this post was submitted on 22 May 2025
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Nothing I had as a kid ran on batteries. It was all springs.
You think I'm doing the "riding dinosaurs" spiel, but I'm not that old. And, yes, there were things that had batteries, but not most kid toys. I had a 3' tall battle robot from some TV show, pre-transformers, that shot hard little plastic missiles from one fist, and the entire other fist could be spring-launched hard enough to bruise a younger sister's forehead. Not that I'd ever have done such a thing. I had an Eagle lander from Space 1999 with detachable cockpit, which also must have been 3 or 4' long. I had fucking lawn darts, perhaps the most incredible and incredibly dangerous weapon sold as a toy, which we would try to launch over the house into a yard we couldn't see, and compete for who could get their's stuck most deeply in the earth. When I was 6, I had a full-on pump-action BB gun capable of putting holes in thin plywood.
We didn't have a lot of batteries, but we also had almost no regulation in the toy industry, and it's honestly surprising to me today that so few of the neighborhood ended up in the hospital from just the toys.
Shogun Warriors:
Damn. That's them. Did you have one? Which part did you lose first? I think the missiles were the first to go; they may not have survived the holiday season. Then I lost the hand. I'm pretty sure mine had switchblade wings and maybe a switchblade sword, too, although I'm not sure about that.
I was 7 or 8, and not great at keeping track of small parts and these things disassembled quite a lot.
But what I really miss is that Eagle Lander. I'd pay good money to find one in good condition; they were the coolest things flying, at the time.
I only had 2 of the big ones, but they came in different sizes, and I still have all the small ones.
Little axes and things always got lost, then people would steal them out of the boxes on store shelves, so if you were looking for a new one you always had to verify all the parts were there. :(
I got one big one and the Lander the same Christmas; we weren't well-off, and that was an extravagant Christmas, the best I'd ever had, haul-wise.
It was the year before my parents divorced, and that probably had something to do with the largess.
We couldn't afford the one I really wanted. Combatra! It split up into 5 different vehicles(!)
https://www.shogunwarriors.org/p/mattel-combatra.html?m=1
I remember that!
They look way less detailed and fabulous than I remember; that's imagination for you. I just remember them being nearly as tall as I was, and it was glorious.