Exp.pack, 1000 S Santa Fe Avenue, Los Angeles, CA (2026)

09/29/2026

Tony Hawk walked into Activision in 1998, picked up a PlayStation controller, and started skating around as Bruce Willis.

He’d been pitching his own game around when Activision called with one already in the works, built by Neversoft, who had nearly gone under wrapping the Bruce Willis shooter, Apocalypse. The team dropped Bruce onto a skateboard in Apocalypse’s engine, gun still strapped to his back, and sent him into the desert. Tony only had to do a few tricks in the demo to know the controls were right.

Activision offered Tony $500K to buy his name outright, but he instead took a cut of every copy sold, a call he’d later describe as “absolutely the best financial decision of my life.” As the dev team sketched out each level, they borrowed the idea of collecting stars from Super Mario 64, except you’d be tracking down secret VHS tapes. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater (THPS) hit North American shelves September 29th, 1999, and two months later it was the third best-selling PlayStation game in the US.

Activision later folded Neversoft into Infinity Ward in 2014, so when the original came back in 2020 as THPS 1 + 2, a different studio had to rebuild it. A brand new THPS hasn’t come out since 2015, and Tony said the next one is in Activision’s court. We’re still here 20+ games later. Not bad for a game that started with Bruce Willis and a gun.

09/28/2026

Forget a PB&J; no combo was better than Halo & Mountain Dew.

Soda and gaming partnerships weren’t new when PepsiCo connected with Microsoft to promote Halo 3. That said, this collaboration took it to another level.

That dedication made it memorable and beloved by fans. PepsiCo not only put Master Chief on Mountain Dew cans, but also gave the iconic character his own flavor.

Gamer Fuel hit shelves in August of 2007; the citrus-cherry soda had an initial run for 12 weeks. Despite being cherry-flavored, the soda came in an orange color that was meant to resemble Master Chief’s helmet visor.

The soda was such a hit that the partnership was eventually extended beyond that 12-week plan. Surely, Halo 3 being a massive hit in the world of gaming helped a lot with the success of Gamer Fuel. But PepsiCo also did their part, investing millions into the partnership. 7-11, which constantly collaborated with PepsiCo on marketing partnerships, also participated with special promotions that included Slurpee Cups, limited edition bottles, and even prizes.

Though Gamer Fuel existed before and after a partnership with Halo, the phenomenon that was Halo 3 made the soda essentially Master Chief’s drink of choice permanently.

Yes, it was extra caffeinated. Yes, it was unhealthy. But it was also a refreshing way to engage with one of the biggest games ever. And boy, did Gamer Fuel leave a lasting legacy among avid soda drinkers and gamers alike.

Credits: TheDomain, Halo Fandom, Mountain Dew Fandom, The Michigan Daily, GamesIndustry

09/27/2026

Spider-Man: The Animated Series gave us Spidey in a new light. It also gave us one of the biggest cliffhangers in television ever.   Running for four years, Spider-Man arrived when children’s television was at its peak. In its heyday, the show was the top-rated action series on television, even edging out the beloved X-Men Series.   Leaning heavily on the comic book source material, the series expertly balanced mature tones with a wide net in terms of audience. It was a masterfully written show that followed often intense story arcs, spun off into epic crossovers, and even introduced us to the Spider-Verse decades before it would take over popular culture.   The show infamously ended on a cliffhanger. Many episodes after losing anguishly losing Mary Jane, Peter departs his world with Madam Web into another dimension to search for his love. Though the show gave fans the trauma of watching Peter lose Mary Jane, it never gave us the resolution to that story. Until now.   Earlier this week, former showrunner John Semper Jr. announced via Twitter that he would be returning to the world of Spider-Man to finish the story the animated series never could.   “I didn’t realize what kind of trauma it was going to cause for millions of children across the world that I didn’t give them closure. So this is my gift to them. This is me giving them that closure,” shared Semper Jr. when speaking to Comic Book Resources about his comeback.   For decades, fans have speculated about what was meant to happen next. With the X-Men series coming back in 2024, fans were hoping for the same from Spidey. It never came to fruition, on television at least.   Fans will finally have their questions answered when Spider-Man ’94 Annual #1 hits the comic book shelves on December 9.

09/26/2026

Sanrio’s superstar has some of the most limited gaming consoles ever.

First introduced on a vinyl coin purse in 1975, Hello Kitty has gone on to become one of the most recognizable characters ever.

Contributing to the cultural transference of Japan to North America, on the way to becoming a billion-dollar character. Yes, it started with purses, but over time Hello Kitty appeared on clothing, television, and even on video game consoles.

In 1997, Nintendo released a Hello Kitty Game Boy Pocket. The handheld was sold exclusively at Sanrio Stores and is believed to have been limited to as few as 10-thousand units. But that was only the beginning.

In the years that followed, Hello Kitty appeared two more times on the Game Boy. Her most famous appearance is likely the two transparent Sega Dreamcast consoles that were released in 1999. In 2005, Hello Kitty’s most limited console was released in the form of the Crystal Xbox, which was allegedly limited to 500 units.

Hello Kitty changed popular culture forever. With her lovable features and the genius behind Sanrio, she has become a household name. All the while, becoming the namesake for some of the most limited gaming consoles ever.

Console estimates courtesy of Consolevariations.

