How spoiled were you as a kid, and how it influenced your current collecting

Discussion in 'Transformers Toy Discussion' started by Psychoshi, Apr 24, 2016.

?

How many transformer toys did you have growing up?

  1. VERY SPOILED- had way more TFers than a child should ever have

    21 vote(s)
    10.8%
  2. MILDLY SPOILED- more than most kids had

    45 vote(s)
    23.1%
  3. AVERAGE- the middle ground

    53 vote(s)
    27.2%
  4. LESS THAN AVERAGE- only a handful

    58 vote(s)
    29.7%
  5. ALMOST NONE- less fortunate

    18 vote(s)
    9.2%
  1. Logik

    Logik Real Life Diaclone Driver

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    I said less than average....my toy experience was a mix of the comments above. We weren't well off, so I didn't get many Transformers, but I loved them immensely. It was the complexity of a transforming figure, I loved the ingenuity....I still do to this day, I still claim they are the best toys ever created and will be unmatched for some time....anyways not to go off on a tangent.

    I watched all the 80's programs but really only liked MOTU and TF's, so my wishes weren't grand but I only got a few from my parents and only on B-days and Christmas I think 5 in total over the course of 5 yrs, they weren't so much interested in what I liked, they just bought toys to keep me occupied..it's sad really. Many a time I heard the "you can get that when your older and working and have your own money", so I started working as young as I could and then bought them with that and saving allowances. I think I maybe had 15-20 total over that period, but those around me had tons and didn't have to work (I wasn't old enough to have a "job" job I was a kid under 10 during the era). I too could never figure out how kids could just smash things. I cherished the figures I had...and then the irony was my parents made me give them all away even though I bought most of them...it was awful, because the family I gave them to had no reference to the toys so I knew they were going to be destroyed within days, only one made it into my collection today. I even bought a few G2's when they came out, as I missed my originals...eventually started collecting again when I got that "adult money"!! LOL

    Did it influence my collecting habits...sure to a degree, but I was always so careful with my possessions because I knew they would never be replaced unless I did it, so I think it affected my discipline and sense of value more. I don't buy excessively, but I did want to see if I could complete G1 in some form and so that's what I'm working towards .
     
  2. LightningBlade3

    LightningBlade3 Destined to be a Prime

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    I was allowed one or two new figures a month growing up. As a result, I have plenty of Unicron Trilogy figures.
     
  3. NemiMonkey

    NemiMonkey Whippin Dem Fungals

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    Probably say average. Which surprises me since we didn't really have a ton of money when my sister and I were growing up. So if it was a big figure like G2 Op, I usually got it for my birthday or Christmas.

    That sort of had an effect on my collecting as an adult. I'm really particular with figures I get. If I don't really want it odds are I don't end up buying it. Although on the other hand having the freedom to get figures myself often ends with me binge spending.
     
  4. Pride21

    Pride21 Honor Wisdom Virtue

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    Very spoiled.

    Especially around Christmas.

    Still have most of my Beast Wars figures.

    Even went to a collector store in Rhode Island.

    Picked up a number of G1 and G2 figures:

    1984 Bumblebee
    1984 Gears
    1984 Megatron
    1984 Optimus Prime
    1984 Soundwave with Laserbeak and Ravage
    1984 Starscream
    1984 Wheeljack
    1985 Defensor
    1985 Grimlock
    1985 Shockwave
    1985 Sludge
    1985 Snarl
    1985 Swoop
    1986 Galvatron
    1986 Hot Rod
    1986 Rodimus Prime
    1988 Powermaster Optimus Prime
    1989 Pretender Bumblebee
    1990 Action Master Bumblebee
    1990 Action Master Megatron
    1990 Action Master Optimus Prime
    1990 Action Master Shockwave
    1993 Jazz
    1993 Megatron
    1995 Laser Optimus Prime
     
  5. Sy-Rein

    Sy-Rein Rogue Stunticon

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    I would say that I was spoiled but not excessively so. I think I was lucky to have what I had as a kid. My parents weren't poor but weren't anything resembling rich either. I'd get TFs or other toys for B-days, Christmas and usually if I did well at school, I'd get something at the end of the school year. Otherwise my parents might pick up a toy for me at random times throughout the year.

