Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Ro-Gun Robots


What: One of the earliest mini figure memories I have is getting a big bag of mono color, cheap plastic robots at the dollar store. I was never that attached to them but they were always there, hanging out alongside my much more cherished MUSCLE and Monster in My Pocket figures. Fast forward more than two decades and I finally discover some details about this line, called Ro-Gun Robots (thanks to MinifiguresXD, formerly Toypedia, for shedding some light via an informative post a few years back). This set consisted of six unique sculpts, each of which came in three colors: dull blue, dull red and black. They're made of a hard, light plastic that would probably crack pretty easily if bent (I haven't tried). One part of me kind of likes these and another part doesn't think they're incredibly exciting. In any case, they're a welcome addition to any mini figure army, especially if you have a weakness for robots and/or cheapo toys.

When: The MinifiguresXD entry linked above says 1984, but I'd estimate that I got mine in the late 1980s or very early 1990s so it seems they were being sold for a while.

Where: U.S. (at least). I remember getting mine at a variety/dollar store, but I have also seen people say they found them in toy vending machines.

Who: Made by Arco

6 comments:

  1. i think rogun mini's also came with the transformers / Tyco train set from 1984 how ever that set has grey color scheme instead of the black ones

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  2. Got these stored in my 40k and Epic stuff. When you need a bot, theres plenty there.
    Fr. Medinoche.

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  3. I have a painted one picked up sometime in the 80s or early 90s either here in the UK or possibly during a holiday to Spain. As far as I'm aware it's the only one I've ever had. - http://sta.sh/0630fi7cx57

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  4. My brothers and I had a bag of these. Would have been around 1986 that we got them. Many of them were stepped on and tossed. A bunch more got lost. The survivors hung around until we sold them in a big pre-moving clear-out yard sale in 1997. Although, I found one hanging out at my parents' a couple years ago, so maybe they never really go away!

    We definitely had our favourite sculpts, which also seemed to be the ones we had the fewest of. They took part in many a marble flicking or rubber band shooting war along-side our green army men. Some good memories.

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  5. I love these still got mine stored with muscle.love how cheap these were and the defects in molding really added character.i also got the larger scale rubber set at Kmart

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