JoeDeclassified.com

Remember back when you were a kid and you ran across that totally cool new toy line that you thought was the best thing to come out ever only to find out a few months down the road that apparently not everyone shared your enthusiasm and the line died? What was yours? What made it so cool and why do you think the line died?

For me I think it was Sectaurs; I loved the insect idea and the hand puppet gimmick (even though they were only 4 legged bugs) was one of the coolest ideas I had seen in a toy line in a long time. The scale was out of wack with everything else I was collecting but I didn't care, I wanted bug people riding bug puppets! Even the standard single figs gave you two toys; a human-ish figure AND a bug companion so it was like maximizing my spending. I was bummed that the figures had "squishy elements (head, anteni and weapons to some extent) but they were like nothing else I had seen so I was amazed that something so unique didn't catch on though I should have guessed when from my moms reaction when I got General Spidrax and Spider Flyer that parents probably were not going to go out of their way to get these for their kids.
My guess on why they failed was that there might have been a level of repulsion on the parents part for the whole bug thing but if I remember Coleco went bankrupt fairly soon after they released the line (or was that Captain Power?) Anyway, I think that the thing that attracted me to it was it's downfall; too alien and unlikable for the masses and I bet the price didn't help much either as they were on the expensive side.

Anyone else have a toy line they pine over?

Sectaurs was indeed cool. Even as a kid, I loved anything that had humans spiced with plant/animal/insects.

I always had a fondness for Sky Commanders, but that lasted less than a year. But, when it was being clearanced out, I did manage to get most of it.

StarCom was another line I really liked, but that also faded away fairly quickly. In fact, it wasn't until I was in Asia in 1989 that I discovered there were several new sets released overseas that never made it to most U.S. markets. Talk about the irony of the U.S. Space Force line not being continued in the U.S.!

There was also Mega Force---a die-cast 1:87 scaled futuristic military vehicle line I thought was pretty cool. I had several of those sets, but I used them more in conjunction with the old FASA BattleTech table top miniatures game than as a Mega Force-proper line.

Sky Commanders, Visionaries, and Mega Force were my big faves. I even have Werecat's Mega Force stuff sitting here on my shelf!

Exo-Squad, Visionaries, and Crystal Warriors were ones that I thought were cool and would like to have seen them continue.

I'm just glad it went to a good home where it is appreciated, instead of sitting in a box collecting dust.

As for my Sky Commanders, that anal retentive OCD side of me forced me to do some custom tweaks a few years ago. When I was a kid, I used a ballpoint pen to draw in eyes on all my M.A.S.K. and Sky Commander figures because I disliked the blank faces. It was pretty sloppy, but as long as they had eyes, I was happy. Well, in hindsight that wasn't the best idea because I hated how it looked as an adult. So when I pulled these guys out of storage, I was pretty much forced to paint in more realistic eyes. I also added some paint to the uniforms, web gear, and stuff like that to make them more cartoon accurate. Here are just a few I had handy for pics.

Damn, I'm jealous Chris.

As a kid I was hyper focused on G.I. Joe when it came to retail. But that was mostly due to it's shear scale. There was never any shortage of G.I. Joe to buy.

Garage Sales, Flea Markets and Clearance Aisles, that was a different story. I would buy practically anything I came across.

The 2 real stand outs for me, that I still have the originals I bought, were Visionaries, and Transformer Action Masters. Bought almost complete sets of both on clearance, and was really disappointed there were not more to track down.

Visionaries I loved because they were so close to G.I. Joe, would have liked them the same scale though. The holograms didn't hurt either. I think they may have failed because of timing. They were sort of at the end of the D&D craze, and think people got enough sword and sorcery from He-man. Would have helped it if the cartoon was a daily instead of a weekly. Also, as I recall, the comic sucked.

I think Action Masters Downfall was obvious. Transformers that don't Transform? Kid's and parents alike just didn't get it. But I LOVED them for the very reasons I largely ignore Transformers to begin with. They had a consistent scale, and cartoon accurate looks. Scale was a REALLY big deal for me back then, and having tiny little Micro Masters next to Optimus Prime when the characters were supposed to be as big as Jazz, just did not work for me. If the scale makes sense, I'm there. Jazz should be smaller than Prime, but Bumblebee should be almost as big as Jazz.

C.O.P.S., Crystar, and Centurions get honorable mentions from me.

Oh, how could I have forgotten Metal-Man from Zee-Toys: http://www.zylmex.com/1980pg29.html
No idea how I first got these. I was only 6 or 7 when they came out. Must have found them at a garage sale. Took me years to figure out what they were. Finally saw some liquidated at KB, but I already had everything they were selling. Great line, really could have gone somewhere. But the company was too small, and unknown. And I suppose a die-cast action figure was considered too dangerous compared to plastic.

Roger

M.A.S.K. was my favorite toy line when I was young. I had everything up till the split seconds line I didn't like those too much
I loved jets and had a bunch of ring raiders those were kinda fun.
Air Raiders were pretty cool too
Captain Power was my favorite show at that time and I wish I had those toys
Later I was into Exo-squad I loved the show but was disappointed that the toys were not really screen accurate.

I'm pretty much the same as Roger. I was a tried and true Joe fan. From '82 through '88, I obsessed over Joe. All of my time was spent playing with them, organizing them, staring at the catalogs, determining my next purchase or how x was going to fit into my armies. If I wasn't doing that, I was out on any of my three paper routes I had to support my collecting.

But I did have a few test runs of other toys. I had collected Star Wars up until 82. I collected the odd transformer, but not actively, just - if they came into my collection, I kept them. I also had a brief flirtation with MASK, but again, as Roger said, scale was everything to me. These toys couldn't interact with my joes because of scale, so they got relegated to the back of the closet. I had a smattering of Gung-Ho (Corps) and American Defense but they were poor quality, and didn't see much action beyond 'background thug' roles. And besides, my best friend was spoiled. He got everything. EVERYTHING. So I got to test stuff out (we hung out every day for pretty much 6 years straight. I remember once sleeping over at his house 23 nights in a row). He had entire runs of Sectaurs, MASK, Bravestar, Exo Force, Bionic Six, COPS, Inhumanoids, Visionaries, and decent collections of the boys toys trifecta: Star Wars, Transformers and Gijoe; some StarCom,, Robotech, Air Raiders and others I'm sure I'm forgetting. Nothing could hold a candle to Gijoe as far as I was concerned.

As for since then, I still root for any toyline that comes out in 'Gijoe scale'. I always hope they find success. I still often view the toyscape in that 8 to 14 year old mindset, that 3 3/4 is THE scale, everything else just didn't plan properly, or do enough research.

Darren