    By the time I got out of toys, I certainly had a moderate collection including TFs, GIJoe, MASK and He-Man (although I did buy a lot of the Joe figures myself in the later years). My brother and I had some Star Wars stuff but that was given to a cousin who promptly destroyed it all. I guess I was lucky, my brother and I were taught to take care of our stuff, appreciate what we had so everything I had left from a kid (other than the SW stuff as above and the He-Man stuff I sold a number of years ago) is still with me.
     
  6. Matrix1981

    Matrix1981 It's Hot Rod's fault...

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    I had a fair collection. My family knew what I liked as a kid so for birthdays and christmas I got a bunch. That said I never had any complete combiners, no groups complete, not even an G1 Optimus.

    I feel it that my childhood influenced my collecting in that I still like my toys. I still don't have a proper G1 Optimus (YOTH Prime here) lol.
     
  7. ssjkazer

    ssjkazer mr dyslexia

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    I had a hard time getting tfs school fairs where the best for getting them how this changed how I collect today I hate missing out I work out strategies just for collecting which im almost done
     
  8. AnonymousDwell

    AnonymousDwell Well-Known Member

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    We grew up pretty poor. (Think, having to eat at soup kitchens, in and out of homeless shelters.) My parents did an in retrospect amazing job of filling my childhood world with a sense of magic and wonder with very little money. We did have rabbit ears and a crappy TV though, so I grew up watching and loving the cartoon. And at Christmas I would ALWAYS get at least one robot, somehow.

    The best year ever was when I asked Santa (whom I believed in fervently lol) for Powermaster Optimus Prime, and the YMCA toy give away actually gave me one! This persuaded my young mind that both Santa and Christmas miracles were real for sure lol.

    I'd say the influence it had on my collecting is, I have a limited list of "must have" characters to feel satisfied, and many of them (Skullcruncher, Powermaster Optimus Prime, Skyhammer, Kup) are more because of associations with those Christmasses and fond memories of my parents than anything else.
     
  9. DOTM Bumblebee

    DOTM Bumblebee Funny Little Man

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    I rarely had more than ten at a time until the past few years, because they kept getting broken, and I wasn't exactly born into a rich family. Luckily, I have managed to amass a respectable collection, with quite a few customs. I'm in that "I have a job, I can buy so many TFs!" phase right now. I'm planning on trying to slow down, but with so many good figures coming out in the next Generations line, and so many figures from Combiner Wars, Prime, and RID still out there that I want to get, I'm worried I might not be able to.
     
  10. transmasterc

    transmasterc Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, I wasn't spoiled at all and that's not a bad thing. I was not born into a rich family but I had a good up bringing. Though my 2 sets of Grandparents did give me a few Transformers. God rest their souls. Back in the day my mom's parents got me Soundwave and Sunstreaker. I had these:

    Soundwave
    Sunstreaker
    Prowl
    Warpath
    Powerglide
    Slingshot
    Swindle
    Blast off
    Chromedome
    Brainstorm
    Runamuch
    topspin



    Mostly I was into GI joe. A kid I went to school with had a ton of stuff. I was not spoiled at all. I know if there was something I wanted I had to work for it or want until my Birthday or Christmas.
     
  11. Grimwing

    Grimwing Scientist Supreme

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    I only had a few. But that made it a shorter list to get clean new copies of my childhood tfs.

    G2 Megatron (electronic)
    Powermaster Darkwing
    G2 Ramjet
    G2 Scrapper

    Powermaster Optimus Prime
    Autobot Military micromaster patrol: Flak, Sunrunner, Sidetrack, & Big Shot
    Action Master Mainframe & Push Button
    Sparkabot Sizzle
    Rotor Force G2 Manta Ray
    Pretender Bumblebee (the later carded version without the shell)

    They probably effected my collecting. In valueing small figures, and playsets for them. As well as perhaps being more aware of obscure characters once I entered the fandom and finding that to be important a aspect to preserve as hidden gems.
     
