REPLIES: 124 comments
Wow, I wish Spidey would give me some cheese. Or backpacks, or backpacks made out of cheese of course...
/first comment
//obligatory
Chestnuts roasted by Bill Cosby's Sweater @ 05/07/2004 12:37 AM EST
Second Comment!!! Whoooo.
Did anyone here actually do any of those grit or greeting card things?
Chestnuts roasted by Vic Colfari @ 05/07/2004 12:45 AM EST
Sadly, I never ordered from any of them. I do, however, remember with particular detail the charles atlas and olympic "prizes or cash" scheme...I mean, conspira...organization. And I definately have a recollection of a backorder form for comics, but that may have been from the people who made the comics themselves, and not any particular reseller.
Chestnuts roasted by quentin mcalmott @ 05/07/2004 12:52 AM EST
As tempting as those Captain O things were,I'm glad my parents discouraged my brother and I from signing up for it,especially after Matt's story.
I ordered stuff from the Johnson Smith Company from an ad in Boy's Life magazine (yes,I was a Boy Scout,but only for a short time in the third grade)and kept getting the Things Your Never Knew Existed catalog for years,until it stopped coming because I didn't order anything from them. Even if you don't buy anything,it's still great reading material,like a Victoria's Secret catalog.
Chestnuts roasted by Overlord @ 05/07/2004 12:54 AM EST
I actually did the cheap comics thing. The comics were name brand but sometimes I didn't get the issue I ordered. Now looking back a few years, porn magazines offer the same deal with movies. Get like 10 2 hour vids for $25.
Oh and the muscle thing? My dad said he did that when he was a kid. Supposedly it was a little pamphlet telling you to do squats, sit ups, jumping jacks, and push ups. Pretty Special.
Chestnuts roasted by ZacWax @ 05/07/2004 12:55 AM EST
Not to be annoying (fat chance) but if you were in third grade, you were a Cub Scout.
Anyone else notice how on the main page, the date for this story is the sixth, but the date inside, where matt signed it is the seventh?
the mystery abounds...
Chestnuts roasted by quentin mcalmott @ 05/07/2004 12:57 AM EST
WOOO!
No.7!
Chestnuts roasted by Mathew O. @ 05/07/2004 12:59 AM EST
I work at a comic shop. I could send you hundreds of ads. But you probably don't care.
Ususally when I see an ad for Evel Keneval (sp?) toys from Ideal and the Hostess Fruit Pies ads I have to fight the urge to scan them and email them to Matt.
Chestnuts roasted by Pete @ 05/07/2004 01:00 AM EST
Pete, I'd actually like that a bunch. Shoot me an e-mail.
Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 05/07/2004 01:01 AM EST
Shame they couldn't be redeemed in New Zealand, but I also enjoyed staring at the prizes in the Captain O advert.
Chestnuts roasted by Matt (NZ) @ 05/07/2004 01:07 AM EST
Matt, email sent.
Chestnuts roasted by Pete @ 05/07/2004 01:14 AM EST
So did anyone else notice the "Super page and a half" sized link to the J&S story?
Chestnuts roasted by FuzzyHulk @ 05/07/2004 01:46 AM EST
Oh, and http://www.seanbaby.com/hostess.htm has all those old Fruit pie adds. Over 130 of them.
Chestnuts roasted by FuzzyHulk @ 05/07/2004 01:50 AM EST
Very interesting article. How do people get the first comment.... it boogles the mind!
Chestnuts roasted by Ballerina @ 05/07/2004 02:13 AM EST
Yeah I used to live across the street from MILE HIGH COMICS, I have since moved to the suburbs... wonder if its still open... it used to be an actual store back in the mid to early 90's. I spent countless hours *and dollars* on comics from that place... shame I don't have a single one now :(
Chestnuts roasted by Michael From Denver @ 05/07/2004 02:17 AM EST
I remember the Olympic ads...and funny thing is, the town given in the address is the town that I'm moving to in two weeks. Not like anyone cares...but I care! Shut up! No, YOU'RE dumb, dummy!
Chestnuts roasted by Sara @ 05/07/2004 02:33 AM EST
My grandparents have really old comics somewhere with ads for crap like a "working" submarine that could fit 3 kids, 200 plastic soldiers for $1, and a toy robot city playset thing.
Chestnuts roasted by RewolfJ @ 05/07/2004 03:00 AM EST
The one I always remember in those Abracadabra ads was the "Smoking Pet...Really Works!" I always wondered if it did work. Dogs and cats don't technically have lips like us...so how did it work? I guess the easy was is to just set them on fire.
Chestnuts roasted by Clean Myke @ 05/07/2004 03:25 AM EST
Like THE Matt, I too read the Choose Your Own Adventure Books of my own free will.
I also seem to remember (and if anyone else knows I could use confirmation) Nintendo capitalizing on the craze with four CYOA books of their most popular games. I remember Castlevania and Metal Gear. Maybe they weren't CYOA but I know they did books and I had them. Anyone else know what I speak of?
