Mall of America Nerf Arena Grand Opening Announced

The newest Nerf Arena in the Midwest is now officially set to open at the end of this month. Tactical Urban Combat just solidified a Grand Opening date of December 28th and are offering free nerf gameplay from 10am to 3pm. Nerf and laser tag combat in the Mall of America is about to be a reality.

We've been tracking some awesome developments from the already successful business in Minnesota. Tactical Urban Combat has been running a nerf-only location at Eden Prairie Center in a suburb of Minneapolis since October of 2017.  They have their own scenarios like a custom version of capture the flag and their own concoction in a game-style they call Sabotage.

Check out the Grand Opening announcement below (from their facebook feed). We also get a look at the laser tag system they'll be using.

I love CEO Dustin Shallenberger's energy. Also the Grunt Style shirts are sick. If you haven't watched some of his facebook videos and live updates on the Tactical Urban Combat page, I would highly recommend catching up. He's shown passion every step of the way, often doing his transports and builds far into the early mornings to get this opening on the road.

Unfortunately, I don't think I can get a team up to Minnesota in time for the Grand Opening. In fact I'm writing this from Florida between work trip duties. I'm really stoked to check out the new digs soon, though!!

Yet another reboot...? and working with a friend!

What's up, Warriors?!

Long time, no talk. I hope this little note finds you well. I've missed you!

I don't know if you've caught up yet, but we've been able to flex the creative editing muscle a little bit with our friends at Foam From Above!
Check out the latest and greatest videos from Vas the Stampede over there. This badass-looking golden X-Shot Chaos line is the latest, but we've had a chance to work together on the last several.

More to come with obligatory explanations about our absence and so on. Let's say for now, F2A kept me going on the hobby during a dark age. I'm very excited for now to just be lining up to play in games all over the midwest and maybe back West a little bit too! Let us know what you think of the new edits!

Click Click BAMF (left) and Foam From Above (right) just chillin'.

In other news, Coop might be doing a thing soon too! (No, not that coop. Calm down.)
Alright warriors, until we meet again; Game On!

~CJ

Nanofire in the Wild

The wifey found the two colors of Nanofire out in the wild at ALDI here in Iowa just after Easter.

The Nerf N-Strike Nanofire is a new release this year. They've got it in blue and green. There are two holes on the top for horizontal ammo storage.

The official description: 

This compact Nerf blaster lets kids take it almost anywhere to start blasting almost anytime! Load 1 dart into the barrel, pull down the priming handle, and pull the trigger to fire. Reload and fire again! Storage for 2 darts on the handle. Comes with 3 Elite darts. Available in 2 colors: blue and red (each sold separately).

Yeah, you read that right. It says the two colors are blue and red. So the question is, will we see a red one, too?

Many will just write these off as Jolt repacking, and that's not totally untrue. To be exact, this is a repackage of an older repackage of the Jolt. The blaster was called the Dart Tag Stinger that came out in 2013. The biggest draw I see is that you're getting good, usable blasters for family wars or single-shot-only games for 4 bucks if you get them at ALDI.

If you're not lucky enough to have an ALDI nearby, they're going for 10.99 on Amazon.com at this writing. Better yet,  go to www.hasbrotoyshop.com and get it for the MSRP of $4.99.

Sorry for the short blurb. Today, we're heading out for an anniversary game at Carnegie Stout Public Library in Dubuque, Iowa. We'll be recording a review on the road, finalizing interviews for our new series we've been promising and playing in two hours of non-stop Nerf action among the stacks in an actual Carnegie library!

I love this job! ~CJ

TOY FAIR REPORT: Even More New Blasters Announced

This post will update with images and thoughts throughout the week.

Now for a couple of Nerf things we didn't really hear about during the Toy Fair 2018 coverage and a few things we just have more on.

The one I didn't hear a peep on or see anything on for sure was the Nerf Doomlands Holdout. The pic comes from our friends at Nerf and the description comes from their Hasbro Product Page.

