The Video Game Soda Machine Project Is Vital Work

The Videogame Toilet Museum is one of the most important institutions of video game [two words - pay attention, crapper curators] culture. It's working tirelessly to document the dunnies of our virtual worlds, no to mention recording what lurks within their bowls. This is vital work at the heart of what video games are all about.

In a similar field, one jittering historian has now launched The Video Game Soda Machine Project to document gaming's many fizzy pop dispensers. Send them your support, your thanks, and - most importantly - your screenshots of soda machines.

Jess Morrissette has been gathering, soliciting, and tweeting pictures of virtuapop for several weeks, but now he's collecting those in a Storify for your dispensing delight.

You'll find famous knock-off machines:

Weird confused Dr Peppers:

Alcoholic machines:

666xXxtreme666 machines:

Unpalatable awfulness:

Utilitarian machines:

Political machines:

And so very much more! What an absolute treat.

Do enjoy, and please help contribute if you can. If we don't remember our doofy knock-off fizzy pop, what's even the point?

I do also admire the collections of video game hot dogs, video game manholes, and video game tumbleweeds, but we can agree: soda machines and toilets are what matter most.

(I am actually strongly in favour of real-world brands appearing in video games more. Sure, doofy knock-offs and gags can be funny but they're jarring in worlds which are meant to be our own. The problem with real-world brands in games is that they're product placement deals, which means one brand dominates the virtuaworld to a ridiculous degree. Alan Wake never finds shit batteries from the pound shop, does he, only pristine gleaming Energizer batteries. Nah, if a world is meant to be ours, I'd rather see a mish-mash of a million brands and generics rather than parodies which stick out for not quite being what they're supposed to be. Either that or go all Repo Man on it. The #brands have got us good, man. We'll never get the #brands out.)