The Dialup Log / Issue 7: Deep in Retroland

Hello Dialers, hope February treated you well with Valentine’s and a federal holiday. I have to say, this log is becoming more of an end of the month retrospective. And this month I’ve been really, uh…, lost in retroland.

This log is sponsored by me and my wife, so you are more than welcomed to snoop around the other issues here and visit my site at www.dialupinter.net

End of sponsor section.

You might have some inkling on the meaning of retroland. And I want to preface that it did start as a research phase. Absolutely honestly true, alright let’s begin this log.

It’s the seventh issue of The Dialup Log! And I just have a bunch of images on everything retro video game than the dot-com companies. Just saying that this might trigger any nostalgia for a retro shopping spree. I have warned you, beware!

For those who’ve just joined the newsletter, in The Dialup Log I mostly share the behind the desk workings, which are design ideas in the works and research I’ve come a crossed. However, this month I seem to have been lost in my own nostalgia.

Michael from The Dialup Internet

Let me share a little (in retrospect, it’s not little, it’s a lot) about my childhood. I think I’ve been in the gaming scene since I was 3 or 4 years old. I don’t remember much of my early years, but I do remember an instance of a memory when a co-worker of my father bought me a NES console. He took it out of the top shelf of some store, a black and wide box, and I was utterly surprised, perhaps shocked. I might remember this moment, probably because I did take a liking to it. Whatever happened, I have a vague memory of having shown interest cause the man who bought the NES console, asked a bunch of times if I wanted anything in the store.

My second memory of a game is the morning of December 25th, 1992. I remember because I had a nicely wrapped up gift set with a card from Santa, which I still cherish to this day. I received two gifts: a RC car, and a Mario Kart game for the SNES. I don’t quite remember if I received the SNES console on Christmas or before, but I do remember Mario Kart as a Christmas gift. Now that I think about it, racing cars seem to have been the theme for our family in 1992.

Oh yes, I’m not done. Half of this issue is going to be about my video game childhood. This is the final warning, buckle up for more gaming memories as I write.

Fast-forward to 96’-98’, the first memory during these years is the time I bought my own game with my own allowance. I don’t know how long I saved up, but it was at least a couple of months. I’ve been reading a lot of game magazines, mostly about Nintendo. And boy do they advertise. Just reading the walkthroughs is an advertisement, and they do this months before the actual release, teasing 90s kids left and right.

Like I said, I saved up for months maybe closer to a year of allowance money. And when I had thought I had saved enough, at the first chance in going to the mall I begged my mother to let me go with her. Then I took a detour asking mother to follow to a small kiosk at the far end of the mall. Only to realize I had half the amount needed to buy the game. Oh, the desperation. I was lingering; stuck to the display glass looking into game box art with yearning. In the end, I did get it. A few back and forth with mother and she cooly offered the other half of the payment. And I sure was the happiest boy that day. Amazing game by the way, and not to alarm you but a new, sealed box set of the 30 year old game is valued at $1500 these days.

The second memory from the era is Pocket Monsters. Known as Pokémon by everyone today. The first time I read about the Pocket Monsters mania in Japan, I was in wonder. The descriptions and the screenshots of the game was all I had and the imagination did the rest. Every new monthly issue I looked up if it had more information on the Pocket Monsters. Even calling it Pocket Monsters was enticing. Especially, if you owned a Gameboy Pocket.

The thing about my experience of Pokémon was that no one knew about it or cared when it first released. I had my hands on it the moment it came out and for the first few weeks playing the game I was having a blast. So, I naturally tried to share the experience, but no one had it nor did they care. Perhaps it was just a fun anime show that debuted during September of 1998 and no one connected it to a game. By the time I finished the game and wondering when the next one would come out, my friends then started to play. I felt bittersweet, I was happy that I was early to something popular, but also sad that I wasn’t going to experience it with many others for the first time. One thing for sure, Pokémon left a mark in me.

I’m getting conscious talking about my childhood games, but here’s the last one so I can jump into the so called research aspect. The Nintendo 64 (N64), I don’t have a specific moment for it, but I know when I played Super Mario 64 for the first time it was simply astounding. Not to mention how worried I was before even getting the console. I was honestly worried about how well 2D gameplay would translate into 3D. What a silly thought.

