Arco Space War

Arco toys out of Westbury, New York, were there and on the shelf in early 1978 producing the Spacewar line of knock off Star Wars toys - taking advantage of Kenner's slow response to the overwhelming demand for Star Wars toys. The Arco Spacewar line was an offshoot of its Playkid line which was very similar to the Playmobil, Airgam Boys, and Fisher Price Adventure People lines. The Spacewar line was available in many retail outlets thru America, especially 5 and dime stores (the 70s equivalent of a "dollar" store) as well as Woolworths and K-Mart. The 6 Spacewar figures retailed for just under $1 each.
The human character (most commonly considered to be "Luke") in the Spacewar line is the only one available on both a Playkid header card as well as a Spacewar card. BOTH are exceedingly rare. The other major variation on this line's packaging was that the (at the time) retail giant Woolworth had Arco send them their version of the Spacewar line with a slightly altered card. Gone was the die cut detailing and the addition of the Woolworth logo at the bottom of the card to distinguish the product for their stores. The Woolworth versions are ultra rare, and in fact some figures have yet to publicly surface on a Woolworth card, although they were produced. So far no examples of certain figures are known to have survived.

Here are carded examples of the entire Arco Spacewar line.
R2-D2:                                                                                                          Chewbacca:
Stormtrooper:
Luke Skywalker
Darth Vader: Regular AND Woolworth versions:
C3-PO; Both regular and Woolworth versions:
Here is a seldom seen "Playkid" set featuring both the "Luke" and  the "Darth Vader" character from the line. This is the only example of this set that I've ever seen.
The Galaxy Command Center, above, came with 4 bagged "Luke" figures.



The carded Play kid "Moon Walker" aka Luke is almost as rare as the  SpaceWar version, with known examples being in the single digits.





Even rarer still is the Woolworth Space Set, shown below, which also came with 2 of the Moon Wallker Luke style figures.

 
Prototype unproduced 3 pack mockup. The figures are prototypes with hard copy heads,and the art is completely different than what Arco used on the released versions.  Next to the 3 pack here >>> is a mock up version of the Luke figure that they released. Both are chromolins glued to thin foam core. Truly amazing to find prototype material from any bootleg line of figures.
 
 


Arco Also made a variety of target guns to go along with the Space War line, and cash in on the popularity of the Star Wars franchise.
 
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