Every now and again you stumble upon something that makes you shout into the void, “I wish I had made this!” Maybe it happens more than I’d care to admit, but it definitely happened when I picked up Super Eyepatch Wolf’s The Bizarre World of Fake Video Games. Available over at the excellent Hollow Press*, this large-trim hardcover does exactly what I’d love to do with every waking creative moment of my life: Write about fake games as if they were real.
In this context, the collection of fake games were all released across various Hollow Sphere consoles over the years and covered in the pages of a nonexistent game magazine. The results are as if GameFan magazine existed in a parallel universe, complete with a variety of journalist personalities, including the extreme-era dudebro who just wants to shoot zombies and grab a beer with a beefy polygonal protagonist.
For someone who has been noodling around with fake games for as long as I can remember, this book is pure catnip for the imagination. The genres run the gamut, from RPGs to visual novels and more esoteric experiences that may or may not fall into the category of cursed media. There are even some familiar sights throughout, including Leon Chang’s Bird World, which served as the subject of his 2017 album of the same name. I’m no stranger to creating fake video game soundtracks, too, so it’s cool to be able to connect that with more information on what Bird World was and how it played in a parallel realm.
I particularly love all the PS1 aesthetic horrors scattered throughout Super Eyepatch Wolf’s well-curated collection, which, as the author notes, wouldn’t have been possible without the hard work of many creative artists. It ends up going above and beyond what even I would ask of it, gradually weaving a creepypasta-worthy narrative throughout its pages as it builds to a finale that includes one of Hollow Press’s own fake game releases, Plastiboo’s diabolical dungeon-crawler Vermis.
The Bizarre World of Fake Video Games asks many questions and offers few answers in return, and that’s exactly how I like it. Its prose is bulletproof, too, because even when its writing is rough around the edges it can be played off as a quirk that intermingles with the overarching world constructed within. Like all good apocryphal timelines, all this collection of games is missing are the games themselves. I’m not saying I want to play them all, but if I never get my hands on Apple Quest Monsters I’ll be more than a little disappointed.
* At the time of this writing, The Bizarre World of Fake Video Games is sold out on the Hollow Press site. It looks like they plan to publish a reprint in late March, though!
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