NERF DOOMLANDS HOLDOUTIn a post-apocalyptic future, the Earth is left a barren, lawless wasteland. Out of the ashes, a lone hero emerges to bring justice to a doomed land. This is the world of Doomlands! Scope out some action with the Holdout blaster, which has a removable targeting scope that slides onto a tactical rail. Load a dart into this single-shot blaster, pull back the handle, and pull the trigger to fire. Includes 2 Elite darts that can be stored on the scope.• Includes 2 blasters and 2 darts.• Single-shot blaster• Detachable scope• Includes 2 Elite Doomlands darts• Transparent area reveals inner firing mechanism• Ages 8 and up

New Click Click BAMF T-Shirts for Nerf and Foam Warfare Fans!

What's up, Warriors!? I'll tell you what's up; new t-shirt designs!

We got approved for our Amazon Merch account over the weekend and started submitting the work. You've got to be careful with the way their shop works though. You can't say things like Youtube and Nerf in the description because they (Amazon) view it as a copyright infringement. That's unfortunate for people searching for things like "Nerf" on Amazon, because they won't find our designs as easily as you.

R U Nerfous? - $25.00
It's a word. Well, at least it's a word now. Check out the listing for the new dictionary definition we put on the back.

It's just kind of a different way to celebrate your Nerf fandom.

Official Fan Shirt - $35.00
This one costs a little more, for a couple of reasons.
As you know, we've been working hard on a pilot for our new reality series, "Nerfing in Unconventional Place (Working Title)".  Your purchase of this shirt will allow us to expand the budget on this and other projects!
In addition to supporting the brand, you'll also get special access to any events that Click Click BAMF puts on this year. Your ticket will automatically be upgraded to VIP if you wear the shirt!

"What's up, Warriors?" -$19.99
Well, the name says it all. You know we start almost every video with that phrase. Not everybody has expendable income, so we wanted to make a less expensive shirt to rock your fandom right away!

New Channel Trailer Out!!

I hope all our warriors are getting the chance to check out the new channel trailer.

I worked on it going into the weekend. It shows off some of the cool gameplay we've taken part in and also points out how we've gone across the US to show off some of the Nerf news and arenas. Please make sure you subscribe and hit the notification bell on youtube to get all the updates from us!

LATEST Blasters Announced

Well Warriors. We've got quite the smorgasbord to choose from when it comes to Nerf blasters in the Fall 2018 lineup. Here are two of the latest blasters to be announced when video of my thoughts on the issues:

Please look out for Foam From Above's posts from Toy Fair 2018. He's got the first appointment for Hasbro and NERF and I'll be really excited to see what he tries out with some of these blasters.

As for the rest of the 2018 Fall lineup, I split the video into a second part and you can find the rest of it here:

I definitely want to get in on that Infinus action, but I am unsure about the rest for me personally. I'm still thinking about the Nemesis when it comes to Rival power and mag/hopper size!

Let me know what you think about the latest announcement. Please also consider subscribing to the Youtube channel. We've preserved partner status so far, but I would love to solidify that going into our new series this Spring!

Thanks for all you do,
CJ

Click Click BAMF Rises Again!

Hey Warriors!

That new video is up that I promised. It's kind of long for a straight talking piece, so there are timecodes in the description for where I talk about what.

As you see, we just had to talk a little bit about the Youtube Partnership complaints. We appreciate all the support that fans are showing the community. It's just time to realize that Google isn't going to hand out prizes for existing. That's over and it's okay!

Looking ahead:
I don't know if you've seen the new press releases for the latest two Nerf announcements, but they're not bad! Foam From Above posted them and I haven't been thinking about the Infinus' dart loading system. I want to see this "motorized Quick-Load Technology; as kids feed darts into the blaster, the darts are automatically loaded into the 30-dart removable drum." My main worry is the potential for movable parts to get broken by human error or normal use. But I just have to check it out as soon as we can!

Oh, and that reality project we mentioned? More is definitely coming. I might be able to get a teaser trailer up by the end of February depending on what we shoot when. Feel free to comment or drop us a line over e-mail. Contact links above! ~CJ

Behind the Zombie Strike Crosscut

So, warriors, the N-Strike Elite Dual-Strike was not the only Spring 2016 release we got the heads up about. You may have see the first peek at the Nerf Zombie Strike Crosscut on our youtube channel from a couple days ago. It's a single-shot blaster (two-barreled) that incorporated a rubber-foam blade that actually spins. The blaster will help us ring in the new year at $14.99.

The video is below again in case you are curious.