Here’s an obligatory mention when speaking of the N64; Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the N64 was also amazingly fantastic. I feared playing parts of it, but I’m proud of my own moment of finding courage to go through the game until the ending.

And then we have the Blockbuster game renting. We probably went every week. For me, one of the rented games that left a mark was Quest 64. I didn’t have a memory card to save in that game so I just replayed the same first few villages over and over again.

So, about that research.

I talked about big boxes last issue. How I want to have a package like the old software big boxes. I also meant console game boxes too. It’s just that these are much smaller and a hat is bigger in comparison. My attachment to software boxes have been lingering in my mind for years. I just love that experience both visually and experientially. All of them are so well made.

Coming back to the research, when I received my Analogue 3D as a Christmas gift, I thought back to recollecting a few games. Then I started looking at Ebay for a few and apart from diving deep into my own nostalgia, I noticed the difference in price between a loose game and a CIB (complete in box). I wanted to get my hands on a few, but the price is downright impossible. Sure, I could get a cheap one, but what’s the point in getting one I had no memories with? I then turned to software big boxes, but even those the shipping was hefty cause of the size. Though I managed to snag one at a cheap enough price. Behold the Riven big box.

Sturdy cardboard box, and the many inserts. I have to say once I received it I wasn’t too sure what to do with it. I feel it isn’t too different from looking at the boxes on the internet. I mean, you do get a closer look at the inserts and how the box is made, which is fine as a secondary detail. I felt perhaps having a physical box would help me get a better understanding, but maybe Riven wasn’t the best of choices.

Nintendo 64 boxes

I wasn’t really into researching dot-com companies with the Analogue 64 poking at my own nostalgia incessantly. Plus, the marketplace platforms don’t help either with their addicting designs. And I suddenly found myself buying protector cases for my N64 cartridges.

These plastic cases reminded me of cassette tape cases. You know, I mean I hope you know what I’m talking about. Like the Spice Girls’ Spiceworld cassette, everyone knows this right? Listening to Stop over and over again, and secretly liking the B side track Viva Forever singing ‘hasta mañana’? Yes?

Was that a confession? I mean, a real confession would be that I loved watching Spice Girls’ Spice Up Your Life music video because it was so cool.

Enough of my past life; with the retro cartridges, cartridge protector and the idea of a miniature game box, I started to draft a prototype. Finding the right files, printing, and cutting. It took time to get the right proportions, but I got a good result.

The images don’t do it justice. It looks great. A miniature box for my own nostalgic games. Along the way, I learned about creating a more authentic box: double layering it with card stock paper and adhering a glossy lamination for a shine most software boxes had. And I’m happy I followed through with this, I just needed a small step forward. This has prepped me for whatever comes next, always thought the packaging would be a daunting task. My research sidetracked a lot, but it really wasn’t about doing more research. I just needed to get down with it and craft a few cheap prototypes.

I’ll have to say this was more like a journal of my interest this month. While I seem to have expanded the meaning of nostalgic archiving, I’ve learned much from the retro video game scene. It’s just full of archives and communities. And it’s not only about collecting memorabilia, but remembering, cherishing and passing on those great moments to future generations. I found this part to be truly interesting. It moves past a self-agenda of collecting items for ones own sake into a territory that’s more collective and communal. Of course there is a scalper culture in the retro scene, where pricing gets hyped.

Nevertheless, as I step into a more archivist role, it seemingly feels more important to share my discoveries and creation. Frankly, this has been the most challenging part, as I spend hours working on recreations of dot-com companies’ graphic assets from research to creation and even the QA. Yet, I’m positive I’ll figure something out.

As always thanks for reading my secret journal! I’ll be closing and locking my journal now! If you ever have questions or suggestions or photos of hats or early internet company gear send me an email at

The more I write, the less I depend on AI. I mean we’re at a stage where sounding off, and having grammatical as well as structural errors is more enjoyable as a written content. And this is great as I enjoy writing things on the fly.

And finally, if you would like to support The Dialup Internet, it helps me and this small business immensely if you can write a review, share a photo of the hats, and/or share with people about The Dialup Internet, so that it can keep doing the things it does: finding more archival internet and turn them into archival apparel.

For those who were keen in watching the shop website, I do have one update on the images. The Winamp Lightning hat now has one actual photo of the product.

And don’t forget, we have one more month left until Q2, where prices will definitely raise by much. Bye-bye for now.