nabby
Distinguished Member
I had a conversation with the father of my daughter's best friend the other week and he was telling me how he'd been in Toys-R-Us in Croydon a few days beforehand with his two kids. He'd wandered past the aisle with the Scalextric sets (other racing car track sets available) and fancied getting one "for the kids" although of course he'd had one as child and loved it. He hoped to install similar passion for slot car racing in his children.
So about £100 was thrown at the cashier and they came home with the set they'd chosen.
It took him (of course, it was just him ) 2 hours to unpack and set up ,then the kids played it for 15 minutes, one of the two cars in the set stopped working, the tracks kept coming apart or twisting, cars kept racing off the track at corners, the controllers seemed to either do 0% speed or 100% speed with nothing in between and very quickly it all felt like a huge waste of money and a massive disappointment.
Naturally, his choice for the list was Scalextric.
It got me thinking and I remember back in the dim and distant 1980's the craze for domino rallies, where you'd set up lines of dominoes standing vertically and knock the first one down to create a chain of these things falling over. Every time they showed the latest world record attempt on Record Breakers or on Blue Peter or Newsround, me and my brother would be glued to the telly, watching in amazement as these set-ups took 10+ minutes to fall over, with all sorts of fantastic effects going off left, right and centre.
So one Christmas we begged our parents for Domino Rally - Action Alley and got it. It was fun for 20 minutes then it was crap and we never touched it again. Our illusions were shattered, the scales fell from our eyes and we realised that 100 or so rubbish, cheaply made lightweight plastic dominoes were never going to create the brilliant set-ups we'd seen on TV. Then we went back to playing football or cricket in the back garden or playing chess, cards or Top Trumps.
Hence my choice is Domino Rally - Action Alley.
What's yours?
So about £100 was thrown at the cashier and they came home with the set they'd chosen.
It took him (of course, it was just him ) 2 hours to unpack and set up ,then the kids played it for 15 minutes, one of the two cars in the set stopped working, the tracks kept coming apart or twisting, cars kept racing off the track at corners, the controllers seemed to either do 0% speed or 100% speed with nothing in between and very quickly it all felt like a huge waste of money and a massive disappointment.
Naturally, his choice for the list was Scalextric.
It got me thinking and I remember back in the dim and distant 1980's the craze for domino rallies, where you'd set up lines of dominoes standing vertically and knock the first one down to create a chain of these things falling over. Every time they showed the latest world record attempt on Record Breakers or on Blue Peter or Newsround, me and my brother would be glued to the telly, watching in amazement as these set-ups took 10+ minutes to fall over, with all sorts of fantastic effects going off left, right and centre.
So one Christmas we begged our parents for Domino Rally - Action Alley and got it. It was fun for 20 minutes then it was crap and we never touched it again. Our illusions were shattered, the scales fell from our eyes and we realised that 100 or so rubbish, cheaply made lightweight plastic dominoes were never going to create the brilliant set-ups we'd seen on TV. Then we went back to playing football or cricket in the back garden or playing chess, cards or Top Trumps.
Hence my choice is Domino Rally - Action Alley.
What's yours?
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