Furby?

FURBY?!

Really? I mean, furby? Creepiest toy, lamest toy, but greatest of all time? Fuck. That.

@B:

I'll stand by it too. What good is love and honesty if there's no Excitebike? Cripes.

@backbroken:

...what the hell is an "aluminum falcon?"

Hello! Lawn darts! Duh! And BB guns! Firecrackers! And other things that involve matches!

But the best thing we did was take them out into the woods and play with them in the creek. They went swimming in a little pool with a waterfall that was only about six inches high. We had so much fun doing that I wish I could go back in time and do it again.

I still have the house and car and all the clothes (and the dolls). They are dirty from being in storage, but I can't bring myself to throw them away. :(

@GMFish: Also, unused furniture. At my grandma's old house, no one used the dining room so I took over and made the entire room my fort. I would sleep there almost an entire summer.

@korybing: I coveted the K'Nex. It was super expensive when it came out, and my best friend got one. In late middle school/early high school, she got the awesome roller coaster set. At 100 or so dollars, it was too rich for me even thinking about asking my parents for one.

@LightningUsagi:
I have this argument all the time:

The Dreamcast was ahead of its time.
Sony murdered my Dreamcast.

I still mourn for poor Jet Set Radio.

Mill En Ee Um - Fal Kin

I was also really into My Little Ponies, but mostly because they were the perfect size for my TMNT guys to ride on into battle.

We also had Incredible Edibles, which were basically Creepy Crawlers made out of nominally edible materials. I think you can still see them on my MRIs.

@hotdogsunrise: I believe it was called a "Skip-it".. Google the commercial theme song, it's priceless.

@jhuang: The clicky slide thingie = Viewmaster

I just bought my neice one last year for Christmas, they still make those.

I wish I still had my tamagachi, or even just my picachu version of the same thing. So addictive.

@econobiker: Did you also have to walk to school barefoot, uphill both ways, in 12 feet of snow?

@h3llc4t, breaker of office dress codes: My brother had that too.. I played with the foot trap the most.. I thought it was fun to open and close it.

@pecan 3.14159265: My brother and my best friend at the time (he was a boy.) used a jump rope to tie me to a tree.

They said we were playing Ninja Turtles and I was April and they would come and save me.

They didn't come back.

There was ants on the tree.

I was six, and my "best friend" wasn't my friend after that. He decided he liked my brother better.

Fun childhood memories. LOL.

@Trance1861: Blackmailing before you were even potty trained?

I commend you.

@h3llc4t, breaker of office dress codes: Omg yes, I so remember that set.

I broke the hell out of it after like a month, but I loved that thing.

@LandruBek: And we used to make bootleg Lego weapons in the era before Lego gave up the non-violence idea and started to put little guns, cannons, and swords with the theme sets...

@donnie5: Protecting consumers from themselves plus there were probably lawsuits which did in the company.

I kick myself for not buying a pristine still-in-box set from a coworker back in 1996. He had actually tried to take the set to Play It Again Sports and the manager had laughed him out of the store...

@donnie5: Do not forget the use of Lincoln logs with the green plastic army soldiers. Perfect for building forts and destroying them with mock explosions...

TRANSFORMERS!!!!!

My family was so poor that twelve children had only one toy to share...
It was a little wooden car...
And it was broken - it only had three wheels...
And those wheels were square...
Imagine 12 children fighting over a little wooden car that only went "chunk,tah, chunk,tah, chunk,tah" when you tried to push it around...

But we never, ever got to play with it when our mother had to tenderize possum or raccoon meat that she was lucky enough to find on the roadside...

Afterward it was even a more special treat for us children to lick the little wooden car off...

My brother had army guys. They were good for placement in Lincoln Log forts that were then destroyed by the attack of other army guys.

@h3llc4t, breaker of office dress codes: Who you gonna call? . . . . ME!!!! I threw a tantrum that has become the stuff of legends in order to get that set.

@pecan 3.14159265: The one legged skipping rolling ball thing! I loved that! Seriously. I would use that thing for hours. Hours, I tell you!

I liked the buildy toys like Lincoln Logs, Tinker Toys, and Legos, but I played the crap out of my wee battery-operated organ with colored keys, and I wore down to the fake dirt my little farmscapes with miniature barns and animals. (Seriously cute baby lambs.) Probably the all-time winner, though, was a toy travel trailer. Built with the solidity of a Tonka truck, sized for dollhouse stuff (I loved the furniture, but it was the animals who lived in it, because people were boring), so probably close to 2 feet long. Amazing I never attacked my brother with it.

Sega Dreamcast? Honestly? I love my Dreamcast but I would no way be putting it up with the best toys ever, especially since that was the system that kicked Sega out of the console market.

My favorite toys as a kid included K'Nex, Aliens, TMNT, He-Man, Ghostbusters, and Littlest Pet Shop. What, I had to have at least a couple girly toys. Oh also Lego Dragons.

@thesadtomato: Kidney dolls?! :O

Legos Legos Legos, and more Legos

Once I was 12 it was my BB gun

Lego
Dolls (of all kidney: Raggedy Ann to Barbie to GI Joe)
Spirograph
Grocery Store toy (plastic groceries, register, conveyor belt)

I don't remember too many *toys* as in something plastic that came in a box. Mostly I played pretend by dressing up or using a few props like my magic wand, tiara, ruby slippers, and whatever came to hand.

Hot Wheels! And the little plastic Army guys. And Silly Putty.

There's a Saturday afternoon for you.

After that, sports related stuff like a basketball or tennis racket certainly got the most use. I remember being really excited over Transformers or a remote control car, but I didn't play with them for long before I got tired of it. The best toys are the ones with lasting appeal, not just a new fun gimmick.

Lawn Darts don't kill/injure/maim people, People kill/injure/maim people.

My list:

Legos
Stuffed animals
Plastic cups, plates, and bowls
Child-size tables and chairs (so you can have Lego cake with your stuffed animals)
Lincoln Logs
Free frisbees from whatever local bank (they doubled as serving platters)
That one legged skipping rolling ball thing (Google tells me it's called a Skip Ball but I like my name)
Wooden Paddle Ball
Crayola markers and a huge pad of butchers paper
Suction dart guns

One's own imagination. I had jump ropes when I was a kid, and I never used them for jumping. I would pretend I was a spy infiltrating some secret base and I'd use the rope to open doors if I suspected enemies on the other side.

I've got to disagree with the Dreamcast being on the list. Yes, it's a great system, and I still have mine along with copies of SC5 and JGR, but I don't think it was nearly as popular as the Playstation. Having worked in a toy store during the 1997 holiday season, I can tell you that thing was insanely hard to keep in stock.

I received most of my gaming systems for holidays, so I can't really pick which was the best, but I have more memories of playing my Genesis than any of the other ones I received as a kid.

I had a dog on wheels (it was plastic though.... made by fisher price in the 80s). I thought it was AMAZING, until I got my parents to get me a real dog by refusing to potty train until they did. Suckers.

[kotaku.com]