Replying to this post from this thread:
I spent most of my childhood in Malaysia, and I only became interested in Transformers around 1990-91 (I can't remember exactly, I was about 4 or 5).
My memory is a bit foggy, but back then, the store shelves in KL were loaded with G1 Headmasters (originally released in 1987), and shortly after; the Powermasters and Jr Headmasters started showing up. Some might think this is probably left-over stock from the late 1980s, but the Headmasters were still being advertised on TV, and the Headmasters anime was aired on RTM TV1.
Even though we had the 1987-88 toys, we didn't get the whole line. I couldn't find any of the Targetmasters in any store (I remember because I wanted Pointblank but could never find him or the other Targetmasters. I also never knew what G1 Hot Rod/Blurr/Scourge looked like until I was an adult).
We didn't get any of the gold-carded/boxed G1 reissues in Malaysia/Singapore. However, after the whole Headmaster crazed died down, some gold-packaged Pretenders showed up. We got Jazz, Bumblebee, Starscream and the carded Pretenders like Octopunch, Bludgeon, Stranglehold, Longtooth, etc; but none of the fancy ones like Thunderwing or Vroom (well, I never saw them).
Of course, alongside the Headmasters/Powermasters/Pretenders, we got some Action Masters and Micromasters (they weren't so popular).
I know, the above sounds like the description of an alternate reality; and it drives me nuts that there's no documentation on the internet about what was available in 1990s Malaysia-Singapore, combined with the knowledge that the first Transformers I ever got officially came out in 1987, even though I got them in the 1990s.
If anyone lived in Malaysia/Singapore in the 1990s and was a Transformers fan back then, please feel free to back me up or correct me.
To remind myself that I didn't get high from inhaling carbon monoxide and hallucinated the whole thing; I have with me the very first Transformers that I ever got (a photo below that I just took for the sake of this post).
The first Transformer(s) my parents bought me were Pounce and Wingspan, then Highbrow several weeks later. Sadly, Wingspan is no longer with me. These were bought from a department store called Jusco (called "Aeon" nowadays) in the early 1990s.
Thanks for sharing that story, it was a really interesting read.
"I will not have my fwiends widiculed by your common soldiewy..."
I was holidaying in Kuala Lumpur in 1992 and saw a lone 1987 Headmaster sitting on a store shelf. It was the only TF that I found on that trip.
Your memory serves you well and it's great to get a first hand history like that.
The figures that would have been released were the legitimate Chinese G1 reissues, which were also released in Australia in limited numbers and figures, but Asia would have had way more.
Check out the links for more info.
http://fredsworkshop.com/vchina.html
http://highendtfs.com/?q=node/15
I still function.....................while killing threads. ;-)
Yeah, shelves were pretty bare back in 1992. Most toy stores had a few shelf-worn Micromasters and Pretenders that no one wanted, and that was it. The Pretenders were really unpopular, and Stranglehold and Longtooth were the biggest shelf-warmers. The Transformer dry-spell ended when G2 stuff started popping up in 1993-94.
Thanks for the links. I can now confirm that the Transformers I got were in fact Chinese reissues. The most telling is Pounce and Wingspan. I've seen photos of the original Pounce and Wingspans online, and they all had an extra rub-sticker on their chests that indicated whether they turned into Eagles or Jaguars. My copy of those toys didn't have those stickers. Instead, mine only had regular Decepticon logos, similar to the ones described in that guide you sent me.
Also, I pulled out my copy of Brainstorm (as shown in the photo) - just a random toy from that era, and noticed that the country on the copyright stamp got blocked out, similar to that of the Seaspray shown in the guide.
I apologise for the poor quality of the photo. I only have a mobile phone camera, and it's not a very good one. But you can see there is a noticeable outdentation where the origin country normally should be.
I think my (March 31st) Toybento order got lost in the mail...
I was told it was posted April 18th (almost 4 weeks ago), and since that time I have had three items arrive from America that were shipped since that date.
Singapore is usually about as quick as HK, so it should have been here about two weeks ago.
These darn Cyber Battalion toys are like my white whale - not being able to find them in HK, finding only a couple of them in America (at BotCon, but very expensive), and now losing affordable ones in the mail. I think I may just avoid this small series of toys...
(the ironic thing is that they told me when the order was being sent, that it was delayed because one toy got lost on its way to them... so it only makes sense the the rest of the toys followed its lead and got lost on their way to me as well )