
UK SERIES
Ever since the launch of Corinthian's figures in 1995, collector's have always asked about the possibility of producing a smaller version. On the 12th February 2001, after over 2 years of product development, MicroStars were born!
Corinthian had reached an exclusive agreement with the UK's biggest producer of Easter Eggs, Magna Confectionary Ltd, to pack and release the MicroStars figures inside a hollow chocolate shell, called Powerpodz! The figures were packed into a clear sachet and then placed into a plastic capsule, along with a collector's information leaflet.
The cost to pack the figures inside a hollow chocolate shell was only marginally more than releasing it in a clear sachet or window box, and less than the cost of a blister pack. Perhaps the biggest advantage of the Powerpodz was that they were able to be sold in a much broader rage of high street stores, with major retailers like WoolWorths, Asda, Sainsbury's and a whole host of newsagents and garage's, meant MicroStars were literally everywhere!
The main difference that MicroStars have over Headliners/ProStars is that the under the base was some player skill ratings. MicroStars were predominantly aimed at a younger demographic, with a price point of just £1.49, so a game was devised, which started out as a 'One On One' and evolved later into The World Club League.
The 5 base ratings were Dribbling, Shooting, Tackling, Passing and Crossing, with the goal keepers having 2 ratings, Save Shot Left and Save Shot Right. The figures were initially released on 6 different base colours, Green, Red, Blue, White, Silver and Gold with the base ratings increasing with the rarity of the base.
The rarity of each base colour was as follows:
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Green - 1 in 2
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Red - 1 in 5
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Blue - 1 in 8
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White - 1 in 10
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Silver - 1 in 20
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Gold - 1 in 40
Corinthian introduced the ultra rare Black base in MicroStars Series 12, with the ration being 1 in 50 and there were no individual base ratings, instead there was a FREE CALL number!
As with Headliners & ProStars, the MicroStars figures were also assigned collector codes, which began with MC (there are a few exceptions which are all detailed on this site)
In total Corinthian released 19 series of MicroStars for the UK market, with the figues being released on a host of different sized packaging formats, all 19 UK Series are detailed in full, along with the various packaging formats and release information.