The Energon Pub

I was watching some old commercials, and I'm wondering, are the old icons still, well, iconic? Mario was all over a lot of the Nintendo commercials, on the logo for the Nintendo Repair service, and just plain everywhere with Nintendo. Now though I really don't see him connected with Nintendo advertisements that much.

Also, games don't seem to have the same advertising lenth that they used to. It seems like they hype it up a very little bit, and then it's forgotten about a month after its released. The only exception I can think of as of recently is Master Cheif and Halo, and I know there'll be commercials for it long after its released.

So, are gameing mascots as iconic as they used to be? Maybe it's cause they don't acutlly have to be iconic, cause of so many games not being exclusive to a system anymore. Also, there really aren't "mascots" anymore so to speak, as a lot of games are becoming very realistic.

I know my arguement isn't that strong, but I can't seem to properly articulate what I'm trying to say. You guys get the point of what I'm trying to say though? And please bring in your thoughts and opinions.

When Shadow the Hedgehog came out, ads for it were everywhere, on every show, for at least a month.

Other than that, I can't really think of a video game that gets a lot of exposure, other than Halo, and Ratchet and Clank.

Ooh, I love the Ratchet and Clank ads!

Shadowman wrote:When Shadow the Hedgehog came out, ads for it were everywhere, on every show, for at least a month.

Other than that, I can't really think of a video game that gets a lot of exposure, other than Halo, and Ratchet and Clank.

Ooh, I love the Ratchet and Clank ads!

Ditto. Seeing those weapons in live action is awesome!!!

Anyway, commercials back then were because of two things:
A- Video games were fairly recent and needed to be exposed.
B- There was no internet.

Sites like IGN have taken the place of advertising.

Oh, and Mario is still an icon. He's got the most games, and probably the most first party games that weren't handed off to HAL Labs. or Intelligent Systems or any of Nintendo's second party companies.

Mario and Link are still icons, as is Master Chief. But mostly because their games are still selling. Sonic's not the character he used to be due to the lackluster 3-d games (I liked them, but they weren't critically successful). Crash Bandicoot's pretty much vanished.

well there still iconic but now that the world knows what the companys are so they dont need mascots to sell the items anymore. for the most part now the mascots are the fonts the companys use for the consoles.

Was Crash ever iconic?

Sonic and Mario's presence seem to have waned, sadly, but maybe their type of games aren't what today's market craves? I don't know. Link was never really anywhere, but he was always the most spiffing.

Autobobby1 wrote:Anyway, commercials back then were because of two things:
A- Video games were fairly recent and needed to be exposed.
B- There was no internet.

Sites like IGN have taken the place of advertising.

I agree with that. With information about features and release dates so readily accessable and players so good at finding it themselves, corporeal ads have become something of a formality; most of the gamers who want a franchise game are not only going to know it exists, but where to find it and when it's coming out in their neck of the woods (and how to import it if it isn't). Mario and Sonic haven't lost their thunder, it's just showing in different ways than it used to.

Sonic's still the SEGA icon, but he's not as powerful in the icon department because he's no longer sponsoring consoles. And of course, Mario is still one of the biggest video game series ever. IGN named the entire Mario series the #1 video game series of all time. Other notable winners were Megaman, Sonic, Zelda, Pokemon, Final Fantasy, Metroid, and I believe Halo.

SeekerInAFakeMoustache wrote:

Autobobby1 wrote:Anyway, commercials back then were because of two things:
A- Video games were fairly recent and needed to be exposed.
B- There was no internet.

Sites like IGN have taken the place of advertising.

I agree with that. With information about features and release dates so readily accessable and players so good at finding it themselves, corporeal ads have become something of a formality; most of the gamers who want a franchise game are not only going to know it exists, but where to find it and when it's coming out in their neck of the woods (and how to import it if it isn't). Mario and Sonic haven't lost their thunder, it's just showing in different ways than it used to.

Hmm, I guess I never actually thought of how well the games were actually selling. I guess I was thinking along the lines of "If you show your average ten year old a picture of Mario, will they recognize him?" I remember reading that back in the late 80's Mario was more recognizeable than Mickey Mouse. I guess in that sense, Mario and Sonic are no longer at that level, not quite as merchendiseable, but are still relatively iconic.

Hopefully Mario and Sonic don't go the way of Pac-Man, but in some sense, I guess they already are. To elaborate, I really don't have a connection to Pac-man cause I didn't really grow up playing the game. Pac is still iconic in his own right, but I have a strong connection to Mario cause I loved playing the games growing up. Sonic I have a slightly less connection cause I had a Super Nes rather than a Genesis.

Which kinda brings me to what could be another point: are the reasons mascots no longer needed as much cause the audiance has grown, and it is no longer a choice of "which system do I get", but "which system do I get first?", cause usually the audiance ends up getting both or all three.

Was Crash ever iconic?

In a sense, during the days of the PS1 vs. the 64 days. There were some interesting commercials where he asked "Plumber Boy" to come out and fight. Although he was Sony's "unnofficial" mascot. And he's getting a game for the Wii, so he's still around.

Man ads with Crash were everywhere when the PS1 came out. I remember the sarcastic asshole in the giant Bandicoot suit standing on street corners with a megaphone. I always found them hilarious. There was a time when you couldn't look at Sony without seeing Crash attached to the advertisement. Even the old Pizza Hut demo for Metal Gear Solid had him on the cover of the sleeve....THERE WASN'T EVEN A DEMO FOR CRASH ON THE DISC!

I don't ever remember seeing any ads for Crash back in the day. I remember one advert for the first Spyro game and that's about it. Crash clearly never infiltrated my life like Sonic and Mario did.

It seem to me that is necessary to separate mascots and icons. Icons is very popular personages from very popular games or known; but mascots is symbol or visiting card of the game: Jackfrost for Megami Tansai, Cid and moogles (in late parts) for Final Fantasy...

Gonshyk wrote:It seem to me that is necessary to separate mascots and icons. Icons is very popular personages from very popular games or known; but mascots is symbol or visiting card of the game: Jackfrost for Megami Tansai, Cid and moogles (in late parts) for Final Fantasy...

Ok, well Mario and Sonic were certainly iconic, and are mascots for Sega and Nintendo.

Master Chief is sort of a mascot for X-Box, and Halo was the game that put the X-Box on the map.

Well Mario will always be about and he still is Nintendos Masterbattler. But Sonic is on the best way to Extinction, I mean I like his Games 2D and 3D, but The new Sonic the Heghog was totaly crap, I mean nice Graphik, good Sonicish story, fun levels. But to long waiting times, no explanaition of wich way to go. By Sonic I shall miss you.

No, they've given way to Marcus Fenix, Master Chief, Kratos, and Cloud Strife.