Reflecting Back on Gaming Promos
I walked into a Gamestop today and saw probably the most concerning thing when it comes to the future of physical media. Now let me preface that this is a Gamestop in a local mall, not a dead mall but, a bustling epicenter of commerce. Like, there’s very little stores in this mall empty and it was very busy for a Sunday. I guess what I’m trying to say is this is a flagship location in my area and by all means should be a store that epitomizes the full fledge Gamestop experience.
Upon entering I noticed something very disturbing to me as someone who very much swims in the world of physical media. This particular Gamestop is on the larger side and the actual physical video game section is relegated to an afterthought tucked away in a corner. However, the store isn’t empty. No it’s filled with the typical Gamestop “Gamer Garabage” merch that has your favorite pop culture icons plastered on every conceivable piece of kitsch they could find. The thing eating the this particular Gamestops square footage is Trading card games and table tops.
Now I get that Gamestop has been slowly swirling the drain for the better part of a decade and half. However, it got me thinking about how things used to be in these stores. The outside of this store had or obligatory gaming characters window screen prints that say “Hell Yeah we sell games”. However, the inside of the store is sterile. pretty much representative of how I personally see the gaming landscape today, soulless and without a future. I found myself yearning for the day when you walked into a game store and it was loaded with promos and advertisements for the newest systems, releases and what was just within reach on the horizon worth you dropping $5 to pre-order a copy. Don’t get me wrong there are some promos and advertisements but hardly to the degree that we’d see even ten years ago.
Recently I’ve been scoping up old VHS and DVD promo videos from games that interest me. It’s been really cool to look back on the hype that came along with a game you anticipated or even see a game you weren’t so sure of but, stood in a store and watched a promo reel for and that made you decide that you were going to pick it up. Now I’m not looking to snag posters or cardboard cut outs. Those things are fragile and in my opinion are tacky. However, watching old videos previews of games really takes me back as I feel it allows me to relieve or view a game through the lens of the days when it was the newest hottest thing we all wanted. Also, it gives you a chance to do that speculation you used to do as well based on what you saw and read in the magazines. It really does make me wonder if the younger generation are going to go back and watch old Nintendo Directs or State of Plays and feel the same way. I know for myself personally, none of those formats speak to me and I’d rather walk into a store and watch a promo playing on a loop or read about the newest release in a magazine, despite the fact the don’t really exist anymore.
I’ve been considering using my scaler do transfer these properly scaled to a digital format so I can share them. I know I’m not the first to do this but, I want to make sure that others get to experience the same feeling I get when I watch these. My hope is to set it up so it can be done much cleaner than some of the ones I’ve seen on Youtube. I’d most likely add these to my very, very dead YouTube channel and possibly uploading them to archive.org for folks to use if they’d like. So look for that in the future.
That’s all I’ve got for today
-Jake