Chestnuts roasted by Lumberjack Matt @ 05/07/2004 05:02 AM EST
I've seen pictures of covers for Mario and Zelda CYOAs, but never read them. Loved the original series, though.
And Matt, the part about the clowns is the best thing you've typed in weeks.
Chestnuts roasted by Behonkiss @ 05/07/2004 07:29 AM EST
I remember calling up Captain O just so I could talk to 'Bridget'. I then hung up on her like a coward. Oh the love that could have been!
Chestnuts roasted by Guy Hutchinson @ 05/07/2004 07:56 AM EST
nobody does horribly offensive background images better than matt.
Chestnuts roasted by jerome @ 05/07/2004 09:26 AM EST
I have one of those issues of "What The?" with gag ads in it.
-Defused Hand Grenades. Useless except for paperweights because the fuses have been removed.
-Grenade Fuses. Useless except for paperweights because they've been taken out of the grenade.
Chestnuts roasted by Joe @ 05/07/2004 09:31 AM EST
What's the deal with the "choose your own adventure" ad with a devil like face and 666 5th avenue address!
Chestnuts roasted by noone @ 05/07/2004 09:36 AM EST
I have spent countless hours looking through those ads and drooling. I ordered a few times, I would usually get about $10 worth of the gags and jokes. One time I got the "Mystery Bag". It looked like a bunch of left over stuff they had lying around. Well, I guess that is exactly what it was.
I always wanted to get that hovercraft intruction kit that you could make with a vacuum cleaner...
Chestnuts roasted by Stilewalker @ 05/07/2004 09:57 AM EST
OMG! I was obsessed with CYOA books, in fact I bought a whole set of them off eBay a couple years ago so I could re-live my youth...My favorite of all of them was "Inside UFO 54-40" ! A brother and sister who were abducted by aliens abord this ship. These guys were one corrider choice away from ending the world, or ending up in paradise! Used to scare the shit out of me. Classic.
Chestnuts roasted by B-Dawg @ 05/07/2004 10:26 AM EST
Choose your own Adventure was the only reason that I went to the Bookmobile (Where the failed librarians worked). I have that same Sectaurs comic. I think I bought it in a series of 4 just to have all of them. Never really liked them. Chia part 5. Rember when Chris Elliot ordered a submarine on "Get a Life" and built it in his bathtub? Head Paperboy!
Chestnuts roasted by sixpointsix @ 05/07/2004 10:41 AM EST
Sweet Mother of Pearl! Mile High Comics was the biz-nomb!
Be sure to mention the hovercraft ads in your next article--if there is one (it floats on air!).
And I'm still waiting for Olympic to send me my 7 point Calculator Watch...
Chestnuts roasted by Slacker @ 05/07/2004 10:56 AM EST
Man, I remember reading my brother's old Mario CYOA book, then being so inspired by it that I went to a used bookstore and bought a bunch of them. By a bunch, I mean two or three goosebumps ones, because I didn't have much money.
Chestnuts roasted by Mr. Tiddlewinks the 3rd of Cuddlesville @ 05/07/2004 11:40 AM EST
You can find some CYOA gamebooks for download at http://www.the-underdogs.org/gamebook.php including three Super Mario ones.
None were better than The Way of the Tiger series, though.
Chestnuts roasted by Kwon @ 05/07/2004 11:41 AM EST
Actually, Mile High is still around at www.milehighcomics.com! They're known for having way-too-high prices now, but if you're looking for an issue you always know they've got it, and they tend to have a sale at any given time so if you wait for their 80% off sale that happens every few months you can get a heck of a deal.
Chestnuts roasted by VeganMike @ 05/07/2004 11:55 AM EST
I have two CYOA-type books, one from the Wizards, Warriors, & You line written by R.L. Stine, and a Doctor Who one. You think the Captain O operators had to wear those funky tiaras at work, even though no one outside of the boiler room would ever see them?
Chestnuts roasted by kingklash @ 05/07/2004 11:59 AM EST
I used to spend many hours and dollars at Mile High Comics. I still have a bunch(in bad condition), that I keep around for reading. There are still a bunch of the stores around, but the Broadway ones are gone. Thanks for the memories Matt, brought me back to age 13 again.
Chestnuts roasted by Fugu C @ 05/07/2004 12:07 PM EST
Man oh Man. I remember Bonkers, that candy was soooo good. It's so true, people not only didn't want to hear me out when trying to sell for cash or prizes but they hated me with a passion for it. Especially my mother. I remember clearly all of the "they're all gonna laugh at you," discouragement. I remember having that Quik mug, it was irresistible. Unfortunately I still remember when that rabbit mug shattering as it hit the ground. Sad, sad day.
Chestnuts roasted by G4L @ 05/07/2004 12:19 PM EST
I have about a dozen choose your own adventure books. All from different makers...Wizards, Warriors, and You...and a couple that had little tips. Certain decisions had a little "tip" page you could turn to in the back for a hint on the correct line of action. These were my favorite, because instead of the randmness of most CYOA, these you actually followed clues as to which path to take. I rememebr vividly a Dinosaur one and a Time Machine one.
