@aceofknaves That's funny, Snake Eyes and Zartan (along with the Cobra Trooper) were the only GI Joes I had for a long time, until I think the wave with Alpine, Airtight, and the Snow Serpent.

@docsilence Yeah, I still have a soft spot for MASK, Dinoriders, and Visionaries too. If hasbro did a 6 inch series of Visionaries, I'd be in trouble. But the ones you named were the main ones where I tried to get as many as I could.

It's funny to think back when my mother surprised me with every figure (none of the accessories or vehicles) from series 1 and 1.5 except Cobra Commander.  I was like, who are these guys?  None of my friends knew of them either and I didn't appreciate what she did, so I left them in the packages in some hidden spot in my room for what seemed like a year until the 1st mini-series came out--then I finally cracked them open.  Of course, now I almost wish I left them in the packaging.

Not sure why she bought me so many at once, I don't remember it being a birthday or holiday (though, it must have been since I never got more than 2 or 3 figures even for holidays) and she must have found them on sale.  I get so mad at my younger self when I think of how she must have felt when I more or less threw them aside.  And no, I wasn't normally a spoiled brat--this was just a weak moment.

Ah, childhood guilt!  Love you, Mom!  😘 

I never had Snake Eyes growing up. He was as elusive as he was popular, even back then. I did have a few cool figures that only came into my possession as hand-me-downs, like Stormshadow and Zartan. Never had Baroness or Destro or Duke. '85 was the year I started, so that whole wave are the characters I connect with the most. The cartoon also strongly influenced who I bought. So Flint was my leader. Lady Jaye completed the power couple. I loved the buddy relationships like Bazooka and Alpine. I had the Crimson Twins, but I took them and Lady Jaye and Leatherneck with me to the Philippines, and my mom made me give them to my cousin who I'm sure just trashed them. I had to mail away for some figures, notably hooded Cobra Commander, Major Bludd, and Starduster.  I jumped ship just after Cobra-La, with a single figure from the following wave, Spearhead (and Max). That was around 1988, when my interests shifted focus to Transformers.

the old cartoon block of g i joe, transformers, he man, etc. sit down in front of the tv for 2-3 hours and be mesmerized.

@mrboshek That is kind of funny as it goes back to the posts earlier about needing "readers" bifocals, etc.   I guess we are all starting to experience what those older guys went through back then.   I definitely don't have the same appreciation for smaller scale stuff like I used to.

Posted by: @docsilence

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Yeah, that mid- to late 70s age range is the sweet spot for action figures, isn't it. My earliest memories are Star Wars, He-Man, and GI Joe. Add in some Secret Wars Marvel figures and Super Powers DC figures, a few bizarre, pure-'80s cartoons, and boom. My entire childhood. 

I think we were the start of the wave for action figures as we know them now.   

I see the "younger" guys online who were born in the 80s and they have a love for 80s action figures, but their deep love seems to start around TMNT and goes up from there (PR and other early 90s toys).

@detectivehoag Too true, nothing beats 69......... 🤤

‘73 for me too.

I can’t remember when I bought GI Joe first but my friend a couple doors down got everything. While his single mom was always in the office, her guilt bought that only kid everything. 

So Star Wars, Hot Wheels, Joes…he had it all. We had fun times with those at his grandmother’s house. Good times. She had a massive covered porch. Fun.

my earliest Joe toy memories were buying figs at K-Mart and Toys R Us. I remember having Stalker and Destro. Later Spirit and Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes. Mutt, Zartan, Roadblock, Beachhead, Firefly, So on. It may have been late 83 or early 84 when I was buying Joes. I remember moving from RoTJ figs to Joes.

Thwipp!

'75 child here, so I was the right age for SW ESB when it released. The figures and vehicles were a big hit with my brother and I.