Nerf N-Strike Elite Dual-Strike Revealed!

Oh, warriors! Meet one of the newest blasters revealed from Nerf. It's the NERF N-Strike Elite Dual-Strike. Heck. YES. 

You can see here that the product is ready for merchandising and yes, it will be released for the Spring 2016 season. What that translates to is that you will possibly see them on shelves ahead of Christmas 2015 as some stores work to get their product out early. BTW, it's set for a suggested retail price of $19.99.

NERF HQ Visit Tomorrow!

Warriors! We are on the eve of a really cool thing. Right now, I am on the way to Rhode Island to visit with the Nerf HQ team and several community contributors.

It's one of the few times that Nerf has brought in just fans off the street to view their facilities and we get to be a part of it! Granted, we aren't quite just "off the street". Several bloggers, youtubers and forum contributors were specially invited by the team to meet up at HQ to see and discuss the up and coming directions that Nerf is headed in.

There is a pesky little NDA (non-disclosure agreement) that stops us from leaking some stuff, but the PR team tells us that there will be plenty of tidbits that we will be released to share.

You may have seen some of the discussion in from our recent hangout with the Nerf HQ team the brought of some SUPER interesting possibilities for what we might see at tomorrow. Are there any burning questions that you are hoping to get the answer too?

Hit us up! ~Chris

NERF Doomlands 2169 Officially Confirmed!

Official word came down, warriors. The future is now: NERF DOOMLANDS 2169, FALL 2015.

They describe this line as having sci-fi steam-punk designs with visible firing mechanisms. From everything in the product descriptions, it seems that they are actually intending this to be more of a cyberpunk affiliation with a wild west flair. In fact, the folks over at gizmodo call this a mix of Mad Max, Star Wars, and Firefly. Firefly has been in my head, but Borderlands comes up on its heals too. 

I also find it interesting that Nerf's second theme-based line is placed in a post-apocalyptic setting line like Zombie Strike is. They describe the Doomlands this way: "The post-apocalyptic wasteland once known as earth is filled with bands of marauding thieves and all manners of creatures."

It's a Target exclusive to start with. You may remember that Zombie Strike Started out the same way with the first few in their line too.  It makes sense that the Walmart exclusive Split Strike will come out about the same time. I wonder what else Toys R Us will get? I imagine that we'll see the Doomlands line expand to other stores by at least Spring 2016.

Here's the word-for-word details with high-resolution images on the two new blaster that have been leaking out and appearing.

SplitStrike Officially Confirmed for Fall 2015

Our contacts at Nerf will officially note that the blaster leaked in these images is called the SplitStrike. It's set up to be a Walmart exclusive and to be sold starting August 1 of this year. The suggested retail price is supposed to be $19.99 which is a bit steep-sounding for what it can do.

They didn't call it an Elite blaster, but the writing is on the wall . . . of the blaster if you look closely in a shot.

They don't have any official images yet, but are working on getting us some beauty shots and a little more info.

Rotofury on Store Shelves?

Reddit has it boys and girls. User, _Emotionless, posted a find from a store in Hong Kong in the Nerf subreddit.

_Emotionless found it listed at 298 Hong Kong dollars which translates to $38.44 in US dollars. That's not bad considering the MSRP below.

The Rotofury is something we've been hearing about officially since January. NERF sent our the press release with these details back then.

***NERF MEGA RotoFury Blaster***Image and Information Under Embargo until 1/19/15

(Ages 8 years & up/Approx. Retail Price: $34.99/Available: Fall 2015)

Supersize your NERF battles and dominate the field with the highest capacity MEGA blaster ever! The MEGA RotoFury blaster gives you the option of firing one MEGA Whistler Dart at a time, or slam firing a steady stream of ten darts in a row. Hear the darts whistle as they fly through the air and hit targets up to 90 feet away.  Includes 10 MEGA Whistler Darts. Available at most major retailers nationwide and HasbroToyShop.com.

Good images of the blaster have been coming out since Vas from Foam From Above was blasting out images from his annual visit to the Toy Fair! I am excited to see which other blasters from the fair will come out soon. Look over at F2A for images of the other cool blasters such as the Thunderblast which I am totally excited for!!

