What happened to the popular toylines you loved as a child, or discovered as a collector? Some of my favorites not on shelves right now: Battlebeasts - A line closely related to the Transformers brand. Rights are currently held by Diamond Select Toys, and for a time a line based on Minimates and heavily retooled was being considered. For now, all Diamond is releasing is this countdown. Whatever happens, I've been spoiled by this. Micronauts - American version of the line that spawned Transformers and introduced the 3.75 inch figure. In 2006, SOTA toys had planned on releasing a "Micronauts: Evolutions" collector oriented line, with some nice sculpts. Strangely, the original plan was to release them in the 6 inch scale. Even their Japanese progenitor, Microman, is inactive at this time. Micronauts will be back. Hasbro mentioned them in the Unit:E campaign, and JJ Abrams is moving forward with his Micronauts movie. M.A.S.K. - Hasbro holds the rights to MASK. They've been mentioned in connection to both Unit:E and the Hasbro Factory movie, but good information on the future of those projects seems hard to find.
Zbots - I used to have a bunch of these little guys. Sadly, since Galoob got bought out by Hasbro, there's no word on whether or not these things will make a return.
what happened to micro machines? They were awesome, especially the star wars ones. They made some larger vehicles (think deluxe class) in their "action fleet" and I haven't seen them since
IIRC Hasbro bought Galoob, the makers of Micro Machines, and then decided to stop making Action Fleet stuff soon after.
I always wanted some of those Dino Riders but my parents never bought me any I loved Sky Commanders. Anyone remember those? How about Robotix?
Yes they do, the closest thing you'll find to a M.A.S.K. figure though is Special Agent Matt Trakker from the GI Joe line a few years ago. They even put the M.A.S.K. faction stamp on the card to designate him as a member of that sub team! I'd want to see Silverhawks and Dino Riders make a comeback. They both had great shows back then.
Damn you Hasbro, I loved Action Fleet. The Action Fleet figures are almost a perfect match for Diaclone drivers, so I have my AT-AT pilot riding in G1 Grimlock Micro Machines Military was an awesome line. I have a huge box of the stuff and a load of bases. I'm keeping that stuff to make an epic battle scene with my TFs one day
Silverhawks Bionic Six Spiral Zone Centurions Seems like at some point in the day these were in my lineup. The 80's were such wonderful times!
Fisher Price has been releasing Dino Rider-esque toys in the UK. Think the original Dino Riders, but Playskool style. True Dino Riders should be a no brainer, dinosaurs with cyborg bits on them? Sounds like an obvious winner. Yet so far, no joy.
Well, being born in88 and being a90's hoe, I gave in COMPLETELY to Batman The animated series or Jurassic Park. I have almost every single BTAS/AoB&R and TNBA figure ever made, almost a complete jurassic park collection... And I also collected Jonny Quest figures. However, I lost the land rover and that Rage guy, so I have a few left... Other than that, I also managed to acquire a ton of Power Rangers stuff that I gave up when I was 12 (something I seriously regret). I can say that most of my toy collection consists of 2000 to now stuff (Bionicles, Transformers, Zoids, StarWars, etc). But I really wish Jonny Quest was still out there. Those were gi-joe esque toys that had a ton of awesome accessories that not only were realistic, but usable. It was an awesome collection. As for PR, well, since I was a kid, I only cared about the megazords and related mecha. I'm missing a few parts from my Ninja Megazord, and the sword and helmet from my Shogun Megazord. If anyone has them, and is willing to get rid of those, let me know. Also, when I was a kid, I hated being the only Batfreak around. Everyoe else was into Knights of the Zodiac (Saint Seiya). I asked myself 'where are those now' and managed to acquire a few at very low prices, thus completing the matchup i always dreamed of. I also has some figures from Independence Day (Pilot Alien, David LEvinson (played by Jeff Goldblum who is one of my favorite actors), and The President played by Bill Pullman. I also have this Micro Playser that comes with a mothership, and you get to toss balls at WTC, Empire State, and so on. HOW AWFUL ). what an awful toy. But it exists. 1996 TRENDMASTERS--ID4 INDEPENDENCE DAY--DEFEND NEW YORK--MICRO BATTLE PLAYSET | eBay That alien head opens up to reveal NYC, and you get to essentially blow up collapsible building blocks. I was nuts about micro shit back then and this was one of those 'Micro Batman and Mighty Max will defend the world from those awful aliens' type shit. If only real life were that good. I also have a few figures from Aliens, mainly Ripley, Bishop, Drake and that one dude who also survived in Aliens. I also have a few Aliens. Awesome mothafuckas. And that's my edition of 'where are they nao'? Pictures are available upon request. My alien is basically broken, David Levinson and the mothership is all that remains, my Aliens collection is intact, right down to the comic strips, and my Batman collection is...well...in very good condition and on display. All I'm missing are Piranha Blade Batman, Sea Claw Batman, the Robin Dragster and that's it. I practically have a complete pre Justice LEague Bruce Timm action fig collection.
