Retro Gaming Culture

If seeing arcade, Commodore 64, and console retro game classics like Frogger, Asteroids, Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. immediately bring you back to great times, then wall art would really rock for incorporating those gaming themes into a modern home.

People often ask me about the best way to incorporate retro gaming art for kids’ rooms, so I thought it’d be great to provide a few of the sources that I’ve come across.

Do It Yourself
The first and obvious option is the do-it-yourself route which includes;

• Getting a friend with access to a vinyl cutter to cut out designs;
• Putting together your favourite retro artwork on Zazzle; or
• Printing out designs on transparencies.

Let’s face it, making your own ‘classic’ design may not always really be, classic.

Decals or paint?
Back in the day, I knew a great guy who would airbrush some fine art on whatever you gave him; doors, walls, cupboards, or even clothing. However, if you’re not ready to pay high rates for such masterpieces, or want to be able to upgrade the kids’ rooms when they eventually tire of your endless ranting about your childhood fascination with Yie Ar Kung Fu, decals are probably a more cost-effective, and easily-modified solution. This is especially true if you just happen to have bought 20 arcade cabinets while renting a place.

Something that occurred to me after putting up my retro gaming wall art, is that it would have been awesome to plan out a history series, starting with say Pong, and progressing through to later games. Luckily, they are re-usable, so this may some day become a reality for me.

Wall decal suppliers
You may or may not remember the Space Invaders decals on the set of the TV show, The IT Crowd. I certainly did, and eventually found that these were available from online stores such as Blik, Wallstickershop, and Amazon. These are mostly purposely pixel-styled images, which are accurate and licensed.

A number of people online have mentioned Blik, who seem to have varied their range over the years, but still have a nice selection of the classics:

source: Blik

Wallstickershop also have some licensed designs, but also offer the non-pixelart versions; which can sometimes work well, especially if your place is on the cozy side where you’ll view them from a closer distance:

source: WallStickerShop

As most retro gamers are keen to find those elusive items that aren’t immediately obvious, I also managed to dig up a few more:
source: Stickaz

Custom and cool:

source: Etsy

Humourous:
source: Etsy

Finally, here’s one that seems to be no longer available, but looks fantastic and hopefully will become available again at some stage:

source: Amazon

As usual, make sure you get permission from your family before embarking on redecorating your walls.

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diaf23
Retro, science fiction, horror movie fan and breaker of things.

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