Word on the internet streets is that soon, very soon, Burger King will begin selling kid's meals that include Wii U related toys. As a former fast food toy collecting junkie, this makes me feel worried (and overweight).
Danger. Delicious danger.
Adult concerns of water retention aside, I think this is cool! I could get into a deep discussion on the moral standings of unhealthy food companies capitalizing on a child's love for toys, but I'll skip that and go straight to a relevant story of my own: the year of Pokemon toys at Burger King.
It must have been 1999 or 2000, Pokemon hysteria had not quite yet reached a boiling point for the nation, but I was in pretty deep. Burger King announced that it would be carrying pokeballs complete with a secret Pokemon inside with their kids meals but that also, ALSO, they were selling, for a mere pittance, life-sized pokeballs that contained 23 karat gold plated collectible Pokemon cards.
You only need to see the first few minutes of this to see what the toys looked like.
Feel free to watch the whole half an hour, if you'd like.
I went absolutely nuts. Like, begging my mom and grandma to take me to Burger King two or three times a week so that I could collect as many of the toys as possible. Not all 150(+1) original Pokemon were available, but a good number of them were. I was overjoyed to see that Oddish was on the list, and I think I may have died and gone to heaven briefly when I cracked open a tiny pokeball one day and a squashed, plushie Oddish fell out.
There were only six gold plated cards to collect, and try as I might I only ever got three of them. It was a dangerous time of picking up extra chores, pestering adults to drive me to town, devouring excessive numbers of fries, and having my heart beat nearly out of my chest as I waited to see which Pokemon was coming my way. I held my breath in the car, waiting to hear if they had a new batch of gold plated cards in that week, crossing my fingers and wishing for one I hadn't yet purchased.
My hysteria took me to near burger eye makeup heights. [source]
This time period will live in infamy in my head. The best kids meal toys ever. Well, them and when the toys were watches of different Nickelodeon shows. That was another frenzy of mine, but instead of collectibles on the shelf it resulted in me wearing multiple watches on each wrist. What a bamf.
Moving along! What makes the Wii U toys even more dangerous (if that's even possible) is that they will (supposedly) have NFC functionality with the gamepad. REAL WORLD APPLICATIONS. Better start saving money now and scheduling in some work outs to offset those burgas!
-MJ
*burger photos from the following locations: 1, 2, 3, 4
4 comments:
Very cool that the toys will have some sort of functionality with the Wii U. I seem to recall that Burger King had their own Xbox games that they were selling a few years back. They clearly know how to market to the gaming community.
I would go and pick a up a kids meal from them just to show some love...if the damn McDonald's Monopoly game hadn't started yesterday!
Yeah, those xbox Burger King titles were.... weird. You're right though, they definitely know what they're doing!
Oh gosh, McDonalds started their Monopoly again? My friend is doomed.
So am I, ate there twice today. Once on the way to the gym and then again on the way home. "Stupid addicting game, that I never win but always play..."
At least you included a trip to the gym xD And yeah, I've never won anything good. Just some extra fries here and there. But man, I love french fries so it's not all bad!
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