Exidy produced a very different kind of Breakout game in 1977. The game’s name was Circus, and true to its title, it gave players control…
Browsing: Toys & Games
The inventor of this British board game was a Birmingham munitions worker named Anthony Pratt. For him, it was a way of passing the time…
In 1968, the Colorform company made a bold attempt at cracking the action figure market with a set of seven bendable rubber “Outer Space Men,”…
In the early 1950s, a company called Colorforms hit the educational toy market with their eponymous products which “stick like magic”. The original sets contained…
“Computacar – the amazing car with a ‘memory’ you control!” The revolutionary battery-powered Computacar from Mettoy was driven by an electric motor which was activated…
The history of coin-operated video arcade games began not with a whimper, but with several explosive bangs, rendered in simple black-and-white graphics by a young…
Conkers are the hard fruit of the Horse Chestnut tree. These are collected in autumn (we used to throw sticks up the trees to knock…
The “vertical strategy game” Connect 4 originated in the USA where it was designed by renowned independent toy designer Ned Strongin, with Dr Howard Wexler…
Designed for pre-schoolers, Cootie (or Beetle as it was known in the UK, where the word “Cootie” has no meaning whatsoever) hit its mark with…
This short-lived range of rechargeable battery-powered slotless toy cars was introduced by Corgi in 1970 to compete with Mattel’s “Hot Wheels Sizzlers”. The innovative ElectroRockets…
As with many great British companies, the origins of Corgi lie overseas. In 1933 Philip Ullman, head of Tippco – a very successful German toy…
The Cozy Coupe was designed by former Chrysler designer, Jim Mariol, in 1979 and manufactured by The Little Tikes Company in Hudson, Ohio. The red…
In 1885, cousins Edwin Binney and C. Harold Smith took over the Peekskill Chemical Company in the US, named it Binney & Smith, and busily…
Originally made by the American Aerosol Company in 1965, the “fun foam soap” delighted kids with pop culture character designs such as Popeye, Spider-Man and…
Creepy Crawlers were the first species to emerge from Mattel’s ‘Thingmaker’ concept – other do-it-yourself kits would follow in the decades to come, like the…
If you were tired of scratching out tic-tac-toe games on sweaty notebook paper that you passed back and forth in the middle of history class,…
Crossfire was heavily promoted in 1971 on television, but never really lived up to expectations. It was advertised as “The fastest rapid-fire action game ever”,…
American airgun manufacturer Daisy was initially established in 1882 in Plymouth, Michigan, by watchmaker and inventor Clarence Hamilton as the Plymouth Iron Windmill Company. The…
Kenner dipped its foot into the dark, monopolised waters of the late 70s toys-for-girls market with Darci. She was a bit taller and a bit…
Dawn was essentially a poor man’s Barbie . . . but sexier, funkier and a bit hipper! Released by Topper Toys in 1970, she was six…