T-Shirt Artist Transforms Adult Annoyances Into NES Games

StewShearerOld

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Jan 5, 2013
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T-Shirt Artist Transforms Adult Annoyances Into NES Games



Artist Jeremy Kalgreen has launched a new line of T-shirts using NES games to poke fun at the frustrations of adult life.

The <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/editorials/reviews/10834-NES-Remix-Review-This-Cartridge-Blows>NES is arguably the classic console and it's not hard to see why. In addition to being many people's first introduction to the world of video games, it also represents a simpler time where the core concepts of a game could be expressed in a single sentence fragment on a piece of box art. Even if you enjoy being a responsible adult, there's likely still a part of you that sits down at the end of a long, busy day and misses that sort of simplicity.

Enter Jeremy Kalgreen.

A custom T-shirt artist, Kalgreen recently looked at his life and "in a moment of self-awareness" realized that he was getting kind of old. Rather than getting all depressed about it, Kalgreen decided to embrace his emerging "fuddy-duddy-ness" and celebrate it with a new series of shirts poking fun at adult problems by tapping into his childhood days of gaming. "I found myself daydreaming about iconic things I still enjoy... and the image of a settled down Mario having a midlife crisis while Princess Toadstool was stuck at home with a screaming baby popped into my head," he said, speaking to The Escapist. "Eventually that image morphed into this whole lineup."

The shirt line, which he's dubbed "NES My Life," takes everyday problems and transforms them into wearable game covers modeled after the classic NES <a href=http://www.racketboy.com/retro/collecting-nes-black-box-sprite-art-games>black box games. Included among the lineup's launch selections are shirts dedicated to job hunting and chatty checkout workers. Also on the list is one focused on the bane of all modern existence: student loan debt. Each shirt costs $16.99 with tall versions and hoodies available for a higher price. Kalgreen has also affirmed that this opening round of shirts won't be his last. "There are a lot of mundane topics that I think are ripe for ribbing," he said. Suffice it to say we'll be looking forward to seeing them. That is, of course, after we pay our bills, walk the dog, get the oil changed and put the baby to bed.

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Source: Amorphia Apparel


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geizr

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Oct 9, 2008
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Because I live in the DC Metro area, my favorite one is Commute: Hours upon hours of gameplay. That one had me laughing my ass off. I may just have to actually buy that one and wear it around town, just to see how many people get the joke.
 

epicdwarf

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OH COOL! Native advertising!

On a side not, I am the only one sick of seeing the pixelated art style so much? It is everywhere and on essentially everything.
 

Pyrian

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I love the fact that the d-pic came from the right-wing relative. XD
epicdwarf said:
On a side not, I am the only one sick of seeing the pixelated art style so much? It is everywhere and on essentially everything.
What kills me is that pixels didn't even LOOK like that, for the most part. They were fuzzy blobs, not squares (Atari 2600 era aside).
 

anonymity88

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The job hunt one hit a little too close to home, now I'm going to use my day off tomorrow to mope and question every wrong decision I've made in my life up to this point.
 

epicdwarf

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A bit off topic but:
Pyrian said:
What kills me is that pixels didn't even LOOK like that, for the most part. They were fuzzy blobs, not squares (Atari 2600 era aside).
I know right! Only a handful of people make pixel-art that legitimately looks like it is from the 8-16bit era. It sort of reminds me of how the steampunk art-style went down hill.
 

Metadigital

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Anyone have a strategy guide for Right Wing Relative?

Also, I have never encountered a chatty cashier. I'm lucky if I can get more than 2 words from most cashiers. Maybe I'm just in a particularly antisocial area...?
 

Czann

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Where is the Left Wing Relative that wants to convince you that REAL socialism never failed because it was never actually implemented in the world and that Lenin/Stalin were actually misunderstood guys?
 

