Every few years, Casio looks at a watch that costs more than a Hilux and asks, “What if we didn’t?”
In 2019, it gave us the GA-2100, which the internet promptly christened the “CasiOak”. After a month of accidental leaks, Casio has now made its next trick official: the G-Shock 2500 series. Casio won’t say the word Nautilus, but everyone else already has. Meet the CasioNaut.
Nobody is mistaking this for a Patek in the boardrooms of Martin Place. Casio says the design comes from the original DW-5000C, softened with rounder contours, but those broad, cushioned shoulders are pure Genta fan fiction. Then comes the party trick: the minute hand is held magnetically rather than pressed onto a shaft. When you inevitably clip a doorframe, it shifts with the hit and settles back into place. Patek does not recommend trying that with yours – Casio might be a different story.
The rest reads like a proper G-Shock spec sheet: 200m water resistance, a stopwatch, LED light, full auto-calendar and small seconds. There’s also a three-cell “Multi-Mission Date” window that shows the date, stopwatch minutes or settings depending on the mode. A sleep function parks the seconds hand to stretch the battery. No solar or Bluetooth. Quite refreshingly analogue.
There are nine references across three tiers. The resin GAC-2500 comes in black, olive, white and yellow for AU$289. The steel-bezel GMC-2500 runs AU$459, or AU$499 in gold IP. The full steel-bracelet GMC-2500D, in black or blue-grey, tops the range at AU$559. Yes, Japan gets it for roughly a third less. But a flight to Tokyo still doesn’t make it a saving.
The lot lands in November. That gives you a few weeks to practise deflecting “it really looks a Patek” comments with a straight face. But perhaps that’s the point.