This is about toylines that are mostly forgotten nowadays, pieces of nostalgia your friends probably don't even know existed. For me, that was the Z-Bots. Z-Bots were a line of Micro Machines toys. They had everything you'd expect from an 80's/early 90's boy's toyline - good vs evil factions, bright colors, playsets... Sadly, the toyline is fairly obscure since it never got a cartoon for some baffling reason. I mean, they had every reason to make one - you had the heroic Z-Bots (Designed to Defend!) against the evil Voids (Made to Menace!) who were turned bad by a computer virus. There were even combining toys in the line, where three Z-Bots/Voids would combine into either a bigger robot or a vehicle of some sort, and there were also individual Z-Bots who had the ability to transform into futuristic "vehicles." There was also a Burger King promotion, where these guys came from. Upper left is Skyviper (Void), upper middle is Turbine (Z-Bot), upper right is Jawbreaker (Void), bottom left is Buzzsaw (Z-Bot) and bottom right is Bugeye (Z-Bot). I have really fond memories of these guys that only just recently resurfaced. I got the five Burger King Z-Bots off of eBay a few days ago so I can have a sorta "complete" collection without hunting down others on eBay... For now, at least. So yeah. Anyone want to share forgotten toylines from their childhood?
I still have a bunch of Z-bots sitting around somewhere. There were also half-size mini Z-bots that came with vehicles and playsets. I had a lot of Starcom stuff around 1988- all gone now except for one pistol I gave to my last surviving Battle Beast. This is as good a place as any to ask: I remember having a booklet for a line of transforming robot/vehicles circa 1985 that were neither Transformers nor Gobots. There was a Formula 1-type car named "Indy" and I think a van named "Truc". I've never been able to find anything on it.
Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors. Gads I loved that line. The show was fun, and the toys were awesome. I only had four of them, but the playability was through the roof. Godzilla Gang. Harder vinyl figures about 6-7 inches tall that included a bunch of non-standard beasties like what may be on Monster Island. I still have a few, but somehow lost Godzilla. I'm still bummed about that to this day.
Flying Fighters - a line of military aircraft with detachable, electronic joysticks. Came with 2.5" pilot figures. Loved this toyline. Nothing like it since, unfortunately. Didn't last long. There were 3 retooled Flying Fighters F-14 Tomcats sold at KB Toys in the early 90's. Navy(blue), Marines(green camo) and Air Force(white). The mold was retooled with lights in the front to resemble guns. I wasn't sure if these were bootlegs or made exclusively for KB Toys by Hasbro. Not sure if they were sold under the Flying Fighters brand but I don't think they were. Quality was about the same.
Shogun Cyber Warriors. They looked like Bandai's earlier Power Rangers style action figures with chrome plated peg-on armor made by Trendmasters in their heyday. It never got past the four characters and they never released the 'evil alien warlord' the line was supposed to have.
Were they? There was a sub-line called Mini-Zs which were certainly closer to Micro Machines in scale, so I'd imagine Galoob used the MM name for those. I still have the two largest vehicles they made for that line. Hard to say what my favourite obscure childhood toyline would be, but Computer Warriors is probably one of them. I also owned several figures from Kenner's Police Academy toyline.
If you say so. I actually did have one full-sized Z-bots you - a yellow spherical tank thing and it's pilot - but I have NO idea what the hell happened to it. It surprises me that the mini-z's all survived to this day. In fact, that's pretty much the fate of all my toys - apart from the few that broke, they either survived or just flat out freakin' disappeared. I had this big-ass jet thing from New Adventures of He-Man a swell that had like a targeting scope/periscope thing built into it, but since I had no figures from that line I just crammed the cockpit full of other toys...no idea what happened to it.
I was a fan of Shogun Warriors and Micronauts in the 1970, but I'm probably one of the older people on this board.
That military equipment line that transformed into little battle bases. I remember one being a water canteen.