As for toys, I had MEGO (superheroes and all other manner of licenses I was into like C.H.I.P.S), I had Joes, Super Powers (I remember picking out Batman at a Kmart back in the day). I had the 2 different A-Team lines, Dukes of Hazard, C.H.I.P.S in the smaller scale as well, the Magnum P.I car, D&D, RGB (as well as the other 80s staples) and more than I can recall the names of. Pixel Dan's toy hunt videos are always a session of me exclaiming "I had that" or "I remember that".  Having such a wide range of lines meant we mixed them during play, which likely explains why I like having mixed displays now. The Joes called in the Duke boys or the A-Team when they needed a specific set of skills they couldn't find it among the crew. Likewise, Cobra managed to find a way to recruit Warduke and others in an effort to fluster the Joes and actually succeed for once.

The thing about GI Joe ARAH with my friends and I was the first series came out and they were kind of neat. I think I had Snake Eyes, Breaker and the RAM, but for the most part we weren't that into them at first, Star Wars still had us in its grip and they seemed to be a bunch of Army men who looked relatively the same, for the most part. 

It was when series two came rolling along that the line really got our attention. A few of us were picking up the comic book at that point, too. I think it was Airborne, Snow Job, Doc and Gung-Ho that were released first earlier in the year and then Destro, Torpedo and the rest started showed up during the summer. And there was the newer vehicles like the Polar Bear, Hiss and the Dragonfly, too. Much better than laser cannons and missile launchers.

I remember my brother and I grabbed Airborne and Doc respectively the first time we saw series two and they seemed so much better than what had come before. (The new swivel-arm battle grip didn't hurt!) 

Series two had so much more personality than most of the first series. By series three we were fanatics. 

Of course there were also three brothers down the street from me that in the very early days of ARAH went to the store with money they'd saved to buy an Atari 2600 and instead came home with the complete set of series 1 figures and a bunch of the vehicles. That was commitment right out of the gate.

1980 here and my first love was MOTU (with a bit of POP, Toxic Crusaders, and Thundercats mixed in) but that soon got replaced by TMNT which then got replaced by Marvel figures and comics.  The first wave of Toybiz X-Men in 1991 I think, was the last group of figures I owned until I got back into the hobby as an adult.

I never owned any GI Joe, Star Wars, or Transformers.  I was a big fan of the GI Joe cartoon though but never watched Transformers and didn't see my first Star Wars movie until I was well past 30.

Now that I’m an old man and looking back on it, it wasn’t just the toy lines in the 80s and onward for me. It was also the places I found them at that are long gone, at least in my area. Toys R Us was there but also the toyland store inside the Navy base my late father would take the family to for groceries. Then other place like Best, Montgomery Wards, Zodys, Kmart, Newberry, Woolworths, Service Merchandise, etc. There was always a ton of places to go to on a bike to find cool toys. Heck, I even found some toys I was looking for at Longs Drugs and Mervyns. 

@leor drug stores were a gold mine for toys back then, but definitely always more expensive.  I had to leave more than my share of wanted toys on the pegs there because my mother told me we'd find them for cheaper at Walmart later.  Famously this is why I never owned a single Thundercat good guy aside from Lion-O.

@justice Yup. I found my RAH Zartan at Longs Drugs. Found some MASK, Starriors, Centurions, Sky Commanders, etc. at various other drug stores but they were definitely more expensive. By about 5 to 10 bucks more from TRU prices in my area if I remember right. Being young and trying to get by on a weekly allowance was tough if one was a toy collector. It was hard collecting Joes because there was other cool toys to get into during that time as well. There were many times at the stores where I had to put down certain Joes I wanted like Doc or Snow Job because I already spent my allowance on a Transfomer or something.

@ru1977 Those three lines I would spend SO much money on if Hasbro made them at 1/12 scale. I'm actually afraid of how much they'd get me for with Dino-Riders, MASK, or Visionaries. 

The thing I love the most about Classified is that it's letting me get really great versions of characters I lost or never had. Stalker, V1 and 2 Snake Eyes, Scarlett, classic CC... lots of characters I either never had or lost in play and never saw again. 

@mrboshek - the fading visions and mini painting is a weird one for me... I'm actually able to abuse my EXTREME nearsightedness to still paint minis, but that means I can only paint when I've given up seeing at a distance for the day and dumped my contacts and such. I joke that everything I paint look amazing the next day cos I can't see the flaws I painted the night before.