4. Pogs
YouTube These cardboard discs were like crack cocaine for school children in the nineties, to the point that many schools banned the things outright. Who wants to listen to teacher blabbing on about photosynthesis or Marco Polo when you could be slinging your pog collection behind the bike shed? Probably not the right attitude for well adjusted younglings, but when that little pile of pogs was scattered across the floor and you reaped the rewards, nothing else mattered. Thousands of different designs made them a hot property for those of us with collector sensibilities, and when both parties agreed to play for keeps the adrenalin would flow like it was schoolyard roulette. Harmless fun, or gateway to gambling addiction? Hard to tell...
3. Tamagotchi
YouTubeBandai took that contrived "look after an egg for a week" school project meant to warn kids about the challenges of parenthood and turned it into a multi-million selling toy phenomenon. Tamagotchis pandered to our nurturing nature, putting a tiny virtual life in our care, one of the earlier examples of mouldable AI where our inputs shaped their development. Like EA's Sims franchise, these plastic eggs gave us two options: play the kind-hearted parent, gently encouraging growth and happiness for this fragile creature, or be the malevolent sadist, ignoring its piles of poop and letting it die in its own filth. You know you did it. And you should be ashamed of yourself.