If I remember correctly, a lot of the Micro Machines people went on to work on Hasbro's Titanium lines.
The Titanium lines technically were part of the Micro Machines brand, in that they had a easily missed Micro Machines logo on the packaging. Dino Riders were an INCREDIBLE line. First, start with the beautiful packaging. Very nice painted artwork. If I remember correctly, the boxes featured an opening flap with a window underneath. This for a kid's oriented line. All these years later, we're lucky to get packaging that nice on our more expensive collector oriented lines. Then there are the dinosaur sculpts. These are the nicest dinosaur toys I've ever seen. Tyco could've slapped guns and armor on your average cheap vinyl dinosaurs, and kids would've bought it. But the figures are as accurate as scientific theory of the time permitted. Why did this line only last a few years??? As Sol Fury said, Mattel's Imaginext preschool brand is producing a Dino Riders style line of armored and piloted dinos. Coincidentally, Mattel is the current rights holder for Dino Riders, having bought up Tyco years ago. I wish I could believe that the Imaginext dino line is a sign of good things to come... but even if Dino Riders wasn't an obscure line, I wouldn't trust Mattel to orchestrate a successful revival. Look how they've handled Masters of the Universe.
Regarding the Imaginext dinos, the intention of the toyline was indeed as an homage to Dino Riders. Probably won't lead to a proper revival of the brand anytime soon, but we'll see. Mattel could always use another toyline to have the Four Horsemen sculpt and then botch as retail releases... Imaginext Dinosaurs - LittleRubberGuys.com Forums
I would love for the Dragon Ball franchise to make some sort of comeback in toy form like the Irwin and Jakks figures released back in the day for Z and GT. An Italian company made a whole new line of figures just for the sake of DBZ rebroadcasting in Italy and most of the figures look great!
Batman the Animated Series (not JLU style) and Batman Beyond would be spectacular to see on shelves again. Also while not a specific line, I want cloth capes to return. I never understood why lines like DCUC, MOTUC, Marvel Legends etc. add all of this super articulation to a figure only to have a huge chunk of plastic hinder the articulation and make the figures top heavy.
Anyone know who owns current rights to Exo Squad? Exo-Squad, if you didn't know, was awesome. I recall waking up on Saturdays at 5 am to see Generation 2, followed by Exo-Squad's animated cartoon. The toyline's name comes from the exo-suit mechs that were the principal focus of the toyline. Called E-Frames (I'm guessing because exo-suit was not a copywritable term), the exo-suits were great toys. Nice packaging - again a opening box flap. Though the pilot figures weren't anything astonishing, the E-frames had just about all the articulation the pilot figures had, and in most E-Frames the play gimmicks are not intrusive, making the line appealing to older children. Robot and mecha toys took up a large percentage of retail real estate at the time. At the same time Exo-Squad was on shelves, a Battletech toyline by Tyco was on the market. These were larger than Exo-Squad's E-Frames, but were boxier, with fewer details sculpted or stickered on. Another line of the time was Superhuman Samurai Syber Squad. Power Rangers were the biggest toyline in the United States at this time, and Syber Squad has a similar aesthetic. The show was based on the tokusatsu show Gridman, by Tsuburaya Productions (creators of Ultraman), and had a plot loosely similar to Tron or Reboot - things happen inside the computer. I can't tell you more about the show, because I never caught it. But on to the toys - that's what we're here for. Sold in the States as a Playmates product, but these were Takara created and engineered. Which explains why they combine and why Xenon looks so much like Optimus Prime. I have a link to some great pictures I will post later. Late in it's short run, the Exo-Squad name was used to release a variety of Robotech product. It's rumored that Robotech was supposed to play a part in Exo-Squad's future - in both the toyline and cartoon. However, both were canceled. I consider the Exo-Squad Robotech releases a good thing. Prior to this, I'd never been exposed to the great mecha designs of Robotech's parent animes. And it was an opportunity to acquire actual product meant for children from Robotech, rather than the fragile and expensive collectibles that dominate Macross (and Robotech) boards Final postscript to the Exo-Squad story - around 2001, KB Toys began selling recolors of the smaller E-Frames under the brand name Tech Wars. Packaging information listed RePLAY! as the manufacturing company. Figures of the human heroes had been remolded, and figures of the villain NeoSapiens were replaced with robotic or cyborg figures.