Consumer products so extremely expensive that almost no-one ever owned them

Over in the crimes of George Lucas thread,

the crimes of george lucas ('90s on)

we were talking about 80s toys like the USS Flagg:

http://www.timidfutures.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/gijoe-uss-flagg-aircraft-carrier.jpg

which made me ask, wd it be interesting to do a thread about items like this, which surely very few people could have afforded. I'm going to post some things to this thread which seem to fit the bill, but in the meantime, are there like cars, toys, fridges that were/are marketed that almost no-one can afford?

There's also something about the way the advert for the USS Flagg toy makes it look so natural that you would have this in your house as a kid and play with it.

I saw this thread title and immediately thought of the GI Joe aircraft carrier which was like this mystical catalog-only thing that neither I nor anyone I've known ever saw in real life.

$109.99 MSRP in 1985 dollars (around $245 today). I never saw one in stores.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noisembryo#Merzcar

http://www.thewire.co.uk/news/21538/the-residents-release_100_000-ultimate-box-set

A Neo Geo system? Shit was like $600 with carts being $100-$200 each?

Also, for some reason, I keep thinking of the Atari Jaguar in this category

http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090118041341/vgsales/images/thumb/7/7c/Launch_prices.png/1000px-Launch_prices.png

I had a friend who had either the Neo-Geo or the 3DO. I only went to his house once to play it, and the game he was playing was some quiz or game show formatted game that in no way justified the expensiveness of the system.

in elementary school, the 8th graders would host a fair to pay for their class trip or something. All the younger grades had to buy tickets and use them to play games in the gym. One year, a kid had a 3D0 and some tank game. That is the only time I ever saw a 3D0.

I don't think this guy is particularly tall, but wow, that is a big toy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qcxItH0r-Q

Yeah, I mentioned in the other thread that my local vintage toy store has one, and it takes up a LOT of floor space. You can see a portion of it behind the store owner here:

http://media.heightsobserver.org/images_web_res/663_76.jpg

http://2warpstoneptune.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/chrsitmas-morning-u-s-s-flagg.jpg

eBay has one that's listed as "90% complete" going for $399.99.

http://i.minus.com/ibiYKS.gif

The living room from 'Silver Spoons' seemed like the ultimate, come to thing of it:

http://coldslitherpodcast.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/seriessilver-spoons-1x01-pilot_04.jpg

when i was 9 my dad's co-worker left a 3DO in a free box outside his office door, so i had a 3DO. never had any games for it that weren't also in the free box, tho; the ones that mattered were star control 2 and alone in the dark. there was also some interplanetary off-road monster truck racing game whose only memorable feature was that the obligatory CD-ROM-flogging FMV cutscenes were mocked by MST3K-style silhouettes, which i found totally mystifying at the time: who are these people supposed to be and why are they talking over my shitty interstitial space opera? i think like a year later i finally discovered MST3K and honestly it did not make OFF-WORLD INTERCEPTOR seem less weird.

from $967.89 to an office free box, btw: the 3DO story

Star Control 2 & Alone in the Dark (the original with the pointy hands guy)
are all time a+ games

yup. and in sc2's case that was the ideal version, too, until the blessing that is the ur-quan masters.

I'm going to start that game over as soon as I get home. Maybe I can use the plotter at work to print the hyperspace map for reference.

bring back lots of minerals.

I saw this thread title and immediately thought of the GI Joe aircraft carrier which was like this mystical catalog-only thing that neither I nor anyone I've known ever saw in real life.

The one that looked like a cargo airship?

Same

Also the Lego pirate ship

The GI Joe Space Shuttle seemed cooler than the aircraft carrier. Also never saw one in person.

Oh dang. We bought the Lego Black Pearl. That thing stayed in its box for about a year and then got about 1/3 put together. They're going for over $200 sealed on ebay now.

There's a certain malaise to the USS Flagg, at least in that video: it is basically a lot of large flat pieces of plastic, held together so flimsily that it could not 'go' and so loses a lot of its 'shipness' (maybe). The real interest seems located in the superstructure where the figures the child is playing with/identifying with can act out stories. Everything else seems superfluous.

Also on malaise - I hated my friend for some time as a kid just because there was a rumour that they might be getting the Hornby Eurostar train set:

http://www.hornby.com/eurostar-train-set.html

Which when I look at it now is basically a very expensive grey box on wheels, very dull.

