What do you think of the Jet Streex toys from the 90s?

[dark]

In the early 90s hot wheels made some toys called streex, which were kind of like fzero hovercraft cars (they were only pieces of plastic, no wheels or metal parts) that could be shot with a pump launcher on a smooth floor. Then they made plane versions of the toys and provided a 45 degree piece to go on the pump launcher that would launch them into the air. They could actually glide a good distance and would travel pretty fast. It was also fun to launch them off something high like a deck or out of a window in your house as they would obviously glide even further.

Anyways, I always found them to be neat, not only because of the gliding action, but also because the planes basically look like something you'd find in a typical Japanese shmup of the era. I half heartedly want to collect them, but at the same time don't feel like spending the money.

Anyone else a fan of these, or remember them from back in the day? Here's a few pictures to jog your memory and/or show what they look like:

[ChurchOfSolipsism]

Yeah man, I think I remember them, but I didn't own them, just saw the add a couple of times when I was still a little shaver. I loved everything that could fly. If I had known back then that in 30 years time we'd get something like drones I would have spent all my free time trying to invent a time machine just to get to the future and get my hands on one of them.

[Sly Cherry Chunks]

Anyways, I always found them to be neat, not only because of the gliding action, but also because the planes basically look like something you'd find in a typical Japanese shmup of the era.

There was something called Ring Raiders that had a similar vibe:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vACHhiLeyo

I spent some time earlier this year restoring a beat up old Starmax Bomber, again for the shmuppy vibe. Thinking about adding a second one to my collection (Third if you count the one in my parent's loft) but browsing ebay nowadays is a real drag. Imagine waking up one day and deciding you wanted to collect the first wave of Shooting Game Historica. Just impossible.

[dark]

Oh yeah, you reminded me, I think I had a Ring Raiders children's book as a kid. I guess there was a tv show but I don't think I ever saw it.

I did have one of the starcom toys that I got from a tag sale in the 90s just b/c I thought it looked cool. It was this small black plane. I've always liked small, nimble fantasy spaceships like this, maybe one of the reasons I like shmups in the first place.


The 80s and 90s were a good time for fantasy spaceship designs in games, tv shows/anime and comics. The 00s was ok too, but as you could see with Cave shmups and other Japanese games and media, it seemed like after awhile spaceships and machinery fell out of favor to lolitas, fairies and maids.

[Sly Cherry Chunks]

Oh man I have a Shadow Parasite around here too somewhere. What an awesome little design, especially how it compresses down into that neat black triangle.

The 80s and 90s were a good time for fantasy spaceship designs in games, tv shows/anime and comics. The 00s was ok too, but as you could see with Cave shmups and other Japanese games and media, it seemed like after awhile spaceships and machinery fell out of favor to lolitas, fairies and maids.

You could probably plot a graph showing how the decline of interest in Star Wars and the space program influenced trends in anime and toys. Somewhere around the mid 90s Star Wars stopped being about lasers, droids and space battles and became a story solely about the Jedi and the Force.

"Waifuism" is just a market response to our increasingly sexless society. Love it or hate it - it's actually what people want.