09/25/2026

Halo 3 showed players a place nobody could explain for five years.

Play the game on anything but Legendary, and the story ends with Master Chief and Cortana drifting through space in a wrecked ship. If you can beat it on Legendary, one more shot plays after the credits. That same ship heads towards an unnamed planet nobody in the story ever mentions. Bungie never explained it, and fans spent years arguing over what it was. Guesses ranged from a hidden Spartan training world to a lost Forerunner stronghold, but nobody guessed right.

The planet finally had a name five years later in Halo 4. An entirely different studio built that game: 343 Industries, which didn’t exist yet when Halo 3 launched on September 25th, 2007. That planet was Requiem, the actual setting of Master Chief’s next chapter. Bungie spent that whole year calling Halo 3 the end of the trilogy, while quietly leaving the door open.

Bungie closed the book, and the planet they never explained opened the next one.

09/24/2026

Pokémon knows just how to throw an event, and boy, did they last September.

To promote Pokémon: Legends ZA, the Pokémon Company collaborated with el Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) for a special lucha libre show. The show saw the wrestling company’s biggest stars promote the Switch 2’s first Pokémon title in the best way they know how: putting their bodies on the line within the confines of a wrestling arena.

The collaboration placed Hawlucha and Machamp at the front and center. Naturally, Pikachu and Eevee weren’t far behind.

CMLL went all out on the partnership. The wrestling ring canvas was Legends ZA-themed; the banners around the arena featured Hawlucha and Machamp, and fans were even given special crowns with each of the Pokémon on them.

The wrestlers went all out, too, as several of the participants of the special event dressed as Pokémon. Kira dressed as Togepi, La Catalina as Sylveon, Soberano Jr. as Gengar, Hechicero as Machamp, and Mistico as Hawlucha.

A championship belt was made to commemorate the special event. To no one’s surprise, Mistico ended the night holding up the special Legends ZA-branded belt. A special Hawlucha promo card was also created for the event. Strangely, though, it was not distributed that night, and it has not surfaced since.

By using the event to reveal Hawlucha’s Mega Evolution, the collaboration with CMLL in Mexico felt organic and authentic. When you consider how invested the wrestlers and even the audience were, that should come as no surprise.

Pokémon knows how to bring out the joy in anyone. And it did just that inside Arena Mexico last September.

09/23/2026

Some N64 games gave up their secrets in an afternoon. These didn’t.

We went looking for the unlocks that were almost too difficult to finish. The trading quests with real-world timers, the challenges that reset if you moved the wrong way, the requirements so absurd the developers buried them behind an arcade game inside of another game. Perfect Dark sits at a 3.1% mastery rate among the retro completionists still tracking it today, with Donkey Kong 64 not much kinder at 5.5%.

Eleven unlocks. Eleven ways the N64 quietly separated the players who played the game from the players who actually beat it. Which did you complete?

09/22/2026

The pages of Ultimate Spider-Man came to life in September of 2025.   In 2000, Marvel Comics introduced the Ultimate Marvel imprint. This new vertical aimed to bring the characters to the 21st century. The universe allowed for younger versions of our favorite characters to start fresh. The reboot modernized our favorite Marvel characters, and it kicked off with Ultimate Spider-Man #1.   Five years after this new era began, Treyarch turned the series into a video game. And in a true effort to maintain its identity, it was able to bring the unique art style of the comics to life. They did so by introducing the world of gaming to 3D inking.  3-D Inking allowed Treyarch to do what they aimed for: bring the hit comic books from Ultimate Spider-Man to life. The inking gave characters a sense of volume, making them dynamic. In essence, it mimicked the idea of inking in a comic book, as it created characters that felt alive.   Chris Busse revealed in an interview with GameSpot that Treyarch scanned every issue of Ultimate Spider-Man to ensure that the art in the game was as close as possible to the comics.   The result was a Spider-Man game that stood out from the rest. Not only because it offered a different take on the iconic web-slinger, but also because its art style followed the comics that birthed him so closely.   Twenty-one years after launching, the art style of Ultimate Spider-Man is still a joy to look at. Not only because it’s so different. But because it shows the time and care that went into ensuring the game truly honored the source material.   That is something you simply can’t say about every video game adaptation.   Credits: Always Nerdy, IGN, GameSpot, CBR

09/21/2026

No, these tees weren’t bootlegs; they were the sign of a strong partnership.

Fox Kids was a formative block of television for millennials growing up and learning about television. At the center of the programming block was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and X: The Animated Series.

Saban produced both; the programs became two of the biggest hits of the 1990s. They became icons of the time, as did their rare merchandizing. To promote the Fox Kids programming block, they made special graphic T-shirts that crossed over characters from both series. The tees were everything you’d want from a 90s graphic tee: they were heavyweight, they were bold, and they featured some of the coolest characters ever.

The graphics found themselves on children’s sweaters, too. That said, the adult T-shirts seem to be the more sought-after products from this special crossover. At one point, there was a crossover program planned between Power Rangers and X-Men. It unfortunately never came to fruition. The closest we got was the easter egg in S4E01 of X-Men: The Animated Series, where a set is crashed for a program that is obviously a tribute to the Power Rangers.

Two very influential franchises that were connected in more ways than many people realize. Seemingly, though, all we have to show for it are these sick vintage crossover tees.

Credits: Este, eBay, Poshmark, Depop

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