The 1983 Sears Wish Book. Ain’t that cover photo cozy?

A lot of good stuff in this year’s catalog for RPG nerds, including Crossbows & Catapults, Star Frontiers, Traveller, the Star Trek RPG, 221B and Space Opera. You can definitely feel the Star Wars sci-fi vibes overshadowing the fantasy elements. I’m not too familiar with the Dark Riders board game (to the right of C&C) and the miniatures still seem like a weird inclusion, but my favorite thing is actually the core D&D books – look close. Despite having them for the photo shoot last year, this year they just faked it. That top book is supposed to be Monster Manual II if you can believe it.

I included a couple additional pages of toys because come on, how could I not (you can see the two-headed dragon Gaifon from the Other World line that I posted last week, among other things). I’ve said before on here that I love catalogs because they’re time capsules, but the Sears Wish Books are really something else, like a cultural and aesthetic encyclopedia. A vast swath of 1983 is right here, laid out photo by photo. Nostalgic, sure, but something else, too. Like a time machine.