Other excessive childhood products seem kind of ... creamy, sickly, like when a certain friend of mine emails me pictures of his vast wargames miniatures armies. I haven't really interacted in the flesh with this friend for years - this is a very charming person, his sending me the emails with attached images is very genuine, but ...

I've never wanted to own a car - if you have, is it like this with cars? Houses?

I thought maybe you meant things like the carpet cleaners you rent from the grocery store. But yeah, those toys are def Silver Spoons material only. The rest of us just drooling over our Sears Wishbook '85s.

Yeah, I remember toy catalogue shopping as a kid - do many others? Were there some houses that banned catalogues, etc?

I wanted a Hornby train-set so badly when I was a kid, their adverts were always semi-explicit that they were mainly targeting adults who wanted train-sets as children but couldn't afford them, yes?

Triang train sets of the 1950s used to have a dotted line within the box marked 'Place for your second train' - and where's that advert for Mecanno from about then too, showing Brooklyn Bridge in full detail made of Mecanno in a living room, two boys standing by it, and the father, who has taken a cigar out of his mouth, saying, 'I am so proud of you' ...

or possibly 'My wonderful sons' ... something on that level anyway

Dude do you how much money JC Penney made on wish book exclusives alone? I loved getting those things to drool over the weird shit they alone got from Kenner

It doesn't really compare to that G.I. Joe ship, but I remember Fortress Maximus, the biggest (56 centimeters/22 inches) and most expensive of the original 80s Transformers, being this mythical toy that no kid in my working-class neighbourhood owned, in fact I don't think anyone had even seen it outside a toy catalogue.

iphones amirite

Oh wait

https://www.fun4kids.co.uk/index.php/catalog/product/view/id/2541/s/go-ped-hoverboard-motorised-scooter/

1700 for a scooter that you can't ride on the road (not roadworthy) or the pavement (motorised)

I remember seeing tv adverts for Macs as a college student in the mid-90s offering "special pricing for students!" Only to find out that a new powermac cost as much as a used car, which just astounded my broke ass.

http://i.imgur.com/dTogrQq.jpg

Hi! You can absolutely bet that people own this stuff. You might be amazed to learn that there are people who actively enjoy spending lots of money on toys! People who think that the more they spend, the better the toy must be, as a matter of principle!

Nuzzles,

LJ are you looking for fps

iphones amirite

Oh wait

This is another thing that interests me. I'm not literate in the current range of products, really, and it's surprising how omnipresent some stuff is

Are we only talking toys/games here? Can think of lots of other consumer products that went nowhere 'cause they were wildly overpriced

It doesn't really compare to that G.I. Joe ship, but I remember Fortress Maximus, the biggest (56 centimeters/22 inches) and most expensive of the original 80s Transformers, being this mythical toy that no kid in my working-class neighbourhood owned, in fact I don't think anyone had even seen it outside a toy catalogue.

I think a friend of mine had this. Or at least another massive transformer. I were too poor to even have a Transformer, all we could afford was a 2nd hand Robo Machine from a jumble sale. Luxury etc.

http://tilallaremine.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/constructicons-g1-devastator.jpg

sup

^^^I admit to having this guy as a kid, took me like a year to save up and buy all the parts

in fact I put him together for the first time in probably 25ish years last month while home visiting my nephew, who is 4. he was impressed

Yeah, it was my goal to do that, but I think I only got two. And then eventually they just packaged it up as a whole set, iirc?

I bought my kid an optimus prime about 5 years ago. It was such a piece of crap. It was so complicated that he couldn't figure out the transformation process, so I had to do it for him, then a piece actually snapped like the third time I tried to transform it.

we had two of those guys mine was an articulated truck the brothers was a scorpion we fucked them down the stairs til they broke it was good times

xps yeah, it was 5 different guys sold separately. not sure if I ever saw the whole thing for sale as one piece, but there were several other "buy these 5 transformers and then put them all together into a bigger transformer" sets. that one is the CONSTRUCTICONS iirc

pretty sure a lot of my transformers got used for pellet gun target shooting and/or fireworks blow-up time in high school

which is stupid because a lot of them are "valuable" now, although I never left any of mine in boxes bc that would have been dumb

This is not necessarily a thread about toys/games, but I def think that many out-of-reach items are still lodged in the unprocessed areas of one's minds, having been forgotten about but never dealt with.

