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The Last Con Of The Year

Sunday, November 9th, 2014

I went to the local comic con today. I’ve been going for years and it gets bigger and better every time.

As you can see turnout was high. A bit too high perhaps, since it’s clear they’ve outgrown their venue. I got there at opening, and within half an hour it was difficult to walk around.

Here’s some highlights of what I saw for sale:

This is a 30+ year old electronic board game that we actually own (in the box, no less). This one – at $100 – no longer works. He said since ours does it was worth 2 or 3 times that amount!

One guy had a booth full of this stuff. Apparently it was yet another 80’s (failed) toy line that spawned an animation, much like Transformers or Masters of The Universe. I’d never heard of it, and was amazed by how much he had at a local con 🙂

Even with the cigarette burn on the plastic bubble, this was easily the best condition D&D figure I’ve ever seen. Not close to worth $80 though! I’d have paid a tenner maybe…

I had a set like this once, but I can’t remember the film. Planet Of The Apes maybe? Anyway what a crap toy! Kids these days are spoiled…

I ended up spending quite a few dollars on a variety of things:
– several old packs of trading cards
– many comics (at $0.50 or less apiece)
– some Heavy Metal mags from 1980
– a Spelljammer rule book (which I may already own)
– a Playboy from ’86
– a TCG magazine from ’95
– two handmade stuffed animals (for KLS)
And a few Christmas gifts, mostly for my brother.

I also picked up the five new MTG: Commander decks which I didn’t even know about and apparently came out only two days ago:

All in all a fun con. I just hope they upgrade to a bigger venue next time!

Posted in Books & Comics, Toys | Comments Closed

At Last! The Annual List Of What My Brother Will Buy Me For Christmas!

Thursday, October 30th, 2014

The other week I got this text from a certain brother-of-mine:

I was astounded. In previous years I had produced such lists, but little did I know that they had worked their way into the tapestry of my brothers christmas-shopping life (so to speak).

He went on to say “money is no object“ and “the more obscure and difficult to find, the better“. Sadly I forgot to screenshot those bits.

So Bernard, as requested…

Books Category

The ZX Spectrum Book (Andrew Rollins)

A few years back Bernard got me ‘The Commodore 64 Book‘ which was just fab. I quickly snapped up the followup (‘The 8-bit Book‘) but have been tragically unable to acquire the first book from this small publisher. This is perhaps not surprising, since it was published over five years ago in small quantities and is long out of print. I don’t know exactly where he’s going to find it, but when I open this beauty on Christmas day I’ll be a happy reader indeed!

The World Of The Dark Crystal (Brian Froud)

Given there is now a sequel to the film coming, I believe Christmas 2014 would be the perfect time for my brother to put on his sleuth’s hat and solve an outstanding mystery. You see I don’t just want any copy of this book, I want my copy. Truth is, as a youngling sprout, I purchased myself a copy of this lovely tome from Angus & Robertson Charlestown Square. This would have been back in ’82, when the film came out. It was a mildly expensive book, and I had to utilize lay-by to get it! And oh how I loved it! It was one of my most treasured possessions, ‘my precious’ if you will. And then some soulless inhuman thief nicked it :<

As I hinted, the mystery of who stole my book is as yet unsolved. The only lead I’ve had these 32 long years is this photo taken by a security camera:

I’m hoping, in the spirit of Christmas, Bernard may finally discover the identity of the thief and return to me my beloved tome…

Trial Of Champions (Ian Livingstone)

Of course I own this book. Multiple copies in fact. But I don’t own the version shown, which is the US imprint. It was the last FF book released in the US during the initial series, and I have all the others. But not this one. And I have looked, oh how have I looked! The problem is sellers very, very rarely (ie. never) bother to specify the imprint when they sell this book online. And given there was probably 80 quadrillion copies of the UK version printed to every US copy, taking a chance is a fool’s errand. I consider myself one of the world’s foremost ‘online searchers for and buyers of’ gamebooks, and boast a bookshelf of more than four hundred. And yet I’ve never seen this one. I look forward to that changing this Christmas day.

