Surveying the Gen X landscape and the origins of geek
Gorgeous. And I like how Fisher-Price gets us to assemble our own toy—very Tom Sawyer. There were four Adventure Kits, three of which are seen on the back of the box. The fourth was the 4×4 Trail Boss. All of them are part of the superior Adventure People line.
(Images via The Shiplomats/eBay)
We didn’t have Child World in Southern California, but my mother did put lots of stuff on layaway. Try to explain that concept to Gen Y.
The Flying Finnegan game on the second page looks pretty sweet—for about five minutes.
Here’s a great view of the Cheerios box appearing in the ad, courtesy of Gregg Koenig.
These are all the TSR-produced commercials I’ve been able to find so far. They aired in (from top to bottom) 1982, 1983, 1983, 1984, and 1985. I’ve posted them before with the exception of the 1984 spot, which is very well done and advertises not only the red cover Basic Set (Frank Mentzer revision), but the Marvel Super Heroes and Adventures of Indiana Jones RPGs. The 1983 Star Frontiers commercial is my favorite.
Let me know if I missed any.
Because TSR wasn’t making enough money at the time—from $27 million in 1981-1982 to a projected $60 million in 1982-1983—the “products of your imagination” crew decided to lap up a license for the second most popular daytime soap. General Hospital, consistently first in the ratings, already had a game.
College girls (note the Yale flag in the dorm room) and yuppies are the clear marketing demographic.
“To be good, you’ve got to be bad.” Indeed. TSR had embraced the Reagan era. The shark had been jumped.
Zoom out and behold Cthulhu, perched on the dark seas of infinity, an icon of cosmic terror. Zoom in and read the iconic short story. Not too shabby.
The shirt is new from Litographs, a company that specializes in the art-out-of-text technique and offers some indelible designs, most of them subtle and poetic enough to impress the most discerning literature worshiper. The epiphanic A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man print, for instance, won’t make any sense unless you’ve read the book. (A quibble: James Joyce—the beloved artist-hero and champion of Ireland—is listed under British Lit!) And Poems by T.S. Eliot won’t give you a little chill unless you recall the immortal words of J. Alfred Prufrock—“I grow old … I grow old … I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.”
If t-shirts aren’t your thing, all of the designs are available as posters and tote bags as well, and here’s something else that caught my attention: Litographs is
committed to promoting literacy all over the world — to make a direct impact, we proudly partner with the International Book Bank to send one new, high-quality book to a community in need for each product we sell.
That’s not too shabby, either.
From now until next Tuesday, July 22, you can get $5 off the Call of Cthulhu t-shirt—and anything else you want to pick up—by using the code 2WARPS2NEPTUNE in the discounts field.
Artist and animator Benjy Brooke designed the Cthulhu print. Check out more of his work here.
The sign is cut off (and `Dungeons’ is misspelled!), but we’re looking at an AD&D club, hence all the core books and Tramp’s Dungeon Master’s Screen on proud display.
That’s got to be a homemade shirt in the middle, right? It’s not any TSR dragon that I’ve seen.
Our teacher rep, the only woman involved in the proceedings, seems quite happy to be there. I wonder what she thought at the time.
(Photo via Story Games forums)
From a 1985 The Day story on ‘aggressive fantasies’:
Sales of action figures and accessories brought more than $620 million last year… Toy gun sales accounted for $64 million…
`When I was young, it was army men and cowboys and Indians. I think the format for fantasies has changed,’ said John Pedesco, chief psychologist at the Child Guidance Center in Des Moines, Iowa. `It’s become more space and surrealistic, but the nature of the play has not changed…’
‘I think we have one of the more violent societies existing today,’ said Pedesco. ‘If we’re going to look at where it (aggressive play) comes from, it doesn’t happen in a vacuum.’
Wow. That’s one mean eraser.
The game was made in Italy and sold in select European markets, including the UK. The art, really nice, is original and uncredited.
O.G.
I don’t want to hear about how you were into Batman before anyone else because you saw short-ass Michael Keaton wearing a dark cape in a Jack Nicholson movie in the summer of ’89.
2 Warps to Neptune 