When I ran across this article on the man behind Nerf’s blaster line I had to read. I’ve never owned a Nerf blaster, but it’s not because I haven’t wanted to. My boys have some, and they’re fun. They have a substantial feel to them. They’re unashamedly guns. They mix the resin with testosterone. Okay, maybe not the latter bit, but the few guns I’ve played with are totally cool.
It’s no accident. There is a team of people led by Brian Jablonski whose job is to come up with cooler and cooler guns. And they pay attention to what their customers want: Larger ammo capacity and greater range. The result? The latest line coming out this year have a range of over 75 feet. That’s some serious firepower.
Their top-of-the-line new model is a semiautomatic with the 75-foot range and a potential capacity of 144 darts. I…so…want…one.
But in lieu of that, read the article. It’s an interesting look at Nerf’s philosophy and design process. It seems only natural that working for a toy company would be a job you’d be eager to get to every day, but I’ve been in corporate America long enough to know that companies can easily suck all the fun of a job, even toy-making. It sounds like Hasbro doesn’t, though. Good for them.