I want to get hands on this blaster. The assumed mechanics in this one remind me a lot of what I expected the NERF Vortex Revonix to be. Pump-action blasters please me when they are fed by a magazine. Generally the ammo feed works out pretty well in that case. I haven't had as much luck with the turret/barrel situation on pump-action. Really want to try it out, though! ~Chris

The Thunderdome

Warriors, if you haven't heard of the Thunderdome, you should check out the concept.

It takes the idea of a Nerf Arena and puts that right in its creator's back yard. Literally. It's a Nerf arena in a guy's back yard of his house. But that's just what physically exists in Springfield, Missouri. The concept is what creator Rob Lehr does with his love of Nerf and his unique space. Unlike other, commercial arenas, Thunderdome is meant to be free to those who participate in it. Lehr says he wants to spread the concept around to other communities by helping people to start their own clubs too. It's more than just a Nerf Arena. Lehr explains loads more about it with me in the interview we sat down to do this yesterday morning. Check it out:

More info after the jump!

Flameless Fireworks? - The Firetek Rocket!

Cool treat here, warriors. Our friends at Zing sent us a Firetek Rocket system recently and urged us to give it a try. We just had to get some night tests going ASAP.

The Firetek Bow from Zing! was already a lot of fun. I think this gives a lot of fun too at a little lower cost. Though, the Rocket is really not designed to use as a weapon so much as it is built to be a fun launcher. The thing is that you can't fire Rockets from the bow while you CAN fire Arrows from the Rocket sling. So, I would recommend buying extra Zing Firetek Arrows and using them in both of these products so that others can fire them back! I might argue that you can use this as a weapon is some cases -like when you have "explosives" rules in play at Dart Warz or other places where you are using bunkers and the like. More to come on that.

I titled this as "Flameless Fireworks" because I think you can get almost as much fun out of just watching this thing at night as firing it. But what are we missing? More colors!!!

(More after the link!)

The Current MEGA Line

Hey Warriors!

You know those reviews we've been promising? They're coming up now. We just posted the MEGA Cyclone shock review. There are a LOT of good things coming from this blaster. There was a little disappointment in there as well though :( Check out the review to find out what we're talking about. BUT THE BIGGEST PART: Could there be a giveaway announcement tucked in there too?

While we were finishing up that review, Dart Warz put up a group review for the MEGA BigShock we were honored to be a part of! They had their tournament recently and I had a complete blast being part of it along with the store teams and Vas from Foam From Above!

We have our individual BigShock review coming up in a while, but don't be shocked if a lot of what was said in the Dart Warz video is reflected there too! ~Chris

MEGA CycloneShock - Behind the Blaster

Warriors: I think I'll finally get some of those reviews up at the end of the week.

In the mean time, I've got a pretty fun sneak peak to throw your way. Our friends at NERF wanted you to get an early look at their latest video. Check out the excitement that some of the team at NERF HQ have for the MEGA Cyclone Shock!

I think the CycloneShock is actually pretty exciting. Yeah, maybe it can't really knock over humongous signs like they show in the video, but it sure can make the enemy duck on the battlefield. More to come on that! ~Chris

New Logo?

What's up, warriors? I'll tell you what's up: a new logo. We've been wanting to get a badge design going for a while now and to update our current logo a bit. So we finally pulled the trigger. Our designer came back to me with a few designs. We've narrowed it down between a few and will likely make a decision soon! What do you think? ~Chris

Rhino-Fire Pre-orders Are Live!

Warriors! Have you seen the news? The Rhino-Fire is listed for pre-order exclusively at Walmart.com. The nice news that comes along with it is the $89.97 price tag. I don't know if that price will remain after the pre-order period. After all, it was set to be listed at $99.99 when first announced.

Check out their promo video from the Nerf facebook page too:

Post by Nerf.

Sean Hollister at Gizmodo got a chance to review this one early. He labels the Rhino-Fire as the Most Badass Foam Blaster Ever Built. That might be jumping the gun just a little bit, but I'm glad to know it's still setting off geek sensors :)

The two-stage trigger might take some getting used to since most of us have grown accustomed to the flywheel activators that are native to all the other N-Strike Elite flywheel blasters. Also, with the accuracy problems that Hollister notes, the Most Badass award may have issues too.

Can't wait to put this through our combine of tests! ~Chris