10 Most Embarrassing Product Placements In Video Games
1. Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker Sells Its Soul
The Metal Gear Solid series has a long standing history with product placement. In Snake Eater, Naked Snake can distract guards with Playboy magazines and MGS4 has a particularly weird moment where characters extol the virtues of the iPod.
But it’s PSP spin-off Peace Walker that went from walking a line to throwing itself over it asking for capitalist kisses from big corpo Mummy and Daddy. The Japanese version of the game features Doritos, Mountain Dew, Pepsi, Axe, UNIQLO, Sony Walkmans and Weekly Shōnen magazine.
Kojima actually explained that the reason for this was, and we are meant to believe he said this with some degree of sincerity, “to surprise players”.
Yes, in the sense that it’s akin to opening the case on a new game and seeing a skidmark on the disc. Or in the sense that players should be surprised and enthralled that Pepsi NEX somehow appears in a game set in the 1970s - how pleasantly preposterous!
It was all ridiculous and to make things worse these product placements were key to the gameplay. Doritos and Mountain Dew were important to keeping Snake healthy, and spraying himself with Axe body spray was needed to restore his “psyche” - a meter which promotes regenerating health.
So apparently in the Metal Gear universe, the 1970s were a time when all soldiers were ludicrously unhealthy and smelt like 14 year old boys.