Octopus Overlords

I absolutely had those as a kid (my grandmother was big on taking me to some place in Journal Square - Woolworths?) and letting me pick out bags of crap like that for a $1 or whatever it was. I don't want to say for sure, but I am betting I still have a few of them somewhere, buried in a box of my stuff. I clearly remember the "rust monster", but I know I had them.

We had the rust monster and the bulette as kids. They are probably both in my parent's basement somewhere.

What a terrific story! Very cool.

If you're interested in a more academic treatment of the birth of D&D (as well as the birth of the wargaming hobby in general), check out Playing at the World: A History of Simulating Wars, People, and Fantastic Adventures from Chess to Role-Playing Games, by Jon Peterson. It's a bit dry at times, but it's incredibly comprehensive. Peterson has delved deep into the archived correspondence of Avalon Hill, TSR, and all the rest of the major players.

I have to have buried or lost so many of those up at my grandparents house in Indian river Michigan. The "dime store" was across the rail road tracks from their house and on the other side of the street. Right across the corner from "kens". The ONE grocery place in town. An IGA if they atill exist. The town is still so small that I am fourty and when people there learn my grandparents name we manage to find some connection.

Archinerd wrote:We had the rust monster and the bulette as kids. They are probably both in my parent's basement somewhere.

I had those too. They are definitely in a landfill now though. IT's probably a good thing. They are each helping to decompose the garbage with their magic abilities.

I'm pretty sure the bird and the (holiday) armadillo are based off of Rodan and some other Godzilla monster.

After a second read of that article I see they mention Ultraman. That makes sense too.

killbot737 wrote:

Archinerd wrote:We had the rust monster and the bulette as kids. They are probably both in my parent's basement somewhere.

I had those too. They are definitely in a landfill now though. IT's probably a good thing. They are each helping to decompose the garbage with their magic abilities.

I'm pretty sure the bird and the (holiday) armadillo are based off of Rodan and some other Godzilla monster.

If the auctions linked in the article are any indication, might be worth digging them up. Well, out of the basement, not the landfill.

LawBeefaroni wrote:

killbot737 wrote:

Archinerd wrote:We had the rust monster and the bulette as kids. They are probably both in my parent's basement somewhere.

I had those too. They are definitely in a landfill now though. IT's probably a good thing. They are each helping to decompose the garbage with their magic abilities.

I'm pretty sure the bird and the (holiday) armadillo are based off of Rodan and some other Godzilla monster.

If the auctions linked in the article are any indication, might be worth digging them up. Well, out of the basement, not the landfill.

Yeah, I just read the article more closely too. Since I'm heading out to my parents house today I might as well have a look around.

Partial success in finding these.

The Bulette has been located and looks exactly like the picture.


I also found this standing lizard guy.


In addition I found 5-6 of the more dinosaur types, some are in this picture.


I KNOW there were two rust monsters at one time, but I couldn't locate either of them. My sister-in-law is going to get these posted on Ebay for me, I'll post the link here when the listing goes live so you can see all the $$ I'll be making.

Archinerd wrote:Partial success in finding these.

The Bulette has been located and looks exactly like the picture.


I also found this standing lizard guy.


In addition I found 5-6 of the more dinosaur types, some are in this picture.


I KNOW there were two rust monsters at one time, but I couldn't locate either of them. My sister-in-law is going to get these posted on Ebay for me, I'll post the link here when the listing goes live so you can see all the $$ I'll be making.

Did you ever get these sold?

Holman wrote:What a terrific story! Very cool.

Ditto.

Edit: And I see now that I missed this the first time around. So glad it got bumped.

hentzau wrote: Did you ever get these sold?

Nope. My sister in law sells a bunch of stuff on Ebay all the time so I handed them off to her to sell for me for a cut. I must not have stressed enough that these little pieces of plastic could be worth a few hundred. Or maybe I did and she ran off with the money.

Either way I think I should probably follow up on this. I may need to break some knee caps.