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Bravo Bravo Bravo!!!!

Your story is almost exactly like mine. I am 31 years old and I grew up with the g1 transformers and gijoe. My brothers and I watched both cartoons and got all the toys from our parents. My very 1st transformer that I could call my own was Blaster. My brothers would get all the figures and would not every let me transform them because they thought I would break them. My parents thought they were to hard for me to play with also so I got stuck with mostly he-man and Star Wars toys. I complained and complained that I wanted a transformer and one day my mom tells me "get in the car, I'm going shopping and I don't want to leave you here with your brothers because they won't play with you." We went to this store called "Best" which was kind of like a Target back in the day and they had the craziest toy department. My mom walked me over to the toy section and said "get whatever transformer you want." I stood there in shock in front of a whole isle of g1 transformers. The one that caught my eye was Blaster because of his bright color scheme and endless arguments with my brother about Soundwave vs. Blaster. Since he had Soundwave I couldn't wait to get home and bust out the big ass Blaster and destroy his little Soundwave. This memory has stuck with me my whole life and its one of the most exciting days of my life.
My brothers and I grew and lost interest in toys and cartoons but never forgot about the cool toys we had. I began collecting Marvel legends in college and then stopped after series 5 or 6 because it was getting way too expensive. Then I met a coworker who was heavy into gijoe and and he got me into collecting joes. I stopped with gijoe when the movie figures came out and only bought rare figures. One day I was in Walmart and I saw generations thundercracker and wheel jack . At that point I thought to myself where the hell have I been to miss these awesome g1 remakes. That is what triggered my transformer collecting. It brought back all my childhood memories and its now my #1 hobby. With all the cool masterpieces coming out I am getting that same feeling I had as a kid every time I get a new one. It's a good feeling when you go to a store and have the money to buy all the figures you want vs being a kid and only being able to get 1 at a time.

The "spark" that got me into collecting was the relaunch of The TF universe through Dreamwaves comics. Must have been 2001-2002. Absolutely loved the artwork.
I remember reading the first issue and shortly after that I dusted off some of my childhood figs. Prowl and Optimus (both the early nineties classic re-releases) were my two best.

I hit up ebay shortly after that and picked up MIB Tracks and MIB Sideswipe for about $40 each if I remember correctly.

Now I have a collection nearing 500 figs.

For all your faults, I thank you Pat Lee.

*edit:It was 2002.

I stopped playing with them about 25-26 years ago. There was a lull between high school, women and guitars. I guess it'd have to be the Hasbro G1 TRU reissues that brought me back into the franchise. After that and the internet etc i decided to concentrate on a few select MISB & MOSC pieces. Theres' a difference between a toy and a collectible. I don't have a massive 5000 piece MISB collection to brag about, but i quite like what I've got.

Being 42, I was a teen when G1 hit the states but I always liked Japanese anime / sci-fi. I watched Ultraman and Battle of the planets as a kid and even had some of my old Micronauts at the time. I remember having bought a few things like Bumblebee an Blitzwing but as I was getting older, I grew out of that "phase" of my life.

Fast forward around 15 years or so and out of the blue I get a RID Skybyte from my daughter as a Christmas present. Not sure why she did it as I had never seen the show as and hadn't thought about Transformers in years. In any case, I loved the figure. Tons more articulation than what I had remembered as a kid.

Unfortunately, she got it on clearance during the show's final days. Finding more at retail was a pain. Enter BBTS and I pretty much grabbed the rest of the line. From there it has been a downward spiral.

Luckily I have a wife that keeps me reeled in but still encourages my hobby. Hell, she's the one that got me my pristine G1 Shockwave and my Gigatron.

I think I'm somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 figures now. They become lost on the shelves. However I still know exactly where that Skybyte is.

War for Cybertron.

I'm a gamer first and a Transfan second, and had lapsed from Transformers for several years, basically from Beast Machines until the Bayverse started up in 2007. I still had a few Beast Wars figures and my G1 Grimlock and Shockwave collecting dust in my closet, but I'd never have gotten into buying toys again had I not thoroughly enjoyed blasting fools with the Riot Cannon while Steve Blum Barricade cracked wise. I found Generations Optimus Prime and Megatron at my local target while perusing the Mcfarlane Halo figures, and thought, hey, what the hell? They look cool.

