NoJoe!

[the enemy muton]

What really got my back up was being described as a 'clique'. When you consider all the children who grew up playing with GI Joe and it's off shoots in the UK, Ireland, pretty much all of Europe, India, Australia, New Zealand, China, Japan, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Egypt and probably more that I have not mentioned it must run into the 100s of thousands. Looking at it that way, you could call YoJoe the 'clique'. I'm pretty sure all the international markets combined could easily outnumber the home market. And let's not forget it was Action Force that came first, and they do say there is no such thing as a coincidence in business. So there.

[Chopper]

Especially if you own or have trade agreements with the company that started it all.

[Lady Jaye]

And let's not forget it was Action Force that came first

Nonsense, the first wave of GI Joe was in 1982.

[the enemy muton]

But wasn't the first wave of AF '81?

[Lady Jaye]

How difficult is it to check the toy-archive? The link is right above you!

http://www.bloodforthebaron.com/toys/index.html

If you wanna scream fine, but then have your data right.

[the enemy muton]

Just been doing that.

I stand corrected, they were both indeed '82. I still have my suspicions that Palitoy may have been the ones to come up with the idea of shrinking Action Man aka GI Joe down to 3 3/4", especially when you also consider it was they who first developed Kung Fu Grip, life like hair, and Eagle Eyes. Although both companies took different approaches to the idea, it does seem one hell of a coincidence - especially when you take into account what Chopper pointed out.

[fuzzchile]

Here's a short history of Joe and Action Man/Force as toys
GI Joes been going since 1964 whilst Action Man came two years later from my understanding, GI Joe after the Vietnam War wanted to appeal to kids with a less military theme so they bought out the Adventure Team range I guess my first Action Man came from this team been a climber with a beatnik beard lol The life like look came from the Brits apparently Whilst the Kung Fu Grip was an American invention , Then after the success of Steve Austin (I had on of those with Red Tracksuit and boss trainers ) GI Joe made a range of toys to combat Mattels success with The Six Billion Dollar Man by brinnging out Bulletman and Atomic Man (This is where Eagle Eyes were first developed ) but it was the end of the line for the original 12 ' Figures...ibtw in Europe The Adventure team figures were known as "Action Team"(In Germany and Italy ) "Action Joe" in France (Those Frenchies lol) whilst in Japan it they were know as GIJOE and "Combat Man".. In Brazil "Falcon" whilst smaller figures were known as "Comandos em Ação".. I could go on as they were sold world wide all with different names
Then Came Star Wars and following that Ronald Reagan and everything changed Cobra/Duke/Snake Eyes etc first arrived in 1982 under the brand "Real American Hero" and was a big success I guess Palitoy saw this and created a range of toys but instead of Cobra having The Red Shadows as the enemy . The first mistake is to brand something as just American it already isolates other nations thats why AF works better for me more realistic kind of like a Super Nato .. but we all know what happened next .. but lets just say all these toys come under one big happy international family and are all official Joes or Action Men as they've both had a long history ..sorry to waffle just been reading up about it seems very interesting

[tintinlostsnowy]

I always thought they came out in 1981 too, probably because of the 1981 date on the bottom of the vehicles but that's probably just when they were starting to develop them?

[Thundershot]

'Life like body' was the American invention, Palitoy didn't adopt this redesign & developed thier own far superior 'Dynamic Physique' figure.
Bill Pugh, one of Palitoys design team, invented gripping hands, in (or around) 1972, for Palitoy, which Hasbro then incorporated into Joe...Palitoy had also introduced the flocking process for life like hair a few years before, again introduced by Hasbro a year or so after AM 1st had it, to the Joe range.
The biggest reason for the introduction of the smaller Joe's & Action Force was the popularity of Kenner's Star Wars range, profit margins to manufacturing costs were so much higher then the 12" toy lines.

I think the 1981 date stamp is more to do with the designs patent or copy right, rather than than year of 1st release isn't it?

[The Baron]

I don't see that it matters, but for ref. August 1982 was the official launch of Action Force.