Console Cameo

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A console cameo is where the game system on which you're playing (or another by the same company) appears in some form in the game you're playing. Developers, when looking for inspiration for a fictional gadget, enjoy modeling amazing pieces of technology on the console that the player is using. This not only makes the interface really easy to design, but also makes the game just a bit more immersive in that respect. Less common is modeling an object off another console by the same company.

This has to appear in a video game for it to count; systems appearing in other media don't count unless it is based on a video game (Pokemon for example). PCs don't count unless the program is made exclusively for a single operating system and the game makes it clear which operating system (or a parody thereof) is being used. Finally, it doesn't count if the game system only appears in order to demonstrate controls or in something like the Wii's safety screens.

Examples of Console Cameo include:
  • Astro's Playroom: Highlights this trope, with PlayStation consoles and related accessories from the 1990s to 2020 being collectibles.
  • Mario Party's seventh installment has an orange gamecube in the Neon Heights shop.
  • The Nintendo DS game Retro Game Challenge has the player playing video games on the Famicom throughout the 1980s in Japan.
  • The DTS in Trace Memory.
    • Another Code R: A Journey into Lost Memories replaces the old DTS with a new model that resembles a DSi.
  • NPCs in Pokémon often hold the system the game is on and comment on trading with a friend or offer to trade you.
    • The player character has the home console in his/her room at the beginning of the game: In Red/Blue it was a SNES, in its remakes, it's an NES, and when visiting Red's house in Gold/Silver he has an N64. In Ruby and Sapphire, it's a Gamecube while in the DS games it's a Wii. In Gold, Silver, Crystal and Pokémon Stadium 2, it was possible to decorate your room and some of the items were all the Nintendo consoles released at the time, including a Virtual Boy!
    • Pokémon Scarlet and Violet takes it further. Naturally, the protagonist has a Nintendo Switch in his room at his home, but also, once you defeat Penny for the first time you can access her dorm room, where you can see she has a Game Boy, DS Lite, and Gamecube on the shelf. Seems she collects old consoles.
    • Amusingly, after the first battle in Black/White, the Wii in the room is the only thing to survive without a scratch...
    • The Pokédex used to be loosely based on the current Nintendo handheld, going from Game Boy (Pokémon Red and Blue) → Game Boy Color (Pokémon Gold and Silver) → Game Boy Advance (Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire; Fire Red and Leaf Green's looked like the GBA SP)→ Nintendo DS/DS Lite (Pokémon Diamond and Pearl) → Nintendo DSi. Pokémon Black and White broke the tradition; the Unova Pokédex looks more like an iPod than any recent Nintendo handheld. Later games tended to put the Pokédex as an in game phone app.
  • Metal Gear:
  • A battle stage in Mario Kart: Double Dash!! is a giant Game Cube. The DS version featured a giant original Nintendo DS.
  • In the first Crash Bandicoot game for the GBA, one of Crash's idle animations involves playing a GBA.
  • The COMPs in Devil Survivor look remarkably like the Nintendo DS. In this instance, every main character there has it. In the Updated Rerelease, they are 3DS'.
  • The Gamecube version of Tales of Symphonia has a GameCube in the Renegade's Base.
  • The Trophy Room in Super Smash Bros.. Melee has a number of Nintendo consoles in the background, including a Gamecube.
    • If you set the language to Japanese while playing the North American version, any consoles that looked different in Japan will have their Japanese appearance, such as the two-tone gray NES being the red and white Famicom. Also the Virtual boy only appears in the background if the language is set to Japanese.
    • You can also obtain a GCN trophy, whose description says "Rumor has it that Super Smash Bros.. Melee is a software title for this wondrous device."
  • This often happens in the Wario Ware series, since the plot of them is that Wario is a video game designer: Twisted features a specially adapted GBA; Touched has Wario get a DS; Smooth Moves has the Form Baton, which is a Wiimote.
  • A partial case occurs in The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, where the Stone of Agony, a device that lets you use the N64's Rumble Pak, is shaped like... the N64's Rumble Pak.
  • In one level of Army Men: RTS for the PlayStation 2 features a giant (in comparision to the units themselves, which are toy soldiers) PlayStation 2 that you can gain electric energy for buildings and units from.
  • In REmake, the MO disc readers look exactly like GameCubes.
  • The Game Boy Horror (a modified Game Boy Color) in Luigi's Mansion.
  • One of the E-series in Sonic Adventure had visible Sega Dreamcasts built in it.
  • Dee Ess Island in The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass is shaped just like it sounds like it should be.
  • The resort on Sirena Beach in Super Mario Sunshine is shaped like a GameCube controller.
  • Xbox 360s appear as collectibles throughout Condemned. There are achievements for finding them.
  • One level in Breakdown contains an Xbox.
  • Beautiful Katamari lets you roll up Xbox 360s and controllers.
  • In Cyber Troopers: Virtual On, all of the mecha have Sega Saturns attached to their backs. In Oratorio Tangram, they were upgraded to Dreamcasts.
