Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Coleco New Dimensions '78 (PART ONE)
While on the theme of spacey stuff, ie: rockets and UFOs (and science), I thought I'd share a few truly out of this world items from Coleco's "New Dimensions" 1978 sales guide. These were fun sci-fi-esque toys and games for the home, a few featured with a scaled down arcade play style design like mini pinball machines and shooting galleries, others in the more simplistic, electronic, hand-held style typical of the late 70's. I'll have lots more from this guide in the next post too-- and for anyone curious about the TV Block Buster screen captures on some of these pages, apparently 1978 was the biggest budget year for Coleco in promoting their products on television! If you find any of these on youtube somewhere, please put the link in the comments-- thanks!
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8 comments:
Also, if you find these toy sales guides interesting, I have a few more featured in the AEET Archives, here:
http://andeverythingelsetoo.blogspot.com/2010/12/excerpts-from-70s-christmas-list.html
and The Haunted Mansion board game spotlighted HERE:
http://andeverythingelsetoo.blogspot.com/2010/12/haunted-mansion-board-game.html
Toy guides are always great!
I've got a couple dozen of the things, might get around to sticking them up for all to see eventually.
Meanwhile... How amazing would it've been to open that UFO Pinball table on Xmas morning in 1978???
those little tv film strip things are cool.
i had a merlin and some of those manual hand held games but that was about it.
Two Headed: I remember these pinball machines, they were REAL flimsy but still fun-- for a little while anyway.
Carol: I had the handheld Mattel Football and Basketball games, I played them for years even though they were very limited in the graphics department. Possibly that level of simplicity is what made them so engaging!
>those little tv film strip things are cool.
Yes... I really really REALLY must see the commercial for DIGITS-- those bored, yawning actresses are surely ready for a dose of pulse-pounding DIGIT action!
"How amazing would it've been to open that UFO Pinball table on Xmas morning in 1978?"
Pretty sure I would have already been too tall for it in seventy-eight. If the whole thing is just over three feet at the back, then the flippers were probably just about two feet off the floor. The average height of a six year old is over forty-one inches (boy or girl), which means that by seven they'd have to stoop a little to play. The models in those ads must be munchkins.
I had one of those Coleco pinball machines! Can't find the ad for the ones seen in this catalog, but here's a few from '77...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wED99rJblc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddLZwrqMaVE
Typical operation (this takes me back)...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vflqoHI6TQk
Of course if you had the money to blow for a "real" pinball machine, there was always this which I'm sure got sold out of catalogs like Sears...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6Ju-Ddfahs
Cool, thanks Chris!!
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