great way for an artist to use existing Glyos components to give a character of his own design a connection to the other toys in the series. He’s not an essential purchase for any Glyos fan, but for the hardcore fanatics in the audience any Nibbler toy makes a beautiful feather in the collection that’s every bit as neat as an original Custom Corps (review here) or TheGodBeast’s Aliens (review here). I’m happy I’ve got a Nibbler and, to be honest, every now and then a new version of the figure drops and I think about grabbing a second.

Philip Reed wishes he would have been able to grab the Jawa Nibbler. After all, how could a Jawa anything be a bad addition to any toy collection?