Metadigital

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Czann said:
Where the Left Wing Relative that wants to convince you that REAL socialism never failed because it was never actually implemented in the world and Lenin/Stalin were actually misunderstood guys?
I live in the US so I don't get that. Our "left wing" is libertarianism.
 

RossaLincoln

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Metadigital said:
Anyone have a strategy guide for Right Wing Relative?

Also, I have never encountered a chatty cashier. I'm lucky if I can get more than 2 words from most cashiers. Maybe I'm just in a particularly antisocial area...?
in the first level, you need to find the hidden inoffensive movie discussion topics. It sucks having to remember them, but they're invaluable for deflecting the "Kenyan Birth Certificate" attack. There's also a warp zone in level three that instantly takes you into the living room where sports are happening on TV. The game gets a bit incomprehensible for most of us at that point, but it neutralizes all attacks for the rest of the level. However, this risks causing a massive beam spam attack consisting of arguments over botched calls.

Also, go to Trader Joe's and you'll experience it a lot.
 

Lilani

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May 27, 2009
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I love how the avatar of the guy in Dick Pic Defender is the Right Wing Relative.
 

Czann

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Metadigital said:
Czann said:
Where the Left Wing Relative that wants to convince you that REAL socialism never failed because it was never actually implemented in the world and Lenin/Stalin were actually misunderstood guys?
I live in the US so I don't get that. Our "left wing" is libertarianism.
You don't know how lucky you are.
 

Steve the Pocket

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epicdwarf said:
On a side not, I am the only one sick of seeing the pixelated art style so much? It is everywhere and on essentially everything.
More to the point, does it even really belong on something that's meant to mimic NES cover art? I thought those were usually lavishly illustrated and looked nothing like the actual game (Mega Man being probably the cardinal example).
 

IamLEAM1983

Neloth's got swag.
Aug 22, 2011
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Metadigital said:
Anyone have a strategy guide for Right Wing Relative?

Also, I have never encountered a chatty cashier. I'm lucky if I can get more than 2 words from most cashiers. Maybe I'm just in a particularly antisocial area...?
The guide for "Right Wing Relative" is barely one paragraph long. I can quote it from memory:

"If you play Right Wing Relative on Normal, your best strategy is to spam the Ignore action until the game is won by virtue of filling the Relative's Food Coma bar. If you play the game on Hard (e.g. Canadian Hardcore Conservative or American Tea Party Mode), then the following Holiday Get-Together Conversation Topics have to be ignored. Failure to do that triggers a Stun Lock move by the Relative that drastically depletes your Enjoyment bar:

1. the Canadian healthcare system
2. Obamacare
3. opposition to Enbridge if you're Canadian or Keystone XL if you're American
4. CBS/NBC/Anything that isn't Fox or CTV News
5. Quebec-specific cultural quirks
6. Anything related to Politics or Culture, really

Don't EVER speak French in their presence, because the Relative confuses "Can you pass the salt?" for "John Maynard Keynes was a blight upon the face of the Earth and Marx's 'The Capital' is my go-to Tijuana Bible"

Or, you know, just dust off the ol' Game Genie and input "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ". That keeps the Relative's Boredom bar filled up during the entire Christmas party, which amounts to him never showing up in the first place. The code also ups the value of the UPS Gift items, so you don't have to watch the Relationship bar decay.
 

FalloutJack

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Nov 20, 2008
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Metadigital said:
Czann said:
You don't know how lucky you are.
You wouldn't say that if you had to live here.
I would.

OT: In reference to Trash Tower AND the holiday we are currently in...

"So, we dumped all the garbage over the cliff and made a Trash Tower at the bottom, went back to Alice's, had a Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat, and did not get up until the next day...where we got a call from the police. Man on the phone said 'Kid...we found an envelope with your name on it underneath a Trash Tower. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?'. And I said, 'I cannot tell a lie. I put that envelope underneath the trash for you to find.'."

And so on.

You can get...anything you want...at Alice's Restaurant.

...except Alice.