DVD Section

It Couldn’t Happen Here (1988)

Otherwise known as ‘The Pet Shop Boys film’. I saw this a few years after it came out, probably at the Enmore theatre, probably with a lass named Caraid who I forget everything about except her unusual name. I think she looked like Karen Gillan though, and her mum gave me a beer once within 30 seconds of visiting her house. Weird. Anyway I want to see this film again, which means I want it on DVD. This is a tall order, since it’s never been released on DVD. Which limits my options to two: VHS or Laserdisc. The first option is of course absurd, but the second is a possibility since I own a working LD player. Maybe. So that’s the hard part out of the way, now all I need is the disc, in NTSC format of course. I’ve made your work easy Bernard 🙂

Adam Adamant Lives! (1966)

I’ve never seen this show since it never screen outside of England and I’m not an Englishman. Firstly, the BBC trashed a bunch of episodes so it doesn’t even exist in it’s entirety. Secondly, it’s never been released on anything outside of England. And lastly the DVD set (containing the 17 existing episodes) is long out of print. All these considerations aside, given that this show inspired Doctor Who and The Avengers (and some of Kim Newman’s characters) I obviously need to see it. And I shall, when Bernard gives me the Region 2 box set loaded with extras for Christmas.

Toy Section

Dark Horn ‘Harry Special’ (HM Zoid Kit)

There’s a lot of beautiful things in this world, and then there’s the limited ‘Harry Special’ variant HM Zoid Dark Horn kit. I mean look at that! Could there even exist a better looking model kit? Of course not, and I therefore must own it. Bernard will undoubtedly agree, and I’m just going to be ebullient when he gives it to me for Christm–

Oh to hell with it! This guy’s so pretty I just can’t goddamn wait until Christmas! Hang on a second, while I go buy it…

Ok, taken care of. It’s now mine, all mine. And in case you don’t believe me, let Emi prove it to you:

OMG the box is bigger than Emi! Sorry Bernard. Guess I ruined that as a potential gift 😉

L.E.D. Mirage V3: Inferno Napalm (FSS 1:100 kit)

If I ever met anyone that claimed that any other kit was better looking than this, I’d start by punching them, and I’d end by never being their friend. We all know that Five Star Stories mech’s are stupidly pretty and the jewel-in-the-crown of FSS model kits is unquestionably this one. Sure it costs more than almost every piece of furniture in my house, is supposedly extremely difficult to assemble and when you do takes hundreds of hours, but gosh it’s pretty. Even prettier, I suspect, than Caraid, the girl I saw a movie with 25 years ago and have forgotten about. Oh and Bernard, when you budget for this guy, be sure to add on another $50 or so for the sizeable cost of shipping the collossal box all the way across the USA 😉

Game Section

The Sacred Armor of Antiriad (C64, 1986)

I’m a canny beast. Much like Steven Moffat (aka. the favourite scribe of my illustrious friend Adam ‘The Bold’ W), I like winding secrets into the story of my life. I bet none of you knew back when I penned this that I was in fact laying the groundwork for this very post? That blink-and-you’ll-miss-it reference to this game was none other than a deliberate mention to plant the thought into my brother’s mind that “Hey, that’d be a good gift to get him for Christmas!” This game was never that great, but it has a lot of nostalgia factor, and I’d like to give it a whirl again one day. Now before you say it, I’ll quote my prestigious friend Florence ‘The Bear’ L: “Emulation, shmemulation!” She knows, as I do, that emulation is for fakers, and I must play the original C64 version. This introduces a… wrinkle into the equation though, for even if my bellowing brother Bernard ‘The Brave’ S gets me this game he’s going to have to get me something to play it on. It’s good thing therefore that this list also contains…

Commodore SX-64 (1984)