  • Populous DS has a tileset that straddles both examples - settlements start out as a Game & Watch and become more advanced Nintendo consoles as their population increases, culminating in the Wii. The second-largest settlement is an original Nintendo DS.
    • The SNES port did the same thing.
  • In NES Adventure Island games, killing a coyote from behind rewards you with a NES controller granting points. The Game Boy ports replace these with Game Boys.
  • In Banjo-Kazooie, on the file select screen, Banjo will be playing a Game Boy if you select the third file.
    • In Banjo-Tooie, the multiplayer mode on the main menu is represented by an N64, with some game cartridges next to it. The N64 is still there in the Xbox Live Arcade version, but the games are replaced by copies of B-K: Nuts & Bolts.
    • In Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts Kazooie is seen playing both an Xbox 360 and Nintendo 64. Later, one of the levels is called LOGBOX 720, which is modelled after the interior of an Xbox 360.
  • In Midtown Madness 3 for the original Xbox, you can see pedestrians holding boxes with Xbox logos on them.
  • Alan Wake contains an Xbox 360. The room also contains a copy of Night Springs: The Video Game, based on the Show Within a Show.
  • NESes appear in Animal Crossing.
    • In Animal Crossing: Wild World, there is a furniture item (pink box?) that if you look hard enough, has a Gamecube on one of the shelves.
    • In Animal Crossing: New Horizons, there is an in game Nintendo Switch.
  • In Mega Man 7, one of the "junk" items that Rush can occasionally dig up is a Game Boy.
    • Also, several Famicom systems appear in the background at the beginning of Junkman's level in the same game.
  • In Metroid Fusion, the X-infested fans in the tropical zone are bordered by a mishmash of metallic-looking objects, including one that looks like a Game Cube.
  • In Super Paper Mario, Francis owns pretty much every Nintendo console out there, including the Virtual Boy. Also there are recipe systems that look like the Nintendo DS.
  • Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door has a palmtop device, "Mailbox SP", that looks exactly like the GBA SP.
  • Phantasy Star Portable has most of the Sega consoles as weapons: the Mark III, the Master System, the Genesis, the Saturn and the Dreamcast.
  • Donkey Kong Country 3 has a Nintendo 64 in Wrinkly Kong's cave. You can even hear the castle music from Super Mario 64 playing in the background.
    • In Donkey Kong Country Returns, one of DK's idle animations has him playing a DS, and if you listen carefully, you can hear sound effects from the original Donkey Kong.
  • In No More Heroes, Travis Touchdown has a Nintendo 64-esque console in his apartment.
  • In Shenmue, Ryo Hazuki has what appears to be a Sega Saturn console in his house; odd, considering that the game takes place in the mid-1980s.
  • Mac Pluses appear in Glider PRO. Glider 4.0 had similar small-screen Macs, and could actually be played on something like them.
  • The appropriately named MSX in La-Mulana qualifies, if you happen to be playing on a laptop.
  • In the Mega Man Battle Network and Mega Man Star Force games, the Wii, GameCube, Super Nintendo, and DS all make appearances. The GameBoy Advance also shows up in Battle Network 5.
  • In the game Elebits, Wiis and Wii remotes appear as objects scattered throughout the game.
  • In the subway multiplayer map for Perfect Dark Zero, there appears to be a suspiciously boxy video game console in a trash can. PD0 started off as a Game Cube game before Microsoft purchased Rare. Of course, considering how PD0 turned out, this may well be a Take That backfire.
  • F-Zero GX's Port Town circuit has a giant ROB.
  • Shadows of the Empire: The supercomputer which Dash Rendar is tasked to steal from the frigate ship Suprosa is modeled after an N64 with the Shadows cartridge plugged in.
  • Picross DS has a series of puzzles that make pictures of Nintendo systems. Years before that, Mario's Picross included a puzzle that made an original Game Boy.
  • Pulseman has a picture of a Mega Drive (Genesis in America) in the backround of the first stage.
  • In Super Mario RPG you can buy a Game Boy off of a mushroom kid, and it even opens up a shooter-style minigame.
  • Pikmin 2 is loaded with these, most notably an NES D-Pad and a Game & Watch.
  • In Snatcher, the computer used by Jean-Jack Gibson varies between versions. In the PC-88 and MSX2 versions, it is the same computer platform that the game is running on, whereas in the later console versions it is a PC-68 (a fictional model).
    • In SD Snatcher, Gibson's computer is specifically an MSX Turbo-R.
    • In the later versions of Snatcher, Metal Gear Mk. II is rebuilt at the end as the platform the game is running on (i.e. in the Sega CD version, Metal becomes a second model Genesis with a Sega CD attachment).
  • The Genesis version of Aladdin has tons of said systems in the background of the level taking place inside Genie's lamp. Justified, considering The Genie Knows Jack Nicholson.
  • Some of the weirder enemies you can fight in Star Ocean the Second Story are murderous PlayStation controllers that whip you with their cords.
  • Pushmo has a giant Nintendo 3DS puzzle.
  • One of bosses in Hyper Zone, an early SNES game by HAL Labs, is shaped like the face button layout on the SNES controller.
  • In Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time, Professor E. Gadd has what this troper presumes to be his portable computer shaped like a Nintendo DS.
  • Among the treasures Wario can gain in Wario World are an NES, Nintendo 64, Game Boy Advance, and Nintendo Gamecube.
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