“Bergbeklimmer”

Some cheap stuff that I bought recently online here. First of all I bought a MOSC (mint-on-sealed-card) Dutch Cobra Action Pack from Hasbro’s vintage 3.3/4-inch G.I. Joe line. This is the Mountain Climber action pack, or “Bergbeklimmer” as it is known by its Dutch translation. The Mountain Climber action pack is a motorized accessory that was released in the US in 1987. The Dutch version was released in 1988, as will have been the case with all the other European versions of this toy. It was probably part of the last wave of G.I. Joe toys that were released in Dutch-only packaging. From 1989 Hasbro switched to dual language Dutch-French packaging for both the Dutch and Belgian market in order to cut costs.

On the back of the card it is interesting to note that although the copyright year is 1988, the company name is still listed as Hasbro Bradley, Inc. As readers of my funky new series of articles on MB Transformers will know, Hasbro Bradley, Inc was only used between September 1984 and June 1985, after which they switched to just Hasbro, Inc. Now, of course it can take some time for this name change to trickle through to all their products, but 3 years???

The U.S. version of this toy carries a (correct) 1987 copyright notice of Hasbro, Inc., so it’s kind of strange why this Dutch version of the toy that was released a year later still manages to carry an outdated company name on the copyright notice. Also interesting to note is that MB is mentioned on the card back as MB International B.V. in Utrecht, Holland. This was one of Hasbro’s many European MB subsidiaries after their takeover of the Milton Bradley Company in 1984. Hasbro continued to use MB for the distribution of their products like Transformers and G.I. Joe in the Netherlands up until the 1990’s.

“MB Puzzles”

I also got these G.I. Joe and Transformers puzzles. Since MB was well known for its puzzles and board games it was only logical for Hasbro to have MB create and sell puzzles based on two of their hottest properties. The Dutch MB factory was located in Ter Apel, Groningen and primarily created puzzles and some board games. It closed down in mid 1994.

“One More Thing”

For those who are waiting for the second part of my MB Transformers article series, stay tuned! The next installment should be online within 24 hours!