Let’s for a moment consider that there even exists a world in which my brother find a US version of one of these portable C64’s in working order and for sale. That alone would be surprising, given the fact they are 30 years old and contain circuitry that has almost certainly worn out after so long (not to mention the screens are infamous for burn-in). But if that happens, we must also consider the chance he would somehow manage to acquire it and not keep it for himself. I would imagine that chance to be miniscule, especially since in good working order this would cost more than that LED Mirage kit mentioned above. These reasons are why this would (no doubt) be a truly heartfelt and appreciated gift. Doubly so when he sends me hundreds of games with it 🙂

Gold Cliff (1988)

Last year I asked for the Zelda Game & Watch, but Santa ignored me. This year I’ll scale down my desire slightly to the even rarer penultimate dual-screen release: Gold Cliff. I saw one of these boxed, in Japan, for almost a thousand dollars. Naturally I’d want a boxed version, so it’s a good thing my brother made that quip about money not being a problem isn’t it? 😉

Miscellaneous Section

Now I’m no fool. I fully realize some of the above are hard to find. And therefore I’ll finish with a brief list of other items that would be wonderful to find under the tree. This list may not contain as much detail as the above, but I can’t do all the work for you now can I?

– t-shirts (large size, preferably with Ultraman on them)
– 4711 soap
– Any other FSS model kit
– A Stonehenge papercraft model kit
– “How to Master The Video Games” (sadly stolen in the same heist that nabbed the Dark Crystal book…)
– Any game & watch that isn’t ‘Turtle Bridge’, ‘Donkey Kong Jr’ or ‘Ball’
– trading cards, preferably sealed packs (of anything non-sport)
– Anything on old lists I don’t have yet (esp. the John Pertwee album of bawdy songs!)

And there we go! Happy hunting 🙂

Posted in Blog, Books & Comics, Family, Gamebooks, Games, Miscellaneous, Movies, MTG, Otaku, Tech, The Unknown, Time, Toys, TV | 2 Comments »

Day Four

Sunday, October 12th, 2014

Today was the final day of the con. We had about five hours to fill before we’d have to leave for our train. So fill them we did!

That’s my usual ’empty con floor shot taken before the doors open from the VIP room’. Twenty minutes later it would be hell 🙂

So as mentioned my #1 goal today was to get an autograph from esteemed thespian Patrick Stewart, arguably best-known for his performance of Gurney Halleck in Dune. I’d made all sorts of boastful claims to a certain person that I could get his autograph for them and by Jove I was going to get it!

Then he canceled yesterday. No worries, I said, there’s always tomorrow!

And then he canceled today as well…

To paraphrase KLS: “The only possible excuse for this sleight of his fans was if the next thing I read about him was his obituary! Either way, he’s dead to me!”

I hastily put ‘Plan B’ into action, and joined the line for an autograph from John de Lancie, arguably best known for his unforgettable portrayal of ‘Fish Halman’ in Crank 2. The certain person who shall remain nameless (cough, bear, cough) had recently waxed lyrical about the sensuality of de Lancie and I knew she needed his mark 🙂

At the risk of spoiling a gift, let’s end there for now…

Oh btw here’s a stealth shot I took while waiting (seemingly forever!) in line. I got neither of these guys autographs, but almost wish I had!

That’s Riker and Data, both in civilian attire. Riker was quite a fellow!

And what of the remainder of our final day at NYCC? Well we spent much of it shopping and looking at countless booths and just enjoying the spectacle of it all. Even though we’d spent dozens of hours already, the size of the con means there’s always something new to see!

Such as more retro toys:

More cosplayers:

Nifty Star Trek jewelry (the saucer section detaches!):

A comic vendor with a sense of humour:

Some nifty figure prototypes:

And even fine art:

As with all good things though the four days of madness had to eventually end and we waved goodbye once again.

After a quick lunch in a city deli…

…we were on our train back to Albany. Which is where I am right now as I type this.

Thanks for the fun NYCC; see you in 2015!

Posted in Art, Books & Comics, Miscellaneous, Otaku, Toys | 1 Comment »

(Even more) Comic Ads! (Plus a bonus quiz!)

