[TenScaryMonkeys]

I still consider the 1/18 scale BBI Apache helicopter to be the best $35 I've ever spent, and am deeply saddened that their in-scale vehicles don't seem to be readily available at retail anymore. The BBI WWII aircraft in particular were utterly stunning; they were durable, well-constructed items with paint as good as one would expect from a model several times the $40 cost they demanded at most retail shops.

That said, I understand and empathize with both the parental and retailer dilemmas - the toys are so huge and devour so much room that many parents can't justify the sheer space they eat up (even at BBI's ludicrously low price points, let alone Hasbro's occasionally astronomical ones), and the fear of a box that massive shelf-warming today's increasingly limited toy aisles is an undeniable consideration. Heck, they broke the aforementioned Apache down to as small a footprint as one can expect without sacrificing durability, and that monster's box still clocked in at almost 2 feet long. Despite post-Christmas clearance sales bringing the behemoth down to around $15, it was still really easy to find that toy around here until nearly February. That's simply absurd for an item as well-crafted and undeniably appealing as the BBI Apache.

At the end of the day, while I would kill a man in cold blood with a shovel for a shot at, say, a BBI 1/18 P-40 Tomahawk in the $40-$50 range, I fear that the days of viability for the affordable in-scale vehicle are fast waning for all but the most lucrative toy lines. Star Wars and GI Joe might be able to crank out one or two from time to time (lines with that kind of broad, ingrained cultural recognition are few, and only the 800 pound gorillas can afford those kinds of risky moves in these unstable times), but I seriously doubt that we'll again see an era of items that sizable across a broad range of properties like we did in the heyday of the 80's.