Chestnuts roasted by Stilewalker @ 05/07/2004 12:29 PM EST
woooooohhhh 35th post!!!
really its pathetic how everybody clambers to be 1st post on here.
Chestnuts roasted by marc lewis @ 05/07/2004 12:35 PM EST
Yah Marc, real pathetic.
Chestnuts roasted by Clamors @ 05/07/2004 12:48 PM EST
CYOA is awesome, but most cross promotions with CYOA. I recently picked up some CYOA Transformer books from 1985 in a thrift shop (#1 and #3), and boy, are they as bland as hell.
#1: The Decipticons take over the Dinobots and have them rampage across a few farms. The Transformers save the day with with magnets.
#3: The Autobots have to escape from a cave full of Insecticons... No biggy...
Chestnuts roasted by Mr. Mr. Mr. @ 05/07/2004 12:56 PM EST
The Charles Atlas seal of approval!
I loved CYOA. I remember Superbike the most. And some one where the kid levitated.
Chestnuts roasted by Piscez @ 05/07/2004 01:19 PM EST
Just 2 quick comments...I had the CYOA book with the haunted house that if you did the wrong thing, you could be dismembered by the "scary" gardener, or be turned into mice to be eaten by the witches cat. No never affected me much! And I ordered a "ghost kit" from one of those comic ads when I was a child, and was totally dissipointed by the ghost (it was just a trash bag with a ballon to put inside), but I was added to a list where they sent me a catalog once a year...very thrilling for a nerdy 13 yr old. Flash forwars many years, and I'm working at my promotions job with a new name ( I work in radio) and in the mail one day comes ...THE NEW JOHNSON-SMITH CATALOG! Even with my radio name on it! What a thrill to read after last seeing one 20 years previous...and as I sat and relived part of my childhood, I could help but think in the back of my head.........how did they track me down?
Chestnuts roasted by superflash68 @ 05/07/2004 01:34 PM EST
Kids at school used to have CYOA races where we'd each pick one and start reading and see whose story went on for the longest before they ended up mutilated because no one ever got to the good ending on the first try.
Chestnuts roasted by Gabbylicious @ 05/07/2004 02:54 PM EST
http://www.peakentertainment.co.uk/monsters.htm
Whoa!
Chestnuts roasted by Behonkiss @ 05/07/2004 02:55 PM EST
Awesome! I have 3 old Batman comics with classic ads such as Megaman 2 and TMNT cereal! Very fun times..
Chestnuts roasted by Andrew @ 05/07/2004 02:56 PM EST
My sister's Archie comic books had one of those ads that basically said "GET A BUNCH OF FREE JUNK IN THE MAIL" but not in so many words. Basically, it was give us your address and we'll send you free samples and put you on every possible mailing list known to man. My parents started a recycling program after that...
Chestnuts roasted by Clambake @ 05/07/2004 02:57 PM EST
Oh, and no mention of Sea Monkeys?
Chestnuts roasted by Clambake @ 05/07/2004 02:58 PM EST
Holy shit... the Quik Bunny mug... I bet that's still here in the house somewhere. I have to go tear my kitchen apart now.
Chestnuts roasted by Mike Fireball @ 05/07/2004 03:02 PM EST
I always loved the sea battle or civil war army men sets. By my rough estimation you got about 12,000 army men and it looked like a oil painting when you set it up.
Chestnuts roasted by Radworld @ 05/07/2004 03:10 PM EST
I'm with Clambake...Sea Monkeys have to be included in any discussion regarding Comic Book Ads. Those smelly little disgusting growth-stunted Mosquito Larva were quite entertaining.
Chestnuts roasted by Mark @ 05/07/2004 03:53 PM EST
No D&D ads?!?! I remember ads most prominently for the Monstrous Compendium and the various additional volumes (well, back then it was still sold in binder form) on the back, but I'm pretty certain there were plenty of other ads. Man, these things made me want to play D&D before I even had any idea what it was, I just knew that whatever was being advertised was something I wanted in on.
Guess I was fated to be a geek from the beginning.
Incidentally Mile High Comics still advertises in comics. They've had an ad running in Marvel (maybe DC, too lazy to get up and check) books for the past few months trying to get people to sell them high-grade copies of various golden and early silver age comics. Yeah. Cause I just had this 9.8 copy of Action Comics #1 (indeed one of the listed comics) lying around and I was wondering whether I should use it to wipe my ass or not. Anybody who reads comics and owns any of the issues mentioned knows what they're worth and is either wanting to buy, not ever selling, or already sold it.
Most of the ads in comics anymore are the same shitty slick ads you'd see in any youth-oriented publication for videogames, candy, and movies. Marvel in particular keeps trying to push the most assinine crap just because it's Marvel branded (in case I want to join a bolwing league and get a Hulk ball, purchase a set of Wolverine darts, or buy a Spider-Man cell phone)
Chestnuts roasted by Belgand @ 05/07/2004 04:06 PM EST
i was all about the CYOA books when i was a kid, and i still have a few of the, and i am pretty sure one of them is the fabled text containing gorga the space monster.
i had a couple of generic off-shoots, but my favorite ones were my choose your own horror or something like that..i had craven house horrors, and nightmare store, and i am pretty sure its not the most educational way to sepend your road trip to your grandmother's house trying to avoid the crazy girl that wants to pour acid down your throat...
i used to always cheat and flip through the book finding the one or two "good" endings (read: you didn't die) then i would follow the pages backwards and then be the hero of CYOA...