Thursday, October 2nd, 2014

As often happens, I recently acquired 15 old comics from the early 1980s. They cost me only $3 in total, which is a hell of a deal for that much entertainment. I read them all. I laughed, I cheered and I wept. I won’t say what series they are from, since you’re going to guess that at the end of this post!

But first, since you love them, let’s get to the advertisements from days gone past.

The above is from 1983, and it shows a product I didn’t know existed. That was in my D&D/Gamebook heyday (actually, maybe those days are now) so I would have been all over this. I bet it looked dreadful unpainted though…

Here’s a truly awful video game ad from the same year:

Could that have really sold cartridges? I find it amusing today, since games have gotten so much easier than they once were and I imagine advertising the difficulty of your game now would be a certain way to ensure failure!

Speaking of games…

I’d love to see a word game based on Phoenix!

The above half-page ad skirts as close as possible to the Transformers appearances and trademarks without infringing. I wonder if the marketing department at Marvel had any qualms about running ads (seemingly) for bootleg merchandise?

What about ‘Spacetubes’??! Who even knew these things even had names? They are still available today, sold under all sorts of names (‘Wonder Wand’, ‘Glitter Rod’ etc.) but ‘Spacetube’ is coolest don’t you think?

Enough with the professional big-budget (?) ads. Let’s get to the weird stuff found in the classifieds. How’s this for a start:

As my only comment, I’ll direct you here.

Speaking of ads that would have appealed to 12-year-old me:

As an ex-professional breakdancer, I must admit that I didn’t even know half of the moves named in that advert even existed!

Now I’m no exobiologist, but I reckon that looks more like a helium balloon with some paper taped to it than an actual alien. I will admit though that the ‘obeys your commands’ line intrigues me. I suspect fishing line and a hook in the ceiling!

The tiny ads in these comics can be divided broadly into categories. The vast majority of them are for comic stores selling back issues, and then we have the ‘selling weird stuff’ ads, the ‘pyramid scheme’ ads (sell 20 boxes of cards and get free toys!) and the ‘selling a dream’ ads. All these next examples are from the last category…

The Dream: You buy the plans and end up with an awesome tree fort in your own backyard!
The Reality: You show the plans to your dad and he throws them away in terror.

The Dream: You become a poultry magnate, world-renowned for the quality of your guineas.
The Reality: Your dad takes you to KFC for dinner, and discards the brochure when you are asleep.

The Dream: You develop awesome powers to defend yourself against the dark arts.
The Reality: The only magic here was the speed at which you were conned.

The Dream: You get a girlfriend. Finally!
The Reality: Actually this one’s good. How could love advice obtained from a shady advert in a comic book possibly be bad?

So in what series did these ads run? Well I’m not going to tell you, but I’m going to give you the change to guess. The books span 3 years and are drawn by a range of artists. If I posted scans of the main character wearing his iconic outfit you’d know immediately what the comic was, so here’s three shots of him in civilian dress. From these, can you guess the series?

First to guess the series gets all fifteen books for Christmas 🙂

Posted in Art, Books & Comics, Otaku, Time, Toys | 3 Comments »

The Worst Sci-Fi Novel Ever Written?

Sunday, July 6th, 2014

Over the years I’ve enjoyed purchasing old science fiction novels as gifts for my brother. I tend to specialize in, shall we say, ‘awful’ books and always try to one-up myself.

Yesterday I was browsing a local store, and picked up this gem:

I bought it for a few reasons: the terrible name, the infringing cover (it’s not a Star Trek novel), and the ludicrous premise (Captain Bronet leads his crew on an expedition to an ‘evil planet’ called Galaxy 666. Yes that’s the name of the planet.) I thought to myself “This one looks memorable. My brother will love this one”…

And then I googled it.

Before I continue, read this. Also, feel free to google ‘Galaxy 666’ or ‘Pel Torro’ or ‘Lionel Fanthorpe’ and read one of the many other articles about this novel!

So it seems, entirely by luck, that yesterday I paid less than $2 for the worst novel ever written by the worst SF author of all time!

Bernard’s going to love it 🙂

Posted in Books & Comics, Miscellaneous | 1 Comment »