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Doll Play Ticket Play Station Set (1993)
First written August 18, 2023
The Ticket Play Station Set (キップあそび駅セット) was released in later 1993 as the second and final set in the Doll Play series. The Ticket Play Station Set includes a Doll Play Nozomi 300-series Shinkansen, a reversing figure-eight layout, and the titular ticket play station, where a play ticket machine will accept train pass cards and dispense tickets to slide through the ticket reader when going to board.
Set contents
| Quantity |
Item |
Photo |
|---|---|---|
| 2 pieces |
Doll Play Nozomi (300 series Shinkansen
with lead car attached to intermediate battery car with
seats for figures in the lead and tail cars) |
 |
| 8 |
R-03 Curve Rail |
 |
| 4 |
R-11 Turnout Rail (two of each L and R) |
 |
| 2 |
R-12 Figure Eight Point Rail (one of each L
and R) |
 |
| 1 |
J-17 Railroad Crossing |
 |
| 3 |
Doll Play dolls |
 |
| 3 pieces |
Ticket Play Station |
 |
| 2 |
"Orange Card" prepaid train cards |
 |
| 6 |
train tickets |
 |
The 300 series Shinkansen were introduced to run the new fast Nozomi line in 1992. In the 80s many Japanese railway lines began to switch to automatic ticketing and by 1990 magnetic stripe ticketing was adopted into some standards. JR East began introducing automatic ticket gates in 1990 with 3000 installed in Tokyo by 1992. Automatic ticket gates on Shinkansen trains does not appear to have be adopted until later in the 1990s.
The Doll Play Nozomi is covered in more detail on the Doll Play series page.
This set includes the full range of Doll Play figures. The figures have rotating heads and articulated arms and feet. Magnets in the feet allow the dolls to interact with special accessories, of which only one seems to have been made for the Plarail range. The Doll Play figures are somewhat similar to (and likely based on) the Tomy Train figures, which had similar articulation and magnetic feet.
The ticket play "Plarail Station" comes in three pieces. The large orange base includes a stop rail to stop the train, molded features to install the other station components, a bench, and an automated ticket gate. Magnets under the walkways and a thin plastic sheet that can be rotated using the dial near the stop rail allow the figures to "pass through" the gate, and the tickets dispensed by the ticket machine can be slid along a conveyer in the raised blue ticket scanner between the two walkways. The main wall of the station is a large piece of molded blue plastic with a door frame and several stickers, and the other portion of the rear of the station is formed by the ticket machine. This station was a set exclusive but was later released as the J-19 Automatic Ticket Gate Station with the train cards and tickets as well as the boy doll between 1995 and 1998 or so.
Inside the base of the station is the stop rail mechanism and a small gear train that runs two pin-feed rollers to drive the plastic strip that the play dolls stand on. Another gear couples the knob up to the conveyor belt under the blue ticket scanner to move the tickets through the machine.
The set includes two larger punch-out plastic "orange cards" (オレンジカード) prepaid travel cards and six smaller train tickets. Inserting the prepaid card into the machine and pulling the lever will dispense a train ticket that can then be "scanned" through the gate. My boxed copy of this set was seemingly unused and thus the tickets are all still on their sprew (or on their sprew in a sealed bag). At some point I will get out my calipers and measure these to 3D print replicas but I have not set my 3D printer back up since moving (July 2023).
(October 2023)
Orange
cards measure approximately 41.7mm by 26.8mm by 2mm thick. The tickets
measure approximately 40mm by 20mm and are also around 2mm thick. They
should be reproducible out of any material which is reasonably sturdy
and formable, but I opted to 3D print some. The files I used are
available here.
Tickets are loaded into the back of the ticket machine in a stack.
The train cards fit into the top slot on the ticket machine. Pressing the red lever below it will dispense the bottom ticket in the stack. The orange card does not have to actually be inserted in order to dispense a ticket.
The ticket can then be inserted into the ticket gate and wound through the machine.
The rails in this set are all Thailand treaded rails. The Thailand figure eight point rail has the roughtop surface under the treads and was likely originally a Japanese mold, with the small oval above the Made in Thailand mark probably covering where "JAPAN" was in the mold previously.
The layout is a somewhat bare reversing figure eight loop with only the Ticket Play Station and a New Railroad Crossing to play with. The signals and stickers for the railroad crossing come in the same bag as the tickets.
(Click for longer video with sound)
The reversing figure eight layout is more interesting than some other layouts and offers some play appeal but it is obvious that the intention of the set was to focus on the ticket and doll play aspects.
After getting a ticket at the ticket machine, the ticket can be placed into the "IN" on the machine and the play dolls at the entrance of the gate and then by turning the knob by the stop rail the figures and ticket will be transported to the boarding side of the gate.
My copy of the set also included the manual which shows more about how the ticket machine functions. It also included a copy of the 1993 catalog.