Thats right, i am proud to say that i had to cheat on a BOOK...
Chestnuts roasted by cycoyuk @ 05/07/2004 04:07 PM EST
Cycoyuk, I did the exact same thing with CYOA books... much like starting at the end of mazes and working towards the beginning... I never liked the idea of 'dying' and having to start over...
Chestnuts roasted by Nachokhaki @ 05/07/2004 05:07 PM EST
My nephew got those Texas Rattlesnake Eggs a couple months ago. Good for 30 seconds of entertainment.
I hope he doesn't end up a loser
Chestnuts roasted by grandtagulation @ 05/07/2004 05:09 PM EST
Cool article. I read quite a few COYA books in my early days, and enjoyed every page of it. I especially enjoyed when I chose the wrong page, and ended up killing my heroes. (I was quite the devil back then.) I got tired of it after a while, though, and ended up cheating (i.e. reading the whole thing front to back, seeing where all the endings are.)
Chestnuts roasted by Scott @ 05/07/2004 05:49 PM EST
In April, the town of Apache has a Rattlesnake Hunt and fair (one of many that pop up around this part of the country during the warm months), and a lot of booths sell the snake eggs joke. Best advice, the rubber-band and washer gadget can be put in almost any envelope. After South Park's "Good Times with Weapons" episode, I'll never look at the knife booths the same way again. Let's Fighting Love!
Chestnuts roasted by kingklash @ 05/07/2004 05:51 PM EST
I loved the CYOA. I had one of the "super size" titles I think was titled "You are a superstar" which would have you great at a lot of different things - acting. singing, sports. Two endings in that book still stick with me - in one you ended up as a chimpanzee after genetic experament and other had you captured by aliens and put in room where you de-aged to nothing. I think I read those two ending more than any other.
Chestnuts roasted by Emperor_Zorak @ 05/07/2004 06:56 PM EST
Some of the ads requested in the comments have already been covered on the site. (ie -- Sea Monkeys) Try out the search on the main page, you might get lucky.
Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 05/07/2004 07:00 PM EST
Ahhh, I miss the good ol' days. I never purchased, but boy did I stay up at night with my flashlight dreaming of what I'd order...
Chestnuts roasted by Pulsey @ 05/07/2004 07:07 PM EST
Great Stuff!
A friend of mine actually trademarked the ads of Johnson Smith and started a T-Shirt company.
You can now wear these wonderful old ads as a tribute to a more innocent time.
www.scam-co.com
Excelsior!
Chestnuts roasted by Matthew @ 05/07/2004 07:48 PM EST
This also reminds of those friggin' GRIT ads in the Harvey's comics. It always confused me why Richie Rich would friggin' want to sell GRIT when he's the richest boy in the world... (insert Bill Gates joke here).
Also, another inanity of comics I remember was those Hostess pie ads. Marvel especially seemed to run these in the mid-late 70s, and it appeared someone on the staff actually drew them. It was always funny seeing Hulk or Nick Fury defeat the enemies with Hostess pies. I remember they used to pull enemies out of nowhere too: "The Mad Magician" f'rinstance.
Still entertaining tho
Chestnuts roasted by AlphaCentaurian @ 05/07/2004 08:24 PM EST
Just had to add one comment...
"It's not a cookie, mother. It's a Newton."
Chestnuts roasted by XTacy @ 05/07/2004 08:55 PM EST
Ah, the old Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books. I remember reading those things back in, what, grade 2? For some reason, I always managed to get the ending where your guy got out fine, but the villain or whatever was still out there. Exactly how many of those things WERE there anyway? I remember seeing #118 in the library, but I never knew exactly HOW many there were...
Chestnuts roasted by DocDragon @ 05/07/2004 09:10 PM EST
I don't get it. I can't see anything but background. I really want to read the article. What's wrong?
Chestnuts roasted by Ke'Anna @ 05/07/2004 09:54 PM EST
For some reason lost in my bronze-age comic buying youth, I could actually READ Doug Sulipa's ads. THAT'S my super-power I betcha!!!
Chestnuts roasted by moot @ 05/07/2004 10:01 PM EST
I remember the Olympic Sales very, very well. I never sold anything, but my sister was involved with them for years. Not surprisingly, she didn't do a whole lot better than Matt collecting points (I don't remember ever getting anything really big, like the bike or sports gear). We spent whole summer afternoons poring over the catalogues, deciding on what we would get and what we would do with it.
I remember the Oreo word game ad. Like the Chips Ahoy adds Matt mentioned on the blog last year, the classic Nabisco ads were common sights in comic books and kids' magazines throughout the 80s.
Like the rest of you, I must have read at least thirty or fourty Choose Your Own Adventure stories. My elementary school library couldn't keep them stocked. My favorite was the one about the two kids who solve (or don't solve) the murder of a millionare. (The sequal about chasing the millionare's ghost was a bit too spooky for me, though.)
