SHADOW CLIMBER

A recent casual purchase for the Wotan Archive, on ebay brought this odd little toy. Listed very briefly and cheaply, it was difficult to tell exactly what I was buying as the toy wasn't shown out of the box.

However, when it arrived, I was surprised and rather pleased. The 8WD Space Invader is an 80's cash-in toy put together from scraps around a Hong Kong workshop, but despite this, has a certain charm.

The body is probably a derivative of the Non-Fall Space Explorer series, like the Hover version above. Like the Hover toy, it also borrows the Project Sword Space Glider switch (the bell-shaped part under the searchlight), which is purely decoration on the Invader. The dome is semi-transparent on the new toy, with a flashing light inside.

Possibly the biggest giveaway that the unknown toy company has pillaged parts is the add on chrome accessory part. On the box, it is shown as a twin A-A gun, bun mine came with a searchlight. These two pieces are both lifted directly from the oft copied Lone Star Modern Army series toys of the early sixties. These weapons were rolled out again around about the same time as the Space Invader on the back of Star Wars fever, for the Space Commander range.

 Its probably very likely that there is a third version of the 8WD Space Invader sporting one of the Lone Star Modern Army rocket launcher units which have appeared time and again on many space toys.

But the design and the main reason I bought it, reflects that most elusive of toys, the Century 21 Lunar Climber, a modern myth which has so far only been spotted once on ebay, during a bitter bid war between myself, Woodsy and the unknown lucky winner over ten years ago!