Dorm Labs - Red Dot Sight

Whilst browsing Facetube and Youbook, I watched a great review by Bobololo about the Dorm Labs Red Dot (Pinpoint) Sight.  I had seen this product mentioned before and thought "Man, that looks an awful lot like the NcSTAR Red Dot DP sight that I've been using for awhile".  His review showed everything that it came with, including a little bag of goodies that nailed down my suspicion.  To wrap up his review, Bobo said the price was a bit steep, as Dorm Labs was listing this Red Dot for $24.99 on their website.  So I went back to Amazon.com where I originally purchased a handful of the NcSTAR sights for my Laser Tagging group to use to check on the price.  List price is $12.99 with a sale price of $9.65 on the link I used.

Somewhere between getting rid of the gold "NcSTAR" logo on the top of the sight and redeveloping a clamp specifically designed for a Nerf Tactical Rail that worked just fine straight out of the box in the first place, Dorm Labs has doubled the price on a plastic red dot sight for Tacti-cool Nerfers to purchase.  I'm all for folks making "aftermarket" Nerf Accessories.  Folks like SlyDev, Orange Mod Works, Xplorer, and a handful of other guys have been making great products.  Dorm Labs have made other great products before, but I know this product they're selling... and I know that it already works without modification in my own personal experience.  I made a review of this versatile accessory back in July of 2012, so it's not like this is "new" at all.  It just kinda bugs me that Nerfers who need a Red Dot sight could get their kicks for 10 bucks instead of the one that Dorm Labs "made".  Did I miss something, or could Bobo have gotten his Red Dot sight for half the price?  Polishing cloth and all.

Didn't take long for a response to this.  Seems like a reasonable explanation.
 Hey guys, 

Wanted to take a second to post an official response to this. A lot of our products are derived from airsoft components, we've said that from the beginning. In this specific case, the red dot base assembly that we use is very likely made by NcStar or at least in one of their factories. We're not 100% sure since we purchase them through a separate distributor, but it sure looks like it based on your article. 

When we were testing the red dot sights in the very beginning, before we even started selling them, we thought we weren't even going to have to make an adapter, which would have been great. However, there are a few problems with this. As Owen mentioned above regular clamps fit most, but not all Nerf rails securely. Certain blasters it would fit really snug, and other ones it would pop right off. You can't sell something that is guaranteed to fit on Nerf blasters, and then have it only fit on 75% of them. That was the main reason for designing and printing an adapter. Furthermore, we found out it would be violating some very serious firearm export laws if we were to ship them anywhere outside of the US as they are normally sold. The adapter makes them only compatible for Nerf blasters and therefore, no harm done by shipping them overseas.

If anyone has any other questions on this please feel free to contact us. We're not trying to rip anyone off, we're trying to bring cool unique products to the Nerf community that were previously not easily accessible or didn't exist at all.

Best Regards,
Dorm Labs

Sledge-Slingin'

Love the NERF SledgeFire?  Me too!  Except when you're reloading whilst a horde of Zombies drag their lifeless limbs ever-closer... that can get you in trouble.  Fear not!  There's a quick, effective, and dart-slinging-ly cool way (if I do say so myself) to burn through those 3-Round shells faster than before!

While you're at it, be on the lookout for SledgeFire Refill Packs.  These will come in handy with this burn-through-your-ammo strategy and help you defend your stronghold from the legions of the undead.

Learn the trick after the jump!

Affiliation Nation

Turns out people like what Tactical Tag has been doing.  Who am I to stop them from spreading the word to millions of others?!?  That's why I've been working with My Last Dart recently and there's some cool stuff in the works between us.  You'll notice the MLD logo on the right side of the blog listed as an Affiliate, and I'm pretty proud of that new development!  In the ever-changing world of bloggers, it's good to have some solid friends to rub shoulders with.

I know it probably sounds silly, but if you haven't checked out his blog, head there now.  Go on!  Use that fancy new button on the right>

SledgeFire Mod Planning

So I love my ZombieStrike SledgeFire.  Sure it might take a quick second to reload and it only comes with 3 shells, but it's awesome nonetheless.  I've done nothing to mine but take out the Air Restrictors and the raw power, even with the stock spring, is quite impressive.  However, I had to replace mine since it's priming mechanism sorta stopped working.  Luckily, I have use for that awesome shell as a Laser Tag blaster, but since I'm such a fan of this blaster, I picked up another one... so now I've got 6 shells and 1 unmodified blaster.  But only for now!

NERF - Dude Panda Shot

It's another totally hip Dude Perfect commercial... with a gigantic Panda running along with his fellow "dudes", much to the delight of Texas A&M Fans.  This one's a new commercial for the N-Strike Elite MEGA Magnus doing the "Hold the Mustard" shot.  While I do actually love the Magnus... I still find it hilarious that all these "Perfect Shots" had dozens of takes to get it right.  Even they Dude Perfect guys themselves have admitted "it takes multiple attempts when filming before successfully converting the final shots."  The commercial, however, is obviously trying to show off accuracy and implying that it takes one shot for you, surrounded by all your home-dawgs, to slice through that stream of Mustard and ruin that guy's corporate barbecue.

Laser Dart Nerf Tag?

Laser Dart Nerf Tag!  Or is it Nerf Laser Tag Dart?  Maybe it's Dart Nerf Tag Laser.  Yeah, that's gotta be it.  What's this I'm talking about?  Oh just the "TekStrike Storm Shield" that surprised us at Toy Fair 2014.  Remember that tinted shield we saw on the Rampage nearly two years ago that never made it as an accessory?  Yeah, it's kinda like that... but it's a lot more than a simple blast shield.  It's a whole battle system that combines the Foam Dart goodness of Nerf with the electronic scoring and Smartphone integration of Laser Tag for a super-cool nifty awesome way to play!  ...or is it?  Yup.  Time to be a skeptic!

Color-swappin Elites

Nerf fans with OCD might want to sit out 2014.  One look at the Wall-O-Nerf at Toy Fair 2014 would make any matchmaker cringe.  White with orange, white with blue, orange with white, blue with white, and a nice loud green Firefly Tech magazine to really screw with ya.  It's all over the board... literally.

For me, this is a bit of a pain in the arse after being so happy with the Elite lineup finally unifying the designs and colors to get all matchy matchy with themselves when they came out in 2012.  Well, 2 years later, looks like that's all blown out of the water.  There's some new recolors we can spot in this shot like the Firestrike, Retaliator, even a Strongarm over in the corner.  Somehow, Nerf managed to steal the white-striped RapidStrike from Basic Nerf, too... which technically makes things with the older accessories match better (in contrast to the rest of the new stuff).  Long story short... I'm feeling very conflicted with all my beloved Blue blasters getting phased out and mismatched.  I am, however, looking forward to folks making use of that white RoughCut 2x4 with the Retaliator barrel to go all Masterkey on us!