Chestnuts roasted by starwenn @ 05/07/2004 10:01 PM EST
Hey. My Grandfather served with Mr. Atlas in Panama. Always fun to drop in a conversation.
Chestnuts roasted by TinManFan @ 05/07/2004 11:31 PM EST
I read a few CYOA books in my youth. How many of you flipped to the page to see what would happen, and chose based on whether or not you would die? Did anyone really read these without trying to get the "best" ending?
Oh, and I had one of the Mario CYOA. It was a tie in with Pringles. Weird.
Chestnuts roasted by Cameron @ 05/08/2004 12:36 AM EST
Ah... Choose Your Own Adventure. My parents bought me a box of the first twenty for Christmas one year, because I loved to read and had a short attention span. But really, they were part of a nefarious government plot. See, I always marked pages and went back to see what the other choices did. Kind of like opening web pages in different windows and clicking around to various possibilities on the internet. Choose Your Own Adventures were programming us to be adept at Hypertext TEN YEARS BEFORE THE DEVELOPMENT OF HTML! WAKE UP PEOPLE!!! IT'S IN REVELATIONS!!!
Chestnuts roasted by Schwa @ 05/08/2004 01:02 AM EST
http://www.gamebooks.org/gallery/cjr05o.jpg
Chestnuts roasted by Thomas @ 05/08/2004 02:28 AM EST
I actually read Choose Your Own Adventure until I was 13. That and Encyclopedia Brown dominated my book case. And Matt, I have several of those ads and more in my old comic collection. I own the first issue of the Transformers comic from 1984, and there's an ad for The Last Starfighter in the front cover. And a Marvel Secret Wars comic, with an ad for Captain Crunch, who had been kidnapped by the Soggies. This prompted Spiderman to get involved.
Chestnuts roasted by Dude McGuy @ 05/08/2004 02:35 AM EST
The thing I remember most about Choose Your Own Adventure books was that often the bad endings were completely arbitrary. You know:
"You wake up in a bare room with no memory how you got there. There are two unmarked, featureless doors, one to your left and one to your right.
Go Right: Turn to pg. 4
Go Left: Turn to pg. 38"
Page 38:
"As you step through the door, you suddenly realize there is no floor in this room. It is, in fact, a shark pit. The sharks maul you before you can even scream...
You have died. Start over, looser."
I don't know whether my powers of reasoning were just really bad at that age, but dying all the time from things you could never predict annoyed me. I also remember there was, at the school library, one more complicated fantasy book where you had to use a dice for things like fighting goblins.
Chestnuts roasted by The Waffle Man @ 05/08/2004 02:39 AM EST
"The Adventures of Seinfeld & Superman"
http://www.jerry.digisle.tv/room.html
Chestnuts roasted by ME @ 05/08/2004 07:59 AM EST
i had several of the Mario Bros. CYOA, and Goosebumps. boy, was that some crazy reading.
while i've never done the greeting card / selling door-to-door gimmick--mostly cuz i'm a dumb girl who never read comics--i did once live vicariously through Beaver and Wally on that one episode where they had to sell rank perfume in order to earn points toward a movie projector prize. it turns out (SPOILERS!!! heh)
that it was a piece of crap and Ward bought them a real one.
yep.
Chestnuts roasted by zann @ 05/08/2004 12:18 PM EST
I had one of those morphing watches. #@$, I love those things ^^
Chestnuts roasted by Gymnopedie @ 05/08/2004 12:58 PM EST
I use to have the TV (sell 90 items) I didn't sell anything or answer the add, but my Uncle who was a trucker had that tv in his truck, for some reason he gave it to me. It had a 4.5" black and white screen and an AM/FM radio. I remember watching "Facts of Life" on it while hiding under my bed.
Chestnuts roasted by gbln22 @ 05/08/2004 01:28 PM EST
I actually did the Captain O thing for a few years. There was a clock radio/desklap/calculator thing that I got the first year, the second year I got a black and white TV. I was a bit of a hustler and it worked out okay for me. Wonder what happened to that stuff
Chestnuts roasted by jason @ 05/08/2004 01:34 PM EST
you wanna talk old skewl. I am a voracious swamp thing fan (specifically the alan moore years), I have every issue from #4 on. I have adverts for old atari video games and (to answr a question earlier) the Monsters Compendium. I think I have an advert for the old atari He-Man game as well. Dude, we were so puppets
Chestnuts roasted by jason @ 05/08/2004 01:40 PM EST
Yeah...I actually had the Bunny mug as well. I'm sad lol
Chestnuts roasted by EmperorBinky @ 05/08/2004 02:00 PM EST
I saw Bridget giving Captain O a BJ.
Chestnuts roasted by Kristal @ 05/08/2004 02:10 PM EST
I grew up in Winnipeg in the 80's and I have some vague memories of "Comic World" on frigid Portage Ave. It looked like the place where comics go to die. I remember it being dark and musky and every comic in back stock looked used. I think they moved locations at least once. Anyway, just my contribution!