  12. bobbyjack

    bobbyjack Well-Known Member

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    I was an only child, so I pretty much had most of the old Kenner Star Wars stuff released from 1979-83, G.I. Joe from 1982-86, and Transformers from 1984-86. I was in my early 30's and was making a decent living when my son first started showing interest in Transformers. We pretty much have all the decent stuff from the movies, Classics, and Prime that has been released since 2006. Our Transformers collection is about 4 times the size as the one I had as kid. The big difference is I'm way more into this than my Dad ever was 30 years ago. He is amazed at the size of our collection when he comes to visit.
     
  13. battery1979

    battery1979 Combiner

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    I wasn't spoiled on transformers as a kid at all, but now that I'm an adult I'm working on getting all the transformers I wanted as a kid that I never got.
     
  14. Windsweeper II

    Windsweeper II Banned

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    Not a fan of the term 'spoiled' because it's mostly used by actually spoiled people to guilttrip those less fortunate for the possesion of a few material objects, but i'll vote average :) 

    When i first got into TF's i was a dinosaurgeek so i loved Grimlock, never got him though but i didn't really mind.
    My first Transformer was Deluxe Insecticon Barrage who i loved.
    Between me an my brother we ended up with Barrage, Air Raid, First Aid, Sureshot and Spoilsport, Mindwipe and Vorath, Flamefeather, Snaptrap, Doubledealer with Skar and Knok, Skullgrin, Bludgeon, Thunderwing, and the Micromaster Off Road Patrol and Skyhopper with Helicopter.
    How it affected my collecting as an adult ?
    Well, we didn't have any of the famous guys (and we never read any of the Furman comics so didn't know about Bludgeon and Thunderwing)
    But we loved the toys we had and appreciated their uniqueness.
    In hindsight the toys we had where among the best in terms of playability and i still appreciate unique designs and don't care a jot about wether a character appeared in fiction and what it did there.
     
  15. chucksbikeorama

    chucksbikeorama Decepticreep

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    Wow, homeless as a kid, that must have been rough dude, my sympathies!

    And I so agree about the original COTT film, all those figurines were so fascinating (still are!)
     
  16. chucksbikeorama

    chucksbikeorama Decepticreep

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    + this ↑

    Crikey, I'm humbled!

    Just goes to show though, good parenting producing well-rounded kids / adults isn't remotely dependent on money (not that I'm saying it's inversely proportional) :thumb 
     
  17. Psychoshi

    Psychoshi Grammaton Cleric

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    Reading this thread has made me more determined than ever to donate a lot for the Toys for Tots charity.

    And I envy those of you with kids that you can bond with over transformers. I can tell you one thing. If I ever have kids, I'll never force them to give the toys away. Maybe try to convince them to willingly donate some of their least-favorite ones to charity, to teach them some compassion.
     
  18. razingstorm

    razingstorm Well-Known Member

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    My mom didn't like the idea of warring robots, so I only got Transformers when my grandparents visited. We were fairly poor, trailer park folks. As a result I overbuy, and overbuy for my oldest son. He even has his own Detolf for his CW stuff, and the Masterpieces I've bought and thought better of (YOTH Prime, YOTG Soundwave, OS Grimlock).

    I've definitely built up some debt power-collecting, but I figure I'm still young enough to make the money to compensate barring tragedy. Probably not good for my son to get nearly every TF he wants, but I'm a hardass on him about plenty of other things.
     
  19. Ronbot1986

    Ronbot1986 none

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    My Mom worksd in Child World! She says NOW if I only knew what 30yrs would do price wise! I didn't get the TF JetFire the Joes. Inhumanoids that's what I wanted. But it is all still possible to get. Yeah I got the Go-bots back. It does play into my collecting. Why? Memorys and the story's to share. And that's what matters!
     
  20. Smashs

    Smashs Internet: Pure Truth Moderator

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    I was pretty damn spoiled as a kid, but never had many TF's. Who I remember having was Optimus, Bee, Skylynx, Slag, Sludge, Snarl, Skullgrin, Chromedome, and Mindwipe. Even that is probably a dream come true for many kids.

    I'm exceedingly fond of those figures, and Hope to get MP level versions of them all some day. Optimus and Bee are covered, but I need to get around to finding the FT D-bots. Planning on grabbing Cupola pretty soon, too.