Also, somebody painted a large dump truck in Constructicon colors with a Decepticon logo and parked it by I-5, near Corvallis, OR.

http://hikecorvallis.blogspot.com/2011/05/i-5-constructicon.html?m=1

Decepticons sure are patriotic.

http://www.i-mockery.com/blabber/pics/tomhanks-big-transformer.jpg

Massive flat screen TVs are another thing I think of as 'expensive' but which aren't anymore as far as I can tell

Neiman Marcus christmas catalog to thread, obv

http://most-expensive.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/submarine_2000.jpg

Flat screen TVs ARE crazy cheap now, and they get cheaper every year, very affordable

xp That's a yacht submarine ...

Is that really real?

Front projection TVs in the 1980s - stupidly expensive, never knew anyone that owned one.

Also from Nieman Marcus.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c8/Kitchen_computer_ad.jpg
$10K in 1969, none were sold.

Haha yes! I actually had one friend that had one. His folks were country club types. If it was completely dark in the room it looked ok.

xp re: proj. tv.

There was a millenium falcon that i remember seeing ads for on US tv. Seemed pretty detailed, not sure how large or expensive it was. Just that I'd've loved one at the time.
Remember it being large enough in the ad to have the dolls move around inside with parts of the roof removable.

Dunno if this is the same one I saw at Sharper Image years ago but:

http://www.odditycentral.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/alien1.jpg

I had that Millennium Falcon. Probably the biggest/most elaborate SW themed thing I had. Didn't like that the figures couldn't really move from place to place in there, so I tried cutting the plastic away so Han could move from the cockpit to the hangout area in back. Played the hell out of that thing.

https://blbarber.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/100_0519.jpg

i had one of those combined transformers, though not the one pictured i don't think. even wee me thought it a bit lame that combined it looked less like a mighty unified robot than it did a torso with cars for legs and arms.

I had all that star wars crap in the photo above.. except whatever that is between the falcon and the x wing

I don't think that's Star Wars. It looks like something else I used to have, but I can't remember the name.

Not Construx, but some other building-based play system with a vague space theme.

Are the SUV type of car as widespread in America as they're supposed to be? Are they (you can tell I'm not a driver) more expensive to buy and maintain than, I suppose, normal cars? Are they like widescreen TVs?

There was a mech warrior type video game 10 years ago that came with a crazy full cockpit controller.

I had that Millennium Falcon. Probably the biggest/most elaborate SW themed thing I had. Didn't like that the figures couldn't really move from place to place in there, so I tried cutting the plastic away so Han could move from the cockpit to the hangout area in back. Played the hell out of that thing.

I have a lot of sci-fi (esp. Star Wars) collectibles in and on display cases in my basement, and I am looking at that Millennium Falcon right now from where I sit. It's sitting right next to a Slave I on top of a glass display case that has a bunch of 1/6th-scale figures from Sideshow Collectibles.

xpost
Steel Battalion! would love to try it sometime, without having to own/store it

http://i.imgur.com/vWyOywI.jpg

There was this toy shop in Bicester growing up - nothing special, just another Toymaster shop. But from time to time, they'd have odd Transformers in there, ones that were never officially released in the UK - the original Constructicons, Sky Lynx, Shockwave, etc. And then one day, I went in, and saw them. *Two* Fortress Maximuses, selling for £39.99 each. I was ten, I think? And boy I wanted one so, so much. the next time I went, they were gone. Sadness.

…

Christmas morning was a surprise :). As Transformers from that era go, he's bulky and doesn't have a huge amount of articulation, but so many bits and pieces to play with - hidden weapon emplacements, loading him up with other Transformers, the Inception Headmaster gimmick. Definitely better than Flagg, I'd say. And at the prices in Pied Piper, he was bizarrely only £10 more expensive than Metroplex…

SUVs used to be more popular, and now huge trucks are still plenty sellable

Aside from toys, wouldn't pretty much everything in the Hammacher-Schlemmer catalog qualify itt?

Steel Battalion

I caught a few minutes of a TV movie starring Dirk Benedict (Face from The A Team) that used the centre part of that controller as a prop. Oh and a silver painted Space Shuttle model as a miniature effect. So to bring it back on topic, I remember seeing this huge 1:72 Space Shuttle kit made by Revell. Also there might have been 1:72 scale Saturn V as well.

oh and also...
http://www.es-promotions.com/sites/default/files/4%20lane%20scalextric.jpg

My dad once bought me a Scalextric knock-off from a car boot sale that didn't have any cars. Great present that. Because it wasn't actually a Scalextric I couldn't find cars for it at local shops, and he sure as hell wasn't going to help find any. Cheers dad.

Then you decided to make your own and now you're an electronics genius.