Was watching some reviews where - as a matter of fact - the content creator stated that once prized Yo-Yo models introduced 10, 15 years ago were outdated, obsolescent and just plain old!
Got me thinking. Is this true?
My gut feel tells me that the answer varies by play style. I’m thinking 2A Loopers have longest shelf life.
Historically how long do you think reasonably a “new” design remains relevant? …your style of play? …and why?
Hmm… that’s a pretty absurd generalization that was probably made through the lens of the competitive aspect of yoyoing. Totally depends on the context IMO. For casual play, yoyos introduced 10-15 years ago are just as good & fun now as they were back then. I CONSISTENTLY use yoyos I got 10-15 years ago, like the Chief for example, and often prefer them to yoyos released recently. Were some designs a bit more ahead of their time (like the Chief)? Absolutely. Could you use pretty much any yoyo made back then in a competition nowadays? You could, but you’d probably be better off with a modern, performance oriented yoyo. Both have their use cases, and any reasonable person can appreciate both. Not everyone is after the latest and greatest performance monster, while some people are only after that. I like both! I will say there is a higher number of higher quality yoyos nowadays, meaning you could pretty much buy any yoyo blindly and it will be great. Not so much the case back then. But to say they’re outdated or obsolescent is just… wrong lol
Facts
I was going to say, pretty much, the same thing. There’s people who collect older designs and new releases that are based on older shapes. Look at how popular the OD Panorama/Diorama was when it was released and it’s very much, an old school, high wall, design.
I mean if we talk wear 2a starbursts physically wear out over time
But design is subjective as can be. If we are talking comp wide is the new meta or whatever but like that’s a narrow view.
unless you are competing at worlds > easily 10 years for 1a
Generally when looking at competitive yo-yos the yo-yos that we use today to compete rather than what was used 5 even 10 years ago are quite different. I think this is a good thing since companies are pushing to innovate and make new and interesting designs. When it comes to recreational play it’s really impossible to determine the shelf life of a yo-yo since old yo-yos are just as fun as new yo-yos. Most of them aren’t as technically capable and can’t be viably used in modern competitive yo-yoing however i think this isn’t detrimental to the overall usefulness or viability of the yo-yo. In recreational yo-yoing you can kinda do whatever the hell you want, so the old “outdated” designs are just as useable as the new ones. This is coming from a guy who regularly uses an original Crucial Milk and a W1LD anceps, 2 yo-yos that couldn’t be any different.
All in all I think that yo-yo shelf life is generally relative to the use case of the yo-yo. Some yo-yos do have a literal shelf life, such as some of yoyojams hybrids which crack more than eggs (very unfortunately).
I do think that for sake of discussion though that 2a yo-yos generally stay pretty similar, you could theoretically win worlds using modded raiders but I don’t see why you would do that when there’s many more modern designs that don’t break or wear down as easily
My throws are strictly Responsive. I searched introduction dates of my throwing Yo-Yos and calculated the average intro date weighted by models. BTW - I enjoy them all.
Results as follows …
All Throws - Average intro date 16 years ago (Spanning 1954 - 2025)
Premium Throws - Average intro date 7 years ago (Spanning 1998 - 2025)
