The original pester power generation has come of age and the toy marketers have cottoned on. They know you're more likely to pressurise your kids to buy certain toys than the other way round. Louise Holden reports

If you spent any time in a toy shop over Christmas, you may have experienced déjà vu. A number of last year's successful toy lines were in the retro category - toy revivals from the 1970s and 1980s accounted for a small but significant portion of overall sales.

This year, expect all the old faces to come flooding back, as toy companies cop on to the potential for pester power in reverse. Parents get a warm feeling when they see the plastic friends of their youth: what thirtysomething Dad will not want to buy the 20th anniversary edition of Transformer Optimus Prime for his son's birthday?

You name an old toy flame and you're practically guaranteed a reunion. Last year saw the return of Care Bears, My Little Pony, Strawberry Shortcake, Transformers, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Masters of the Universe. Film remakes of old TV and comic series such as The Incredible Hulk and Spiderman have also helped to feed the nostalgia frenzy. Even Bill and Ben The Flowerpot Men have emerged from the toolshed after 50 years.

During the 1980s children became the focus of concerted advertising for the first time. In the intervening years marketers have perfected the art of recruiting little sales reps to work in our homes, employing an arsenal of dirty tricks from emotional blackmail to public disorder. For years parents have complained about the bully-boy tactics kids are prepared to use in order to get what they see on TV. Now, the original pests have come of age and had children of their own. Toy marketing executives, ever on top of their game, are bypassing children and going straight to the generation who invented pester power.

Our weakness for Care Bears and He-Man is not just about personal nostalgia, however. We may also be motivated by fear of the 'Brave New World' our children face. There's a wholesomeness to many of the 1980s toys that attracts parents turned off by the sinister violence of computer games such as Silent Hill or the overt sexuality of dolls such as the Bratz series. They've got us on both counts - love of the old and fear of the new.

I know it's only March, but round about now toy shops are ordering stock for Christmas 2004. If you want to be ahead of the game, look out for revivals along the following lines in 2004 - Etch A Sketch, Slinkies, Rubik's Cube, Ghostbusters, Weebels and Garbage Pail Kids Cards. Anorak parents in our midst may even have kept the originals.

If you have a stash of My Little Ponies in the attic, dust them off now.

Other events on this year's toy calendar include the 40th Anniversary G.I. Joe Collection, the 20th Anniversary edition of Transformer's Optimus Prime, the Star Wars Original Trilogy Collection and the 30th Anniversary Dungeons and Dragons Set.

Get ready to see parents in toy shops nagging their children to choose Luke Skywalker in the X-Wing Fighter or He-Man in Castle Greyskull. We don't need another hero.

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