this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2025
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Vintage gaming advertising pictures: a gallery (lemmynsfw.com)
submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
68 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

This is probably going to seem wildly low-effort compared to my usual posts here, but I've found a bit of a treasure trove of print media gaming ads from magazines and sites. And they're amazing. I found it so fun to see what companies used to do to promote their games.

Things have clearly changed a lot over time, some of them are insensitive or even outright sexist, but if you just look at it through a lens of being a time capsule, it's fun.

This one's going to be very image-heavy. If you're using Boost on iOS then you might struggle to scroll through this (or maybe not? It's happened with all my other posts though, so you've been warned), if that happens just visit using your browser :)

Game Boy Advance/SP:

The 'feet' collection were from an ad company in Stockholm, in 2005. I think it is to mean you're using hands to play the GBA, and only have feet left to use for real life:

PS2:

Nintendo Game Cube:

And that's that! Just interesting to see a time when gaming was a little more experimental and edgy.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago

Sony had some fucking weird ads back in the day.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

I remember seeing these ads as an impressionable young gamer and getting the idea that Playstations had games that were scary and weird, and Nintendo games and handhelds were for boys. Generally the ads told me "this is not for you". Because I only ever saw ads for specific PC games and never for PCs themselves, (they were aimed at adults, not in the kind of magazines and comics young me was perusing) even though I was still not the target market it clicked more with me. I think that might be a part of why I've only ever really gotten into PC games over the years. I knew there were games I'd like and games I wouldn't, and never got the same platform level messaging.

I remember seeing an ad for Thief and thought it looked cool, and I remember being super grossed out by that Quake 3 ad, but I never felt unwelcome or out of place playing PC games. In contrast, the focus on marketing to young males is really obvious in those console ads.

Examples of some PC game ads I remember working for me and led to me getting them:

https://cdn.mobygames.com/promos/18308445-thief-the-dark-project-magazine-advertisement-pc-gamer-usa-issue.jpg

https://www.retromags.com/rmg_fs/gallery_imgs/monthly_2022_06/large.1061174590_LordsofMagic02(December1997).jpg.82c9c4e56622e154a87711d93647ccc3.jpg

https://cdn.mobygames.com/promos/6568546-the-elder-scrolls-iii-morrowind-magazine-advertisement-pc-gamer-.jpg

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago

You put your finger on it. Most of the ads say, "this is not for you," to a young girl.

Old ads for cars, alcohol, cigarettes etc. were like that as well. They're aimed at the hotshot guy who has a chick he's treating poorly, or more accurately, the guy who wants to have chicks throwing themselves at him. They have nothing to offer a woman or girl, because why would she want to be ignored arm candy?

I guess the one with the woman holding a controller in the bathtub may be an exception.

I'm sure a lot of boys and men were weirded out by these ads too.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Now I'm curious what that Quake 3 ad was. Just lots of gore?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

Kolanaki linked it above. It's a disgusting crusty gamer den implying the game is so addictive you'll live in filth. I remember that image being on the first couple of pages of a PC Gamer issue from the late 90s or early 00's.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I've seen Pokemon condoms but I don't think they were licensed, fortunately none of them said "gotta catch em all" though

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

My wife and I still have all three of these systems. All three still work. They are still fun.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

But do you have the Tribal Edition?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Vintage? That stuff is so new it was already crap gaming compared to PC :p

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm surprised you didn't post that PSP ad with the white lady beating the shit out of the black lady....to promote the sale of a white PSP.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Never heard of this ad since i was a kid at the time and not Dutch. Here it is.

Wow.

https://www.polygon.com/2017/4/5/15190396/sony-psp-ad-white-is-coming-pepsi-kendall-jenner

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

OK this cements my belief that people who work in marketing are batshit insane.

Even after seeing backlash, they doubled down and kept running the ad.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

It's all the cocaine. When I watched madmen I thought it was an exaggeration. Then I dated a guy who worked in marketing and met his coworkers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

Like artistically I can see what they were aiming for with this but they not only failed to understand the medium and audience, but when the obvious interpretation came to their attention they did not fucking care.

Just incredible.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

See they should have done a Charlie's Angels type thing, have them standing kind of back to back like they're on the same team. But I guess that won't have been as controversial.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

I think they were trying to lean too hard into the warring gamers battling it out, and the black woman represented the original PSP while the white woman represented the new white PSP, player 2.

But they put it on a fucking billboard where the only context we have to go by is beating the shit out of a black chick. What they fuck did they expect people to think?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

PS3 did some wierd shit, too.

And PSVita... The PSVita had this:

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

I hate to say it actually depicts the concept pretty good

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago (2 children)

The gameboy with the tribal tats is killing me.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I like the Nintendo ones, there were 'risky' ads here, now they're very conservative

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They were always conservative. A few years before these ads Nintendo participated in Senate hearings where they advocated for censoring the entire medium. They just had a "fellow kids" period in the early 2000s. Luckily, judging by the sales of the GameCube, most people weren't fooled.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

Meanwhile, Nintendo in their rebellious youth:

Note: mario didn’t exist at the time, but i got this image from a news site that added it to censor the woman’s breasts.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

My thoughts exactly. Some of these ads are just plain weird in a way that they would never dare today.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Love the PS2 ones. They almost have a Goth vibe in their aesthetics.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

I thought "gnostic vibe", but yes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The GBA SP really was a great portable. I carried my black\silver "executive" model everywhere and felt cool as shit at the time.

Those PS2 ads though, holy shit, what was Sony smoking back then?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

me pullign out the playstation Condoms

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I wish there was an easy way to quote/reference specific images. Golden Sun literal fire was nice, but those PS2 ads were... What the fuck

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

I loved the Golden Sun ad. Literally how little me felt playing that basic ass fantasy game. Basic but still love it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is probably going to seem wildly low-effort compared to my usual posts here

My man, you just compiled tons of obscure posters from the corners of the Internet. I admire your dedication, and this does take an effort.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

*Miss, not man!!!

(I'm just glad people enjoy all this weirdness as much as I do!)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

My apologies, I missed that one!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Those PS2 underwear ones are fucking wild

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They had bizarre TV adverts as well. You could never accuse early 2000s Sony of not getting weird with it.

I don't know if any of it really helped. It rode in on the already wildly successful PS1. It had a DVD player in it back when a DVD player was quite expensive. It had SSX and Tekken Tag at UK launch. It could play all your PS1 games and "upscale" them. The only competition it had at launch was the Dreamcast. It was going to sell anyway.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

It also looked so cool and, a rumor had it, could run Linux (it could, but only the fat models and with a hard drive sold separately as part of a kit, and only a specific kind of Linux with Sony's patches, and slowly as hell, but)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It strikes me that I have no point of reference because I haven't seen any ads for 20 years. If they stopped doing y2k edgy-style ads, what are they like now?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

Lol, it strikes me that I don't even know how they advertise games outside of blogs these days?

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