Chestnuts roasted by Opteryx @ 05/08/2004 03:13 PM EST
I remember ads for a "30 foot remote controlled ghost" for about ten dollars. Does anyone remember the ads for x ray glasses? this was circa 79' 80'
Chestnuts roasted by MIKE @ 05/08/2004 03:17 PM EST
Favorite ending line from my Doctor Who book: "You escaped Omega by being born." There's a bit in it somewhere that tells you to turn to certain pages depending on whether the day's date ends in an odd or even number.
Chestnuts roasted by kingklash @ 05/08/2004 04:02 PM EST
Considering most things covered on this site are usually things I just barely remember, I'm rather shocked to see a bunch of ads I not only remember clearly, but can find the comics where they are printed in my basement. It's spooky....
Show us the Ewoks comic. I wish I still had mine. Moreso, I wish I still had the Count Duckula comic where he meets Geraldo. That happened!
Chestnuts roasted by Mars @ 05/08/2004 05:24 PM EST
Remember the alternatives to CYOA? I remember, there was a Time Traveller series where you got to jump through time in various eras.
There was also the green-ended Fighting Fantasy books by Steven Jackson & Ian Livingston. They had a more RPG feel to 'em, and it was an excuse to roll six-siders.
Chestnuts roasted by AlphaCentaurian @ 05/08/2004 07:09 PM EST
The one I always liked was the Hypnotize Your Friends ad. Or the X-Ray glasses.
Whatever.
Chestnuts roasted by The Return of Long Duck Dong @ 05/08/2004 08:54 PM EST
My favorite episode of "Get A Life" was when Chris Elliot finally got the one person-sized submarine from the back of the comic book.
Chestnuts roasted by Richard @ 05/08/2004 10:25 PM EST
One thing about the Captain O ads: The person to ask for ALWAYS changed. The ad on your site says to ask for Bridget, but various ads in other comic books always gave a different name to ask for.
Chestnuts roasted by John @ 05/08/2004 10:29 PM EST
lol - I thoroughly enjoyed reading that, great stroll down memory lane and quite funny. Kudo's
Chestnuts roasted by Kelly Madsen @ 05/08/2004 11:05 PM EST
I know Doug he's a friend of mine and if you've seen the comic world store(which is now phased out and Doug only does Mail order now) you would understand that ad.
I bought many a Batman comic from him and was quite disappointed that he closed his retail store, I still miss it to this day. On a brighter note he sells his goods at a local flee market in Winnipeg.
Gato
Chestnuts roasted by Live's in Winnipeg, MB @ 05/09/2004 12:49 AM EST
I wasn't really big into comic collecting as a kid, but every so often I'd pick a few up. Never turned out very lucrative... case in point: I've got mint condition (more or less) issues of Ghost Rider 2099. Eugh.
I remember once I bought some of that Fake Cola power from one of those comic book ads. As soon as I got it I decided to use it. My little sister was feeling sick, and you wouldn't believe how lucky I felt when she accepted my carbonated gift. She drank the colored water and she cried. I felt like an asshole.
Chestnuts roasted by Night_Trekker @ 05/09/2004 10:41 AM EST
Earlier, John said:
"One thing about the Captain O ads: The person to ask for ALWAYS changed. The ad on your site says to ask for Bridget, but various ads in other comic books always gave a different name to ask for. "
Yeah... that's because of the high turnover rate for working for Captain O. That grabass always scared the ladies off, and half the proceeds from peddling his crap was to help him in sexual harassment lawsuits.
-- Schwa ---
Chestnuts roasted by Schwa @ 05/09/2004 01:30 PM EST
Your site is awesome. I really enjoyed what you said about the "Choose Your Own Adventure" books. They turned me on to books when I was a kid, and now I am a librarian. I know that that's not exactly an exciting career, but I love it.
Chestnuts roasted by The Pants @ 05/09/2004 07:01 PM EST
Those CYOA books presaged hypertext and Web pages in more than one way, I think -- far too many of the 'You Fucked Up' endings, such as the aformentioned turned-into-mouse-and-eaten or de-aged-into-oblivion options, seem to have turned up in contemporary fetish fiction written by people of about the right age group to have read these things...
Chestnuts roasted by Jack Hare @ 05/09/2004 07:12 PM EST
Oh, yeah, incidentally, the 'Smoking Pet' gimmick isn't a means to make a real pet appear to smoke. It's just a cheap, squeezable plastic figurine that 'smokes' by puffing powder out of the provided fake cigarettes.
Chestnuts roasted by Jack Hare @ 05/09/2004 07:20 PM EST
I read CYOA books to death as a kid. I read mostly the real series as well as their super-sized double CYOA books. I did also enjoy the 'Space Ace' series, which had several different successful endings and would rate you at the end on how well you did. Another good series were the semi-historical time traveller series (don't remember the exact name, Time Gate?) where you would be sent into history to recover an artifact or learn, for example, the true origin of the Atlantis myth (theorized to be the destruction of the Minoan civilization in the book). In one, you could accidentally damage the time stream by preventing Abe Lincoln from being killed. When you did that, you would end up stuck in an infinite loop where it would send you between a handful of pages over and over (page 22: turn to page 35, page 35: turn to page 78, page 78: turn to page 22).
