Bionic Marketing

This week’s entry in the Summer of Xbox Live Arcade promotion was the long-awaited revamp of the classic NES game Bionic Commando. Bionic Commando Rearmed takes the original game and jazzes it up with updated graphics and music and adds new features like a couple new moves, challenge rooms and two-player co-op. Unlike the previous games in the Summer of XBLA promotion, I bought Bionic Commando: Rearmed and didn’t receive a free download code, because I was a huge fan of the original game. Nostalgia alone is rarely enough for me to drive a purchase, but in the case of Bionic Commando Rearmed there was another compelling reason for me to check out the game: It is a perfect example of the phenomenon of selling marketing material to the audience in the guise of a stand-alone product. Bionic Commando Rearmed is, at its core, an advertisement.