Gaming Mascots
Video game mascots used to be all the rage in the late 80’s to the late 90’s. Similar to the Hollywood “star system” of the 1940’s, back in the day, there was a tremendous drive to create and push mascots by game companies. What happened?
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Wow does anyone remember the Sega Gen. teaming up with 7up and making a game, they should have mentioned that in here. Now that was a good mascot to bad no-one likes 7up.
One small detail, though... I didn't think the Donkey Kong of Donkey Kong and the Donkey Kong of Donkey Kong Country were the same ape. Isn't he the son or grandson of the original Donkey Kong? And the original Donkey Kong was henceforth Cranky Kong?
You're right. That's how they justified it logically. But my point is that they did so in order to make a cuddly mascot for themselves.
"Even i=his shirt was yelling at you!"
no word about reiko?
uhmm...
you guys should do a episode on Billy mitchell episode
They could call it "Douches of Gaming" and they could also add Jack Thompson.
I'm totally down with that.,
What about Yoshi, he's still around and he made a new game for the DS (Yoshi's Island) and in my opinion, Yoshi kicks ass
I think theres still mascots around today, they're just more human-like now, take Master Chief and Kratos for instance. Even even the newest one, a murderous Russian immagrant, who'd have thunk?
Oh, you alsk spelt Alex Kidd wrong, he's made a kind of comeback recently.
Ah, did I spell it with only one "d"? Man, I need an assistant, if I did. Good call- yeah, it's supposed ot be "Alex Kidd".
I've thought about current day properties, like Master Chief and Marcus Fenix, but I consider these more "franchise characters" than mascots- although they are franchise characters that are console exclusive. To me, mascots appear and make cameos in other people's games, and enodorse other properties from their company. Master Cheif kinda comes close, though. I guess I'm waiting to see if these characters evolve into more traditional mascots but for older gamers. The move by companies now seems to be to make franchise charaters that can appear in more than just games, like Lara Croft or Master Chief. First a hit game, then books, then movies, etc. Take then from being just video game properties and into properties that span all popular media.
I suppose so, but you could also just consider them as a changing wave of mascots (flavor of the month even). But you do see a lot of new mascots on cell phone games nowadays, maybe thats where they've gone!
I did come up with an idea for a flash animation we were going to do online ages ago about a made up ex-gaming mascot called "Jynx the Lynx", who was lined up to be a massive franchise in the early 90's, but game just completly bombed, so he was axed,
The episodes were about him desperatly trying to get back in the limelight, but putting constantly putting his foot in it the moment he got a break :D
How you been BTW dude, not spoken in ages!
Hey, how've you've been? Sorry, I've been out of touch. I just filmed another four episodes of the show, and have been working on an entirely new series on the side. Shoot me an email, and we'll chat about upcoming projects. Love your idea about the washed-up mascot!
Hi Jeremiah
This is a wonderful series. I'm new to this site so I was wondering how often we can expect new episodes?
I read a comment on another episode that it is weekly however it's been a couple weeks since the "Gaming Mascots" episode went up.
Keep up the great work!
The schedule is basically that a new episode is finished every other week. They go up around that often, give or take. Sometimes they are closer together, sometimes farther. But every other week has been the average for a while now pretty much. I expect I new one to go up any day now.
Thanks man...definitely looking forward to each and every episode!
First, congrats on the time limit extension. Now I get two more minutes of awsomeness!
But overall, it was a pretty good episode. I vaguely remember the barrage from when I was growing up, but the only one I remember with any clarity is the guy with the big head.
I've also noticed that you guys seem to be stretching for episodes now. You could have two episode branching into current times, one about the xBox, than another about machinima and web series like Red vs Blue. Just a thought.
All in all, another fantastic episode!
Thanks. We're happy with the time limit extention, and hope to keep it at ten minutes going forward now that we've gotten the "ok" from up top.
Good call- an episode on machinima is definitely on the list for future episodes when we start getting more current with the topics.
thanks man for all the nice words.
yay new one! thanks guys, these vids are the best.
never stop making them
This is weird I was checking to see if there were any updates earlier today and didn’t see any and I got side tracked. When I came back to listen to some of the older ones I saw a new one!!! Sweet and thanks for uploading a new one.
Ok two things… first I about died laughing hearing Libe drop that many f-bombs in a row and second I have pretty good hearing and I can hear a huff of a laugh when Jeff is talking about Bonks “enormous noggin” at 5:25. I’m just wondering which one of you laughed.
Love the gaming history vids keep up the great work.
Yeah, Libe's unexpected f-bomb string kinda surprised me/cracked me up, too. I just had to put it in. And that was me laughing when Jeff referred to Bonk's enormous noggin. I think I used the phrase "massive, invincible forehead" in our discussion of the character, but when Jeff said the word "noggin", for some reason it cracked me up.
Thanks for watching.