Retroist Photon Podcast – The Retroist

At one point in the mid-80s, two light based combat gun games hit the market, Lazer Tag and Photon. I wanted Lazer Tag and would eventually get one, but the first set I got was Photon. Which my grandmother got me as a very thoughtful Christmas Gift.

In the episode I start by talking about how poorly I received the gift, but to my grandmother’s credit, she kept it in mind. Many months later she would surprise me with a visit to a Photon arena in Wildwood, NJ. It was AMAZING. While I might have still been interested in Lazer Tag, I was suddenly proud to have a Photon set.

After the story I move onto Photon itself. I talk about the arenas, the home guns, the toys, the TV show, video game and much more.

Photon had a lot going for it, but the toy business is rough. If you don’t catch on completely, its hard to become a multi-year hit. Despite the arenas and the TV show, Photon just couldn’t make the leaps. Still for those of us who owned a set or got to visit and area, it was very memorable.

The light shines!

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• This is the 335th episode of the Retroist Podcast and episode 10 of the new season. I planned on doing this show back-to-back with my Lazer Tag Podcast. It has only taken 7 years for me to get to it.

• We didn’t go to Wildwood, NJ very often and when we did, we tended to squeeze as much out of it as we could. This might have been my best trip there with my family.

• I wish I could bottle the enthusiasm I had for the gun set I had once I got out of that Arena.

• You can hear segments of the music in the commercial for the Arena in Baltimore that I play. Now looking for the laser disc, although I am sure a lot of other people are doing the same. Here is a digitized version posted onlne.

• I think we had 3 of these arenas in NJ.

• Do check out video that Flack shot of the last Photon arena.

• Entertech’s water guns were bananas. Still amazed they existed. My friends and I were obsessed them. The biggest problem with these water gun (besides the realism that scared people) was that they used up their water quickly.

• The Photon TV show reminds me a lot of Power Rangers. When the music shows up in an episode, its pretty exciting.

• When I look through old TV guides about Saturday Morning, I am always surprised at just how much kid’s programming you could get every Saturday Morning. Just hours and hours of cartoons.

• Bonus Clipping should be up on Patreon tomorrow.

• Music on the show is, as always, by Peachy.

Thanks for listening to the show and I hope you have a great weekend.