I read enough of the CYOA books to have a favorite author, Edward Packard. He was the author of CYOA #1, The Cave of Time, and I knew if his name was on the cover it was good reading. He had recurring characters in most of his books, and maybe his female scientist character created some of my lust for geeky women today.
I was also in O-thing. I did OK between selling to my family, relatives, and a couple of neighbors. I think I got 20-30 points. It was loads of fun digging through the catalogs and I spent hours looking at them in the comics too. Another fun thing as a semi-successful seller was delivering all the crap to people when it came to you in the mail. I think I 'bought' a Sony walkman or something.
I ordered a number of back issues from Tales of the Beanworld from Mile High Comics via eBay once.
Great article as always Matt. I agree that half the fun of comics of this era was pouring over the ads and imagining what I'd get. Unlike Matt I never actually participated in much mail away but spent much time fantasizing about it. My own ant lion ...
Chestnuts roasted by Kit @ 05/10/2004 12:34 AM EST
Click the homepage link for a great page on Edward Packard's work.
Chestnuts roasted by Kit @ 05/10/2004 12:40 AM EST
Damn... that just reminded me of another variant... remember the Transformers CYOA-type books? I'm sure there were other genres/licenses of these as well
Chestnuts roasted by AlphaCentuarian @ 05/10/2004 01:53 AM EST
I remember the CYOA books also. So great. I remember when my brother and I when we were younger, planned on stealing a bunch of books from the library including many CYOA's. There were so many windows, we planned on opening one and throwing out a ton of books so we could keep them. Glad we didn't do it, now that I think about it. Would we be considered bad kids for plotting to steal books, or good kids for wanting to read books at all?
Chestnuts roasted by G4L @ 05/10/2004 09:17 AM EST
For the guy who was posting about the "devil-face" in the Choose Your Own Adventure Ad--that's the Evil Power Master, of the CYOA book _War With the Evil Power Master_. If memory serves the book wasn't all that good.
Chestnuts roasted by Mike @ 05/10/2004 01:15 PM EST
This was on Fark today: www.chooseyourownny.com/
Chestnuts roasted by Richard @ 05/10/2004 02:38 PM EST
That's great Richard.
Chestnuts roasted by Beerstalker @ 05/10/2004 04:25 PM EST
Choose Your Own Adventure! Fantastic!
...And I thought I was the only guy who cut out and saved the Hostess Cupcake ads!
Chestnuts roasted by Aaron @ 05/11/2004 02:06 PM EST
My sister had the Oreo cup, but it wasn't wide enough to actually dunk an oreo in it. How retarded is that?
Chestnuts roasted by chris @ 05/11/2004 02:11 PM EST
My brother had the Intergalactic Spy CYOA book
It was different because only one of the paths would lead to the end
the rest killed you
After I read that I was severely disappointed that the other books didn't have a right answer
Chestnuts roasted by Buster @ 05/11/2004 11:12 PM EST
I have that count duckula comic book with geraldo and have scanned the cover, not sure how to post it though......
Chestnuts roasted by simoneagle @ 05/12/2004 05:21 PM EST
I have that count duckula comic book with geraldo and have scanned the cover, not sure how to post it though......
Chestnuts roasted by simoneagle @ 05/12/2004 05:21 PM EST
Dude, I loved CYOA, especially the one SuperAdventure I had, wich was Journey to the Year 3000. Does anyone else here remember that?
Anyway, sweet ads. I definitely would've gone for the Spidey backpack had I known about it. I remember participating in a similar offer when A&W gave away a color-changing Spidey mug.
Chestnuts roasted by Nate @ 05/12/2004 10:40 PM EST
I remember most of the ads. They also had similar ads in Boys' Life the evil magazine of Boy Scouts of America. I think the Johnson Smith ads are still in most comic books and magazines.
Chestnuts roasted by The Adamantium Elbow @ 05/13/2004 02:44 AM EST
Is there any chance of bringing back Jack Chick? Do you have links to the old ones you used to put up? I'm trying to tell my boyfriend about them but I just don't do it justice.
Chestnuts roasted by littlemissv @ 05/13/2004 10:22 AM EST
Man, doug Sulipa's Comic World . . . that's a frightening memory! I remember going there as a kid when we'd go into Winnipeg, and the descriptions so far are accurate; a huge maze of shelves & boxes of musty old comics. Once I took a huge box of comics in to sell, and ended up with barely enough to get an old X-Men that looked like somebody have given it to a really violent 5 year-old. If memory serves, it changed locations a number of times, before disappearing all together.
Chestnuts roasted by Killdozer @ 05/14/2004 01:59 AM EST
I greatly enjoyed the article, my dad is a big comicbook nerd who has been collecting since he was 9. He knows Doug Sulipa personally and is now an Overstreet Price Guide Advisor. Since there were always thousands of comics around, I remember each of those adds....I'm getting all misty and nastalgic now...
