Retro has become a huge niche market in almost all areas – t-shirts included. And one t-shirt company out of Ireland are taking advantage of that rise in popularity of all things retro.
8BIT has a collection of carefully designed tees based on the glory days of retro gaming. The 8-bit era produced some of the best games and established the modern-day industry as it stands now. Their limited edition run of shirts (snap them up quick: there are only four designs, and each design only has 100 or 125 versions) appeal to the kind of person who lived through the 8-bit era the first time round, and now wants to show their love for their childhood with a beautifully crafted piece of clothing.
That care in the end product comes as soon as you receive the package. Your tee is encased in a brilliant white box, sturdy enough to keep the quarry inside clean and tidy but not too heavy.
And once you open the box, and take aside the tissue paper and the cool postcard with an old-school Gameboy on a washed out beach, you realise that the shirt inside is pretty great, too. The design I received was ‘001 – Grace’ (€30) which is a limited print run of 125 (mine was #19).
It’s a luscious representation of the kind of huge sprites from the classic era of 8-bit games that you grew up with; this footballer performing an overhead kick could have been ripped right out of something like Amiga’s Sensible Soccer franchise.
The quality is great, as you’d expect from a company so invested in producing the great packaging they do. The tiny touches such as a nicely presented package are one of the best ways to separate the wheat from the chaff in an industry where the ability to enter it is becoming ever lower. Those who take pride in their work will make sure to present it neatly.
The tee is a thick, soft one, and it holds up well in a wash. Overall, if the bright lights of the 1980s and early 90s gaming world is your thing, you should head on over to 8BIT and grab yourself a tee.
Pretty good week from BustedTees, I don’t like the ‘Extra Virgin Olive Oil’ shirt, but that’s just me, it has the feel of a shirt your Uncle would wear, except the artwork is too good. Everything else is just fine and dandy by me.
The video games industry is still booming, and it’s not only the games themselves which are bringing in the money for companies like Nintendo, Sony and Sega. In addition, it’s the merchandise that has been inspired by great games and characters which are increasingly becoming a part of all of our fashion collections, providing a brilliant extra revenue arm for these huge multinational consumer electronics companies.
But what exactly is it about video game themed merchandise and in particular t-shirts that continue to give them the edge over other electronic-inspired clothing, such as social media clothing? A lot of it comes down to how people find themselves relating to a character, whether that be a protagonist in a game or a mascot of a company such as Nintendo’s Mario or Sega’s Sonic, who could actually be placed in both of these categories.
There should be no underestimating the human power of personification, particularly towards characters that we choose to spend our time with when we want to escape the real world, and this is the biggest reason why the surge of video game t-shirt popularity is showing no signs of slowing. New games breed new characters, and each hero (or villain for that matter) is almost guaranteed to attract a huge amount of fans, providing a great merchandise opportunity, with players continuing to demand gaming related fashion for their wardrobe.
So what are our favourite characters from the video game world that we just have to be seen wearing? Mario is still right up there in the top three, that’s without a doubt, even though he first hit the scene back in 1981 in the first ever arcade version of Donkey Kong (I know, I feel old too!). Thanks to his appearance in over 200 other games since his first outing, there aren’t many people who don’t see him as the epitome of video gaming, particularly if you grew up in the 80s or 90s, and this continues to drive his popularity as one of the most popular characters for any so-called geek fashion.
But what of the more recent trends in gaming, and the changes in the way we’re now playing games. Has this had any impact on the types of video game merchandise that we’ve decided to wear? Since the onset of mobile gaming, one of the most popular games has undoubtedly been Angry Birds, and this too has now seen a huge increase in merchandise sales as people look to show off their favourite game that they can play just about anywhere. The Bird Watcher t-shirt (BlueBanana.com, £14.99/$18.29) has seen a great increase of sales, particularly after the additions to the Angry Bird family of the Star Wars themed game and Bad Piggies, a game played from the pig’s point of view.
With such a huge and varied range of merchandise available related to video games and their characters, there’s never been a better time to be seen wearing a tee from Nintendo, Angry Birds, or any other type of game, and it looks like, at the moment, there’s going to be no halting the growth of the computing fashion craze.
About The Author: Laura Watson loves writing about alternative fashion, and is a huge video gaming geek. Bring the two together, and you’ve got this post about video gaming fashion!
I’m sure we’ve seen that ‘Legend of Zombie’ design at a couple of the daily site before, but I think the other two designs might be making the debut at Split Reason as part of this latest release.
Looks like 604Republic are getting a bit nostalgic for the golden age of gaming. All three shirts are $23 a piece and available now.
Sure, it’s too late for Halloween this year, but it’s never too early to get a head start on next year’s outfit, and this Donkey Kong t-shirt would be all you need since he doesn’t wear trousers (though maybe some brown leggings would be more appropriate).
Slightly less recognisable than some of the other abstract tees I’ve posted based on pop culture characters (well, to me at least), but still very cool.
Grand Theft Otter is such a reach of a pun that it almost ruins the other two well designed shirts at Tshirt Laundry this week for me, and be sure to check out their whole range as it’s all $12 a piece as part of their back to school sale.
I’ve enjoyed the other A-Z shirts that A Better Tomorrow have produced and this gaming version if no different, though I think it’s a bit harder for me to guess that names compared to the superhero version. The names are listed on the product page, but feel free to have your fun in the comments trying to guess the characters and games.
Another solid and funny design from Glennz as usual. I actually have a working zapper under my TV right now, I haven’t used it for years but I’m sure it scores me lots of geek points.
I must have my dates mixed up because I was sure that Go Ape existed before HYA, but since we celebrated 6 years of the site in January and Go Ape is just mentioning it now I guess that’s not the case.
This latest shirt, showing how the ghosts became ghosts in Pac Man, is typically Go Ape, and was designed by the rather well known t-shirt Aled Lewis.
Bioshock gets some attention at TeeFury.
Monty Python meets Monopoly at Shirt.Woot.
Metroid is the subject matter at RIPT.
Delightful artwork at Shirt.Woot today.
Breaking Bad makes an appearance at RIPT.
If you think about it, the original Game Boy really was fantastic. It was released in the 80s (only just), and yet you were able to go outside and play games that were on cartridges the size of a cracker. That seems really easy now, but at the time it was revolutionary, and you were the coolest kid in school if you had a Game Boy. Since the GB has got me harking back to the glory days of green & black gaming it’s hardly surprising the Pixel Propaganda thought it would be a good idea to make a tee based on the pioneering hand-held gaming device.