5 ms·

Lots of great 70s and 80s toys that are still around are terrible. Super soaker? A joke, premium prices and way worse than squirt guns 1/4 the price, which are

Lots of great 70s and 80s toys that are still around are terrible. Super soaker? A joke, premium prices and way worse than squirt guns 1/4 the price, which are themselves not as good as early Super Soakers. Tank's not even removable which means it's basically not even the same sort of product at all—I'm sure the gaskets added too much to the production cost. Loopin' Louie? Motor's too weak, and it's lighter, so it doesn't work as well. They even managed to make Hungry Hungry Hippos suck. Rock 'em Sock 'em? Really bad compared to the original (you can find the original at flea markets sometimes—it's so much better, this isn't just nostalgia). The usual approach seems to be to cut vital features, shrink everything 10-30% (it's sometimes hard to tell if you don't have the original to compare it to, but it's really obvious when you do), and make all the plastic paper thin. I think it's part of most things that aren't computers getting worse over the last few decades. Shit would be double the price if they still "made it like they used to". Even fast-food pizza—Pizza Hut's in fact way worse than it was even in the mid 90s (they've had at least two major reformulations of the sauce, for one thing, getting worse each time), but if you find a different pizza place that makes pizza around 90s PH quality it'll be 50+% more expensive. But yeah, inflation's only low-single-digits percent a year. LOL sure.

mustacheemperor 5y ago
From what I can tell pump to charge water guns like the original super soaker simply don’t exist anymore, only pump to fire. I think you’re right that the gaskets/hardware necessary for the pressure tank add a lot of cost, and I wonder if there’s a liability factor as well. Nothing you can buy today can fire with nearly the same power as a super soaker since there’s no charged pressure tank. I had kind of assumed there’d be some small brand selling “classic” water gun designs but a quick google looks like most people only recommend vintage.
underwater 5y ago
Our kids were gifted "Guess Who" (a game which is problematic in a whole host of other ways). I was shocked that it was thin plastic and cardboard. The while thing felt disposable. I feel that this must be a strategy used on toys that were previously popular. They're not going to return to being the popular must-have item that people will pay a premium for, but there is residual value in the marketing campaign from the 80s. So the toy companies push the build quality as low as they can and milk the last good will from the brand by making it a cheap impulse purchase. To your larger point, there are still high quality toys around. You just avoid the big Toys R Us style stores and go to an independent or smaller toy story. Plan Toys and Green Toys stick out to me as two brands which felt consistently high quality and were widely available.
quesera 5y ago
> But yeah, inflation's only low-single-digits percent a year. LOL sure. Compounded inflation/interest is pretty powerful. 2% compounded over 25 years (to mark your "mid-90s" reference) would be a 64% increase, which lines up with your 50+% pretty directly. Agreed that Pizza Hut sucks now. I sometimes wonder which has changed -- the me, or the thing. Good to know that at least with Pizza Hut, it's not all in my head. My personal pet peeve is the plastic playing pieces of board games. Formerly well-weighted and painted, now thin cheap and with a bad sticker. How much can plastic playing pieces actually cost? I wonder if Monopoly still ships with cast metal pieces...

mustacheemperor 5y ago

From what I can tell pump to charge water guns like the original super soaker simply don’t exist anymore, only pump to fire. I think you’re right that the gaskets/hardware necessary for the pressure tank add a lot of cost, and I wonder if there’s a liability factor as well. Nothing you can buy today can fire with nearly the same power as a super soaker since there’s no charged pressure tank. I had kind of assumed there’d be some small brand selling “classic” water gun designs but a quick google looks like most people only recommend vintage.

underwater 5y ago

Our kids were gifted "Guess Who" (a game which is problematic in a whole host of other ways). I was shocked that it was thin plastic and cardboard. The while thing felt disposable. I feel that this must be a strategy used on toys that were previously popular. They're not going to return to being the popular must-have item that people will pay a premium for, but there is residual value in the marketing campaign from the 80s. So the toy companies push the build quality as low as they can and milk the last good will from the brand by making it a cheap impulse purchase. To your larger point, there are still high quality toys around. You just avoid the big Toys R Us style stores and go to an independent or smaller toy story. Plan Toys and Green Toys stick out to me as two brands which felt consistently high quality and were widely available.

quesera 5y ago

> But yeah, inflation's only low-single-digits percent a year. LOL sure. Compounded inflation/interest is pretty powerful. 2% compounded over 25 years (to mark your "mid-90s" reference) would be a 64% increase, which lines up with your 50+% pretty directly. Agreed that Pizza Hut sucks now. I sometimes wonder which has changed -- the me, or the thing. Good to know that at least with Pizza Hut, it's not all in my head. My personal pet peeve is the plastic playing pieces of board games. Formerly well-weighted and painted, now thin cheap and with a bad sticker. How much can plastic playing pieces actually cost? I wonder if Monopoly still ships with cast metal pieces...