I found Soundwave in the line after that, and then started checking ebay and thought, hey, some of these movie toys are pretty cool. I picked up some ROTF stock, and shopped around on ebay for some Classics/Universe stuff... and a year later I was bidding on BotCon figures. That was when I knew I had been consumed. And I liked it.

For me it would have to be RotF Sideways, followed by Sideswipe.
I did have some toys as a kid, but I wasn't really into the collecting side of it.

The the second film came out, and the toys looked really REALLY good.
Especially Sideways. Bought him, then decided he needed someone to be displayed with. And it just kept on going from there.

(The story is a little more detailed in my collection thread: http://www.seibertron.com/energonpub/va-al-s-bi-national-collection-t80445.php)

Money!

I was an exceedingly frugal kid, so I never really had any Transformers growing up. My parents wouldn't buy them for me and I didn't want to spend my own money on them. I had a grand total of 4 growing up. Two I bought in late high school for a quarter each (Universe Razorclaw and Armada Smokescreen) and two I got accidentally in elementary school - I had purchased a small bag of toy cars at a Boy Scout fundraiser for $1 and discovered there were Transformers in it when I got home. But at that age I was a Beast Wars kid and didn't give two hoots about G1 Hubcap and G2 Hook. I threw them in the toy bin and forgot about them for years. Lol.

The first Bay movie is what got me into collecting, oddly enough. I pulled my money together right before it premiered and purchased a few figures (Barricade, Ratchet and Jazz, at first, followed by Bee, Blackout and entry mode Starscream after the movie aired). I was in college though, so I was really very limited in what I could spend. Absolutely fell in love with Animated when it aired too, but didn't own any figures while in school.

After graduating and finding a full time job, I started buying 2-4 figures a month (mostly deluxes, but there were a few voyagers). My first focus was Animated, despite having begun (casually) with the Bay-verse. Things have grown from there.

Great responses folks! Awesome to see the similarities in everyone's stories.
I was hoping to hear if anyone's went through what I did mentally though. (I think my OP was too long for most to read LOL)
Did anyone else feel weird for buying toys as an adult at first?
We're you acutely aware of being watched by other adults as you browsed and sifted through toy isles?
We're you concerned about what people you knew might thing if they came over and saw a bunch of figures standing about your home?
How did it make you feel, what did you do about it and how did you finally come to understand that it wasn't crazy for an adult to collect figures?
Or was I the only one who worried about what others thought so much and worried about being "normal" so much that I questioned my sanity when the desire to buy toys as an adult out of the blue hit me so hard?
Thanks folks!

Megs for pres wrote:We're you acutely aware of being watched by other adults as you browsed and sifted through toy isles?

No, not really. I'm quite comfortable doing so. I'm up to date on what's released so a quick 2 second glance at the aisle is more than enough.

Megs for pres wrote:We're you concerned about what people you knew might thing if they came over and saw a bunch of figures standing about your home?

I've got a room full of the stuff. Can't hide that they know I'm a fan and that they're my guilty pleasure (the MISB stuff). My GF's even bought me a few.

Megs for pres wrote:How did it make you feel, what did you do about it and how did you finally come to understand that it wasn't crazy for an adult to collect figures?

I've always thought it normal. I only started collecting 10-11 years ago, even then I thought not to let people's opinion's affect my decision making

Megs for pres wrote:Or was I the only one who worried about what others thought so much and worried about being "normal" so much that I questioned my sanity when the desire to buy toys as an adult out of the blue hit me so hard?
Thanks folks!

Enjoy the ride. It's in your blood now

I was drunk ...

How it all began, I read the Marvel Transformers comics when I was little child but did not have much toys. But Grimlock was always a favorite of mine and many years later when I was really drunk I logged in to Ebay and found the MP Grimlock and just had to buy him. And that continued the collecting.