Chestnuts roasted by DMC @ 05/14/2004 08:59 PM EST
Y'know what was forgotten? that one where meat Loaf and the marvel Superheroes teamed up to fight world famine. "We'll help, Meat Loaf, but how?" I loved that one.
Chestnuts roasted by Max @ 05/14/2004 10:15 PM EST
I read those CYOA stories a hella lot, now that I think about it...
Chestnuts roasted by add!ct @ 05/16/2004 04:49 AM EST
I remember each and every one of those ads, and I'm sure if I thumbed through enough of my back issues of The Defenders (starring both silver surfer and the Hulk) or perhaps my bargain bin bonanza of Rom Spaceknight (Marvel) issues i could find dozens more for you. lol. And yes, we ALL collected those giant white boxes, like status symbols of the highest grade.
Chestnuts roasted by Ben @ 05/17/2004 01:54 PM EST
Back in the mid-90s, I read the Sonic The Hedgehog Archie Comics series. There were ads for Twizzlers and Shock Tarts.
The guy in the Shock Tarts ad looked like Beakman from Beakman's World and the photo of a man altered with Twizzlers Pull-and-Peels were funny as hell.
Chestnuts roasted by AngeFaitore @ 05/18/2004 05:29 PM EST
that Captain O. always looked very suspicious to me. I am glad I never joined it.
BTW I LOVED CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE!!!
Chestnuts roasted by Mike @ 05/19/2004 04:15 PM EST
that Captain O. always looked very suspicious to me. I am glad I never joined it.
BTW I LOVED CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE!!!
Chestnuts roasted by Mike @ 05/19/2004 04:32 PM EST
that Captain O. always looked very suspicious to me. I am glad I never joined it.
BTW I LOVED CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE!!!
Chestnuts roasted by Mike @ 05/19/2004 05:04 PM EST
Oh man those ads, who could forget them? And I was king of CYOA books, The best of the Best had to be the Zork novels. I would always keep my thumb in the page before making any major decisions, you know, just in case. Great article man.
Chestnuts roasted by Steve @ 05/25/2004 01:27 AM EST
I HAD the Mario CYOA book where all of Bowser's kids were in it and you and Luigi had to get away without running into one of them. (Wendy, Larry, etc.) Those bastards. Also, in the book you were Mario. But I was ALWAYS Luigi....i had a love/hate relationship with that book.
Chestnuts roasted by Muppet Baby @ 05/27/2004 03:42 PM EST
Wow... a number of thoughts come to mind after reading this article! Well, for one, with CYOA books, I had one that was entitled, 'Star Trek- Phaser Fight' or something to that end, and I swear, it seemed like at every turn, I'd get the bad end of the stick, either having the Enterprise get bashed up by meteors, Klingons taking over he ship, or some space spores killing the crew. Dammit, Jim!
And as far as Mile High Comics go, I too, live in Denver, and as a matter of fact, as a kid, Mile High was a mecca for any comic book collector, hardcore to neophyte to casual collector (I'm 25 now, BTW.) At any rate, when Image Comics was still extremely hot in the 1990s, my twin brother actually went to Mile High Comics' superstore well north of Denver and had his GEN13 #1 signed by J. Scott Campbell. My bro even had a picture taken with him, and was the envy of everybody for a while! For a comic book fan, that's definitely a cool moment.
Oh, and I was just wondering, Matt... when are you gonna write an article about those frickin' milkcaps known otherwise as POGS? Those things... that fad... was just odd.
Keep up the good work!
Chestnuts roasted by RKMtwin @ 06/02/2004 01:28 AM EST
Growing up in Winnipeg, I had the privilege of visiting Doug Sulipa's Comic World whenever I was downtown on school in-service days, or seeing a movie on Saturday afternoons. What the beautiful advertisement conceals is the fearful nature of the store...a grungy basement store that was never cleaned, where the employees continually smoked pot, and where one of the employee's (perhaps Doug Sulipa's) own mother was an employee who couldn't be bothered to be helpful and was continually screamed at by the employees. Unfortunately, they had a really great four-comics-for-a-buck bin that always sucked me back in, and built up my Spider-Man collection.
Chestnuts roasted by Tyler @ 06/11/2004 02:24 PM EST
Wow. I actually had the robot watch from Bonkers. I love this site, it has everything I did when I was a kid!
Chestnuts roasted by Chris @ 06/29/2004 08:53 PM EST
Batfreak's the name (via GYBO) - you have fanz, mate.
yep, i was BIGTIME on the CYOA books, and I never bothered responding to the plethora of ads - why would you from Down Under?
What WAS fun, though, was coming to grips with the value of the American dollar WAY BEFORE the Australian dollar got floated... ho boy.
Chestnuts roasted by Australian reader @ 08/27/2004 05:37 AM EST
heh i remeber all the things from the comic books..my favorite comics were GI Joe.strange for a girl but ahh well..heh thanks for bringing me back to my child hood for a little while..mm..now i am craving bonkers and nabisco cookies.:)
Chestnuts roasted by the sunmaid @ 09/19/2004 02:08 AM EST
